BOOKS


Previews New Titles: Fiction


New Titles: Fiction May 2022


Things are hotting up in May as beach reads and big sellers start to surface, with an impressive selection of commercial fiction to choose from


Alice O'Keeffe @aliceokbooks


W


elcome to May, where—judging by the books—spring has


definitely sprung, and we are edging into summer.


Always a super-strong month for commercial fiction, among the big-hiters this month are Jane Fallon’s second hardback outing Just Got Real (Michael Joseph), set in the world of online dating, and the second feel-good novel from Clare Pooley (her debut The Authenticit Project was an Editor’s Choice for me), The People on Platform 5 (Bantam Press). Among the big-selling beach reads is the latest rom-com from Emily Henry, Book Lovers (Penguin), about a rivalrous liter- ary agent and editor. Gremlins in the works mean Sarah Morgan’s Beach House Summer has been listed in Commercial rather than in Top sellers, where it belongs—apologies.


Submissions New Titles: Fiction is a monthly preview of hardbacks, trade paperbacks and paperback originals. For its submission guidelines, contact alice.o’keeffe@ thebookseller.com. For submission deadlines, visit thebookseller.com/ publishing-calendar.


Next week 24


In crime and thriller, an island is the most dangerous place to be. In Lucy Clarke’s One of the Girls (HarperFiction) a holiday on a Greek island turns deadly, and in The Sanctuary by Andrew Hunter Murray (Hutchinson Heinemann) a man gets a nast shock when he travels to the remote island owned by a millionaire where his fiancée has been living. See also: The Island by Adrian McKint (Orion).


Espionage fans are very


well-served this month, with the third James Bond novel from Anthony Horowitz, With a Mind to Kill (Cape), and Bad Actors (Baskerville), the eighth in the much-loved Slough House series from Mick Herron. The later comes ahead of the Apple TV adaptation of the series, starring Gary Oldman and Kristin Scot Thomas, due to air this spring. Finally, short stories are


definitely having a moment, with collections from Maggie Shipstead, Sally Rooney favourite Jem Calder and, my pick, the wonderful The Secret Lives of Church Ladies (One) by Deesha Philyaw.


BookScan ratings accompanying titles are based on TCM sales (excludes e-book, export, direct, library and other sales) of the author’s most recent original work in a similar format with at least six months’ sales through Nielsen BookScan, using the notation left.


50,000+ 25,000+ 10,000+ 5,000+ 3,000+


The next edition of The Bookseller (11th February) will feature New Titles: Non-Fiction covering titles released in May.


4th February 2022


Book of the Month Irwin’s Regency romp is a wonderfully escapist read


Historical


Sophie Irwin A Lady’s Guide to


Fortune-Hunting HarperFiction, 12th, £14.99, HB, 9780008519520


Début The year is 1818 and Miss Kitty Talbot has just received some


terrible news; her suitor has suddenly and inexplicably declined to marry her despite their two-year engagement. As the eldest sister of five girls, Kitty must urgently secure a husband with his


own fortune as her recently deceased parents have left the family with an enormous debt. With the bailiffs only weeks way, Kitty must travel from


Dorsetshire and launch herself into London society in pursuit of a husband (with at least four thousand a year), to save herself and her sisters from penury. What follows is a glorious whirl through the ballrooms


and drawing rooms of Regency London in the company of a determined, charming and ever-resourceful heroine. First-time author Irwin has brilliantly, with a palpable love of this histori- cal period, brought the Regency world to life with a knowing wink for a modern readership of all ages. It is clever, funny, wonderfully escapist and the ending is immensely satisfying.


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