Recommendations based on "Exit Ghost"

Prisoner of war, optometrist, time-traveller - these are the life roles of billy pilgrim, hero of this miraculously moving, bitter and funny story of innocence faced with apocalypse slaughterhouse 5 is one of the worlds great anti-war books centring on the infamous fire-bombing of dresden in the second world war, billy pilgrims odyssey through time reflects the journey of our own fractured lives as we search for meaning in what we are afraid to know

This is the story of Aman, as told in his own words - a boy from Afghanistan fleeing the horror of the Afghan war. When a western dog shows up outside the caves where Aman lives with his mother, Aman is initially repulsed - it is not customary for people to keep dogs as pets in his part of the world. But when Aman and his mother finally decide to make a bid for freedom, the dog Aman has called Shadow will not leave their side. Soon it becomes clear: the destinies of boy and dog are linked, and always will be...

'Witty, stylish and ferociously absorbing' ObserverJean-Baptiste Grenouille is abandoned on the filthy streets of eighteenth-century Paris as a baby, but grows up to discover he has an extraordinary gift: a sense of smell more powerful than any other human's. Gradually he learns how to exploit this gift in the art of creating the most sublime perfumes in France. Yet there is one scent he cannot capture: the scent of an innocent young virgin. In order to perfect his experiments, he must have this final ingredient, at any cost. A cult international bestseller, Perfume is a bewitching, darkly humorous fable of desire, obsession and death.

The Stranger is a rite of passage for readers around the world. Since its publication in France in 1942, Camus’s novel has been translated into sixty languages and sold more than six million copies. It’s the rare novel that’s as at likely to be found in a teen’s backpack as in a graduate philosophy seminar. If the twentieth century produced a novel that could be called ubiquitous, The Stranger is it.How did a young man in his twenties who had never written a novel turn out a masterpiece that still grips readers more than seventy years later? With Looking for “The Stranger”, Alice Kaplan tells that story. In the process, she reveals Camus’s achievement to have been even more impressive—and more unlikely—than even his most devoted readers knew.Born in poverty in colonial Algeria, Camus started out as a journalist covering the criminal courts. The murder trials he attended, Kaplan shows, would be a major influence on the development and themes of The Stranger. She follows Camus to France, and, making deft use of his diaries and letters, re-creates his lonely struggle with the novel in Montmartre, where he finally hit upon the unforgettable first-person voice that enabled him to break through and complete The Stranger.Even then, the book’s publication was far from certain. France was straining under German occupation, Camus’s closest mentor was unsure of the book’s merit, and Camus himself was suffering from near-fatal tuberculosis. Yet the book did appear, thanks in part to a resourceful publisher, Gaston Gallimard, who was undeterred by paper shortages and Nazi censorship.The initial critical reception of The Stranger was mixed, and it wasn’t until after liberation that The Stranger began its meteoric rise. As France and the rest of the world began to move out of the shadow of war, Kaplan shows, Camus’s book— with the help of an aggressive marketing campaign by Knopf for their 1946 publication of the first English translation—became a critical and commercial success, and Camus found himself one of the most famous writers in the world. Suddenly, his seemingly modest tale of alienation was being seen for what it really was: a powerful parable of the absurd, an existentialist masterpiece.Few books inspire devotion and excitement the way The Stranger does. And it couldn’t have a better biographer than Alice Kaplan, whose books about twentieth-century French culture and history have won her legions of fans. No reader of Camus will want to miss this brilliant exploration.

HarperCollins is proud to present its incredible range of best-loved, essential classics.Winston Smith rewrites history. It’s his job. Hidden away in the Record Department of the sprawling Ministry of Truth, he helps the Party, and the omnipresent Big Brother, control the people of Oceania.Winston knows what a good citizen of Oceania must do: show his devotion for Big Brother and the Party; abstain from all vices; and, most importantly, possess no critical thoughts of their own. The new notebook he’s begun to write in is definitely against the rules – in fact, the Thought Police could arrest him simply for having it. Yet, as Winston begins to write his own history, a seed of rebellion begins to grow in his heart – one that could have devastating consequences.In George Orwell’s final and most well-known novel, he explores a dystopian future in which a totalitarian government controls the actions, thoughts and even emotions of its citizens, exercising power through control of language and history. Its lasting popularity is testament to Orwell’s powerful prose, and is a passionate political warning for today.

A gripping historical thriller set in 1930s Munich, Prisoner of Night and Fog is the evocative story of an ordinary girl faced with an extraordinary choice in Hitler's Germany. Fans of Code Name Verity will love this novel full of romance, danger, and intrigue!Gretchen Müller grew up in the National Socialist Party under the wing of her uncle Dolf—who has kept her family cherished and protected from that side of society ever since her father sacrificed his life for Dolf's years ago. Dolf is none other than Adolf Hitler. And Gretchen follows his every command.When she meets a fearless and handsome young Jewish reporter named Daniel Cohen, who claims that her father was actually murdered by an unknown comrade, Gretchen doesn't know what to believe. She soon discovers that beyond her sheltered view lies a world full of shadowy secrets and disturbing violence.As Gretchen's investigations lead her to question the motives and loyalties of her dearest friends and her closest family, she must determine her own allegiances—even if her choices could get her and Daniel killed.

Berlin, 1940. The city is paralysed by fear. But one man refuses to be scared. Otto, an ordinary German living in a shabby apartment block, tries to stay out of trouble under Nazi rule. But when he discovers his only son has been killed fighting at the front he's shocked into an extraordinary act of resistance, and starts to drop anonymous postcards attacking Hitler across the city. If caught, he will be executed. Soon this silent campaign comes to the attention of ambitious Gestapo inspector Escherich, and a murderous game of cat-and-mouse begins. Whoever loses, pays with their life.

"Wild Animal ticks with the precision of a well-crafted wristwatch."—Wall Street Journal From the devious mind of New York Times bestselling author Joël Dicker —master of the plot twist—comes this gripping domestic thriller that transforms into an ambitious heist mystery involving a famed Geneva jewelry boutique. On July 2, 2022, two criminals set out to rob a jewelry shop in Geneva. But even with a foolproof plan, their “perfect” heist will prove far from uneventful. . . . Twenty days earlier, on a luxurious estate along the shores of Lake Geneva, Sophie Braun prepares to celebrate her fortieth birthday. Her life seems perfect: she has a fairytale marriage, two perfect children, and lives in a stylish modern mansion surrounded by lush forest. But her idyllic world is about to crumble. Her husband is becoming embroiled in petty schemes. Her neighbor, a policeman with a spotless reputation, is obsessed with her and spies on the most intimate moments of her life. Then, on her birthday, she receives a gift from a mysterious prowler that endangers her life. It will take many journeys into the past, far from Geneva, to unravel the origins of this diabolical plot from which no one will emerge unscathed, including readers. Told at a breathtaking pace, filled with nerve-jangling suspense, Wild Animal demonstrates once again why Joël Dicker—since the publication of The Truth About the Harry Quebert Case—reigns supreme as one of the most beloved contemporary mystery writers in the world today. Translated from the French by Robert Bononno

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Originally published in 1941, Arthur Koestler's modern masterpiece, "Darkness At Noon," is a powerful and haunting portrait of a Communist revolutionary caught in the vicious fray of the Moscow show trials of the late 1930s. During Stalin's purges, Nicholas Rubashov, an aging revolutionary, is imprisoned and psychologically tortured by the party he has devoted his life to. Under mounting pressure to confess to crimes he did not commit, Rubashov relives a career that embodies the ironies and betrayals of a revolutionary dictatorship that believes it is an instrument of liberation. A seminal work of twentieth-century literature, "Darkness At Noon" is a penetrating exploration of the moral danger inherent in a system that is willing to enforce its beliefs by any means necessary.