The Puppet Boy of Warsaw - Eva Weaver
This is the story of Mika, a Jewish boy who inherits a coat from his grandfather and discovers a puppet in one of its many secret pockets. He becomes a puppeteer in the Warsaw ghetto, but when his talent is discovered, Mika is forced to entertain the occupying German troops instead of his countrymen.
It is also the story of Max, a German soldier stationed in Warsaw, whose experiences in Poland and later in Siberia's Gulag show a different side to the Second World War.
The Marriage Game - Alison Weir
Bestselling historian Alison Weir brings all her knowledge of Elizabeth I to vivid life in a novel of intrigue, sex, plots, mysteries and tragedies, amid all the colour and pageantry of the Tudor court.
The Island of Doctor Moreau - H.G. Wells
Prendick, a naturalist, is shipwrecked on the island retreat of notorious vivisector, Dr Moreau.
In a laboratory called the House of Pain, Moreau manufactures 'humanised' animals known as the Beast People, whom he controls through fear - until the terrifying day when one of his degraded victims turns against him.
The War of the Worlds - H.G. Wells
The first modern depiction of extra-terrestrials attacking the earth, The War of the Worlds remains one of the most influential of all science-fiction works.
It shows the whole of human civilization under threat, as terrifying, tentacled Martians land in England, build gigantic killing machines, destroy all in their path with black gas and burning rays and feast on the warm blood of trapped, still-living human prey. The forces of the Earth, however, may prove harder to beat than they at first appear.
The Underground Railroad - Colson Whitehead
Cora is a slave on a cotton plantation in Georgia. All the slaves lead a hellish existence, but Cora has it worse than most; she is an outcast even among her fellow Africans and she is approaching womanhood, where it is clear even greater pain awaits.
When Caesar, a slave recently arrived from Virginia, tells her about the Underground Railroad, they take the perilous decision to escape to the North.