‘It didn’t take long for the citizens of Moscow to realize that if you had no choice but to stand in line, then Pushkin was the man to stand next to.’A new story by the New York Times best-selling novelist Amor Towles, featured in Granta 148: Summer Fiction.

    But then a tragic accident changes Huw's life and he must move abroad. Fifty years later, Huw and Megan finally meet again. Both their lives have changed and Megan is about to get married. Can Huw convince her that their love is still strong?Cambridge English Readers: Level 3

    Also available to read online.‘You will have heard of my friend the once celebrated novelist Jocelyn Tarbet, but I suspect his memory is beginning to fade…You’d never heard of me, the once obscure novelist Parker Sparrow, until my name was publicly connected with his. To a knowing few, our names remain rigidly attached, like the two ends of a seesaw. His rise coincided with, though did not cause, my decline… I don’t deny there was wrongdoing. I stole a life, and I don’t intend to give it back. You may treat these few pages as a confession.’A jewel of a book: a brand new short story from the author of Atonement. My Purple Scented Novel follows the perfect crime of literary betrayal, scrupulously wrought yet unscrupulously executed, published to celebrate Ian McEwan’s 70th birthday.

    Tebrick sends away all the servants in an attempt to keep Sylvia's new nature a secret. Both then struggle to come to terms with the problems the change brings about.(Summary by Annise )

    Oxford bookwormsStage: starter

    He waited for the victim outside his home, & around 4:30 AM, when the temperature was 92, he shot the Negro. He was motivated by nothing except his own pure-D satisfaction. At the end of the story he had not yet been apprehended, & he speculated that in his town of Thermopylae things would soon be as bad as New York & Chicago. (This story parallels a true occurrence: Medgar Evers, an NAACP leader in Jackson, Miss. was murdered. Byron de La Beckwith has been charged with the crime.)

    

    A group called the Free Merioneth Forces have claimed responsibility but there had to be an individual at the end of that missile launcher and Paula is determined to find out who it was.This short story is taken from Manhattan in Reverse, the first short story collection in thirteen years from the master of space opera. Peter F. Hamilton takes us on a journey from a murder mystery in an alternative Oxford in the 1800s to a brand new story featuring Paula Mayo, Deputy Director of the Intersolar Commonwealth's Serious Crimes Directorate. Dealing with intricate themes and topical subjects this top ten bestselling author is at the top of his game.The cover image for The Demon Trap was designed by Andrew Parkes as part of a competition run by Pan Macmillan in association with SFX magazine.

    One day a learned Persian theologian visits this coffee-house. He is a man who has spent his life studying the nature of the Deity, and reading and writing books upon the subject. He has thought, read, and written so much about God, that he eventually lost his wits, became quite confused, and ceased even to believe in the existence of a God. The Shah, hearing of this, banished him from Persia.

    They don't think it was suicide. A short story

    The story Pages from a Young Girl's Journal won Aickman the World Fantasy Award in 1975. It was originally published in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction in 1973 before appearing in this collection.Cold Hand in Mine stands as one of Aickman's best collections and contains eight stories that show off his powers as a 'strange story' writer to the full, being more ambiguous than standard ghost stories. Throughout the stories the reader is introduced to a variety of characters, from a man who spends the night in a Hospice to a German aristocrat and a woman who sees an image of her own soul. There is also a nod to the conventional vampire story (Pages from a Young Girl's Journal) but all the stories remain unconventional and inconclusive, which perhaps makes them all the more startling and intriguing.• The Swords • The Real Road to the Church • Niemandswasser • Pages from a Young Girl's Journal• The Hospice • The Same Dog • Meeting Mr. Millar • The Clock Watcher

    

    Thirty years after the event, when both husband and lover have died, she remembers one further detail.Part of the Storycuts series, this short story was previously published in the collection Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marriage.