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recommendations 2011 title alone in berlin by hans fallada details its berlin 1940 and the city is filled with fear at the house on 55 jablonski strasse its various occupants try to live under nazi rule in their different ways the bullying hitler loyalists the persickes the retired judge fromm and the unassuming couple otto and anna quangel then the quangels receive the news that their beloved son has been killed fighting in france shocked out of their quiet existence they begin a silent campaign of defiance and a deadly game of cat and mouse develops between the quangels and the ambitious gestapo inspector escherich when petty criminals kluge and borkhausen also become involved deception betrayal and murder ensue tightening the noose around the quangels necks room by emma donoghue jack is five he lives with his ma they live in a single locked room they don t have the key jack and ma are prisoners this book will break your heart it is the most vivid radiant and beautiful expression of maternal love i have ever read irish times it presents an utterly unique way to talk about love all the while giving us a fresh expansive eye on the world in which we live new york times book review a reliable wife by robert goolrick country businessman seeks reliable wife compelled by practical reasons reply by letter rural wisconsin 1907 in the bitter cold ralph truitt a successful industrialist stands alone on a train platform waiting for the woman who answered his newspaper advertisement but when catherine steps of the train she s not the woman that that ralph is expecting she is both complex and devious and haunted by a terrible past she is motivated by greed catherine s plan is simple she will win ralph s devotion later she will leave him as a wealthy woman what catherine has not counted on however is that ralph might have plans of his own for his new wife 11 townyard lane malahide 8455073 www.villagebooks.ie info@villagebooks.ie

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cutting for stone by abraham vergehesse marion and shiva stone born in a mission hospital in ethiopia in the 1950s are twin sons of an illicit union between an indian nun and british doctor bound by birth but with widely different temperaments they grow up together in a country on the brink of revolution until a betrayal splits them apart but fate has not finished with them they will be brought together once more in the sterile surroundings of a hospital theatre from the 1940s to the present from a convent in india to a cargo ship bound for the yemen from a tiny operating theatre in ethiopia to a hospital in the bronx this is both a richly visceral epic and a riveting family story purge by sofi oksanen old aliide truu lives alone in a cottage in the woods pestered by flies she wishes would leave her in peace her isolation is interrupted when she spies a young woman under a tree in her garden the girl is strange arriving in the dead of night bruised dirty and shoeless why is she at aliide s door overcome by curiosity the old woman decides warily to take her in purge is a hauntingly intimate portrait of one family s shame against a backdrop of european war it is a fiercely compelling novel about what we will accept just to survive and the legacies created by our worst experiences lean on pete by willy vlautin fifteen-year-old charley thompson wants a home food on the table a high school he can attend for more than part of a year and some structure to his life but as the son of a single father working at warehouses across the pacific northwest he s been pretty much on his own for some time a portrait of a journey populated by a vivid cast of characters against a harsh landscape lean on pete is also the unforgettable story of a friendship and of hope in dark times freedom by jonathan franzen the new novel from the author of the corrections patty and walter berglund were the new pioneers of old st paul the gentrifiers the hands-on parents the avant-garde of the whole foods generation but now in the new millennium the berglunds have become a mystery in charting the mistakes and joys of freedom s intensely realized characters as they struggle to learn how to live in an ever more confusing world franzen has produced an indelible and deeply moving portrait of our time 11 townyard lane malahide 8455073 www.villagebooks.ie info@villagebooks.ie

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the slap by christos tsiolkas winner of the commonwealth writers prize 2009 this title is an international bestseller at a suburban barbecue a man slaps a child who is not his own the reverberations call into question the relationships between all those who witness it at a suburban barbecue one afternoon a man slaps an unruly 3-yearold boy last night in twisted river by john irving in 1954 in the cookhouse of a logging and sawmill settlement in northern new hampshire an anxious twelve-year-old boy mistakes the local constable s girlfriend for a bear both the twelve-year-old and his father become fugitives forced to run from coos county to boston to southern vermont to toronto pursued by the implacable constable their lone protector is a fiercely libertarian logger once a river driver who befriends them in a story spanning five decades last night in twisted river john irving s twelfth novel depicts the recent half-century in the united states as a living replica of coos county where lethal hatreds were generally permitted to run their course the long song by andrea levy you do not know me yet my son thomas who is publishing this book tells me it is customary at this place in a novel to give the reader a little taste of the story that is held within these pages as your storyteller i am to convey that this tale is set in jamaica during the last turbulent years of slavery and the early years of freedom that followed cha i tell my son what fuss-fuss come let them just read it for themselves parrot oliver in america by peter carey olivier is a french aristocrat the traumatized child of survivors of the revolution parrot the son of an itinerant printer who always wanted to be an artist but has ended up a servant born on different sides of history their lives will be brought together by their travels in america when olivier sets sail for the new world ostensibly to study its prisons but in reality to save his neck from one more revolution parrot is sent with him as spy protector foe and foil as the narrative shifts between the perspectives of parrot and olivier and their picaresque travels together and apart in love and politics prisons and the world of art peter carey explores the adventure of american democracy in theory and in practice with dazzling wit and inventiveness 11 townyard lane malahide 8455073 www.villagebooks.ie info@villagebooks.ie

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started early took my dog by kate atkinson a day like any other for security chief tracy waterhouse until she makes a purchase she hadn t bargained for one moment of madness is all it takes for tracy s humdrum world to be turned upside down the tedium of everyday life replaced by fear and danger at every turn witnesses to tracy s faustian exchange in the merrion centre in leeds are tilly an elderly actress teetering on the brink of her own disaster and jackson brodie who has returned to his home county in search of someone else s roots all three characters learn that the past is never history and that no good deed goes unpunished kate atkinson dovetails and counterpoints her plots with dickensian brilliance in a tale peopled with unlikely heroes and villains started early took my dog is freighted with wit wisdom and a fierce moral intelligence it confirms kate atkinson s position as one of the great writers of our time sunset park by paul auster in the sprawling flatlands of florida 28-year-old miles is photographing the last lingering traces of families who have abandoned their houses due to debt or foreclosure miles is haunted by guilt for having inadvertently caused the death of his step-brother a situation that caused him to flee his father and step-mother in new york 7 years ago pulsing with the energy of auster s previous novel invisible sunset park is as mythic as it is contemporary as in love with baseball as it is with literature it is above all a story about love and forgiveness not only among men and women but also between fathers and sons peace by richard bausch it s italy near cassino the terrible winter of 1944 a dismal icy rain falls unabated for days three american soldiers set out on the gruelling ascent of a perilous italian mountainside in the murky closing days of the second world war haunted by their sergeant s cold-blooded murder of a young girl and with only an old man of uncertain loyalties as their guide they truge on in a state of barely suppressed terror and confusion with snipers lying in wait for them the men are confronted by agonizing moral choices taut and propulsive peace is a feat of economy compression and imagination a tough and unmistakably contemporary meditation on the corrosiveness of violence the human cost of war and the redemptive power of mercy 11 townyard lane malahide 8455073 www.villagebooks.ie info@villagebooks.ie

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skippy dies by paul murray ruprecht van doren is an overweight genius whose hobbies include very difficult maths and the search for extra-terrestrial intelligence daniel skippy juster is his roommate in the grand old dublin institution that is seabrook college for boys nobody pays either of them much attention but when skippy falls for lori the frisbee-playing siren from the girls school next door suddenly all kinds of people take an interest including carl parttime drug-dealer and official school psychopath a tragic comedy of epic sweep and dimension skippy dies scours the corners of the human heart and wrings every drop of pathos humour and hopelessness out of life love robert graves mermaids m-theory and everything in between my name is asher lev by chaim potok asher lev is the artist who painted the sensational brooklyn crucifixion into it he poured all the anguish and torment a jew can feel when torn between the faith of his fathers and the calling of his art here asher lev plunges back into his childhood and recounts the story of love and conflict which dragged him to this crossroads orpheus lost by janette turner hospital in this compelling reimagining of the orpheus myth leela a young mathematician encounters gifted australian musician mishka performing in the subway the connection is immediate a steamy love affair ensues insulated by their love the pair ignores the anxious urban landscape but when leela is picked up off the street and taken to an interrogation center and an explosion rocks the subway the fabric of their bond-and their very identities-begins to unravel the twin by gerbrand bakker when his twin brother dies in a car accident helmer is obliged to return to the small family farm he resigns himself to taking over his brother s role and spending the rest of his days with his head under a cow after his old wornout father has been transferred upstairs helmer sets about furnishing the rest of the house according to his own minimal preferences ostensibly a novel about the countryside as seen through the eyes of a farmer the twin is in the end about the possibility or impossibility of taking life into one s own hands it chronicles a way of life which has resisted modernity is culturally apart and yet riven with a kind of romantic longing 11 townyard lane malahide 8455073 www.villagebooks.ie info@villagebooks.ie

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the weight of silence by heather gudenkauf when two seven-year-old girls go missing all are under suspicion calli clark is a dreamer a sweet gentle girl callie suffers from selective mutism brought on by a tragedy she experienced as a toddler petra gregory is calli s best friend her soul mate and her voice but neither petra nor calli have been heard from since their disappearance was discovered now calli and petra s families are bound by the question of what has happened to their children as support turns to suspicion it seems the answers lie trapped in the silence of unspoken secrets lovesong by alex miller strangers did not as a rule find their way to chez dom a small rundown tunisian cafe on paris s distant fringes run by the widow houria and her young niece sabiha but when one day a lost australian tourist john patterner seeks shelter in the cafe from a sudden parisian rainstorm a love story starts to unfold john and sabiha s becomes a contented but unlikely marriage-a marriage of two cultures lived in a third-and yet because they are essentially foreigners to each other their love story sets in train an irrevocable course of tragic events like the truly great novelist he is miller locates the heart of his story in the moral frailties and secret passions of his all-too-human characters if you like our recommendations and want to order a book please call us on 8455073 or email us at info@villagebooks.ie book clubs order your books in village books and receive a 10 discount minimum of 6 copies keep up to date with the village books book club and junior book clubs on our blog ­ accessed through villagebooks.ie for the latest book news reviews events locally and nationally and for our latest offers and gift ranges sign up for the village books ezine 11 townyard lane malahide 8455073 www.villagebooks.ie info@villagebooks.ie

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