category: Fiction

Nayan Olak keeps seeing Helen Fletcher around town and on his daily run out to the Peaks. She’s come back to the old house at the end of the lane, with her teenaged son, Brandon, though nobody seems to remember much about her. Some trouble at school, back in the day. A certain defensiveness. Nayan is powerfully drawn to her, though he doesn’t quite know why.

He hasn’t risked love since he lost his young family in a terrible accident twenty years before. All his energy has gone into work at the union, where he’s now running for the leadership against accomplished newcomer, Megha. It’s a huge moment for Nayan, the culmination of everything he believes. But as he grows closer to Helen, and to the possibility that their pasts may have been connected, much more is suddenly threatened than his chances of winning.

Sunjeev Sahota is the highly acclaimed author of OURS ARE THE STREETS, THE YEAR OF THE RUNAWAYS and CHINA ROOMS. THE YEAR OF THE RUNAWAYS was shortlisted for the 2015 Booker Prize and the International Dylan Thomas Prize, and won the Encore Prize, the South Bank Sky Arts Award, and the European Union Prize for Literature. CHINA ROOM was shortlisted for the Rathbones Folio Prize and longlisted for the 2021 Booker Prize, the RSL Ondaatje Prize and the Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction. Sahota was chosen as one of the Granta Best of Young British Novelists 2013 and is a fellow of the RSL. He lives in Sheffield and teaches at Durham University. The Spoiled Heart is his fourth novel.

An atmospheric tale of loss and second chances that weaves together the stories of two women, Eliza and Iris, whose past mistakes bring them to London, and specifically, to the Hampstead Ponds, where both swim each morning. Told in the present day with flashbacks to 1995 school years, there’s a strong YA element, and Iris’ story introduces an unexplored take on missing people and how they are found again.

How long would you let someone else’s secret control your life?

Eliza has lived two lives – one before she fell into an obsessive teenage friendship with twins Eric and Maggie, and the one after it was destroyed in a single afternoon.

To Eliza, Eric and Maggie were irreplaceable, so she hasn’t. Instead, drifting through life alone, she works as a teacher, living in an isolated cottage on the edge of Hampstead Heath, spending every morning diving into her memories as she swims in the Ponds – her guilt never far below the surface.

Twenty years might have passed, yet Eliza still can’t help searching for Maggie everywhere. Then one day she spots a woman who looks just like her. Eliza has spent half her life wondering what really happened that afternoon and if Maggie is back, will it help her finally get answers?

But memories are deceptive, like ripples on water. As the past and present collide, Eliza begins to wonder: will learning the truth set her free – or will it only drag her down deeper?

When she’s not writing fiction, Hilary Tailor runs a design consultancy, specialising in colour and trend forecasting. She has worked with adidas and Puma and sits on the Pantone View colour committee. Hilary was raised on the Wirral Peninsula and graduated from the Royal College of Art. Her debut novel, The Vanishing Tide, was published in 2022 and has thousands of five-star reviews. Where Water Lies is her second novel. Hilary is represented by Rebecca Ritchie at AM Heath.

Sophia, Safa, Ella, Ajola and Caoimhe have been friends since school. Difficult, unlikeable women; funny sharp and clever ones. The sort that would have probably ended up burned at the stake, a few hundred years ago. They know exactly how dangerous it is to be this sort of woman – and when one of them is about to be framed for murder, they know exactly what to do.

After inextricably binding their fates together via some bin bags, a spade and a stone circle, the women must separate their lives, leaving each of them navigating the daily challenges of womanhood alone and in their own way. But when old secrets start to re-emerge, the group must come back together to get their stories straight – and find out who it is that seems to know the truth.

Surviving the patriarchy can be hard, but burying it isn’t easy either…

Marie O’Hare is 34 years old and splits her time between teaching, competing in cross-country running events and raising her 5-year-old son in a dual Irish and British Pakistani family. She was recently awarded a Master’s with Distinction in Novel Writing from Middlesex University. She is represented by Claire Wilson at RCW Literary Agency.

Outside the island there is nothing: the world destroyed by a fog that swept the planet, killing anyone it touched. On the island: it is idyllic. 122 villagers and 3 scientists, living in peaceful harmony. The villagers are content to fish, farm and feast, to obey their nightly curfew, to do what they’re told by the scientists.

But the security system has also wiped everyone’s memories of exactly what happened the night before, which means that someone on the island is a murderer – and they don’t even know it.

Stuart is the author of a high-concept crime novel and lives in London with his amazing wife and two little girls, and drinks lots of tea. Stuart’s debut novel, The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle, was published in 2018 by Bloomsbury and his second, The Devil and the Dark Water​, in October 2020, which also been under option for Film/TV. He is represented for publishing by Harry Illingworth at DHH Literary Agency.