This preview highlights titles to be published in January
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contemporary Maine, from the author of The Girl from Donegal.
M J Hollows The Violinist’s Secret HQ Digital, 16th, £9.99, pbo, 9780008530440 From the author of The German Nurse and The German Messenger comes a “spellbinding” historical novel about a woman in Nazi Germany who works as a double agent, using her cover as an orchestra’s violinist to infiltrate inac- cessible places.
customers and employees, celebrating connection and community.
Kate Fagan The Three Lives of Cate Kay Bloomsbury Publishing, 7th, £18.99, hb, 9781526682024
Début Exploring love and the cost of
ambition, this lead début, structured as a memoir, is one for fans of Taylor Jenkins Reid, says Bloomsbury. Cate Kay is the most famous author on the planet. Yet some- how, she has remained completely anonymous. But now she is finally ready to reveal herself: a woman of three names and three lives.
Theresa Howes A Matter of Persuasion HQ Digital, 30th, £9.99, pbo, 9780008666842 This historical romance reimagines Jane Austen’s Persuasion, a tale of love, loss and sacrifice, in the opulent but guarded Gilded Age society.
Commercial
Holly Bourne So Thrilled For You Hodder & Stoughton, 16th, £16.99, hb, 9781529301632 Big Little Lies meets Expectation in the new novel from the author of Girl Friends. It follows four university friends in their thirties who are reunited at the “baby shower from hell”, where someone starts a fire and every- one’s a suspect. BookScan
Historical
Jane Yang The Lotus Shoes Sphere, 28th, £16.99, hb, 9781408730300
tions: Little Flower, sold to Linjing’s wealthy family to become a muizai, and Linjing, who ensures Little Flower
can never leave her to ascend in society. Inspired by the author’s great-great-aunt, whose embroidery skills allowed her to change the fate of the women in her family despite her lack of bound feet, this novel explores foot binding, arranged marriage and Eastern vs Western values. It was acquired in a pre-empt before US rights sold in a six-figure deal, and rights have sold in nine more territories.
TheBookseller.com
Jennie Felton Rosie’s Dilemma Headline, 2nd, £7.99, pbo, 9781472296795 A “heartrending” new novel about a woman who returns to her Somerset hometown from London at the outbreak of the
Sarah Handyside Instructions for Heartbreak Macmillan, 30th, £16.99, hb, 9781035032754
Début Pitched as Everything I
Know About Love meets Expectation, this “razor- sharp début” following four female friends living in London explores female friendship and how to survive a broken heart.
Sonoko Machida The Convenience Store by the Sea Orion, 30th, £9.99, pbo, 9781398722774 Having sold more than half a million copies between Japan and South Korea, this novel tells the “heartfelt and quirky” stories of a convenience store’s
Jill Mansell If Only Headline Review, 16th, £16.99, hb, 9781035409983 The “heartwarming” new novel from the author of The Wedding of the Year is set at a Cotswolds luxury holiday retreat, where a new employee struggles with an attraction that won’t go away and a jaded Hollywood star forges new connections. BookScan
Silvia Saunders Homesick HarperFiction, 30th, £16.99, hb, 9780008667016
Début Awarded the Comedy Women
in Print prize 2023, this “fresh and funny” début about heartbreak and moving on is one for fans of Really Good, Actually and The Happy Couple, says HarperFiction.
practices, of finding community and yourself, from a Korean rising star, who won the New Writer’s Award for Lazy Kinko.
Second World War, from the author of The Coal Miner’s Wife and the Families of Fairley Terrace series. BookScan
Lisa Carter Six Poppies Michael Joseph, 30th, £8.99, pbo, 9781405975414 When Carl returns from fighting in Afghanistan he leaves behind the love of his life and six friends who didn’t make it home. He will never forget their stories. Written by a former editor of Femail, this epic romance was inspired by a number of true stories.
Saga
Yeon Somin, Clare Richards (trans) The Healing Season of Pottery Viking, 30th, £12.99, hb, 9780241698709
Début In this healing novel, sold in 20
territories, a burnt-out journalist stumbles upon a pottery workshop where everyone has a story to share. An uplifting story of new friends and old
Annie Murray The Pearl Button Girl Macmillan, 9th, £20, hb, 9781035019977 Book one in the “gritty, heartwarming” Children of Birmingham series, following the trials and triumphs of the Fletcher family, from the author of Chocolate Girls and Sisters of Gold.
One to Watch
Début Set in 19th-century China, this sweeping début follows two women bound by society’s expecta-
Maggie Campbell The Housekeeper of Holcombe Hall Michael Joseph, 30th, £8.99, pbo, 9781405966382 “Downton Abbey” meets Nancy Revell in this new series follow- ing the upstairs and downstairs residents of Holcombe Hall as the roaring twenties come to an end. The first in a three-book saga series set in 1930s Lancashire. BookScan
Cathy Sharp An Orphan’s Story HarperFiction, 16th, £9.99, pbo, 9780008680169 In the latest “gritty and heartfelt” saga from the author of The Lost Evacuee, a young evacuee is sent far away to Canada on the eve of the Second World War, but even there he cannot escape the war. BookScan
Margaret Pemberton The Oyster Girl Pan, 16th, £8.99, pbo, 9781509841813 A “sweeping” historical saga following the lives of three families living in a small oyster-fishing town on the southeast cost of England whose lives are changed forever by the advent of the First World War, from the author of 30 novels including The Londoners trilogy. BookScan
neighbours, in this rivals- to-lovers romance by the author of TikTok favourite The Cheat Sheet and The Rule Book. BookScan
Jackie Ashenden Book People Headline Eternal, 28th, £10.99, pbo, 9781035418015 An enemies-to-lovers contemporary romance about warring bookshop owners in an English village forced to reconcile their differences and work together, from the author of many romance series including Talking Dirty and Nine Circles.
Hannah Bonam-Young Out of the Woods Bedford Square Publishers, 30th, £9.99, pbo, 9781835011454 A married couple joins a week-long gruelling wilderness expedition to help them reconnect, in this heartfelt companion novel to Out on a Limb. Bonam-Young has won her fans by combin- ing “swoon-worthy storylines” with diverse representation. BookScan
Joanna Toye A New Chapter at the Little Penguin Bookshop Penguin, 16th, £8.99, pbo, 9781804946039 Book two in the series that began with The Little Penguin Bookshop, about the power of Penguin books and how they brought people together during the Second World War. BookScan
Romance
Sarah Adams Beg, Borrow, or Steal Headline Eternal, 21st, £9.99, pbo, 9781035409112 Two feuding second-grade teachers find themselves as unlikely allies, and
Kate Eberlen Life Begins Orion, 30th, £9.99, pbo, 9781398712164 This is an “emotional” relationship drama set in the Italian countryside about a woman who made a pact to marry her male best friend at 40, and the woman caught between them. Eberlen is the author of Richard & Judy pick Miss You, Only You and Ever After.
Katie Holt
Not in My Book Penguin, 9th, £9.99, pbo, 9781804996348
Début In this spicy romcom for fans
of The Hating Game, romance writer Rosie must collaborate with her arch-nemesis Aiden on a novel for their grad school class. As they compete for a career-changing oppor- tunity, will they be able to
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