Books published by Daunt Books

Four explosions rolled in the distance. If there'd been clouds in the sky, the noise would've been mistaken for thunder.Aziz and his older brother Ali live in a village amid the pine forests and endless mountains of eastern Afghanistan. Their family is poor, but inside their mud-walled home,they have stability, love, and routine.But when a convoy of armed men suddenly arrives in the village, their parents disappear and their world is shattered. In order to ensure his and his brother's survival, Aziz must join the Special Lashkar - a US-funded militia hungry for Afghan recruits. No longer a boy, but not yet a man, Aziz struggles to understand his place in a conflict both savage and entirely contrived. Will he embrace the brutality of war or leave it behind, and risk placing his brother - and a young woman he comes to love - in jeopardy?Green on Blueis a gripping debut novel, and an astonishing feat of empathy and imagination about boys caught in a deadly conflict.'Harrowing, brutal, and utterly absorbing . . . Ackerman has spun a morally complex tale of revenge, loyalty, and brotherly love.' - Khaled Hosseini, author of The Kite Runner'Haunting . . . Powerful . . . a bone-deep understanding of the toll that a seemingly endless war has taken on ordinary Afghans.' - Michiko Kakutani, New York Times'As good a book as you're likely to find on men at war. It is full of insight, compassion, and extraordinarily beautiful writing. I could not recommend this novel more highly.' - Kevin Powers, author of The Yellow Birds'What makes Green on Blueso brilliantly poignant is Elliot Ackerman's feeling of empathy, his ability to get under his characters' skin, reminding us not only of our vast differences but of our shared humanity.' - Azar Nafisi, author of Reading Lolita in Tehran

A haunting classic of modern Catalan literature from one of Spain's most prestigious authorsExtending from the prosperous Barcelona of the 1870s to the advent of the Franco dictatorship and the Spanish Civil War, A Broken Mirror follows three generations of a fractured aristocratic family at the turn of the 19th century.When Salvador Valldaura first meets Teresa Goday he is seduced by her velvety eyes and contagious laughter. Valldaura, a wealthy diplomat, and Teresa, a widowed fishmonger's daughter, marry and move into a grand, sprawling villa on the outskirts of Barcelona. In that house, their family flourishes and fractures across a century of change: from Teresa's second husband and her secret, illegitimate son Masdéu, to daughter Sofía and Sofía's playboy husband Eladi, and son, Ramon, tormented by a heinous act from his childhood and unknowingly in love with his half-sister, as well as several generations of servants, ghosts - and even a rodent.Through a kaleidoscope of perspectives and turning upon events both intimate and historic, A Broken Mirror tells the story of a splintering matriarchal dynasty founded on love, lies, secrets, and betrayals.

An outrageous, darkly funny novel aboutmanhood . . . The late 1970s. Seven men - friends, acquaintances, and strangers - gather in a suburban home in Berkeley, California. They intend to start a men's club, the purpose of which isn't immediately clear to any of them. But as the evening wears on and the drinks flow faster, they discover a powerful and passionate desire to talk - to unburden and to share, to try and comprehend their feelings, their insecurities, their lives. Kramer claims he's slept with six hundred women; Berliner and his wife beat each other up as foreplay; Cavanaugh - big handsome guy - is haunted by his former life as a professional basketball player. And Terry just can't get over Deborah Zeller. The Men's Club is a scathing, pitying, absurdly dark and funny novel about manhood and masculinity.

McPhee is a grand master of narrative non-fiction.' - GuardianInspired by the glass of freshly-squeezed juice he bought every day on his morning commute, Pulitzer Prize-winner John McPhee takes us on an idiosyncratic and remarkable journey in search of the world's most popular fruit. With his trademark style and enchanting wit, he unravels the rich history and fascinating cultivation of this botanical marvel. Beginning with the fruit's origins in Southeast Asia, McPhee travels from the great orangeries belonging to Louis XIV, to the shores of Andalucia, and through the endless groves in Florida. Along the way he introduces the people whose livelihood depends on the world's insatiable demand for the fruit: orange pickers, a citrus scientist, and an orange baron worth over $20 million.In his inimitable and endlessly compelling prose, McPhee reveals the story behind this extraordinary fruit. Your morning glass of juice will never be the same.'His genius is that he can write about anything.' - Robert Macfarlane'A delicious book . . . more absorbing than many a novel.' - Harper's

'John McPhee is celebrated in America and all but unknown in this country. The volume I love most is Coming into the Country, an account of Alaska and the Alaskans. His genius is that he can write about anything.' - Robert Macfarlane In this unforgettable and astutely observed travel account, Pulitzer Prize-winner John McPhee journeys into the wild frontiers and frigid climate of Alaska - exploring the diverse terrain of this Northern US state. Travelling by foot and canoe, helicopter and dog team, McPhee traverses total wilderness, urban landscape, and the depths of the bush, drawing a rich and comprehensive history of this vast land and its varied inhabitants.With his keen eye and poetic sensibility at the helm, we paddle with McPhee through the salmon-filled waters of the Brooks Range Rivers, meet a young chief of the Athapaskan tribe, and become well-acquainted with the habits of the barren-ground grizzly bear. We encounter settlers along the way and discover the extraordinary dreams that impel them to survive in one of the most remote regions on Earth.McPhee is an endlessly curious adventurer and Coming into the Country is the work of a master storyteller. 'It is a reviewer's greatest pleasure to ring the gong for a species of masterpiece.' - New York Times Book Review 'McPhee has acted like an antenna in a far-off place that few will see. He has brought back a wholly satisfying voyage of spirit and mind.' - Time 'With this book McPhee proves to be the most versatile journalist in America.' - New York Times

Elisa is Gilles' wife and her devotion to him is passionate and all-consuming. Her daily life is permeated by thoughts of him - thoughts of his return from the factory, thoughts of his footsteps on the path as he arrives home each evening, when, in the minutes before his return, she is overcome with paralysing anticipation. But when Gilles suddenly finds himself powerfully and helplessly attracted to Elisa's younger sister, Victorine, Elisa's world is overturned. The joys of home and family are destroyed and her desperation is so profound that it begins to threaten her every sense of reality and the core of her existence. Set among the dusty lanes and rolling valleys of rural Belgium in the 1930s, La Femme de Gilles is a sensual and shattering novel about infidelity, lust, and the loneliness of losing the one thing that matters most. 'One of the more remarkable literary discoveries of the last few years.' - Jonathan Coe, Guardian 'A marvellous, rediscovered novel about selfless love.' - Kate Kellaway, Observer 'A haunting, slim novel which has the mesmeric inevitability of classical tragedy.' - Independent on Sunday 'La Femme de Gilles is about physical passion, its etasies, aberrations and ruthlessness . . . quiet, compassionate and unsparing.' - Times Literary Supplement

In these eight evocative and unpredictable essays, Sybille Bedford chronicles her adventures through Europe over a thirty-year period. With her elegant prose and razor-sharp insight, Bedford takes us on a propulsive journey - dropping us into the passenger seat as she drives to meet Martha Gellhorn in Capri, taking us across the wind-swept piazzas of Venice in winter, and tantalising our taste buds with a tour of the vineyards of Bordeaux. Bedford shows us the world through her eyes - the eyes of a seasoned traveller - in all its beauty and wonder. Pleasures and Landscapes is a satisfyingly sensuous literary expedition told by one of the greatest travel writers of the twentieth century. 'Bedford's ability to recreate landscape is matched only by her appetite for mouth-watering descriptions of exotic food . . . She cannot write a dull page.' - Financial Times 'Bedford writes of the lure of the sensual life, the picni, lobster salad, hock and seltzer and going to the opera, in Italy, in summer . . .' - The Times 'When the history of modern prose in English comes to be written, Sybille Bedford will have to appear in any list of its most dazzling practitioners.' - Bruce Chatwin

Day after day, 'Miss Lonelyhearts' sits in his office responding to letters from 'Broken-hearted, Sick-of-it-all, and Desperate', dispensing words of hope, inspiration, and other platitudes to get his readers through their tormented days. But it's all getting to be too much for Miss Lonelyhearts. Under the weight of his colleagues' mockery and the endless gloom of his correspondence, Miss Lonelyhearts finds himself crippled with cynicism and dysfunction. Set in New York City at the height of the Great Depression, Miss Lonelyhearts stands as one of the most intelligent and hilarious works of the 20th century. Laced with dark humour, irony, and razor-sharp insight, this novel is as hauntingly relevant today as it was nearly a hundred years ago. 'Wildly funny, desperately sad, brutal and kind, furious and patient, there was no other like Nathanael West.' - Dorothy Parker 'In dark times, Miss Lonelyhearts shines the brightest light in the blackest places. For this reason West's novel has never felt more alive than today.' - The Daily Beast 'A miniature comic epic.' - Edmund Wilson 'Rendered with scalpel-precision . . . Nathanael West's masterpiece is a mercilessly unsympathetic novel on the theme of sympathy.' - Jonathan Lethem

Leonard, a young writer drifting through the city, meets Sylvia by chance at a friend's shabby Greenwich Village apartment. He's instantly besotted with her striking beauty and quiet disdain, and the question of what to do with his life is resolved. In this remarkable semi-autobiographical novel, we are drawn into the world of a beatnik couple living in Manhattan in the early 1960s, and their demi-monde of jazz, poetry, late nights and early mornings. But when Sylvia's depression emerges and her disturbances take hold, their fights become increasingly violent and their relationship hurtles towards self-destruction. Written with extraordinary clarity and precision, this is a compelling portrait of the mad intensity, exquisite pain and destructive power of young love. 'Every page reveals the mark of an extraordinarily original and gifted talent.' - William Styron 'The writing isn't merely stylish; it's vital . . . the ending is as shocking as that of any thriller.' - Sarah Manguso 'A novel that has the power and the rawness of memoir.' - New York Times

Cassandra, daughter of the King of Troy, is endowed with the gift of prophecy but fated never to be believed. After ten years of war, Troy has fallen to the Greeks, and Cassandra is now a prisoner, shackled outside the gates of Agamemnon's Mycenae. Through memories of her childhood and reflections on the long years of conflict, Cassandra pieces together the fall of her city. From a woman living in an age of heroes, here is the untold personal story overshadowed by the battlefield triumphs of Achilles and Hector. This stunning reimagining of the Trojan War is a rich and vivid portrayal of the great tragedy that continues to echo throughout history. 'A beautiful work.' - Bettany Hughes 'Cassandra is fierce and feverish poetry that engages with the ancient stories while also charting its own path. Filled with passionate and startling insight into human nature.' - Madeline Miller, author of The Song of Achilles 'Christa Wolf wrote books that crossed and overcame the divide of East and West, books that have lasted: the great, allegorical novels.' - Gunter Grass 'A sensitive writer of the purest water - an East German Virginia Woolf.' - Guardian 'One of the most prominent and controversial novelists of her generation.' - New York Review of Books

Marie is enjoying life. She has a husband, whom she adores with every ounce of her being (and who equally adores her), and she's easily pleased by the smaller things in life - the drag of a cigarette, a hotel balcony, the scattering of light across the surface of the sea. While on holiday, Marie spots a young man lying on the beach and is instantly drawn to him. Their connection develops into a passionate and intense love affair, opening a window into Marie's untapped desires. As she explores the vibrant immediacy of her yearnings, Marie begins to see her entire world anew. Set among the bustling train stations and narrow rues of 1940s Paris, Marie is a hypnotically powerful and life-affirming novel detailing the interior life of a 20th century woman - with exquisitely crafted moments of sensual acuity and profound insight. 'A short, intense novel, suffused with tenderness, humour and sensuality. . . . mixing passion and politi as its existentialist heroine embarks on a desire fuelled route of living at full-tilt.' - Michele Roberts 'Exquisite, quiet, elegant, disciplined and nonsentimental . . . Bourdouxhe conveys the sharp, almost physical intensity of thought as experienced by a central character suspended between apathy and restless curiosity.' - Irish Times 'Bourdouxhe was a writer admired by her contemporary Simone de Beauvoir. It is easy to see why: female autonomy, a delight in Paris and its freedoms, the rapture of living in the present and seizing life with both hands . . . luminous.' - Times Educational Supplement 'An unforgettable, thrilling achievement . . . stakes a claim to Bourdouxhe's rightful position alongside Proust and Virginia Woolf as an explorer of interior life . . . inspiring and impassioned.' - Sunday Times

Peking in the 1930s - an ancient city of warlords, bordered by brutal civil war, and a place of exquisite beauty. Laura Leroy, whose marriage to a diplomat has taken her far from home, lives divided between England and the social farce of diplomatic life in Peking. When a group of expats venture out on an expedition to the great monastery at Chieh T'ai Ssu they find themselves intoxicated by the extraordinary flowering beauty of Chinese landscape in spring. Laura is drawn to Vinstead, a man who reminds her of the green fields and spires she has left behind in Oxford. But far from the pleasures of cocktails and picnic parties, they encounter a shocking clash that threatens the security of their fragile society. Peking Picnic is an enthralling novel, and Ann Bridge evokes the uneasy balance of living between two worlds, between east and west, and between old China and the coming of the new. 'A first novel of rare quality - beautiful, grave, humorous, exciting, and wise.' - Observer 'Ann Bridge's special blend of landscape and romance, makes us feel that we have been there too and have shared its dramas and enchantments.' - Linda Kelly 'Almost unmixed delight . . . It is pictorial and exciting and illuminating.' - L. P. Hartley 'And unusual and beautiful first novel, which leaves one thinking long after one has put it down.' - Spectator

It is 1956, and Daniel Wollin returns to East Germany after sixteen years of Soviet imprisonment. A brilliant architect, Daniel is taken in by his former colleague, Arnold Sundstrom, who has become hugely successful since their exile in Moscow. Together, the two men work to redesign the nation for the Communist future. But with Daniel's arrival, Arnold's young wife, Julia, begins to uncover the lies that hold her marriage together and the mystery behind her own parents' deaths in Russia many years ago. A novel of political intrigue and personal betrayal, The Architects tells a story of love and friendship in a world governed by surveillance and mistrust. 'Totally absorbing . . . Stefan Heym is, by any measure, a literary phenomenon.' - Times Literary Supplement 'Heym was unique in the history of European literature.' - Telegraph 'A leading figure in the East German literary scene.' - Tony Judt 'A splendid find, a compelling drama.' - Will Wiles 'Brave, vivid and uncompromising, a chilling portrait of a man and a society struggling to find traces of humanity in themselves and others as their world comes under threat from life-shattering secrets and the tightening grip of brutal ideology.' - Chloe Aridjis, author of Book of Clouds

Grace Kilmichael, the well-known painter, is running away. She's escaping her husband, and his wandering eye, her bullying grown-up children, and the tiresomeness of being herself. En route to Split and Dubrovnik, Grace travels through Paris and Venice, and to the glories of Torcello. Here she meets Nicholas - fascinating, rebellious, completely unsuitable (and half her age). Thrown into turmoil by their relationship, it is not until Grace arrives in the remote, unspoilt beauty of the Illyrian coast, among the wildflowers and peaceful villages, that she can truly begin to find enlightenment. Both farcically funny and full of wisdom, this is a classic novel of escape and rediscovery, set against the glorious Illyrian spring. 'Excellent . . . at once romantic and tough, absurd yet realistic, escapist yet down-to-earth.' - Jenny Uglow 'This is the most intelligently escapist novel - and scandalous for its time. What astonishes is its freshness. Reading it is like taking a holiday - although it is a serious sentimental education too.' - Kate Kellaway 'It still makes the perfect holiday read.' - Lady Magazine 'Few people can evoke the spirit of a place more vividly than Ann Bridge.' - Linda Kelly

A debut collection of short stories which range from Argentina to Siberia, Papua New Guinea, London and New York. Charged with the irrepressible human urge to connect in the face of disorientating change.

As the Second World War looms, Flavia is living in a small village in the South of France. She studies for her Oxford entrance, swims in the sea, eats at local cafes, and lives with all the confidence and relish of youth. Drawn into the demi-monde of artists and writers, Flavia is awoken to the pleasures and complications of adult life. Her world is overturned when she becomes fascinated by Andree - beautiful, sophisticated, yet manipulative - and is caught up in a devastating intrigue. This is a dramatic companion novel to A Favourite of the Gods, also published by Daunt Books. 'A powerful and merciless book - a classic coming of age novel.' - Hilary Mantel 'The lure of the sensual life, the picnics, lobster salad, hock and seltzer and going to the opera, in Italy, in summer . . .' - The Times 'A mesmerising writer.' - Nicholas Shakespeare 'There will always be people for whom her books are part of their mind's life, and people who are discovering her for the first time as if entering a lighted room.' - Victoria Glendinning 'Sophisticated . . . skilful.' - New Statesman

"e;In a crumbling park in the crumbling back end of Copacabana, a woman stopped under an almond tree with a suitcase and a cigar.That was the last time anyone saw the famous Brazilian novelist Beatriz Yagoda. Upon hearing the news of her disappearance, her American translator Emma flies immediately to Brazil. There, in the sticky, sugary heat of Rio, Emma and Beatriz's two grown children conspire to solve the author's curious disappearance. But as the trio begins to uncover the bizarre and troubling affairs Beatriz has left in her wake, they realise their search for her is far more cryptic than they could have imagined. Are the secrets to Beatriz's disappearance hidden in her enigmatic novels? Or are her words obscuring more than they reveal?Brilliant, suspenseful, and compulsively readable, Ways to Disappear is a fabulously inventive novel about the ways we do appear to each other. Both playful and profound, it is as much a mystery as it is a manifesto on the joys of translation. Idra Novey is a bold, unprecedented new voice in American fiction. 'Reads like an Ali Smith novel with a fun Brazilian noir vibe.' - Publisher's Weekly starred review'Fleet and vivid.' - The New Yorker 'Lush and tightly woven . . . charges forward with the momentum of a bullet.' - New York Times Book Review'Unlike any novel you've ever read. It's a lush page-turner, a journey into the unique madness of modern Brazil, and a joyful ride into the crazed passion of literary creation itself.' - Hector Tobar 'It's impossible to put this book down, or to shake its residue once you've finished it.' - Leslie Jamison, The Empathy Exams "e;