Showing results by author "Mark Haddon"

Fifteen-year-old Christopher Boone has Asperger's Syndrome, a condition similar to autism. He doesn't like to be touched or meet new people, he cannot make small talk, and he hates the colors brown and yellow. He is a math whiz with a very logical brain who loves solving puzzles that have definite answers.

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time is a murder mystery novel like no other. The detective, and narrator, is Christopher Boone. Christopher is fifteen and has Asperger's, a form of autism. He knows a very great deal about maths and very little about human beings. He loves lists, patterns, and the truth.

At 61, George Hall is settling down to a comfortable retirement. Then his tempestuous daughter, Katie, announces that she is getting remarried, to the deeply inappropriate Ray. Her family is not pleased and Katie can't decide if she loves Ray or loves the wonderful way he has with her son, Jacob. Her mother, Jean, is a bit put out by all the planning and arguing the wedding has occasioned, which get in the way of her quite fulfilling late-life affair with one of her husband's ex-colleagues.

The set-up of Mark Haddon's brilliant new novel is simple: Richard, a wealthy doctor, invites his estranged sister Angela and her family to join his for a week at a vacation home in the English countryside. Richard has just re-married and inherited a willful stepdaughter in the process; Angela has a feckless husband and three children who sometimes seem alien to her. The stage is set for seven days of resentment and guilt, a staple of family gatherings the world over.

From the moment that Jim and his best friend, Charlie, bug the staff room and overhear two of their teachers speaking to each other in a secret language, they know there's an adventure on its way. But what does "spudvetch" actually mean, and why do Mr. Kidd's eyes flicker with fluorescent blue light when Charlie says it to him? Perhaps Kidd and Pearce are bank robbers talking in code. Perhaps they're spies. Perhaps they are aliens. Whatever it is, Jimbo and Charlie are determined to find out.

The tales in Mark Haddon's lyrical and uncompromising new collection take many forms - Victorian adventure story, science fiction, morality tale, contemporary realism - but they all showcase his virtuoso gifts as a stylist and the deep well of empathy that made his three best-selling novels so compelling. The characters here are often isolated physically or estranged from their families, yet they yearn for connection.

An expedition to Mars goes terribly wrong. A seaside pier collapses. A 30-stone man is confined to his living room. One woman is abandoned on a tiny island in the middle of the ocean. Another woman is saved from drowning. Two boys discover a gun in a shoebox. A group of explorers find a cave of unimaginable size deep in the Amazon jungle. A man shoots a stranger in the chest on Christmas Eve.

At 61, George Hall is settling down to a comfortable retirement. Then his tempestuous daughter, Katie, announces that she is getting remarried, to the deeply inappropriate Ray. Her family is not pleased and Katie can't decide if she loves Ray or loves the wonderful way he has with her son, Jacob. Her mother, Jean, is a bit put out by all the planning and arguing the wedding has occasioned, which get in the way of her quite fulfilling late-life affair with one of her husband's ex-colleagues.

George Hall doesn't understand the modern obsession with talking about everything. 'The secret of contentment, George felt, lay in ignoring many things completely.' Some things in life, however, cannot be ignored. At 57, George is settling down to a comfortable retirement, building a shed in his garden, reading historical novels, listening to a bit of light jazz.

From the bestselling author of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time and A Spot of Bother comes a superb book about family and secrets. Two families. Seven days. One house. Angela and her brother Richard have spent twenty years avoiding each other. Now, after the death of their mother, they bring their families together for a holiday in a rented house on the Welsh border. Four adults and four children. Seven days of shared meals, log fires, card games and wet walks.

The Talking Horse and the Sad Girl and the Village under the Sea combines bittersweet love-lyrics, lucid and bold new versions of Horace, comic set-pieces, lullabies, wry postmodern shenanigans (including a note from the official board of censors on "18" certificate poetry), and an entire John Buchan novel condensed to five pages.

Das ziemlich eintönige Leben des 13-jährigen Jim ändert sich schlagartig, als er und sein Freund Charlie einer Verschwörung auf die Spur kommen...

Leading up to the 40th anniversary of the first moon landing, the excitement of this momentous event is captured through the eyes of a child in this glorious picture book, reformatted with a new cover design. Mark Haddon is the prize-winning, highly-acclaimed author of the best-selling novel The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time. Years ago there was a little boy who dreamed of rocketing to the moon, of landing on the crumbly rock and walking across the Sea of Tranquility.

From the moment that Jim and his best friend Charlie bug the staffroom and overhear two of their teachers speaking to each other in a secret language, they know there's an adventure on its way. But what does "spudvetch" mean, and why do Mr Kidd's eyes flicker with fluorescent blue light when Charlie says it to him?

The three-day Folio Prize Fiction Festival 2014 brought together some great writers and audiences and gave them a real opportunitey to talk in depth about their work and similar subjects. The festival included interviews and discussions with top writers, novelists, poets, critics and publishers, including Eimear McBride, Paul Baggaley, Sergio De La Pava, Rachel Kushner, Sarah Hall, Pankaj Mishra, Stephanie Merritt, Jane Gardam and Mark Haddon. 

A celebration of adult literature and reading. The whole book industry, including booksellers, librarians and publishers, were invited come together and pick out their favourite titles to be included the final list of 25 books by authors from the UK and Ireland. The final list included fiction, poetry and memoirs, among others. There were some best sellers, some classics and some lesser known. Interviews with Graeme Simsion, Lucy Fleming, Jojo Moyes, Lemn Sissay, Mark Haddon, Tracy Chevalier, Victoria Hislop, Rupert Thomson and Andrew Motion.

A newborn baby is the sole survivor of a terrifying plane crash. She is raised in wealthy isolation by an overprotective father. She knows nothing of the rumours about a beautiful young woman, hidden from the world. When a suitor visits, he understands far more than he should. Forced to run for his life, he escapes aboard The Porpoise, an assassin on his tail....