Adult

Cold Hand in Mine stands as one of Aickman's best collections and contains eight stories that show off his powers as a 'strange story' writer to the full, being more ambiguous than standard ghost stories. Throughout the stories the reader is introduced to a variety of characters, from a man who spends the night in a Hospice to a German aristocrat and a woman who sees an image of her own soul. There is also a nod to the conventional vampire story ('Pages from a Young Girl's Journal') but all the stories remain unconventional and inconclusive, which perhaps makes them all the more startling and intriguing.

As Mark Douglas photographs a pod of whales stranded in the waters off Edinburgh's Portobello Beach, he is called by his son's school: His wife, Lauren, hasn't turned up to collect their son. Calm at first, Mark picks up Nathan and takes him home; but as the hours slowly crawl by, he increasingly starts to worry. We gradually learn some of the painful secrets of the couple's shared past, not least that it isn't the first time Lauren has disappeared. And as Mark struggles to care for his son and shield him from the truth of what's going on, the police seem dangerously short of leads. That is, until a shocking discovery.

Desperate to prove himself to his politician father, Esmond Lowndes is sent to Italy to forge ties between the British Union of Fascists and Mussolini's government. In Florence, he discovers art and passion amongst the eccentric expatriates and glamorous locals. But with the coming of war, Esmond chooses to leave his past behind and joins the Florentine resistance. Finding himself closely bound to his comrades and unexpectedly in love, Esmond becomes involved in undercover operations and assassination plots, culminating in a final mission of extraordinary daring.

Life on land is suffocating for Jess Creary, who wastes her summers flipping burgers for tourists on a fishing boat. After all, her older sister Kay died in a boating accident two years ago, her mother has disappeared, and her father isn't exactly dealing with things so well. Surfing and the handsome Captain Matthew are about the only bright spots in her life. When Jess catches the perfect wave on her 23rd birthday, she transforms into a mermaid and is reborn into a confident, powerful predator with superhuman strength. Now, she has 30 days to choose between land and sea; legs and fins; her humanity and her freedom.

When Nancy Tucker was eight years old, her class had to write about what they wanted in life. She thought long and hard about it, and then, though she didn't know why, she wrote: "I want to be thin." Over the next 12 years, she developed anorexia nervosa, was hospitalized, and finally swung the other way towards bulimia nervosa. She left school, then rejoined; went in and out of therapy; ebbed in and out of life. From the bleak reality of a body breaking down to the electric mental highs of starvation, hers has been a life held in thrall by food.

Cool, calm and competent, events planner Paige Walker loves a challenge. But when Paige loses the job she loves, she must face her biggest challenge of all --- going it alone. Except launching her own events company is nothing compared to hiding her outrageous crush on Jake Romano --- her brother's best friend, New York's most in-demand date and the only man to break her heart. When Jake offers Paige's fledgling company a big chance, their still-sizzling chemistry starts giving her sleepless nights. But can she convince the man who trusts no one to take a chance on forever?

Emily Emerson is used to being alone. Her dad ran out on the family when she was just a kid, her mom died when she was 17, and her beloved grandmother has just passed away. But when she’s laid off from her reporting job, she finds herself completely at sea…until the day she receives a beautiful, haunting painting of a young woman standing at the edge of a sugarcane field under a violet sky. That woman is recognizable as her grandmother --- and the painting arrived with no identification other than a handwritten note saying, “He always loved her.” Emily is hungry for roots and family, so she begins to dig. And as she does, she uncovers a fascinating era in American history.

On an average day in America, seven young people aged 19 or under will be shot dead. In ANOTHER DAY IN THE DEATH OF AMERICA, award-winning Guardian journalist Gary Younge tells the stories of the lives lost during the course of a single day in the United States. It could have been any day, but Younge has chosen November 23, 2013. From Jaiden Dixon (9), shot point-blank by his mother’s ex-boyfriend on his doorstep in Ohio, to Pedro Dado Cortez (16), shot by an enemy gang on a street corner in California, the narrative crisscrosses the country over a period of 24 hours to reveal the powerful human stories behind the statistics.