Buckeye\u00a0\u2013\u00a0Patrick Ryan
\nOur choice<\/p>\n
RRP: \u00a316.99 (Bloomsbury)<\/p>\n
Check price<\/a><\/p>\n It\u2019s VE Day, 1945, and in smalltown Bonhomie, Ohio, hardware storekeeper Cal Jenkins and beautiful Margaret Salt steal a moment of illicit passion, one thing leading to another.<\/p>\n Cal\u2019s wife, Becky, uses her psychic gifts to comfort the bereaved. For Margaret\u2019s husband, Felix, away on a cargo ship in the Far East, the war isn\u2019t over \u2013 and he has illicit passions of his own.<\/p>\n The fateful consequences of their liaisons play out over decades and cause emotional havoc with their sons, as another war erupts in a far country.<\/p>\n Tender, funny, forgiving and so cleverly wrought, Ryan\u2019s debut adult novel has garnered high praise from the likes of Tom Hanks and Ann Patchett.<\/p>\n Secrets of the Starlit Sea \u2013 Santa Montefiore<\/p>\n RRP: \u00a320 (Orion)<\/p>\n Check price<\/a><\/p>\n New York, New York! When nonagenarian Alma Aldershoff inadvertently unleashes a malevolent spirit in the luxury Manhattan hotel that was her childhood home, it\u2019s a job for pink-haired psychic Pixie Tate \u2013 and it\u2019s a tricky one.<\/p>\n She has to \u2018timeslide\u2019 and \u2013 yikes! \u2013 she\u2019s back in 1912 aboard an ocean going liner where the past yields its secrets. An easy read, wildly improbable and great fun.<\/p>\n High Season \u2013 Katie Bishop<\/p>\n RRP: \u00a318.99 (Transworld)<\/p>\n Check price<\/a><\/p>\n Aged just five, Nina Drayton witnessed her sister, Tamara, being drowned in the pool of the family\u2019s villa on the C\u00f4te d\u2019Azur \u2013 or so it is said.\u00a0<\/p>\n The babysitter, Josie, has served time for murder, but 20 years on, Nina can recall nothing of the events to which she testified.\u00a0<\/p>\n And if Josie isn\u2019t guilty, is the real killer still at large? A highly accomplished psychological thriller; deeply impressive.<\/p>\n The Predicament\u00a0 \u2013 William Boyd<\/p>\n RRP: \u00a320 (Penguin)<\/p>\n Check price<\/a><\/p>\n Oh, for a quiet, blameless life! Boyd\u2019s reluctant double agent and travel writer Gabriel Dax, besotted with his alluring MI6 handler, is drawn into intrigues that will take him to Guatemala and to Cold War Berlin, where John F Kennedy is scheduled to visit.\u00a0<\/p>\n A faultless evocation of 1960s England, masterful, old-fashioned storytelling. The second novel in a trilogy that\u2019ll leave you wanting more.<\/p>\n Words for Life \u2013 Susie Dent<\/p>\n RRP: \u00a316.99 (John Murray Press)<\/p>\n