The Mulberry Empire

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Robert Edric

"Late summer 1946: a demobilized British officer oversees the demolishing of a defunct lighthouse in the Wash, a marshy area on England's west coast. Mercer, unhappy with his work crew and lonely staying in the remains of an old building on the site, attempts to get to know some of the local residents. Mercer complicates his relationship with them by cultivating friendships with a German POW, who wants to remain in England after the war, and a Dutch Jew, who is haunted by memories of the sister he couldn't save in the concentration camps. Tensions caused by the implications of Mercer's project and by the presence of foreigners in this isolated English area ultimately erupt in cruelty and violence.

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William Trevor

"Captain Gault had seen off the three intruders easily enough. They had come in the night with the intention of firing the house, but a single shot had sent them scuttling back into the darkness. One, though, had been wounded and for that the Gaults were not forgiven: sooner or later there would be trouble again. Other big-house families had been driven out - the Morells from Clashmore, the Gouvernets, the Priors, the Swifts. It was time to go too.". "But Lucy, soon to be nine, the only child of the household, could not bear the thought of leaving Lahardane. Her world was the old house itself, the woods of the glen, the farm animals, the walk along the seashore to school. All of that she loved and as the day of departure grew closer she determined that this exile should not take place. But chance changed everything, bringing about a calamity so terrible that it might have been a punishment, so vicious that it blighted the lives of all the Gaults for many years to come.". "William Trevor's new novel begins in rural Cork in 1921, in a country still in turmoil. The old order has fragmented, a way of life is already over. Trevor brilliantly conveys the disquiet and confusion that colour the story of Lucy Gault as it's told while it happens, in towns and countryside, and told again when passing has made it different."--BOOK JACKET.

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Lydia Davis

"In Varieties of Disturbance, her fourth collection, Davis extends her reach as never before in stories that take every form from sociological studies to concise poems. Her subjects include the five senses, fourth-graders, good taste, and tropical storms. She offers a reinterpretation of insomnia and re-creates the ordeals of Kafka in the kitchen. She questions the lengths to which one should go to save the life of a caterpillar, proposes a clear account of the sexual act, rides the bus, probes the limits of marital fidelity, and unlocks the secret to a long and happy life"--Publisher website (November 2007).

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Salman Rushdie

Midnight's Children (2/2) is a celebrated work by Salman Rushdie (Booker of Bookers Winner), recognized for masterclass storytelling and lasting literary resonance.