In Time for the Weekend Reading Picks!

'The Heart Goes​ Last' by Margret Atwood

'GLORIOUSLY MADCAP' - THE OBSERVER

Stan and Charmaine are a married couple trying to stay afloat in the midst of economic and social collapse. Living in their car, surviving on tips from Charmaine's job at a dive bar, they're increasingly vulnerable to roving gangs, and in a rather desperate state. So when they see an advertisement for the Positron Project in the town of Consilience - a 'social experiment' offering stable jobs and a home of their own - they sign up immediately. All they have to do in return for this suburban paradise is give up their freedom every second month, swapping their home for a prison cell.

At first, all is well. But slowly, unknown to the other, Stan and Charmaine develop a passionate obsession with their counterparts, the couple that occupy their home when they are in prison. Soon the pressures of conformity, mistrust, guilt and sexual desire take over, and Positron looks less like a prayer answered and more like a chilling prophecy fulfilled.
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A sinister, wickedly funny novel about a near-future in which the lawful are locked up and the lawless roam free, The Heart Goes Last is Margaret Atwood at her heart-stopping best.
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'Gabriati Rise of the Perceptor' by Sreyus Palliyani

A DEBUT NOVEL

​"Gabriati - The Legendary Preceptor and the deadliest assassin of the cloak is the only thing that stands between humanity and the greatest threat to our existence. As blood is spilled in God’s name, Gabriati – the lone warrior rises against all odds. The question is – Is he the greatest saviour or the greatest traitor of the ancient Brotherhood?
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'The Incarnations' by Susan Barker

SHORTLISTED FOR THE KIRKUS REVIEW PRIZE 2015

Beijing, 2008, the Olympics are coming, but as taxi driver Wang circles the city’s congested streets, he feels barely alive. His daily grind is suddenly interrupted when he finds a letter in the sunshade of his cab. Someone is watching him. Someone who claims to be his soulmate and to have known him for over a thousand years.

Other letters follow, taking Wang back in time: to a spirit-bride in the Tang Dynasty; to young slaves during the Mongol invasion; to concubines plotting to kill the emperor; to a kidnapping in the Opium War; and to Red Guards during the Cultural revolution.

And with each letter, Wang feels the watcher in the shadows growing closer … 

Sweeping between China past and present, 'The Incarnations' illuminates the cyclical nature of history, and shows how man is condemned to repeat the same mistakes over and over again.