Books published by publisher Faber and Faber

Set in mid-1970s india, a fine balance is a subtle and compelling narrative about four unlikely characters who come together in circumstances no one could have foreseen soon after the government declares a 'state of internal emergency'. It is a breathtaking achievement: panoramic yet humane, intensely political yet rich with local delight; and, above all, compulsively readable.

Nothing happens, nobody comes, nobody goes, it's awful.' This line from the play was adopted by Jean Anouilh to characterize the first production of Waiting for Godot at the Théâtre de Babylone in 1953. He went on to predict that the play would, in time, represent the most important premiere to be staged in Paris for forty years. Nobody acquainted with Beckett's masterly black comedy would now question this prescient recognition of a classic of twentieth-century literature.

The top ten bestseller from the Nobel Prize-winning author of The Remains of the DayShortlisted for the Man Booker PrizeIn one of the most acclaimed novels of recent years, Kazuo Ishiguro imagines the lives of a group of students growing up in a darkly skewed version of contemporary England. Narrated by Kathy, now thirty-one, Never Let Me Go dramatises her attempts to come to terms with her childhood at the seemingly idyllic Hailsham School and with the fate that has always awaited her and her closest friends in the wider world. A story of love, friendship and memory, Never Let Me Go is charged throughout with a sense of the fragility of life.

Since it was first published in 1954, William Golding's classic debut novel has remained a stark allegory of civilization, survival, and human nature. As dystopian stories like Hunger Games and Battle Royale surge in popularity, this haunting tale of a group of young boys stranded on a desert island still captivates schoolchildren around the world, raising timeless and profound questions about how easily society can slip into chaos and savagery when rules and order have been abandoned. When a plane crashes on a remote island, a small group of schoolboys are the sole survivors. From the prophetic Simon and virtuous Ralph to the lovable Piggy and brutish Jack, each of the boys attempts to establish control as the reality- and brutal savagery-of their situation sets in.A teacher himself, Golding clearly understood how to interest children with a gripping story and strong, sympathetic characters. The novel serves as a catalyst for thought-provoking discussion and analysis of universal issues, not only concerning the capabilities of humans for good and evil and the fragility of moral inhibition, but beyond. The boys' struggle to find a way of existing in a community with no fixed boundaries invites readers to evaluate the concepts involved in social and political constructs and moral frameworks. Symbolism is strong throughout, revealing both the boys' capacity for empathy and hope, as well as illuminating the darkest corners of the human spirit. Ideas of community, leadership, and the rule of law are called into question as the reader has to consider who has a right to power, why, and what the consequences of the acquisition of power may be. Often compared to Catcher in the Rye, Lord of the Flies also represents a coming-of-age story of innocence lost.

These thirty stories, selected and introduced by fellow crime writer and lawyer Michael Gilbert, are a terrific introduction to Cyril Hare's inventive and clever Golden Age detective fiction, which often turns on an ingenious use of the law. Born in 1900, Hare was a barrister and judge and only began writing at the age of thirty-six. Some of his first short stories were published in Punch and he went on to write nine novels including his most famous, Tragedy at Law. Two of the stories in this collection feature Francis Pettigrew, a barrister and amateur detective who appeared in several of Hare's novels and was perhaps his best-loved creation. 'Dazzlingly ingenious.' Sunday Times 'Of Cyril Hare's detective stories my only complaint is, that they are too infrequent.' Tatler 'A master of the short story.' Spectator 'Neat, taut and sufficiently dipped in irony to give a sharp tang to the quirks of love and life.' Glasgow Herald

As portrayed in Homer's Odyssey, Penelope - wife of Odysseus and cousin of the beautiful Helen of Troy - has become a symbol of wifely duty and devotion, enduring twenty years of waiting when her husband goes to fight in the Trojan War. As she fends off the attentions of a hundred greedy suitors, travelling minstrels regale her with news of Odysseus' epic adventures around the Mediterranean - slaying monsters and grappling with amorous goddesses. When Odysseus finally comes home, he kills her suitors and then, in an act that served as little more than a footnote in Homer's original story, inexplicably hangs Penelope's twelve maids. Now, Penelope and her chorus of wronged maids tell their side of the story in a new stage version by Margaret Atwood, adapted from her own wry, witty and wise novel.

As portrayed in Homer's Odyssey, Penelope - wife of Odysseus and cousin of the beautiful Helen of Troy - has become a symbol of wifely duty and devotion, enduring twenty years of waiting when her husband goes to fight in the Trojan War. As she fends off the attentions of a hundred greedy suitors, travelling minstrels regale her with news of Odysseus' epic adventures around the Mediterranean - slaying monsters and grappling with amorous goddesses. When Odysseus finally comes home, he kills her suitors and then, in an act that served as little more than a footnote in Homer's original story, inexplicably hangs Penelope's twelve maids.Now, Penelope and her chorus of wronged maids tell their side of the story in a new stage version by Margaret Atwood, adapted from her own wry, witty and wise novel.The Penelopiad premiered with the Royal Shakespeare Company in association with Canada's National Arts Centre at the Swan Theatre, Stratford-upon-Avon, in July 2007.

'In 1958 - the year in which Krushchev came to power in Russia, the year after Eden's resignation over Suez, two years after John Osborne's "Look Back in Anger" - the last of the debutantes, myself among them, went to the Palace to curtsey to the Queen.' Fiona MacCarthy and her fellow 'debs' were taking part in one of the final rituals of aristocratic power. The system had been in operation almost unchanged since the eighteenth-century. It was a female rite of passage, an elaborate initiation ceremony marking the emergence of the virgin out of the schoolroom and into society at the marriageable age of seventeen. But that year, in 1958, it was drawing to a close. Under pressure to shine - not least from their mothers - the girls were somewhere between teenagers and clones of the Queen herself. Still the focus for newspaper diarists and society photographers, these young women participated in a party season stretching for months among the great houses of London and the Home Counties. Yet behind all the grandeur lay anxiety and making-do, as many families struggled to maintain the splendour of former times. Filtered through some of its most colourful and eccentric inhabitants, from Lady Caroline Lamb in the eighteenth-century to Princess Diana in the twentieth, "Last Curtsey" is a riveting portrait of Britain as both empire and the customs and certainties of the old order came to an end.

Boxed set of the three books in the first 'Adventures of Eddie Dickens' series. Join Eddie Dickens in a nineteenth-century world of blotchy skin, runaway orphans, eccentric relatives and a stuffed stoat called Malcolm. Contains paperbacks of 'Awful End', 'Dreadful Acts' and 'Terrible Times'. Philip Ardagh introduces us to Eddie Dickens and his crazy family, his parents, Mad Uncle Jack and Even Madder Aunt Maud with her stuffed stoat called Malcolm. Hilarious and nefarious.

From P.D. James, one of the masters of British crime fiction, comes the debut novel that introduced Scotland Yard detective Adam Dalgliesh. Set in the peaceful English countryside, Cover Her Face is a classic murder mystery. St Cedd's Church fête has been held in the grounds of Martingale manor house for generations. As if organising stalls, as well as presiding over luncheon, the bishop and the tea tent, were not enough for Mrs Eleanor Maxie on that mellow July afternoon, she also has to contend with the news of her son's sudden engagement to the new parlour maid, Sally Jupp. On the following morning Martingale and the village are shocked by the discovery of Sally's body. Investigating the violent death at the manor house, Detective Chief Inspector Adam Dalgliesh becomes embroiled in the complicated passions beneath the calm surface of English country life. In Cover Her Face, award-winning P.D. James (author of Death Comes to Pemberley, The Murder Room and Children of Men) plots a complex story of family secrets and suspicion. Meet the dark and brooding Dalgliesh - a gentleman, a poet, and a gifted detective-and read the novel that launched P.D. James's career as the world's pre-eminent crime writer.

"The flames now appeared to lift from individual treetops in showers of orange sparks, exploding the way a pine log does in a campfire when it is poked. The sparks spiralled upward in swirls like funnel clouds. Twisters of brightness against grey sky."On the Appalachian Mountains above her home, a young mother discovers a beautiful and terrible marvel of nature: the monarch butterflies have not migrated south for the winter this year. Is this a miraculous message from God, or a spectacular sign of climate change. Entomology expert, Ovid Byron, certainly believes it is the latter. He ropes in Dellarobia to help him decode the mystery of the monarch butterflies.Flight Behaviour has featured on the NY Times bestseller list and is Barbara Kingsolver's most accessible novel yet.