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On an unseasonably warm autumn day, an American teacher enters a public bathroom beneath Sofia�s National Palace of Culture. There he meets Mitko, a charismatic young hustler, and pays him for sex. He returns to Mitko again and again over the next few months, drawn by hunger and loneliness and risk, and finds himself ensnared in a relationship in which lust leads to mutual predation, and tenderness can transform into violence.

Once more, we catch up with the delightful goings-on in the fictitious 44 Scotland Street from Alexander McCall Smith. With customary charm and deftness, Alexander McCall Smith gives us another instalment in this popular series, now running in its ninth season in The Scotsman. Anything could happen to Bertie and the gang...

As suspenseful as it is heartwarming, set in Jerusalem, the latest Christmas novel from New York Times bestselling author Anne Perry is the perfect holiday treat. When Victor Narraway, Thomas Pitt's close friend and former boss, and his new wife, Lady Vespasia, travel to Jerusalem for a Christmas holiday, Vespasia cannot shake the feeling that they are being watched. Then, an old man leaves a mysterious envelope for Narraway-and is murdered soon after. But it is only when the couple is ambushed the following morning that they realize they are in grave danger.

When an explosion in London kills two policemen and seriously injures three more, many believe that anarchists are the culprits. But Thomas Pitt, commander of Special Branch, knows the city�s radical groups well enough to suspect otherwise: that someone with decidedly more personal motives lit the deadly fuse. As he investigates the source of the fatal blast, he�s stunned to discover the bombing was a calculated strike against the ranks of law enforcement.

The American West is bestselling author Larry Watson's forte, and in this, his tenth novel, he has created his most vivid, genuine antihero yet in Calvin Sidey, a man stuck in a myth. Calvin Sidey, steely, hardened, with his own personal code, is one of the last cowboys. It's the 1960s, and he's living off the grid in a trailer on the prairie when his adult son, Bill, seeks his help. A mostly absentee father and grandfather, Calvin nevertheless agrees to stay with his grandchildren for a week.

Bright lights. Big city. Brutal murder. Chicago, 1938. Late one night before the ten o'clock show, the body of a prominent radio actress is found dead in the station's lounge. All the evidence points to murder.and one young, up-and-coming radio actress, Vivian Witchell, as the next victim. But Viv isn't the type to leave her fate in the hands of others-she's used to stealing the show. Alongside charming private detective Charlie Haverman, Vivian is thrust into a world of clues and motives, suspects and secrets.

On a moonless night in the spring of 1851, a young slave makes a bid for freedom with only the North Star to guide him. Jonah Williams, on his eighteenth birthday, flees the South Carolina plantation on which he was born with only a few stolen coins, a knife, and the clothes on his back. No shoes, no map, no clear idea of where to head, except north, hiding during the day and running through the night.

With fighting erupting around his Kansas farm, 16-year-old Jefferson Davis Bussey can hardly wait to join the Union forces. He wants to defend his family from the dreaded Colonel Watie and his Cherokee Indian rebels. After enlisting, Jeff discovers the life of a soldier brings little glory and honor. During battle, his friends die around him. And when he infiltrates Watie's camp as a spy, he discovers the enemy is much like himself-only fighting for a different cause.

After losing her parents in a car accident and her sister to a house fire, Christy Reed has been mired in grief. Life is finally starting to feel normal again when an envelope arrives in the mail--addressed in her sister's handwriting. And the note inside claims she is still alive. FBI Special Agent Lance McGregor, a former Delta Force operator, is assigned to reopen the case, but he's coming up with more questions than answers. If Ginny Reed is still alive--who is the woman buried in her grave? Where is Ginny?

Cornelius P. "Fatty" O'Leary and his wife, Betty, plan a vacation in Ireland for his fortieth birthday, where they will tour his ancestral homeland and relax in the countryside. Almost immediately, things go terribly wrong: the seats in economy class on the plane are too small; the country hotel's dinner spread and bathroom fixtures leave much to be desired; and the down-to-earth O'Learys find their fellow guests are more than a little snobbish.