Independent Hove book shop, City Books, lists their bestsellers for September and October…
The Man Who Saw Everything, Deborah Levy
The Booker longlisted new title from Deborah Levy is a shape-shifting novel about love, memory, carelessness and Communism. In 1988, a young Saul Adler is hit by a car crossing the Abbey Road, shortly before travelling to East Berlin. The seemingly unconnected events that follow gradually crystallise into a twisty, time-hopping masterpiece from one of our most exciting writers.
Dinner with Edward, Isabel Vincent
A sweet, moving memoir about two unlikely friends who found solace in each other and in good food whilst both grieving their very different lost marriages. Investigative reporter Isabel Vincent began eating dinner with her recently widowed neighbour, Edward, during the breakdown of her marriage. Ninety- something-year-old Edward, an excellent cook and expert cocktail maker, quickly becomes an unexpected and vital part of Isabel’s routine. An uplifting read about friendship, freedom and food.
The Testaments, Margaret Atwood
Margaret Atwood returns with what is sure to be one of the biggest titles of 2019. The Testaments is a sequel to her 1985 novel, The Handmaid’s Tale, set 15 years later and containing the explosive testimonies of three female narrators from Gilead. It has been named on the shortlist for the 2019 Booker Prize and the longlist for the 2019 Giller Prize.
Girl, Edna O’Brien
An unflinching, astonishing novel told from the perspective of a young woman abducted by Boko Haram, set in the deep countryside of northeast Nigeria. As she did with The Little Red Chairs, O’Brien brings contemporary issues to the fore with empathy and intelligence. O’Brien is prolific in her work, with her writing critically celebrated from her first novel, The Country Girls.
Year of the Money, Patti Smith
The next memoir from the iconic singer-songwriter and author of Just Kids and M Train. A profound and riveting work that takes the reader from Southern California to the Arizona desert, considering loss, grief, politics, ageing, transformation and hope, accompanied by the author’s own signature polaroids.
Heaven, My Home, Attica Locke
Locke returns with the second instalment in her Highway 59 series starring Texas Ranger Darren Mathews. Texas is already bracing itself through a new wave of racial violence in the aftermath of Trump’s election, and now Mathews is dealing with a very delicate case – the possible murder of a young white boy, the son of a member of an Aryan Brotherhood captain, and the only suspect is a black man. Locke once again combines an excellent, twisting plot with a thoughtful and 7incisive look at modern-day America. The first in the series, Bluebird, Bluebird, is out in paperback now.
Over the Top, by Jonathan Van Ness
Beloved Queer Eye star Jonathan Van Ness shares never-before-told secrets in this new memoir. Van Ness is known all over for being a beacon of joy and positivity – Over the Top reveals the sometimes difficult journey it took to get there, from childhood in a small Midwestern town to international fame. Revelatory, honest, sweet and funny – just like Jonathan.
