All The Lonely People

If you loved A Man Called Ove, then prepare to be delighted as Jamaican immigrant Hubert rediscovers the world he'd turned his back on this "warm, funny" novel (Good Housekeeping). In weekly phone calls to his daughter in Australia, widower Hubert Bird paints a picture of the perfect retirement, packed with fun, friendship, and fulfillment. But it's a lie. In reality, Hubert's days are all the same, dragging on without him seeing a single soul. Until he receives some good news—good news that in one way turns out to be the worst news ever, news that will force him out again, into a world he has long since turned his back on. The news that his daughter is coming for a visit. Now Hubert faces a seemingly impossible task: to make his real life resemble his fake life before the truth comes out. Along the way Hubert stumbles across a second chance at love, renews a cherished friendship, and finds himself roped into an audacious community scheme that seeks to end loneliness once and for all . . . Life is certainly beginning to happen to Hubert Bird. But with the origin of his earlier isolation always lurking in the shadows, will he ever get to live the life he's pretended to have for so long?

Even with a huge problem to worry about, Father McKenzie still manages to see the good in everyone. His job is made more difficult by his nosy housekeeper and the gossips from the shop down the road. Will they succeed in spoiling things, or will Father McKenzie’s advice win the day? This charming tale shows the ups and downs of everyday life in a truly heart-warming way. It will have you laughing out loud and shedding a tear – both at the same time.

These are tales told in a variety of voices: street hustlers, priests, blues singers, holocaust survivors, cross-dressers, paramilitary snipers, even those we may euphemistically consider the "ordinary" - all of them authentic, and all would subscribe to the maxim that "happiness is overrated." The dialogue is true to speech as it is spoken, shot through with humor, piercing sadness and puzzling beauty. To quote the important American critic, M.L. Rosenthal, "His is one of the few story collections I've seen that even begins to pick up from the method of Dubliners. Like Joyce, Callaghan gets so deeply and honestly into the local world that it is the international place we all inhabit."

'Empathetic, enlightening, deeply human' - Michael Harris, author of Solitude An intimate portrait of loneliness, All the Lonely People sees psychologist Dr Sam Carr collect hours of conversations with people young and old, including single parents, carers, teenagers and the bereaved – all shared over countless cups of tea. In stories of love and loss, of trauma and hope, told from care homes, living rooms, classrooms and kitchens, Carr discovers that while each of their stories is utterly unique, they are all born out of the same desire for human connection. As Carr interweaves these touching and powerful tales with his own personal narrative, he opens a window onto the inner lives of regular people – the forgotten, misplaced or misjudged – who all feel isolated in some way. Sparking a profound conversation about a universal emotion, which may simply be an inevitable part of life in an increasingly disjointed world, he questions what we can do to build stronger human relationships, and to be a part of something bigger than ourselves.

Ruby has just moved into a new neighborhood. She and her husband and daughter must live with her invalid father-in-law until he dies. Ruby hates the house and hates her father-in-law. But between the letters she writes to her own mother, life goes on in the neighborhood a young mother dies in a sanitarium, a widower pulls a gun on a child; a middle-aged veteran lures young children into his house; a thirteen-year-old boy is shot; an old mother is put into a home. And Ruby has to figure out where she fits into it all. Will she find happiness and friends? Will her daughter find her own place in this world? And what will happen to all these lonely people?

All The Lonely People is the curtain-raiser to a successful nine-book series featuring Liverpool solicitor Harry Devlin. Devlin finds himself number one suspect in a murder case that is far too close to home. The victim is his estranged wife, Liz, who is found murdered in a dingy alleyway. Determined to find her killer and prove his innocence, Harry begins a journey that takes him into the city's underworld and shatters forever his illusions about the woman he loved. Now beautifully presented in eBook format, avid readers of crime will love reading this gripping, well-written thriller.