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Daunt Books Children's Short Story Competition 2013

Northern Europe

• Scandinavia
• Great Britain
• Ireland

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  London Fields by Martin Amis

  Price: £7.99    Add to Basket

  Sam Young, a dying American writer, decides to tell the story of three characters he meets in a pub, the boozy lout, the sexual deviant and upper-class wimp. Funny, while being forebodingly apocalyptic and rather light on plot.

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  Night Haunts: A Journey Through the London Night by Sukhdev Sandhu

  Price: £7.99    Add to Basket

  A truly wonderful, evocative little book about exploring London at night. Sukhdev Sandhu roams the streets meeting security guards, zookeepers, marine patrols and pirate DJs. Short works of reportage where his elegant, lyrical prose elevates each piece to the level of a short story.

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  Hackney, That Rose-red Empire by Iain Sinclair

  Price: £10.99    Add to Basket

  In an impassioned cry intended for the ears of the Olympic committee, Iain Sinclair has written an ode to the borough in which he has lived and roamed for 40 years. A lively combination of his own musings and interviews with local artists, musicians, writers and anarchists.

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  The Buddha of Suburbia by Hanif Kureishi

  Price: £7.99    Add to Basket

  A coming-of-age novel based on Hanif Kureishi's own experiences growing up in suburban London in the 1980s. Funny, absurd and embarrassing as all tales of teenage angst should be and one of the first literary representations of a modern, multicultural London.

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  Lost London by Philip Davies

  Price: £29.99    Add to Basket

  A fascinating and surprisingly moving book of black and white photographs featuring the houses, factories, churches and streets of London which no longer exist. Endlessly absorbing, it is a great present for any Londoner. Please note that this book is extremely heavy, so we will have to add approximately £5 postage.

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  Hawksmoor by Peter Ackroyd

  Price: £8.99    Add to Basket

  A classic from Ackroyd and considered by Penguin to be part of the 'Decades' series - novels that have shaped modern Britain. Inspired by the urban myth that six of Wren's London churches form a sinister matrix, he retells the story of their design and execution while simultaneously describing a series of gruesome murders discovered in modern-day London.

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  The Lonely Londoners by Sam Selvon

  Price: £8.99    Add to Basket

  A rare voice describing the West Indian immigrant experience of the 1950s. Sam Selvon tells the story of Moses, a Trinidadian living in London, and his relationships with other West Indian immigrants who flow in and out of his life. A novel about dreams and their disillusionment, at times funny and yet achingly sad.

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  Mrs Dalloway by Virginia Woolf

  Price: £8.99    Add to Basket

  Mrs Dalloway is preparing a party but her carefully controlled existence is thrown awry by the arrival of an old lover. Septimus Warren Smith, a man deeply scarred by his experience in the trenches, reaches the peak of a nervous breakdown. An utterly remarkable piece of fiction where two entirely separate lives take their course over a summer's day in London, linked only by the sounds and smells of the city.

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  Men and the Fields by Adrian Bell

  Price: £10.00    Add to Basket

  A lovely new edition of Adrian Bell's travels through rural East Anglia during the 1930s and 1940s. A precious literary monument to traditional farming and a lost way of life.

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  The Go-Between by L. P. Hartley

  Price: £8.99    Add to Basket

  A summer spent in Norfolk in 1900 when twelve year-old Leo, bored and eager to impress, ferries love letters between his host's sister and her secret lover, has disastrous consequences. An evocative tale of doom set in a time of strict social and moral codes and on the eve of the two World Wars.

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  Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro

  Price: £7.99    Add to Basket

  A masterpiece in subtlety and in expressing the heart-break of missed opportunities, a butler recalls his younger life working in an English stately house before the war, before the demise of the English aristocracy and recalls his housekeeper, Miss Kenton. A beautifully-written guide to English reserve.

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  The Cranford Chronicles by Elizabeth Gaskell

  Price: £6.99    Add to Basket

  A delightful novel set in Cheshire, which recounts episodes in the lives of three women of the community and their friends. Gently satirical, amusing and deeply touching.

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  Middlemarch by George Eliot

  Price: £7.99    Add to Basket

  A wonderful novel which tells the story of the young, intelligent Dorothea Brooke and her neighbours, who live in a provincial town possibly based on Coventry. The superb writing and the psychological depth with which George Eliot bestows upon her characters and their struggles in a time of astounding social and cultural change make this an absolute joy to read.

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  Scotland by Michelin

  Price: £4.99    Add to Basket

  A reliable road map of the entire country although any walker should pick the appropriate OS map for serious detail.

  Map scale: 1: 400 000

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  44 Scotland Street by Alexander McCall Smith

  Price: £7.99    Add to Basket

  The first in a series of books Alexander McCall Smith serialised for the Scotsman newspaper. A warm, comfortable and entertaining novel about a building in Edinburgh and its occupants.

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  The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie by Muriel Spark

  Price: £7.99    Add to Basket

  In the prim, puritanical world of 1930s Edinburgh, the powerful, Miss Jean Brodie evokes passion, controversy and adoration in six of her pupils until one of them betrays her. A subtle and intriguing novel about growing up, sexual awakening and control over impressionable young minds.

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  Lanark by Alasdair Gray

  Price: £8.99    Add to Basket

  A new edition of Alasdair Gray's cult, postmodern classic, introduced by William Boyd. The novel's four books follow the lives of the young, disassociated Lanark through a dark dystopia, and Duncan Thaw, a frustrated artist growing up in pre-War Glasgow.

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  Greenvoe by George Mackay Brown

  Price: £6.99    Add to Basket

  A week in the life of a small, fictional, Orkney community coming to terms with a potential military project which may threaten their way of life. A wonderful book which glorifies Orkney culture, weaving into the plot elements of folklore, custom, myth and legend.

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  The Mabinogion

  Price: £12.99    Add to Basket

  A lovely hardback edition and a fresh new translation of the The Mabinogion tales, 11 Welsh medieval stories of myth and enchantment.

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  Wales by Michelin

  Price: £4.99    Add to Basket

  The best road map to cover the whole of Wales, although we recommend walkers pick the appropriate OS map for serious detail.

  Map scale: 1: 400 000

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  Wales by Jan Morris

  Price: £12.99    Add to Basket

  A rich, passionate and anecdotal cultural and natural history of Wales up to the creation of the Welsh Assembly. Accompanied by dramatic black and white photographs, it is more of a travel book through time than an academic history.

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  On the Black Hill by Bruce Chatwin

  Price: £7.99    Add to Basket

  One of our favourite novels and an ode to the Welsh countryside, it is the simple story of twin brothers growing up together on an isolated farm dealing with the frustrations and minutiae of everyday rural life.

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  The Book of Ebenezer Le Page by G. B. Edwards

  Price: £10.99    Add to Basket

  Ebenezer Le Page is a passionate elderly everyman who in Edward's enduring classic strikes up a meandering conversation with the reader about his life and Guernsey's occupation by the Nazis. An engaging and moving masterpiece, a history of both a man and an island, it comes highly recommended.

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  The Empty Family by Colm Toibin

  Price: £8.99    Add to Basket

  Another exquisite collection of nine stories from the great Toibin. Reminiscent of William Trevor, they speak of quiet yearning, loneliness and family relationships.

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  Connemara: Listening to the Wind by Tim Robinson

  Price: £8.99    Add to Basket

  In the first of his Connemara trilogy, Tim Robinson describes the history, folklore and geography of this region of Western Ireland. His exquisite turn of phrase and poetic style make reading this a sublime experience. Highly recommended.