The Dead Lake

A haunting Russian tale about the environmental legacy of the Cold War. Yerzhan grows up in a remote part of Soviet Kazakhstan where atomic weapons are tested. As a young boy he falls in love with the neighbour's daughter and one evening, to impress her, he dives into a forbidden lake. The radioactive water changes Yerzhan. He will never grow into a man. While the girl he loves becomes a beautiful woman. Why Peirene chose to publish this book: 'Like a Grimm's fairy tale, this story transforms an innermost fear into an outward reality. We witness a prepubescent boy's secret terror of not growing up into a man. We also wander in a beautiful, fierce landscape unlike any other we find in Western literature. And by the end of Yerzhan's tale we are awe-struck by our human resilience in the face of catastrophic, man-made, follies.' Meike Ziervogel 'A haunting and resonant fable.' Boyd Tonkin, Independent 'A tantalising mixture of magical and grim realism . . . a powerful study of alienation and environmental catastrophe.' David Mills, Sunday Times 'A poetic masterpiece, a novella of shocking legacies, alien beauty and blistering emotional intensity'. Pam Norfolk, Lancashire Evening Post 'A writer of immense poetic power.' Kapka Kassabova, Guardian Elizabeth Buchan, Daily Mail 'This superb novella . . . reads like a modern fairy-tale, full of a surreal yet mundane horror.' Lesley McDowell, Independent on Sunday 'Central Asian storytelling at its best.' Marion James, Today's Zaman LONGLISTED FOR THE INDEPENDENT FOREIGN FICTION PRIZE 2015 INDEPENDENT BOOKS OF THE YEAR 2014 GUARDIAN READERS' BOOKS OF THE YEAR 2014

In 1964, in Australia's remote outback, on the dazzling saltpan of Lake Eyre, Donald Campbell set out to drive his Bluebird car at over 400 miles an hour - faster than any man in history. Things went wrong from the start: unseasonal rains, a sodden lake bed in which every high-speed run slewed dangerously, money running short...even an Aboriginal curse. WIth death shimmering on the horizon before him, the lonely Campbell tried to hold his nerve until he broke the record. Campbell would lose his life eventually on Coniston Water, with over thirty years passing before his body was recovered in 2001, but this strangest - and greatest - of all his world record attempts was witnessed by a young reporter. John Pearson's classic book about Donald Campbell is an extraordinarily compelling and moving portrait of a modern tragic hero, fighting a battle with inhospitable elements and the outer limits of technology - and, above all, with himself.

“A gothic and elegant page-turner.”—The Boston Globe Twenty years ago, Jane Hudson fled the Heart Lake School for Girls in the Adirondacks after a terrible tragedy. The week before her graduation, in that sheltered wonderland, three lives were taken, all victims of suicide. Only Jane was left to carry the burden of a mystery that has stayed hidden in the depths of Heart Lake for more than two decades. Now Jane has returned to the school as a Latin teacher, recently separated and hoping to make a fresh start with her young daughter. But ominous messages from the past dredge up forgotten memories. And young, troubled girls are beginning to die again–as piece by piece the shattering truth slowly floats to the surface. . . .

A 1942 classic that has been voted Norway's all-time best thriller, a brilliant mix of mystery and the supernatural Deep in the darkest part of the Norwegian woods stands Dead Man's Cabin, where 110 years ago a madman slew his sister and her lover, throwing their decapitated corpses in a nearby lake before drowning himself to join them in death. Ever since, the cabin has been cursed, and anyone who spends the night there is possessed by the killer's spirit and infected with his madness. Bjørn Werner, a young scholar from Oslo, ignored the old superstitions and bought the cabin as a place to read and work in quiet. Now he has disappeared, and the evidence suggests he threw himself in the lake in a fit of insanity. The police write it off as a suicide, but those who knew him are not so sure. Could the curse actually be real? Bjørn's sister and five of his friends travel to the cabin to look into his death, but not all of them will return alive from their stay at the Lake of the Dead ... André Bjerke's The Lake of the Dead (1942) was voted the all-time best Norwegian thriller, and its atmospheric 1958 film adaptation is regarded as one of Norway's best films. This new translation is the first-ever American publication of Bjerke's classic, which features an unusual mixture of murder mystery and supernatural horror that will keep readers guessing until the thrilling conclusion.

Surprising and funny debut collection from a multi-talented Midwest author.

Doc Osborne knows there are plenty of fish in the sea, but only police chief Lew Ferris qualifies as his catch of the day. Just as the summer is heating up, the town gets turned upside down by the bizarre triple homicide discovered on a backcountry road... Peg Garmin was not Loon Lake's most beloved citizen. Considering her "calling" in life, no one was completely surprised when she was found murdered in the company of two exotic dancers...no one, that is, except for Ray Pradt, Peg's dearest friend. As the team digs into the mystery of her past, they discover some startling connections to one of the wealthiest families in Chicago and to the buried secret that could destroy them. Now Lew, Osborne, and Ray must root the skeletons out of the Garmin family closet before Peg's killer becomes the one who got away...

"Six classmates are on a hiking trip to study the geological features of the vast and wild Bellevue Forest when the mighty Mount Darius erupts. The group are swept into a violent landslide of soil and rock. Josh and Greer find themselves alone in a dramatically changed landscape. Lost they stumble upon an eerie, abandoned town and its long-forgotten secrets. And they discover why the lake that surrounds the town was once given the name "Lago da Morte", Lake of the Dead"--Back cover. Suggested level: primary, intermediate, junior secondary.

From the author of Pulitzer-nominated The Devil’s Highway and national bestseller The Hummingbird’s Daughter comes an exquisitely composed collection of poetry on life at the border. Weaving English and Spanish languages as fluidly as he blends cultures of the southwest, Luis Urrea offers a tour of Tijuana, spanning from Skid Row, to the suburbs of East Los Angeles, to the stunning yet deadly Mojave Desert, to Mexico and the border fence itself. Mixing lyricism and colloquial voices, mysticism and the daily grind, Urrea explores duality and the concept of blurring borders in a melting pot society.