New Releases by Barry Unsworth

When the prim and proper head teacher, Rosemary Timmins, witnesses her retired neighbour's sudden collapse, she must inform the woman's husband - the formidable Major Scott Cooper. But his reaction to the news is certainly not what she expected...

A husband and wife attend a function at which they hope the husband will be made president of a large charity organisation. As the night wears on and the wife sees the husband do something rather shocking in public, she begins to question what really is important, as well as asking herself what is important in her marriage and their lives together, too.

Winner of the Booker Prize A historical novel set in the eighteenth century, Sacred Hunger is a stunning, engrossing exploration of power, domination, and greed in the British Empire as it entered fully into the slave trade and spread it throughout its colonies. Barry Unsworth follows the failing fortunes of William Kemp, a merchant pinning his last chance to a slave ship; his son who needs a fortune because he is in love with an upper-class woman; and his nephew who sails on the ship as its doctor because he has lost all he has loved. The voyage meets its demise when disease spreads among the slaves and the captain's drastic response provokes a mutiny. Joining together, the sailors and the slaves set up a secret, utopian society in the wilderness of Florida, only to await the vengeance of the single-minded, young Kemp.

Barry Unsworth’s Losing Nelson is a novel of obsession, the story of a man unable to see himself separately from the hero he mistakenly idolizes Admiral Lord Nelson. Charles Cleasby is, in fact, a Nelson biographer run amok. He is convinced that Nelson—Britain's greatest admiral, who finally defeated Napoleon, and lost his own life, in the Battle of Trafalgar—is the perfect hero, but in his research he has come upon an incident of horrifying brutality in Nelson's military career that simply stumps all attempts at glorification.

Barry Unsworth returns to the terrain of his Booker Prize-winning novel Sacred Hunger, this time following Sullivan, the Irish fiddler, and Erasmus Kemp, son of a Liverpool slave ship owner who hanged himself. It is the spring of 1767, and to avenge his father's death, Erasmus Kemp has had the rebellious sailors of his father's ship, including Sullivan, brought back to London to stand trial on charges of mutiny and piracy. But as the novel opens, a blithe Sullivan has escaped and is making his way on foot to the north of England, stealing as he goes and sleeping where he can. His destination is Thorpe in the East Durham coalfields, where his dead shipmate, Billy Blair, lived: he has pledged to tell the family how Billy met his end. In this village, Billy's sister, Nan, and her miner husband, James Bordon, live with their three sons, all destined to follow their father down the pit. The youngest, only seven, is enjoying his last summer aboveground. Meanwhile, in London, a passionate anti-slavery campaigner, Frederick Ashton, gets involved in a second case relating to the lost ship. Erasmus Kemp wants compensation for the cargo of sick slaves who were thrown overboard to drown, and Ashton is representing the insurers who dispute his claim. Despite their polarized views on slavery, Ashton's beautiful sister, Jane, encounters Erasmus Kemp and finds herself powerfully attracted to him. Lord Spenton, who owns coal mines in East-Durham, has extravagant habits and is pressed for money. When he applies to the Kemp merchant bank for a loan, Erasmus sees a business opportunity of the kind he has long been hoping for, a way of gaining entry into Britain's rapidly developing and highly profitable coal and steel industries. Thus he too makes his way north, to the very same village that Sullivan is heading for . . . With historical sweep and deep pathos, Unsworth explores the struggles of the powerless and the captive against the rich and the powerful, and what weight mercy may throw on the scales of justice.

Durante o reinado dos reis normandos, na Sicília do século XII, romanos, gregos, árabes e judeus convivem em harmonia. O jovem normando Thurstan Beauchamp trabalha para Yusuf, um muçulmano que controla as finanças do reino. Considerado um servo leal, Thurstan é destacado para desbaratar uma conspiração contra o rei. Em suas andanças, reencontra uma antiga paixão e conhece a misteriosa e sensual dançarina Nesrin. Thurstan se vê em uma verdadeira odisseia espiritual, na qual questiona a natureza de suas ambições e a insensatez da reverência pela autoridade real.

Barry Unsworth, a writer with an “almost magical capacity for literary time travel” (New York Times Book Review) has the extraordinary ability to re-create the past and make it relevant to contemporary readers. In Land of Marvels, a thriller set in 1914, he brings to life the schemes and double-dealings of Western nations grappling for a foothold in Mesopotamia (now Iraq) in the dying days of the Ottoman Empire. Somerville, a British archaeologist, is excavating a long-buried Assyrian palace. The site lies directly in the path of a new railroad to Baghdad, and he watches nervously as the construction progresses, threatening to destroy his discovery. The expedition party includes Somerville’s beautiful, bored wife, Edith; Patricia, a smart young graduate student; and Jehar, an Arab man-of-all-duties whose subservient manner belies his intelligence and ambitions. Posing as an archaeologist, an American geologist from an oil company arrives one day and insinuates himself into the group. But he’s not the only one working undercover to stake a claim on Iraq’s rich oil fields. Historical fiction at its finest, Land of Marvels opens a window on the past and reveals its lasting impact.

1149. Turstin, fils d'un chevalier normand, voit son destin contrarié. Il aurait lui aussi voulu porter les armes mais un revers de fortune paternel en a décidé autrement. À Palerme, le jeune homme est " pourvoyeur de plaisirs " à la cour de Roger de Hauteville, roi de Sicile. Bientôt, il se trouve partagé entre son amour d'enfance pour dame Alice - de retour de Terre sainte - et son attirance envers la sensuelle Nesrin, danseuse qu'il a fait venir à la cour. S'apercevra-t-il à temps que l'une des deux le manipule ? Qu'il est le jouet d'un complot menaçant le trône ? Se déroulant à une époque de croisades et de guerres de religion, le roman de Barry Unsworth témoigne d'une connaissance subtile de la Sicile médiévale.

Set in the Middle Ages during the brief yet glittering rule of the Norman kings, this work is a tale in which the conflicts of the past portend the present. Unsworth transports the reader to a distant past filled with deception and mystery, and whose racial, tribal, and religious tensions are still present.

Renowned British novelist Unsworth documents his fascinating travels in Crete, largest of the Greek isles and home to the Minoan civilization of 1500 B.C.--one of the most glittering and sophisticated cultures the world has ever seen.

Audacieuse fresque historique saluée comme un chef d'œuvre par la presse britannique, La Folie Nelson est un roman littéraire foisonnant où s'entremêlent les hauts faits d'un personnage prestigieux de l'Angleterre du XVIIIe siècle et le triste destin de l'un de ses admirateurs. En juin 1799, lors de l'assaut d'une forteresse napolitaine, l'amiral Nelson fit exécuter des rebelles à qui il avait promis la vie sauve. Un acte de trahison qui portera un coup funeste à l'admirable carrière du vainqueur de Trafalgar... Deux siècles plus tard, à Londres, un homme, indigné par cette interprétation de l'histoire, écrit une biographie à la gloire de l'amiral. Charles Cleasby, très tôt orphelin de mère comme son idole, convaincu d'être le double obscur de ce héros dont il reproduit inlassablement les exploits navals dans le sous-sol de sa maison victorienne, se sent investi d'une mission vitale : prouver l'innocence de lord Nelson. Mais tandis que sa secrétaire, miss Lily, émet des réserves sur la bravoure du grand homme, Charles lui-même découvre certains faits qui viennent ternir l'image de son icône. Peu à peu s'engage en lui une douloureuse bataille opposant le maître et le disciple, la réalité et la fiction, les ténèbres et la lumière, premiers signes d'une folie qui le conduira à commettre l'irréparable...

A "powerfully done" ("Times Literary Supplement") and tantalizingly semi-autobiographical novel from the author of the Booker Prize-winning "Sacred Heart".

This early work by Booker Prize-winning author Barry Unsworth chronicles one of his literary obsessions--the corruption of innocence--and forms it into a compelling contemporary narrative set in the rambling, overgrown grounds of an English estate. When a good-looking gardener begins work at their estate, the two women of the household find themselves falling under the potent spell of his strength and seeming innocence.

The year is 1908, the place, a small Greek island in the declining days of the crumbling Ottoman Empire. For twenty years Basil Pascali has spied on the people of his small community and secretly reported on their activities to the authorities in Constantinople. Although his reports are never acknowledged, never acted upon, he has received regular payment for his work. Now he fears that the villagers have found him out and he becomes engulfed in paranoia. In the midst of his panic, a charming Englishman arrives on the island claiming to be an archaeologist, and charms his way into the heart of the woman for whom Pascali pines. A complex game is played out between the two where cunning and betrayal may come to haunt them both. Pascali's Island was made into a feature film starring Ben Kingsley and Helen Mirren.

In 1908 Englishman Robert Markham is appointed to the British legation in Turkey.