Amanda Craig Books

When Enzo shoots an illegal migrant from his bedroom, it sets off a chain of events that intertwines the lives of old and young, rich and poor, native and foreign. Enzo’s elderly neighbors—Ruth, Diana, and Marta—are three friends enjoying retirement in Tuscany. Ruth's grandson Olly is preparing for his wedding at her picturesque farmhouse, but his bride, Tania, appears more interested in vlogging than the ceremony. Meanwhile, Marta is gearing up for an annual music recital funded by a Russian oligarch hiding from Putin, even as her health declines. Her grandson, Xan, grapples with his resentment over social inequalities. Diana cares for her husband, Lord Evenlode, who suffers from dementia, reflecting on their tumultuous marriage. Over two weeks in May, these characters confront difficult choices as they navigate their pasts and the present’s challenges. Despite the beauty of the Tuscan spring, the complexities of modern life make it increasingly difficult to see what connects us rather than divides us. This engaging narrative is a profound exploration of the resilient human spirit, filled with humor and insight.

These stories are aimed at readers of 'Good Housekeeping' magazine - primarily women aged 25 to 55 - and deal with the myriad issues facing women today. Each story is a generous bite size of well-written, self-contained fiction perfectly suited to holiday reading.

As a young guide for Sunshine Tours, Armino Fabbio leads a pleasant, if humdrum life -- until he becomes circumstantially involved in the murder of an old peasant woman in Rome. The woman, he gradually comes to realise, was his family's beloved servant many years ago, in his native town of Ruffano. He returns to his birthplace, and once there, finds it is haunted by the phantom of his brother, Aldo, shot down in flames in '43. Over five hundred years before, the sinister Duke Claudio, known as The Falcon, lived his twisted, brutal life, preying on the people of Ruffano. But now it is the twentieth century, and the town seems to have forgotten its violent history. But have things really changed? The parallels between the past and present become ever more evident.

* A gripping, topical novel - a detective story, a love story and a book about contemporary Britain.

"Quentin and Lottie Bredin, like many modern couples, can't afford to divorce. Having lost their jobs in the recession, they can't afford to go on living in London; instead, they must downsize and move their three children to a house in a remote part of Devon. Arrogant and adulterous, Quentin can't understand why Lottie is so angry; devastated and humiliated, Lottie feels herself to have been intolerably wounded. Mud, mice and quarrels are one thing - but why is their rent so low? What is the mystery surrounding their unappealing new home? The beauty of the landscape is ravishing, yet it conceals a dark side involving poverty, revenge, abuse and violence which will rise up to threaten them. Sally Verity, happily married but unhappily childless knows a different side to country life, as both a Health Visitor and a sheep farmer's wife; and when Lottie's innocent teenage son Xan gets a zero-hours contract at a local pie factory, he sees yet another. By the end of their year, the lives of all will be changed for ever. Part black comedy, part psychological suspense, this is a rich, compassionate and enthralling novel in its depiction of the English countryside, and the potentially lethal interplay between money and marriage"...Publisher's description.

A Vicious Circle exposes the corruption of London's journalistic circuit, the horrors of our hospitals and slums, and the transformations caused by motherhood. Gripping, tender and fiercely funny, it has been instantly recognised as a modern classic about the way we live now.

En ung engelsk kvinde løber hjemmefra for at forsøge sig som maler i Toscana

Will must run, or die. He's seen a murder, and the gang on his estate are after him. Hurt, hungry and afraid, he comes to an abandoned house in a different part of the city. Behind its high fences is a place of safety. Here, he can hide like a wounded beast. He can find food, and healing - and learn how to do more than survive.

Two women meet by chance and discover that they are both victims of abusive husbands. Together, they plot their revenge...

Alice Thomas Ellis introduces a remarkable collection of revenge stories by some of the finest contemporary women writers. This book seeks not to relay the ever burgeoning factual accounts of how women get their own back, but to show their reactions to betrayal, cruelty, and simple nastiness through the filter of fiction. One of the most satisfying means of revenge, as these authors clearly realize, is to put the offender in a story. Ellis studies the history of women's revenge against men, and emerges with fascinating insights into the dynamic differneces that place the sexes in passionate opposition. Alice Munro, Joyce Carol Oates, Fay Welson, Carol Shields, Pat Knight, Agatha Christie, Shelley Weiner, Patrice Chaplin, Judith Amantbis, Sylvia Petter, Jane Barker Wright, Norma Meacock, Pauline Holdstock, Jean Pickering, Vicky Crut, Deborah Bosley, Amanda Graig, and Clare Colvin.

The Tuscan dream holiday turns into a nightmare, before a romantically satisfying - and surprising - resolution. An evocative and contemporary comedy of delights.