A doctor is visited by a desperate woman with a question: am I evil, or insane? When the letters from Italian servant to his wife in London suddenly cease, she is convinced he has been murdered. In the darkened bedroom of a mouldering palazzo by the Grand Canal, an English lord sickens and suddenly dies. How are these little mysteries connected?

Joss le Guern is a town crier in Paris's 14th arrondissement. Over the course of a few days, however, a number of enigmatic and disturbing messages are slipped in to the daily news, and he becomes increasingly alarmed. In the course of his inquiries he begins to sense a sinister and often grotesque menace.

How did the human brain evolve? Why did it evolve as it did? What is man's place in evolution? This book explores the big ideas about the brain, the nervous system and man's place in history. It reveals how science actually works - the passions, the irrational flashes, the moments of insight; the big ideas that work and turn out to be wrong.

It's two days before Christmas and Helsinki is battling ruthless climate catastrophe: subway tunnels are flooded; the streets are full of abandoned vehicles; the social order is crumbling and private security firms have undermined the police force. Tapani Lehtinen, a struggling poet, is among the few still willing to live in the city.

The silence of the jungle is broken only by the ominous sound of drumming. Life on the river is brutal and unknown threats lurk in the darkness. Marlow's decision to hunt down the mysterious Mr Kurtz, an ivory trader who is the subject of sinister rumours, leads him into more than just physical peril.

Follow a dark and powerful journey up the Congo River in Conrad's sharp and incisive exploration of the damages of imperialism. Life on the river is brutal, and unknown threats lurk in the darkness;

When retired actor Buffy decides to up sticks from London and move to rural Wales, he has no idea what he is letting himself in for. In possession of a run-down B&B that leans more towards the shabby than the chic and is miles from nowhere, he realises he needs to fill the beds - and fast.

It is wartime London. Stella discovers that her lover Robert is suspected of selling information to the enemy. Harrison, the British intelligence agent on his trail, wants to bargain, the price for his silence being Stella herself. Caught between two men and unsure who she can trust, the flimsy structures of Stella's life begin to crumble.