Showing results by publisher "Hodder & Stoughton" in Contemporary Fiction

"Hundreds of years in the future, after the Something that Happened, the world is an alarmingly different place. Life is lived according to The Rulebook and social hierarchy is determined by your perception of colour.Eddie Russett is an above average Red who dreams of moving up the ladder by marriage to Constance Oxblood. Until he is sent to the Outer Fringes where he meets Jane - a lowly Grey with an uncontrollable temper and a desire to see him killed.

Carrie White is no ordinary girl. Carrie White has the gift of telekinesis. To be invited to Prom Night by Tommy Ross is a dream come true for Carrie – the first step towards social acceptance by high school colleagues. But events will take a decidedly macabre turn on that horrifying and endless night as she is forced to exercise her terrible gift on the town that mocks and loathes her...

Misery Chastain was dead. Paul Sheldon had just killed her - with relief, with joy. Misery had made him rich; she was the heroine of a string of best sellers. And now he wanted to get on to some real writing. That's when the car accident happened, and he woke up in pain in a strange bed. But it wasn't the hospital. Annie Wilkes had pulled him from the wreck, brought him to her remote mountain home, splinted and set his mangled legs. The good news was that Annie was a nurse and had painkilling drugs. The bad news was that she was Paul's Number One Fan.

Summer has arrived in Barton-in-the-Dale and as a new term begins at the little primary school, it's not just the warm weather that's getting people hot under the collar. Meetings with the teachers from Urebank School to discuss the merger are producing more than a few fireworks, a disruptive new pupil arrives, set to cause trouble, and a surprising staff love affair is exposed.

The BookWorld's leading enforcement officer Thursday Next is four months into an enforced semi-retirement following an assassination attempt. She returns home to Swindon for what you'd expect to be a time of recuperation. If only life were that simple.

Flora and Rose are identical twins who do not know of each other's existence. Rose has been raised by her frivolous mother with the glossy international jet set. Flora has spent her childhood in the beauty and quiet of her father's Cornish cottage. And then, by chance, they meet. The encounter seems heaven-sent to Rose, who longs to escape from a man she no longer desires. Flora can free her, and, in taking her sister's place, her uneventful life is changed forever.

Caroline Cliburn was to be married next Tuesday, and yet she suspected that gratitude was the wrong reason to become a bride. Perhaps that was why she and her younger brother Jody had taken the long drive north to Scotland in search of her missing brother Angus.... When a sudden spring blizzard leaves them stranded by the roadside, it is the snow that gives both her and a lonely young Scot one last chance to find the healing warmth of love.

The second book in the delightful Barton-In-The-Dale series which began with The Little Village School. Elisabeth Devine certainly rocked the boat when she arrived in Barton-in-the-Dale to take over as head teacher of the little primary school. Now it's a new term, and after winning over the wary locals, she can finally settle in to her role. Or so she thinks... For the school is hit by a brand-new bombshell: it's to be merged with its arch rival, and Elisabeth has to fight for the headship with Urebank's ruthless and calculating headmaster. She has her work cut out for her.

A tale of an unexpected friendship, an unlikely hero, and an improbable journey, Alex's story treads the fine line between light and dark, laughter and tears. And it might just strike you as one of the funniest, most heartbreaking novels you've ever heard. Alex Woods knows that he hasn't had the most conventional start in life. He knows that growing up with a clairvoyant single mother won't endear him to the local bullies. He also knows that even the most improbable events can happen - he's got the scars to prove it. What he doesn't know yet is that when he meets ill-tempered, reclusive widower Mr Peterson, he'll make an unlikely friend.

The rich are different. But fate is blind. A private jet plunges into the sea. The only survivors are down-on his luck artist Scott Burroughs and JJ Bateman, the four-year-old son of a super-rich TV executive. For saving the boy, Scott is suddenly a hero. And then, as the official investigation is rapidly overtaken by a media frenzy, it seems he may also be a villain. Why was he on the plane in the first place, and why did it crash?

What happens when love, marriage and children don't come in the expected order? Fifteen years after the tragic death of their older brother splintered Josie and Meredith's already fragile relationship, the two sisters are following very different paths. Hardworking, reserved Meredith thought she'd done it all the right way round - married the perfect man, had the perfect daughter - but now she's wondering if she got the love part wrong. Impulsive and spirited Josie has been single for years.

You aren't stupid. You know there's no such thing as a perfect mother. Plenty of other books will tell you there is, but this one won't lie to you. I was weak and I cheated and I was punished, but, my god, I loved my child through all of it. Love means you never break, and it means you're stronger than the things they do to you. I know this is true because I have been through fire, and I am the proof that love survives. I am not a perfect mother but I will tell you the perfect truth, because this is you and me talking. This is my story.

The main lesson Luce had learned was that you couldn’t count on anybody. In the lonesome beauty of the forest, across the far shore of the mountain lake from town, Luce acts as caretaker to an empty, decaying Lodge, a relic of holidaymakers a century before. Her days are long and peaceful, her nights filled with Nashville radio and yellow lights shimmering on the black water. A solitary life, and the perfect escape.

As war rages across Europe, one young woman faces an impossible choice. Will she save her country...or the man she loves? It is the late 1930s. In London, socialite Rosamund Hanbury is determined to give up the parties and social sets of which she is a prominent member to join the war effort, along with scores of other young women.

At the age of twelve, under the Wind Moon, Will is given a horse, a key, and a map, and sent alone into the Indian Nation to run a trading post as a bound boy. It is during this time that he grows into a man, learning, as he does, of the raw power it takes to create a life, to find a home. In a card game with a white Indian named Featherstone, Will wins - for a brief moment - a mysterious girl named Claire, and his passion and desire for her spans this novel.

Usually, this is where we'd tell you what this book is about. But with Chris Cleave, it's a bit different. Because if you've read The Other Hand or Incendiary, you'll know that what his books are about is only part of the story - what really matters is how they make you feel. Gold is about the limits of human endurance, both physical and emotional. It will make you cry. Gold is about what drives us to succeed - and what we choose to sacrifice for success. It will make you feel glad to be alive.

In the quaint seaside town of Newbay, a beginner's cookery course is starting. And three very different students have signed up.... Liz, determined to find love, has heard the old adage that the way to a man's heart is through his stomach. John is newly widowed after 57 years of marriage, facing a lifetime of cheese on toast. Twenty-two-year-old DeeDee has been drifting from one dead-end job to another. The only thing they have in common: between them, they can barely boil an egg!

It seems a long time ago that Fitz and Gabby were together, with his work on extinct species about to make him world-famous. Now, it's his career that is almost extinct. Suddenly, though, the beautiful Gabby reappears in his life. She wants his help in tracing the history of The Mysterious Bird of Ulieta, a creature once owned by the great 18th-century naturalist Joseph Banks. It soon becomes clear that Fitz is getting involved in something more complicated - and dangerous - than the search for a stuffed bird.

The addictive and emotive new novel from Katie Marsh, author of My Everything and A Life Without You. Perfect for fans of Jojo Moyes, Lisa Jewell and Lucy Dillon. 'I lived over half my life before I met you both, and I hope with all my heart to live many years more. You two are the reason why. Always, always the reason why.' Abi Cooper is living her happy ending. She's in remission and is ready to make the most of her second chance. But during Abi's illness, her family has fallen apart.

When a surrogate mother pretends the pregnancy has miscarried and bears a daughter, to whom does the child belong? To her runaway birth mother or her deceived father and his wife? Scout, born as a result of a surrogacy arrangement, is kept by her biological mother, Joanie, who has deliberately deceived both the clinic and Scout's intended parents by claiming to have had a miscarriage. When this deception comes to light 10 years later, a compelling moral dilemma unfolds.