A hostile mother-daughter relationship stands at the center of this astonishing, blackly humorous novel by the acclaimed author of First Love. Helen Grant is a mystery to her daughter. An extrovert with few friends who has sought intimacy in the wrong places, a twice-divorced mother of two now living alone surrounded by her memories, Helen (known to her acquaintances as “Hen”) has always haunted Bridget. Now, Bridget is an academic in her forties. She sees Helen once a year, and considers the problem to be contained. As she looks back on their tumultuous relationship—the performances and small deceptions—she tries to reckon with the cruelties inflicted on both sides. But when Helen makes it clear that she wants more, it seems an old struggle will have to be replayed. From the prize-winning author of First Love, My Phantoms is a bold, heart-stopping portrayal of a failed familial bond, which brings humor, subtlety, and new life to the difficult terrain of mothers and daughters.

“Phantoms is gruesome and unrelenting…It’s well realized, intelligent, and humane.”—Stephen King They found the town silent, apparently abandoned. Then they found the first body, strangely swollen and still warm. One hundred fifty were dead, 350 missing. But the terror had only begun in the tiny mountain town of Snowfield, California. At first they thought it was the work of a maniac. Or terrorists. Or toxic contamination. Or a bizarre new disease. But then they found the truth. And they saw it in the flesh. And it was worse than anything any of them had ever imagined...

A raw and engrossing portrait of familial and marital dysfunction by “one of Britain’s most original young writers” (The Observer). Neve is a writer in her mid-thirties married to an older man, Edwyn. For now they are in a place of relative peace, but their past battles have left scars. As Neve recalls the decisions that led her to this marriage, she tells of other loves and other debts, from her bullying father and her self-involved mother to a musician who played her and a series of lonely flights from place to place. Drawing the reader into the battleground of her relationship, Neve spins a story of helplessness and hostility, an ongoing conflict in which both husband and wife have played a part. But is this, nonetheless, also a story of love?

Romantic provocateur, flamboyant bohemian, precocious novelist, perfect poet—not to mention an inexhaustible journalist, critic, and man-about-town—Théophile Gautier is one of the major figures, and great characters, of French literature. In My Fantoms Richard Holmes, the celebrated biographer of Shelley and Coleridge, has found a brilliantly effective new way to bring this great bu too-little-known writer into English. My Fantoms assembles seven stories spanning the whole of Gautier’s career into a unified work that captures the essence of his adventurous life and subtle art. From the erotic awakening of “The Adolescent” through “The Poet,” a piercing recollection of the mad genius Gérard de Nerval, the great friend of Gautier’s youth, My Fantoms celebrates the senses and illuminates the strange disguises of the spirit, while taking readers on a tour of modernity at its most mysterious. ”What ever would the Devil find to do in Paris?” Gautier wonders. “He would meet people just as diabolical as he, and find himself taken for some naïve provincial…” Tapestries, statues, and corpses come to life; young men dream their way into ruin; and Gautier keeps his faith in the power of imagination: “No one is truly dead, until they are no longer loved.”

Julie and the Phantoms' adventures continue in this original novel based on the hit Netflix show from Descendants director Kenny Ortega! Julie Molina and her band, Julie and the Phantoms, play their dream gig at the Orpheum. It was supposed to be Luke, Reggie, and Alex's unfinished business as ghosts, so they could cross over. But they didn't. And now, suddenly, Julie can feel them. Whatever happens next, Julie and the guys know they've just had one of the best days of their (after)lives. And it gets Luke and Julie thinking about their last perfect days... For Luke, it was the day he died -- the day Sunset Curve was supposed to play the Orpheum. For Julie, it was the day before she found out her mom was sick -- the last normal day before her life changed forever. This exclusive Julie and the Phantoms story is told in flashbacks and alternating points of view!

One of the Millions' "Most Anticipated" Books of 2019 Torn apart by war and bigotry, two families confront long-buried secrets in this haunting American novel of World War II and Vietnam. In the panoramic tradition of Charles Frazier’s fiction, Phantoms is a fierce saga of American culpability. A Vietnam vet still reeling from war, John Frazier finds himself an unwitting witness to a confrontation, decades in the making, between two steely matriarchs: his aunt, Evelyn Wilson, and her former neighbor, Kimiko Takahashi. John comes to learn that in the onslaught of World War II, the Takahashis had been displaced as once-beloved tenants of the Wilson orchard and sent to an internment camp. One question has always plagued both families: What happened to the Takahashi son, Ray, when he returned from service and found that Placer County was no longer home—that nowhere was home for a Japanese American? As layers of family secrets unravel, the harrowing truth forces John to examine his own guilt. In prose recalling Thomas Wolfe, Phantoms is a stunning exploration of the ghosts of American exceptionalism that haunt us today.

“A charming book full of erudition and wit” that explores the human impulse to accumulate books (Literary Review). Jacques Bonnet, a lifelong accumulator of books ancient and modern, lives in a house large enough to accommodate his tens of thousands of volumes, as well as some overspill from the libraries of his friends. While his musings on the habits of collectors from the earliest known libraries are learned, amusing, and instructive, his advice on cataloging may even save lives. Ranging from classical Greece to contemporary Iceland, from Balzac to Moby-Dick and Google, Phantoms on the Bookshelves is a blend of memoir, history, and love letter that will be a lasting delight for all who treasure books.