Showing titles in Urban

Augie is a poor but exuberant boy growing up in Chicago during the Depression. While his friends all settle into chosen professions, Augie demands a special destiny. He tests out a wild succession of occupations, proudly rejecting each as too limiting - until he tangles with the glamorous perfectionist Thea.

Shani Akilah's stunning collection brings to life the stories of Black-British Londoners as they explore friendship and romance, community and independence, and navigate their way through the relationships that make them who they are.

This is the 1927 book that years later inspired the movie of the same name. It is a book about criminal violence, corrupt politics and police, and illicit sex. The City of New York, from the late colonial period up to the early twentieth century, was a bustling hub of commerce, industry, and immigration. For many the city was the gateway to a new life in America, and for many others it was a place to steal a buck from their fellow New Yorkers and visitors to the city with thievery, fraud, and vice—in neighborhoods such as the Five Points, the Bowery, Hells Kitchen, and the Water Front.

In the early years of the 20th century, influential art critic William Nasmyth travels to a remote island off the coast of Brittany to sit for a portrait painted by his old friend, the gifted but tormented artist Henry MacAlpine. Over the course of the sitting, MacAlpine recalls their years of friendship, the double-edged gift of the critic's patronage, the power he wielded over aspiring artists, and his apparent callousness in anointing the careers of some and devastating the lives of others.

Two corpses. A country on the edge of a political precipice. A conspiracy so bold it would make Machiavelli wince. Andrew Marr's debut novel imagines what really might be going on behind the door of 10 Downing Street. When a young investigative reporter is found dead on the streets of London few people notice. But when another body - minus its head and hands - is washed up on the banks of the Thames, its grisly condition arouses a little more interest.

Blandine isn't like the other residents of her building. An online obituary writer. A young mother with a dark secret. A woman waging a solo campaign against rodents—neighbours, separated only by the thin walls of a low-cost housing complex in the once bustling industrial centre of Vacca Vale, Indiana. Welcome to the Rabbit Hutch. Ethereally beautiful and formidably intelligent, Blandine shares her flat with three teenage boys she neither likes nor understands, all, like her, now aged out of the state foster care system that has repeatedly failed them.

When Libby Nicholls arrives in London, broken-hearted and with her life in tatters, the first person she meets on the bus is elderly pensioner Frank. He tells her about the time in 1962 he met a girl on the number 88 bus with beautiful red hair just like her own. They made plans for a date, but Frank lost the ticket with her number written on it. For the past sixty years, he's ridden the same bus trying to find her. Libby is inspired by the story and, with the help of an unlikely companion, she makes it her mission to continue Frank's search.

Jess is a single mother to two teenage children, and although life can be tough, she’s just about keeping things together. But when her landlord asks her to move on so he can sell the house they’re living in without warning, Jess’ worries take on a whole new meaning. As Jess struggles to regain her footing, cracks begin to appear in other areas of her life, and suddenly she feels she’s failing at everything.

Franny Doyle is having the worst day. She’s been sacked, the subway doors ripped her favorite dress to ruins, and now she’s flashed her unmentionables to half of lower Manhattan. On the plus side, a dashing stranger came to her rescue with his (Gucci!) suit jacket. On the down side, he can’t get away from her fast enough. Worse yet? Someone posted their (entirely not) meet-cute online. Suddenly Franny and her rescuer, Hayes Montgomery, are the newest social media sensation, and all of New York is shipping #SubwayQTs.

She was a madam in a brothel, then a gangster's moll. Now Annie Carter owns the East End of London, and God help anybody that crosses her.... It's 1970, London, and there's a killer on the loose. When gang boss Annie Carter gets a call, suddenly it's personal. A close friend of hers is the latest victim, and another is in the frame for the murder. With hated Delaney gang still causing trouble, and NY mob boss Barolli's family making no secret of the fact they hate her, she senses a feud blowing up in all their faces very soon.

Tom is a photographer and dreamer, capturing snapshots of the city around him, talking to the people on the fringes of his world, always searching for something he knows is missing but can never quite grasp. He speaks to a beggar. He saves a woman from a gang on a darkened alley. He takes his photos...but only as he develops the negatives does he see the magical, hidden world he has brushed up against in all its beauty, and menace, and danger. And deep in those negatives is the clue he needs to continue his search.

Sayon Hughes, a young Black man from Bristol, dreams of a world far removed from the one in which he was raised. Far removed from the torn slips outside the bookie's, the burnt spoons and the crooked solutions his community embraces; most of all, removed from the Christianity of his uncaring parents and the prejudice of law-makers.

In the fifth book in the sensational Before the Coffee Gets Cold series translated from Japanese, the mysterious café where customers arrive hoping to travel back in time welcomes four new guests. They must follow the café's strict rules, however, and come back to the present before their coffee goes cold. Another moving and heartwarming tale from Toshikazu Kawaguchi, in Before we forget kindness our new visitors wish to go back into their past to move on their present, finding closure and comfort so they can embark on a beautiful future.

In 16-year-old Abida's small Pakistani village, there are age-old rules to live by and her family's honour to protect. And, yet, her spirit is defiant, and she yearns to make a home with the man she loves. When the unthinkable happens, Abida faces the same fate as other young girls who have chosen unacceptable alliances - certain public death.

Zadie Smith's deeply funny, subversive and splendidly entertaining The Autograph Man is a whirlwind tour of celebrity and our fame-obsessed times. Following one Alex-Li Tandem - a 20-something, Chinese Jewish autograph dealer turned on by sex, drugs and organised religion - it takes in London and New York, love and death, fathers and sons, as Alex tries to discover how a piece of paper can bring him closer to his heart's desire. Exposing our misconceptions about our idols - about ourselves - Zadie Smith delivers a brilliant, unforgettable tale about who we are and what we really want to be.

When I discover my boyfriend is cheating on me, I quit my job, and move to take up a role as the PR manager for a hockey team. Only problem? There’s a mix up. Now I’m stuck sharing a flat with the grumpy, hockey captain who's a former marine. Worse? (or is that better?) there’s only one bed! Even worse? My ex too has moved, as the captain of the rival team, ugh! When my enigmatic roomie realizes how much I want revenge he comes up with a plan.

Ronke, Simi and Boo are three mixed-race friends living in London. Everyday racism has never held them back, but now in their 30s, they question their future. When Isobel, a lethally glamorous friend from their past, arrives in town, she is determined to fix their futures for them. Cracks in their friendship begin to appear, and it is soon obvious Isobel is not sorting but wrecking. When she is driven to a terrible act, the women are forced to reckon with a crime in their past that may just have repeated itself.

Maria, a trans woman in her 30s, is going nowhere. She spends her aimless days working in a New York bookstore, trying to remain true to a punk ethos while drinking herself into a stupor and having a variety of listless and confusing sexual encounters. After her girlfriend cheats on her, Maria steals her car and heads for the Pacific, embarking on her version of the Great American Road Trip.

Dimple, Nikisha, Danny, Lizzie and Prynce are half-siblings who don't have much in common except abandonment issues. But when a catastrophic event forces them to reconnect with each other and with Cyril Pennington, the absent father they never really knew, things start to get complicated fast . . .

The regulars at the magical Cafe Funiculi Funicula are well acquainted with its famous legend and extraordinary, secret menu time travel offering. Many patrons have reunited with old flames, made amends with estranged family, and visited loved ones. But the journey is not without risks and there are rules to follow. Travellers must have visited the cafe previously and most importantly, must return to the present in the time it takes for their coffee to go cold.