Showing titles in Coming of Age

Haunted by the little girl he couldn’t save from imminent danger, Holder’s life has been overshadowed by feelings of guilt and remorse. He has never stopped searching for her, believing that finding her would bring him the peace he needs to move on. However, Holder could not have anticipated that he would be faced with even greater pain the moment they reconnected. In Losing Hope, Holder reveals the way in which the events of Sky’s youth affected him and his family, leading him to seek his own redemption in the act of saving her.

Audrey Sweetman wakes up one morning next to her husband, excited for the promotion she's been working towards for years. But by nightfall, everything in her life has been upended. She escapes to the seaside village of Whitehaven Bay, but her plan to hide is derailed by her meddlesome new neighbours. The Coffin Cheaters bikie gang. A cranky pensioner with a habit of naked swimming. Shez, the dubious 'CEO' of the holiday flats. A mouthy teen who's nothing but trouble. And a handsome yet elusive retiree, Dr Flood.

For 15-year-old Michael Berg, a chance meeting with an older woman leads to far more than he ever imagined. The woman in question is Hanna, and before long they embark on a passionate, clandestine love affair which leaves Michael both euphoric and confused. For Hanna is not all she seems. Years later, as a law student observing a trial in Germany, Michael is shocked to realise that the person in the dock is Hanna. The woman he had loved is a criminal.

This quintessential coming-of-age novel describes the early life of Stephen Dedalus. It is set in Ireland during the 19th century, which was a time of emerging Irish nationalism and conservative Catholicism. Highly autobiographical in nature, the work is also notable for its being the first one in which Joyce uses innovative “stream of consciousness” writing style. A Portrait... follows Stephen Dedalus from his babyhood into early adulthood.

Crystal learned long ago that love brings only pain. Feeling nothing at all is far better than being hurt again. She guards her wounded heart behind a hard exterior and carries within her a deep mistrust of men, who, in her experience, have only ever used and taken. Then Gabriel Dalton walks into her life. Despite the terrible darkness of his past, there's an undeniable goodness in him. And even though she knows the cost, Crystal finds herself drawn to Gabriel.

Sorrow and Bliss meets Normal People in this utterly compelling, darkly humorous millennial coming-of-age novel about a 27-year-old single Jewish woman in Melbourne who must learn to reconcile family expectations, cultural constraints and inter-generational trauma with her own desires. A coruscating new voice.

Clayton Stumper is an enigma. He might be twenty-five years old, but he dresses like your grandad and drinks sherry like your aunt. Abandoned at birth on the steps of the Fellowship of Puzzlemakers, he was raised by the sharpest minds in the British Isles and finds himself amongst the last survivors of a fading institution. When the esteemed crossword compiler, Pippa Allsbrook, passes away, she bestows her final puzzle to him: a promise to reveal the mystery of his parentage and prepare him for his future.

Giacomo Brolo, aka Jack, is a mess. He works piecemeal construction gigs in remote WA, drinks himself to oblivion and is estranged from his family and friends. He's consumed by a self-loathing all too common for closeted men who have grown up in a world of hate and shame. But then Jack returns to his regional hometown of Geraldton for a family wedding. He hasn't been back since he fled at the age of eighteen, and his past soon catches up with him.

Hidden in the heart of the old city of Barcelona is the 'cemetery of lost books', a labyrinthine library of obscure and forgotten titles that have long gone out of print. To this library, a man brings his 10-year-old son, Daniel, one cold morning in 1945. Daniel is allowed to choose one book from the shelves and pulls out La Sombra del Viento by Julian Carax. But as he grows up, several people seem inordinately interested in his find.

In her most ambitious novel to date, New York Times best-selling author Joyce Maynard returns to the themes that are the hallmarks of her most acclaimed work in a mesmerizing story of a family - from the hopeful early days of young marriage to parenthood, divorce, and the costly aftermath that ripples through all their lives

Flo is sick of Tokyo. She is stuck in a rut, her translation work has dried up, and she's in a relationship that's run its course. That's until she stumbles upon a mysterious book left by a drunken passenger on the Tokyo Subway.

Tormented at school, ten-year-old Jane wants a best friend more than anything. Her wish is answered when Acacia moves in next door and a carefree summer break beckons. Yet as their friendship blossoms and secrets are shared, Acacia remains stubbornly guarded about her home life, especially when it comes to her mother’s new boyfriend, Daryl, a Harley-riding ladies’ man. At a neighborhood party, Jane stumbles onto a disturbing scene involving Daryl and is coerced into silence.

Sean's brother Anthony is a hard man. When they were kids their ma did her best to keep him out of trouble but you can't say anything to Anto. Sean was supposed to be different. He was supposed to leave and never come back. But Sean does come back. Arriving home after university, he finds Anthony's drinking is worse than ever. Meanwhile the jobs in Belfast have vanished, Sean's degree isn't worth the paper it's written on and no one will give him the time of day. One night he loses control and assaults a stranger at a party, and everything is tipped into chaos.

When Elizabeth Bennet first knew Mr. Darcy, she despised him and was sure he felt the same. Angered by his pride and reserve, influenced by the lies of the charming Mr. Wickham, she never troubled herself to believe he was anything other than the worst of men - until, one day, he unexpectedly proposed. Mr. Darcy's passionate avowal of love causes Elizabeth to reevaluate everything she thought she knew about him.

When young orphan, Oliver Twist, is sold into an apprenticeship with an undertaker, he leaves behind years of miserable servitude and mistreatment at an English workhouse. Hoping to move on to better things, he decides to escape his new, equally dreary surroundings and head to London. It is there that the novel unravels as Oliver meets a host of larger-than-life characters, including The Artful Dodger, a high-ranking member of a juvenile pickpocketing gang, and their elderly leader, Fagin.

Set in a terrifyingly brutal Rome-like world, An Ember in the Ashes is an epic fantasy debut about an orphan fighting for her family and a soldier fighting for his freedom. It's a story that's literally burning to be told. What if you were the spark that could ignite a revolution? For years Laia has lived in fear. Fear of the Empire, fear of the Martials, fear of truly living at all. Born as a Scholar, she's never had much of a choice.

Inspired by Nigeria's folktales and war, Under the Udala Trees is a deeply searching, powerful debut about the dangers of living and loving openly. Ijeoma comes of age as her nation does; born before independence, she is 11 when civil war breaks out in the young republic of Nigeria. Sent away to safety, she meets another displaced child, and the star-crossed pair fall in love. They are from different ethnic communities. They are also both girls.

One by one, the members of Stage Dive are falling in love. David, Mal, and Jimmy have all taken the plunge, and now it's Ben's turn-only he refuses to fall into that trap. The sexy bassist enjoys his no-strings-attached lifestyle. But when Ben is forced to keep the one girl he's always had a weakness for out of trouble in Sin City, he quickly learns that what happens in Vegas, doesn't always stay there.

Germany, 1943. The choices she makes will change her life forever. Growing up in Hitler's Germany, Charlotte von Klein has big dreams for the future. Her mind is full of plans for a sumptuous wedding to her childhood sweetheart, Heinrich, while working for the Luftwaffe, proudly giving her all for the Fatherland. But in 1943, the tide of the war is turning against Germany, and Lotte's life of privilege and comfort begins to collapse around her.

During the long, hot summer of 1900, young Leo Colston is invited to stay for a month at a lordly, aristocratic manor in Norfolk. There he falls in love with his friend's older sister, who commissions him to ferry secret messages to the local farmer, her lover. His naiveté sustains their affair until ultimately leading to an event that will change their lives irrevocably.