The year is 1952, and E.F. Bloodworth has returned to his home - a forgotten corner of Tennessee - after twenty years of roaming. The wife he walked out on has withered and faded. His three sons are grown and angry. Warren is a womanising alcoholic; Boyd is driven by jealousy to hunt down his wife''s lover; and Brady puts hexes on his enemies from his mother''s porch. Only Fleming, the old man''s grandson, treats him with respect and sees past all the hatred, realising the way it can poison a man''s soul. It is ultimately the love of Raven Lee, a sloe-eyed beauty from another town, that gives Fleming the courage to reject his family''s curse. In a tale redolent with the crumbling loyalties and age-old strife of the post-war American South made familiar to us by Cormac McCarthy, Gay''s characters inhabit a world driven by blood ties that strangle as they bind. A coming of age novel, a love story, and a portrait of a family torn apart, Provinces of Night introduced a distinctive new voice in American fiction and a superb cast of characters.

Longlisted for the Booker Prize 2021 ''A classic, but with contemporary urgency thumping through it.'' Claire-Louise Bennett, author of Pond A woman invites a famed artist to the remote coastal landscape where she lives. Drawn to his paintings, she believes his vision may penetrate the mystery at the centre of her life. But as a long, dry summer sets in, his provocative presence soon twists the patterns of her secluded household. ''The most singular book . . . A psychodrama that is both timeless and up-to-the minute . . . Truly one of a kind.'' Justine Jordan, Guardian ''A novel of deep insight and scarring honesty.'' Martin Chilton, Independent ''Re-sets the dial yet again.'' Claire Harman, Evening Standard ''Extraordinary . . . fearless.'' Alex Clark, The Spectator ''Glittering brilliance.'' Jon Day, Financial Times

Premonitions are impossible. But they come true all the time. Dr John Barker was an ambitious psychiatrist with an uncontrollable interest in strange mental conditions. Then, in 1966, in the wake of a national disaster, he had an outlandish vision. He would collect the public''s premonitions and forebodings. He would build a database to predict the future and help avert future disasters. The Premonitions Bureau is the astonishing story of this bizarre real-life undertaking - the radical thinking and peculiar characters behind it; the hundreds of correspondents, their visions, the headlines that they made; and the Bureau''s two most gifted "percipients", a charismatic piano teacher and a troubled switchboard operator. Together, the pair predicted plane crashes and train wrecks, assassinations and international incidents with disturbing accuracy. And then, they called to give Barker their most unnerving premonition: a glimpse of his own imminent demise. The debut book from one of today''s most exciting long-form storytellers, The Premonitions Bureau is an enthralling secret history of madness and wonder, promethean ambition and mortal fear - a journey to powerful and unsettling reaches of the human mind.

This is the story of a few strange hours in the life of a troubled teenage boy. You mustn''t do that to yourself Shy. You mustn''t hurt yourself like that. He is wandering into the night listening to the voices in his head: his teachers, his parents, the people he has hurt and the people who are trying to love him. Got your special meds, nutcase? He is escaping Last Chance, a home for ''very disturbed young men'', and walking into the haunted space between his night terrors, his past and the heavy question of his future.

Imagine spending an evening or two at the master's elbow and asking questions to your heart's delight ! That is what this book enables you to do. Larry Evans, who was U.S. National Champion at nineteen, has brought his seasoned judgement to bear on knotty problems posed in the course of his long career. By means of a question-and-answer format, progressing from simple to complex, the average player is led step by step to a clearer understanding the game. These entertaining essays range from the genesis of chess to its wunderkind Bobby FIscher.