New Release Books by Claire Allen

This book analyses London fiction at the millennium, reading it in relation to an exploration of a theoretical positioning beyond the postmodern. It explores how a selection of novels can be considered as “second-wave” or “post-postmodern” in light of their borrowing more from mainstream and classical genres as opposed to formally experimental avant-garde techniques. It considers how writers utilise the cultural capital of London in a process of relocating marginalized, subjugated or under-represented voices. The millennium provides an apt symbolic opportunity to reflect on British fiction and to consider the direction in which contemporary authors are moving. As such, key novels by Martin Amis, Bella Bathurst, Bernardine Evaristo, Mark Haddon, Nick Hornby, Hanif Kureishi, Andrea Levy, Gautam Malkani, Timothy Mo, Will Self, Ali Smith, Zadie Smith, Rupert Thomson, and Sarah Waters are used to explore writing beyond the postmodern. ‘In this significant and welcome contribution to the field, Allen provides us with a sophisticated, detailed, and rigorous study of the move in contemporary fiction beyond postmodernism as exemplified by London fiction.’ —Nick Hubble, Brunel University London, UK

All Annie Delaney wants is her happy ever after. A big dress. A big day. A big commitment. She even has a scrapbook filled to bursting with ideas for her dream day, her dream home and her dream man. But the man on her is less a dream than a nightmare and as for the man currently in her bed - well, that's a whole other disaster in the making.

Marina is homeless, and struggling to keep her toddler son, Oscar, out of care. Liam has received a letter from the father he has not seen for twenty years - the father who is in prison for his mother's murder. Hannah is an elderly widow running a Bed and Breakfast peopled by memories rather than guests. Swallowed up again by the pain of his childhood, Liam flees to the coast. Marina steals a dealer's stash of money and takes a train to the remotest spot she can find, where she quickly encounters Hannah. Hannah can see that Marina is trouble, but loses her heart to Oscar, and cannot resist taking them in. So three lives unexpectedly intersect. But will they find a way through their fears and suspicions to help each other?

The Mountain of Light, a London Indian Restaurant, is Balu's great love, the delicious kulfis and dansaks he devises in its kitchen his sole connection to the land of his childhood. When a young woman, Sarah, rents the flat upstairs, she, her boyfriend Jude, and Hari, a waiter, begin to gather after hours to chat around Balu's tables, though Jude's jealousy of Hari threatens their circle. Meanwhile Jozef, an elderly Polish man, begins to reveal a heartbreaking story to Sarah, and so inspires a journey that will lead her to discover where - and with whom - she really belongs.