One day when Sophie comes home from school, she finds two questions in her mail: "Who are you?" and "Where does the world come from?" Before she know <more...>s it, she is pondering all the great questions of Western philosophy (from the Greeks to Kant, to Marx and Freud) with a mysterious mentor. But Sophie is also receiving a separate batch of equally unusual letters. Who is Hilde? And why does her mail keep turning up in Sophie's world? To unravel this riddle, Sophie uses her new knowledge of philosophy, but the truth is far stranger than she could have imagined.

In Coraline's family's new flat are twenty-one windows and fourteen doors. Thirteen of the doors open and close. The fourteenth is locked, and on the <more...> other side is only a brick wall, until the day Coraline unlocks the door to find a passage to another flat in another house just like her own. Only it's different.

In the late 1980s, Esther and Gemma, whose friendship is complicated by Esther's beauty and her tendency to steal plain Gemma's boyfriends, take a ba <more...>ckpacking trip to India. When they meet up with a third traveler, Coral, things take a sinister turn, leaving Esther with a bad case of guilt.

The Khao San Road, Bangkok — first stop for the hordes of rootless young Westerners traveling in Southeast Asia. On Richard's first night there, in <more...>a low-budget guest house, a fellow traveler slashes his wrists, bequeathing to Richard a meticulously drawn map to "the Beach."

Rob Brook's takes the plunge and moves from London to Manchester with his girlfriend, leaving his home city, his job and his best friend in the whole <more...>world. After six months and realising the difficulties of making friends in your thirties, he places an advert in a Manchester magazine, bringing awful 'bloke dates' with it. Just about giving up, Rob finds just the friend to go for a pint with, unfortunately with one huge flaw. She's a girl.

From their first meeting at the student union over a decade ago, Jim and Alison successfully navigated their way through first dates, meeting parents, <more...> moving in together and more! Then they split up and divided their worldly goods (including a sofa, a cat and their flat) into his 'n' hers. Now, three years on and with new lives and new loves, they couldn't be happier. Until a chance encounter throws them back together, and causes them to embark on a journey through their past to ask themselves the big question: where did it all go wrong, and is it too late to put it all right?

It's been three years since his heartthrob, Agnes, wrecked his life with a chat that started. It's like that song. If you love somebody, set him free. <more...> But no matter how much time goes by, Will doesn't feel very free. He still makes lists of each birthday present Aggi ever gave him, has gymnastic fantasies about a perfect reunion night with her, dwells on the first words she uttered to him. How long can a person stay down in the dumps after being dumped? And how much longer before Will dumps Martina, the sweet but clingy girl he's seeing? Will anyone ever measure up to his Legendary Girlfriend?

Unlike most people Matt Beckford is actually looking forward to turning thirty. After struggling through most of his twenties he thinks his career, fi <more...>nances and love life are finally sorted. But when he splits up with his girlfriend, he realises that life has different plans for him. Unable to cope with his future falling apart Matt temporarily moves back to his parents. During his enforced exodus only his old school mates can keep him sane. Friends he hasn't seen since he was nineteen. Back together after a decade apart. But things will never be the same for any of them because when you're turning thirty nothing's as simple as it used to be.

The career of playwright Joy Sinclair comes to an abrupt end on an isolated estate in the Scottish Highlands when someone drives and eighteen-inch dir <more...>k through her neck. Called upon to investigate the case in a country where they have virtually no authority, aristocratic Detective Inspector Thomas Lynley and his partner, Detective Sergeant Barbara Havers, grapple for both a motive and a murderer. Emotions run deep in this highly charged drama, for the list of suspects soon includes Britain's foremost actress, its most successful theatrical producer, and the woman Lynley loves. He and Havers must tread carefully through the complicated terrain of human relationships, while they work to solve a case rooted in the darkest corners of the past and the unexplored regions of the human heart.

The brutal, inexplicable death of Inspector Thomas Lynley's wife has left Scotland Yard searching for answers. Who is the twelve-year-old boy who pull <more...>ed the trigger? What were the circumstances that led to his horrific act? That story begins on the other side of London, where the three mixed-race Campbell children are sent to live with their aunt. The oldest, fifteen-year-old Ness, is headed for trouble as fast as her high-heeled boots will take her. That leaves the middle child, Joel, to care for the youngest, Toby. But before long, Joel has his own problems with a local gang. To protect his family, he makes a pact with the devil, a move that leads straight to the front doorstep of Thomas Lynley.