The Lesser Bohemians

Shortlisted for The Goldsmith Prize 2016 Shortlisted for the 2016 Bord Gáis Energy Irish Book Awards Eason Novel of the Year The captivating, daring new novel from Eimear McBride, whose astonishing debut novel, A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing, was an international literary phenomenon and earned the author multiple awards and recognition. Upon arrival in London, an eighteen-year-old Irish girl begins anew as a drama student, with all the hopes of any young actress searching for the fame she's always dreamed of. She struggles to fit in -- she's young and unexotic; a naive new girl -- but soon she forges friendships and finds a place for herself in the big city. Then she meets an attractive older man. He's an established actor twenty years her senior, and the inevitable, clamorous relationship that ensues is one that will change her forever. A redemptive, captivating story of passion and innocence set across the bedsits of mid-nineties London, McBride holds new love under her fierce gaze, giving us all a chance to remember what it's like to fall hard for another.

Taking the literary world by storm, Eimear McBride’s internationally praised debut is one of the most acclaimed novels in recent years; it is “subversive, passionate, and darkly alchemical. Read it and be changed” (Eleanor Catton). Eimear McBride’s debut tells, with astonishing insight and in riveting detail, the story of a young woman’s relationship with her brother, the long shadow cast by his childhood brain tumour, and her harrowing sexual awakening. Not so much a stream-of-consciousness, as an unconscious railing against a life that makes little sense, and a shocking and intimate insight into the thoughts, feelings and chaotic sexuality of a vulnerable and isolated protagonist, A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing plunges inside its narrator’s head, exposing her world firsthand. This isn’t always comfortable—but it is always a revelation. Touching on everything from family violence to religion to addiction, and the personal struggle to remain intact in times of intense trauma, McBride writes with singular intensity, acute sensitivity, and mordant wit. A Girl Is a Half-formed Thing is moving, funny, and alarming. It is a book you will never forget.

The blistering non-fiction debut from the author of the critically acclaimed A Girl is a Half-formed Thing *As heard on BBC Radio 4's Woman's Hour* 'A fearless, interrogative work ... A fierce and fascinating manifesto in McBride's persuasive prose' Sinéad Gleeson Here, Eimear McBride unpicks the contradictory forces of disgust and objectification that control and shame women. From playground taunts of 'only sluts do it' but 'virgins are frigid', to ladette culture, and the arrival of 'ironic' porn, via Debbie Harry, the Kardashians and the Catholic church - she looks at how this prejudicial messaging has played out in the past, and still surrounds us today. In this subversive essay, McBride asks - are women still damned if we do, damned if we don't? How can we give our daughters (and sons) the unbounded futures we want for them? And, in this moment of global crisis, might our gift for juggling contradiction help us to find a way forward? 'A satisfying feminist polemic' Susie Orbach 'Remarkable' Scotsman 'Eimear McBride is that old fashioned thing, a genius' Guardian

A dazzling novel of one of America’s most celebrated photographers, Dorothea Lange, exploring the wild years in San Francisco that awakened her career-defining grit, compassion, and daring. “Jasmin Darznik expertly delivers an intriguing glimpse into the woman behind those unforgettable photographs of the Great Depression, and their impact on humanity.”—Susan Meissner, bestselling author of The Nature of Fragile Things In this novel of the glittering and gritty Jazz Age, a young aspiring photographer named Dorothea Lange arrives in San Francisco in 1918. As a newcomer—and naïve one at that—Dorothea is grateful for the fast friendship of Caroline Lee, a vivacious, straight-talking Chinese American with a complicated past, who introduces Dorothea to Monkey Block, an artists’ colony and the bohemian heart of the city. Dazzled by Caroline and her friends, Dorothea is catapulted into a heady new world of freedom, art, and politics. She also finds herself falling in love with the brilliant but troubled painter Maynard Dixon. As Dorothea sheds her innocence, her purpose is awakened and she grows into the artist whose iconic Depression-era “Migrant Mother” photograph broke the hearts and opened the eyes of a nation. A vivid and absorbing portrait of the past, The Bohemians captures a cast of unforgettable characters, including Frida Kahlo, Ansel Adams, and D. H. Lawrence. But moreover, it shows how the gift of friendship and the possibility of self-invention persist against the ferocious pull of history.

Written during her time as the inaugural fellow in the Beckett archive last year, Eimear McBride's three short, characteristically brilliant plays - collected in one work, Mouthpieces.Each play depicts a fragment of female experience, all of them told in in Eimear's vivid, original and sharp-witted style. In 'The Adminicle Exists', we hear the inner voice of a woman who saves her troubled, dangerous partner; in 'An Act of Violence', a woman is quizzed about her reaction to a man's death; in 'The Eye Machine', the character 'Eye' tells of her imprisonment, flickering through a slideshow of female stereotypes.

A New York Times bestseller. “With pages of tips and twelve DIY projects, the book makes the free-spirited style easy to achieve.” —Architectural Digest In The New Bohemians, LA-based designer Justina Blakeney defines the New Bohemians as creative individuals who are boutique owners and bloggers, entrepreneurs and ex-pats, artists and urban farmers. They embrace free-spirited, no-rules lifestyles and apply that attitude to all areas of their existence, including their homes. With little distinction between work and play, the new boho home often includes an office, art gallery, showroom, photography studio, restaurant, or even a pop-up shop. The New Bohemians explores 20 homes located primarily on the East and West coasts. Exclusive interviews with the owners, 12 DIY projects created by Blakeney and inspired by objects found in the homes, and a “Plant-O-Pedia” offer insight into achieving this aesthetic. In addition, each home is accompanied by an Adopt-an-Idea section that offers general decor, styling, and shopping tips for easy duplication in your own home. “The New Bohemians is sure to inspire readers to create, to reuse, to grow, to let loose, and to invite some cool and collected energy into their own homes.” —California Home+Design “A colorful and endlessly inspiring cover-to-cover read . . . From the dreamy homes of twenty stylesetters across the country to easy DIY projects, The New Bohemians is our new favorite coffee table book for home inspiration.” —One Kings Lane “Fans of Justina’s style will be glad to see [the book] reads like a how-to for finding one’s own inner bohemian . . . the book is as functional as it is gorgeous.” —Apartment Therapy

“Justina’s style is so warm and colorful . . . All her plants and pallets and prints are put together in ways that are beyond stylish. It is art.” —Drew Barrymore The New Bohemian Handbook guides readers in beautifully simple techniques for adding good vibes and style to living spaces. Packed with hundreds of ideas for bringing positive energy to your home, the book features exercises and activities for thinking about rooms in new ways. With Justina Blakeney’s expert guidance, learn how to rearrange, paint, prop, and plant your way to a home that’s fresh and inspiring. Uncover your “spirit environment” and learn how to use color and scent to enhance mood, productivity, and relaxation. Revel in Justina’s encouraging advice (“you got this!”), and easily and affordably turn any dwelling into a personal sanctuary. “An indispensable manual to living in a home that’s pretty, restful, groovy and 100% you. This is my spirit book! Finally a book that offers specific, helpful ways to make a home feel original, beautiful and, most importantly, like a haven for its homeowner.” —Sophie Donelson, Editor in Chief, House Beautiful “With Ms. Blakeney as guide, princes, plumbers and poets alike can readily replicate the charm and ease of these featured interiors—from tiny urban studios to suburban domiciles to rustic retreats.” —The Wall Street Journal “As vibrant, rule-breaking and out the box as she showed in her first book . . . It’s part book, part yoga lesson as Blakeney walks readers through finding clarity, flow, growth and harmony in our homes.” —The Detroit News “Full of ideas for bringing positive energy to your home.” —The Washington Post

The colourful, salacious and sumptuously illustrated story of Covent Garden - the creative heart of Georgian London - from Wolfson Prize-winning author Vic Gatrell SHORT-LISTED FOR THE HESSELL TILTMAN PRIZE 2014 In the teeming, disordered, and sexually charged square half-mile centred on London's Covent Garden something extraordinary evolved in the 18th century. It was the world's first creative 'Bohemia'. The nation's most significant artists, actors, poets, novelists, and dramatists lived here. From Soho and Leicester Square across Covent Garden's Piazza to Drury Lane, and down from Long Acre to the Strand, they rubbed shoulders with rakes, prostitutes, market people, craftsmen, and shopkeepers. It was an often brutal world full of criminality, poverty and feuds, but also of high spirits, and was as culturally creative as any other in history. Virtually everything that we associate with Georgian culture was produced here. Vic Gatrell's spectacular new book recreates this time and place by drawing on a vast range of sources, showing the deepening fascination with 'real life' that resulted in the work of artists like Hogarth, Blake, and Rowlandson, or in great literary works like The Beggar's Opera and Moll Flanders. The First Bohemians is illustrated by over two hundred extraordinary pictures, many rarely seen, for Gatrell celebrates above all one of the most fertile eras in Britain's artistic history. He writes about Joshua Reynolds and J. M. W. Turner as well as the forgotten figures who contributed to what was a true golden age: the men and women who briefly dazzled their contemporaries before being destroyed - or made - by this magical but also ferocious world. About the author: Vic Gatrell's last book, City of Laughter, won both the Wolfson Prize for History and the PEN Hessell-Tiltman Prize; his The Hanging Tree won the Whitfield Prize of the Royal Historical Society. He is a Life Fellow of Caius College, Cambridge.