Truly Madly Guilty – Liane Moriarty

Praised by Stephen King as ‘funny and scary’ and likened to ‘drinking a pink cosmo laced with arsenic’ by USA Today, Truly Madly Guilty is a gripping, clever novel by the bestselling author of Big Little Lies.

When an incident occurs at a backyard barbeque in suburban Sydney, friends are drawn apart as they deeply regret what they did and didn’t do that afternoon.

Liane Moriarty skillfully shows readers how guilt can expose the fault lines in any relationship, and it is not until we appreciate the fragility of life that we can truly value what we have.

 The Girl Before – JP Delaney

Jane stumbles on the rental opportunity of a lifetime: the chance to live in a beautiful ultra-minimalist house designed by an enigmatic architect, on the condition she abides by a long list of  rules. After moving in, she discovers that a previous tenant of One Folgate Street, Emma, met a mysterious death there – and starts to wonder if her own story will be a re-run of the girl before.

As each twist catches the reader off guard, Emma’s past and Jane’s present become increasingly interwoven in this thrilling portrayal of psychological obsession.

The Art of the Good Life – Rolf Dobelli

From the bestselling author of The Art of Thinking Clearly, which was translated into more than 40 languages and sold more than 2.5 million copies internationally, comes The Art of the Good Life, an indispensable toolkit for practical living.

As humans, we are inclined to wonder what it means to live a good life, asking ourselves, what will truly make us happy, how much should we earn, how should we spend our time?

Rolf Dobelli’s helpful novel provides readers with fifty-two shortcuts to improve decision-making in home and work situations.  While they may not guarantee a good life, but they will certainly give you a better chance.

 One Italian Summer – Pip Williams

Pip and Shannon wanted to slow down, grow their own food, and spend more time with their loved ones. However, responsibilities got in the way, so they decided to uproot their lives in search for la dolce vita in Italy.

One Italian Summer is a warm, moving and funny tale of one family’s search for a better way of living in the homes and on the farms of strangers. Pip sleeps in a woodshed, feasts under a Tuscan sun, works like a tractor in Calabria and, eventually, finds her dream – though it’s not at all the one she expected.

Lincoln in the Bardo – George Saunders

Heralded a ‘masterpiece’ by Zadie Smith, ‘breathtaking’ by The Observer, and ‘a tour de force’ by The Sunday Times, George Saunders’ bestselling novel and Booker Prize-winning Lincoln in the Bardo is an outstanding, original debut that borrows from history and enters the supernatural.

Following his death at the young age of eleven, President Lincoln’s son Willie finds himself trapped in a transitional realm between death and rebirth, referred to in Tibetan tradition as the ‘bardo’.  It is in this intermediate state that ghosts mingle, complain, quarrel and commiserate, and an epic struggle erupts over Willie’s soul.

Saunders’ unforgettable novel shows the interplay between the living and the dead, and the historical and the fictional, and poses the timeless question: how do we live and love when we know that everything we hold dear must end?

Sapiens – Yuval Noah Harari

Praised by the likes of Bill Gates and Barack Obama for both its focus ‘on the power of stories and myths to bring people together’, and its ability to ‘give you a sense of how briefly we’ve been on this Earth’, Yuval Noah Harari’s bestselling history of our species, Sapiens will make readers question everything they know about humankind.

John Gray from Financial Times stated that Sapiens ‘is packed with heretical thinking and surprising facts’, and was a ‘riveting, myth-busting book’.  John Carey from The Sunday Times believed it was ‘the sort of book that sweeps the cobwebs out of your brain’, while Esther Rantzen from Mail on Sunday compared reading Sapiens to ‘having a mental massage, cold shower and brisk workout, all in the comfort of your own home’.