Love is hottest in the darkness before dawn. Elissande Edgerton is a desperate woman, a virtual prisoner in the home of her tyrannical uncle. Only through marriage can she claim the freedom she craves. But how to catch the perfect man? Lord Vere is used to baiting irresistible traps. As a secret agent for the government, he’s tracked down some of the most devious criminals in London, all the while maintaining his cover as one of Society’s most harmless—and idiotic—bachelors. But nothing can prepare him for the scandal of being ensnared by Elissande. Forced into a marriage of convenience, Elissande and Vere are each about to discover that they’re not the only one with a hidden agenda. With seduction their only weapon—and a dark secret from the past endangering both their lives—can they learn to trust each other even as they surrender to a passion that won’t be denied?

NYRB Classics presents 3 darkly humorous, atmospheric novellas of love and disappointment, set in a run-down London pub after WWI—from the author of the Hitchcock classics Gaslight and Rope. “Bleak and brilliant. . . an authentic lost classic.” —The Guardian Featuring a Dickensian cast of pubcrawlers, prostitutes, lowlifes, and just plain losers who are looking for love—or just an ear to bend—Hamilton’s novels are a triumph of deft characterization, offbeat humor, unlikely compassion, and raw suspense. In recent years, Hamilton has undergone a remarkable revival, with his champions including Doris Lessing, David Lodge, Nick Hornby, and Sarah Waters. Twenty Thousand Streets Under the Sky is a tale of obsession and betrayal that centers on a seedy pub in a run-down part of London. Bob the waiter skimps and saves and fantasizes about writing a novel, until he falls for the pretty prostitute Jenny and blows it all. Kindly Ella, Bob’s co-worker, adores Bob, but is condemned to enjoy nothing more than the attentions of the insufferable Mr. Eccles; Jenny, out on the street, is out of love, hope, and money. We watch with pity and horror as these three vulnerable and yet compellingly ordinary people meet and play out bitter comedies of longing and frustration. Included: The Midnight Bell (1929) The Siege of Pleasure (1932) The Plains of Cement (1934)

Love has designs of its own.… To all of London society, Lord and Lady Tremaine had the ideal arrangement: a marriage based on civility, courteousness, and freedom—by all accounts, a perfect marriage. The reason? For the last ten years, husband and wife have resided on separate continents. But once upon a time, things were quite different for the Tremaines….When Gigi Rowland first laid eyes on Camden Saybrook, the attraction was immediate and overwhelming. But what began in a spark of passion ended in betrayal the morning after their wedding—and now Gigi wants to be free to marry again. When Camden returns from America with an outrageous demand in exchange for her freedom, Gigi’s decision will have consequences she never imagined, as secrets are exposed, desire is rekindled—and one of London’s most admired couples must either fall in love all over again…or let each other go forever.

This is a trilogy about three young men finding the fulfillment of their youthful ambitions, from the late 1980s onwards, in rock music and journalism, up to the present day and middle age. As middle age comes on, each must accept a wider responsibility for their past sins. Having either emigrated to or been born in London, all of them become caught up in tantalising opportunities in the capital to fulfill their ambitions of success and fame. Each of them also finds that success comes with an immense price for them personally, and private failures that unmercifully torment them. Their hopeful idealism and dreams become tainted by ruthlessness, opportunism and betrayal of their principles. As each character grows older, he realises he wants to redeem himself and somehow resolve the worst things he has perpetrated in his life – but true redemption requires genuine sacrifice; one even more intense and difficult than their hard-won successes of the past. It may be more than any of them can endure. All of this happens against the background of London’s fantastic, fabulous variety and wealth and exoticism, opportunity and glamour, corruption and poverty and loneliness and harshness. Its pitfalls, rewards and insatiable demands as a fast-moving cultural and media capital are a significant part of the novel’s tone, with an intensified sense of time and place. Edward St. Boniface takes inspiration from a wide range of authors, including Ray Bradbury, Mark Z. Danielewski and David Foster Wallace. The London Trilogy is a work of adult contemporary fiction that will appeal to fans of highbrow and literary novels, bildungsromans and satire.

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • A blackly comic late 20th-century murder mystery set against the looming end of the millennium, in which a woman tries to orchestrate her own extinction—from "one of the most gifted novelists of his generation" (TIME). “Lyrical and obscene, colloquial and rhapsodic." —The New York Times First published in 1989, London Fields is set ten years into a dark future, against a backdrop of environmental and social decay and the looming threat of global cataclysm. As the dreaded Y2K approaches, Nicola Six, a “black hole” of sex and self-loathing, has chosen her thirty-fifth birthday, November 5, 1999, as the date of her own murder. Whom to manipulate into killing her is the question; her choice wavers between violent lowlife Keith Talent, who is obsessed with winning a darts tournament, and a dimly romantic banker named Guy Clinch. When Samson Young—a writer suffering from a long bout of writer’s block—stumbles upon these three, he believes he has found a story that will write itself. A highly unusual mystery with an unexpected twist at the end, London Fields is also a corrosively funny narrative of pyrotechnic complexity and scalding moral vision.

London, 1958. In the smoky jazz clubs of Soho and the coffee bars of Notting Hill the young and the restless - the absolute beginners - are forging a new carefree lifestyle of sex, drugs and rock'n'roll. Moving in the midst of this world of mods and rockers, Teddy gangs and trads., and snapping every scene with his trusty Rolleiflex, is MacInnes' young photographer, whose unique wit and honest views remain the definitive account of London life in the 1950s and what it means to be a teenager. In this twentieth century cult classic, MacInnes captures the spirit of a generation and creates the style bible for anyone interested in Mod culture, and the changing face of London in the era of the first race riots and the lead up to the swinging Sixties...

London, 1957. Victoria Station is awash with boat trains discharging hopeful black immigrants into a cold and alien motherland. Liberal England is about to discover the legacy of Empire. And when Montgomery Pew, assistant welfare officer in the Colonial Department, meets Johnny Fortune, recently arrived from Lagos, the meeting of minds and races takes a surprising turn... Colin MacInnes gives London back to the people who create its exciting sub-culture. Hilarious, anti-conventional, blisteringly honest and fully committed to younth and vitality, City of Spades is a unique and inspiring tribute to a country on the brink of change.

"It's a fun, frothy quintessentially British romcom about a certified chaos demon and a stern brunch daddy with a heart of gold faking a relationship."—New York Times bestselling author Talia Hibbert AMAZON BEST BOOK OF THE MONTH Named a best book of the year by Oprah Magazine, Entertainment Weekly, Goodreads, The Washington Post, and more! WANTED: One (fake) boyfriend Practically perfect in every way Luc O'Donnell is tangentially—and reluctantly—famous. His rock star parents split when he was young, and the father he's never met spent the next twenty years cruising in and out of rehab. Now that his dad's making a comeback, Luc's back in the public eye, and one compromising photo is enough to ruin everything. To clean up his image, Luc has to find a nice, normal relationship...and Oliver Blackwood is as nice and normal as they come. He's a barrister, an ethical vegetarian, and he's never inspired a moment of scandal in his life. In other words: perfect boyfriend material. Unfortunately, apart from being gay, single, and really, really in need of a date for a big event, Luc and Oliver have nothing in common. So they strike a deal to be publicity-friendly (fake) boyfriends until the dust has settled. Then they can go their separate ways and pretend it never happened. But the thing about fake-dating is that it can feel a lot like real-dating. And that's when you get used to someone. Start falling for them. Don't ever want to let them go. Discover the LGBT romance about exact opposites falling in perfectly imperfect love that New York Times and USA Today bestselling author CHRISTINA LAUREN calls "hilarious, witty, tender, and stunning."

The first book in the No. 1 Times bestselling series ‘This is terrific stuff’ Daily Telegraph ‘A breathtakingly ambitious picture of an era’ Financial Times ‘A masterclass in how to weave a well-researched history into a complex plot’ The Times

All three books in the spellbinding YA trilogy hailed as “a smashing blend of adventure, fantasy, humor, romance, and historical fiction” (Booklist). For cousins Emma, Gretchen, and Penelope, the stuffiness of 1814 London society is simply unbearable. But their fates change when a sacred glass family keepsake is accidentally shattered—and all three young women find themselves gifted with powers of witchcraft. For in the coming days, they will most certainly need them . . . The Secret Witch: London is slowly sinking into darkness as the evil beings of the magical world start to roam free, including a nefarious coven whose powerful members gain their strength from killing young witches. Emma keeps finding the bodies of their victims, leading some to suspect her of the killings. But the coven sees her as something much more—their next target. The Whisper Witch: As a Whisperer, Gretchen constantly hears the murmurs of other witches’ spells. And while this does help her to know when one of her own spells is going wrong, the assault on her magical senses makes it difficult to use her own gifts. But when something evil begins menacing London, only Gretchen and her cousins can stop a terrible sacrifice from unleashing an unspeakable darkness. The Bone Witch: Cousin Penelope has been kidnapped and forced to use her talents for reading objects to locate the bones of long-dead evil witches. Her captor plans to use the bones to reanimate their dark spirits in living bodies and unleash them on an unsuspecting world. And the only hope to stop such a nightmare rests with Gretchen, Emma, and every witch in London as they struggle to reach Penelope in time. Full of action, romance, and humor, these three witchy, wonderful young adult adventures are sure to “appeal to those who were fans of Libba Bray’s Gemma Doyle series and the Twilight Saga by Stephenie Meyer” (VOYA).