Showing results by publisher "Quercus" in Literary Fiction

Canada, 1867. A young murder suspect flees across the snowy wilderness. Tracking him is what passes for the law in this frontier land: trappers, sheriffs, traders and the suspect's own mother, desperate to clear his name. As the party pushes further from civilisation, hidden purposes and old obsessions are revealed. One is seeking long-lost daughters, another a fortune in stolen furs; yet another is chasing rumours of a lost Native American culture.

Follow the path to the freezing north. Follow your ambition. Follow your heart. Flora Mackie first crossed the Arctic Circle at the age of 12. Years later, in 1892, determination and chance lead her back to northern Greenland as a scientist at the head of a British expedition, defying the expectations of those who believe a woman has no place in that harsh world. Geologist Jakob de Beyn was raised in Manhattan. Yearning for wider horizons, he joins a rival expedition.

It is 1628, Charles 1 is on the throne, and the British Crown is finally taking control of Ulster. Returning to his rooms one night, Alexander Seaton is shocked to find a stranger standing there - a man who could be his double. His name is Sean O'Neill, and he carries a plea for help from Maeve O'Neill, forbidding matriarch of Alexander's mother's family in Ireland. All those who bear their blood have been placed under a poet's curse: one by one they are going to die.

A decomposed body washes up on a beach near Glasgow. The victim, Tracy Eadie. Junkie. Prostitute. Fourteen years old. Rosie Gilmour, tabloid journalist and crusader for justice, receives evidence linking police officials with Tracy's disappearance. Digging deeper, Rosie uncovers a sickening network of corruption and abuse, leading back to the very top of the establishment. And to powerful figures who want their secrets kept hidden. Rosie has found the story of a lifetime.

Marnie FitzPatrick is a reclusive sixth former from Hertfordshire with a dysfunctional family, a penchant for Pythagoras' theorem and an addiction to doughnuts and gin. Julie Crewe is a disillusioned maths teacher who lives vicariously through the girls she teaches, yet who once danced barefoot through Central Park with a man called Jo she has never been able to forget.

Thelma is the busy single mum of 12-year-old Louis. When he is hit by a lorry one morning, their lives are changed for ever. Louis falls into a coma, and if he doesn't regain consciousness in the next four weeks, he may never wake up again. At home in Louis' bedroom, a devastated Thelma finds a list of all the things he wants to accomplish in his life and suddenly sees a way to survive: she will fulfil her son's dreams, in the hope that it will bring him back.

You can control want, but desire controls you. When literary writer Anna falls on hard times, she tries her hand at erotic fiction to make money, and faces an uncomfortable truth. Though she's a wife and mother of two, her stories fail to fly because she's never experienced true sexual desire. Even her Sicilian grandmother - wearer of diamante sunglasses and knock-off Louis Vuitton - knows more than she does about real passion. Anna turns to her friends for inspiration. As secrets and desires are revealed, she discovers more about the people close to her than she ever knew.