Weidenfeld & Nicolson

How could a barely literate peasant from Siberia determine the fate of the world? Undoubtedly, the so-called 'mad monk' Rasputin bewitched Tsar Nicholas II and his wife, Alexandra. Yet their strange and scandalous relationship conceals a riddle , one that casts an intriguing light on the controversial 'great man' theory of history. Rasputin was a devoted monarchist, not a revolutionary. He had no official position, no forces at his command. Nevertheless, he contributed more to the fall of the Romanov dynasty than any other individual. So demoralised was the Tsarist officer corps by stories of corruption, to say nothing of the rumours of his debauchery with the Empress - and even her daughters - that when the February Revolution broke out, not a sword was raised in defence of the regime. Just as Rasputin cast a spell over the Romanovs, his legend has bewitched historians. More than a century later, we still fail to comprehend fully the collapse of the greatest autocracy on Earth. Was there any truth to the wild tales that brought down the empire? Or was his true legacy an unsettling lesson on the potency of myth?

Books about friendship are not often described as love stories, but this is one. At the age of twelve, Nell has accepted that hers will likely be a friendless existence. She's not interested in boys or makeup or competing to see who can eat the least - so fitting in at her all-girls' school feels impossible. But then, a new girl arrives at school. Eve has short hair like a boy's, a wicked sense of humour and an unshakable confidence that she will find her place in the world. And the moment they meet, Nell begins to rethink the whole friendless existence thing. As they grow into themselves, Nell and Eve will love each other and hurt each other - through the chlorine-scented savagery of adolescence; long, drunken nights in share houses and gay bars; the highs and lows of parenthood. And always, despite unspoken feelings and sexual confusion, they will choose each other. Again, and again. As friends, as lovers, as family.

Since the inception of the Secret Service Bureau back in 1909, women have worked at the very heart of British secret intelligence - yet their contributions have been all but written out of history. Now, drawing on private and previously-classified documents, leading historian Claire Hubbard-Hall brings their gripping true stories to life. From encoding orders and decrypting enemy messages to penning propaganda and infiltrating organisations, the women of British intelligence played a pivotal role in both the First and Second World Wars. Prepare to meet the true custodians of Britain's military secrets, from Kathleen Pettigrew, personal assistant to the Chief of MI6 Stewart Menzies, who late in life declared 'I was Miss Moneypenny, but with more power', to Jane Archer, the very first female MI5 officer who raised suspicions about the Soviet spy Kim Philby long before he was officially unmasked and Winifred Spink, the first female officer ever sent to Russia in 1916. In Her Secret Service, Hubbard-Hall rescues these silenced voices and those of many other fascinating women from obscurity to provide a definitive account of women's contributions to the history of the intelligence services.

The 30th anniversary edition of the classic international bestseller, with a new afterword from Bernhard Schlink For 15-year-old Michael Berg, a chance meeting with an older woman leads to far more than he ever imagined. The woman in question is Hanna, and before long they embark on a passionate, clandestine love affair which leaves Michael both euphoric and confused. For Hanna is not all she seems. Years later, as a law student observing a trial in Germany, Michael is shocked to realise that the person in the dock is Hanna. The woman he had loved is a criminal. Much about her behaviour during the trial does not make sense. But then suddenly, and terribly, it does - Hanna is not only obliged to answer for a horrible crime, she is also desperately concealing an even deeper secret. The Reader is an international bestseller and a true modern classic, the essential Holocaust novel, examining the gap between Germany's pre- and post-war generations, between the guilty and the innocent, and between words and silence.

Margaret Anne ('Moddie') Yance has just returned to her hometown, to mingle with the friends of her youth, to get back in touch with her roots, and to recover from a stressful decade of living in the city in a small apartment with a man she now believed to be a megalomaniac or perhaps a covert narcissist. Back home, Moddie throws herself at the mercy of her old friends, all suddenly tipping toward middle age. She joins them as they go to parties, size each other up, obsess over past slights, dream of wild triumphs, and indulge in elaborate revenge fantasies. But when a mysterious artist arrives in town to take up a residency at the local university, Moddie has no choice but to confront the demons of her past and grapple with the reality of what her life has become. The inimitable Halle Butler, author of The New Me, returns with a novel that is sadistically precise, completely singular and horribly funny

The received wisdom in quantum physics is that, at the deepest levels of reality, there are no actual causes for atomic events. This idea led to the outlandish belief that quantum objects - indeed, reality itself - aren't real unless shaped by human measurement. Einstein mocked this idea, asking whether his bed spread out across his room unless he looked at it. And yet it remains one of the most influential ideas in science and our culture. In Escape from Shadow Physics, Adam Forrest Kay takes up Einstein's torch: reality isn't mysterious or dependent on human measurement, but predictable and independent of us. At the heart of his argument is groundbreaking research with little drops of oil. These droplets behave as particles do in the long-overlooked quantum theory of pilot waves; crucially, they display quantum behaviour while being described by classical physics. What if the original doubters of our quantum orthodoxy (not least Einstein himself) were onto something? What if pilot wave theory was right all along? In that case, our whole story of twentieth-century physics is topsy-turvy and we must give up the idea that reality is simply too weird to grasp. Weird it may still be, but a true understanding of nature now seems within our reach.

AN ORIGIN STORY BOOK What makes people believe in conspiracy theories? Why have they taken over our political sphere? And how do we counter them before it's too late? The world has always had conspiracy theories. From the Illuminati to the deep state, the JFK assassination to the death of Princess Diana - there have always been those who believe that events are manipulated by shadowy forces with sinister intent. But in recent years, conspiracism has colonised the mainstream. These days, it is a booming industry, a political strategy and a pseudo-religion - and it's threatening the foundations of liberal democracy. Where once political battles were fought over ideas and values, it now feels as though we're arguing over the nature of reality itself. The problem is bigger than lizard people or UFOs: left unchecked, conspiracy theories have the power to warp the fabric of society and justify unspeakable crimes. In Conspiracy Theory: The Story of an Idea, Ian Dunt and Dorian Lynskey pull back the curtain on conspiracy theories: where they come from, who promotes them, how they work and what they're doing to us. From biblical myth to online hysteria, this book explains what happens when the human gift for storytelling goes wrong - and how we might restore our common reality.

AN ORIGIN STORY BOOK A coherent political philosophy or a vacuous cop-out? A pragmatic middle way between the extremes of left and right or a cynical strategy to secure power and neuter debate? Politicians have long invoked centrism as both a term of abuse (Margaret Thatcher) and a badge of pride (Tony Blair). Figures as important as John Maynard Keynes, Roy Jenkins, Bill Clinton and Emmanuel Macron have all had different ideas about how to make sure the centre holds. But for a term that purports to describe consensus, it's ironic just how little agreement there is over what 'centrism' actually means. In Centrism: The Story of an Idea, Ian Dunt and Dorian Lynskey trace the evolution of centrism from ancient Greece to the French Revolution, the Second World War to the 2024 elections. They find a story that is much bigger than the sum of its parts - and that raises some uncomfortable questions about tribalism and compromise.

Why is 'fascist' used to describe everyone from dictators to parking wardens? Does the word 'fascism' describe a historical movement or an enduring ideology? And could we see it rise again today, in an age of populism? Unlike most major political ideologies, fascism has no clear-cut intellectual foundation. It appeals to some of the very darkest instincts in human nature: the hatred of difference, the desire to control, the delight in violence. The story of fascism shows us what happens when these instincts consume entire nations. In Fascism: The Story of an Idea, Ian Dunt and Dorian Lynskey lay out in clear and accessible terms the origins of fascism: what happened, how it happened and why. It is only by understanding fascism's beginnings that we can start to understand what it means today - and guard against those who seek its return.

Thoroughly updated and revised for 2024, JERUSALEM: THE BIOGRAPHY is the history of the Middle East through the lens of the Holy City and the Holy Land, from King David to the wars and chaos of today. The history of Jerusalem is the story of the world: Jerusalem is the universal city, the capital of two peoples, the shrine of three faiths. The Holy City and Holy Land are the battlefields for today's multifaceted conflicts and, for believers, the setting for Judgement Day and the Apocalypse. How did this small, remote town become the Holy City, the 'centre of the world' and now the key to peace in the Middle East? Why is the Holy Land so important not just to the region and its many new players, but to the wider world too? Drawing on new archives and a lifetime's study, Montefiore reveals this ever-changing city and turbulent region through the wars, love affairs and revelations of the kings, empresses, amirs, sultans, caliphs, presidents, autocrats, imperialists and warlords, poets, prophets, saints and rabbis, conquerors and whores who created, destroyed, chronicled, and believed in Jerusalem and the Holy Land. A classic of modern literature, this is not only the epic story of 3,000 years of faith, slaughter, fanaticism, co-existence, power and myth, but also a freshly updated, carefully balanced history of the Middle East, from King David to the new players and powers of the twenty-first century, from the birth of Judaism, Christianity and Islam to the Israel-Palestine conflict and the mayhem of today. This is how today's Middle East was forged, how the Holy Land became sacred and how Jerusalem became Jerusalem - the only city that exists twice - in heaven and on earth.

In The Story of Scandinavia, political scholar Stein Ringen chronicles more than 1,200 years of drama, economic rise and fall, crises, kings and queens, war, peace, language and culture. Scandinavian history has been one of dramatic discontinuities of collapse and restarts, from the Viking Age to the Age of Perpetual War to the modern age today. For a thousand years, the Scandinavian countries were kingdoms of repression where monarchs played at the game of being European powers, at the expense of their own populations. The brand we now know as "Scandinavia" is a recent invention. During most of its history, Denmark and Sweden, and to some degree Norway, were bloody enemies. These sentiments of enmity have not been fully settled. Under the surface of collaboration remain undercurrents of hatred, envy, contempt and pity. What does it mean today to be Scandinavian? For the author, whose identity is Scandinavian but his life European, this masterly history is a personal exploration as well as a narrative of compelling scope.

THE MILLION-COPY BESTSELLER BARACK OBAMA'S BOOK OF THE YEAR PICK AMAZON.COM NO.1 BOOK OF THE YEAR BOOK OF THE YEAR IN: THE GUARDIAN, NEW YORKER, NEW YORK TIMES, TIME MAGAZINE, HARPER'S BAZAAR, OPRAH DAILY AND WASHINGTON POST In 1972, when workers in Pottstown, Pennsylvania, were digging the foundations for a new development, the last thing they expected to find was a skeleton at the bottom of a well. Who the skeleton was and how it got there were two of the long-held secrets kept by the residents of Chicken Hill, the dilapidated neighbourhood where Jewish immigrants and African Americans lived side by side through the 1920s and '30s. In this novel about small-town secrets and the people who keep them, James McBride shows us that even in dark times, it is love and community - heaven and earth - that sustain us.

Its name means 'centre of the world', and since the dawn of history the Mediterranean Sea has formed the shared horizon of innumerable cultures. Here, history has blurred with legend. The glittering surface of the sea conceals the remnants of lost civilisations, wrecked treasure ships and the bones of long-drowned sailors, traders and modern refugees. Of the many cities that dot this ancient coastline, Tyre, Carthage, Syracuse, Ravenna and Antioch are among the oldest and most intriguing. All are beautifully situated, and for layers of history and cultural riches they are rivalled only by their sister cities of Rome, Istanbul and Jerusalem. Yet their fates have been remarkably different. Once major power centres, all five have declined into relative obscurity. Nevertheless, their entwined history takes in Alexander the Great, Nebuchadnezzar, Archimedes and the Roman, Byzantine, Arab and Norman conquests, and their greatness still lingers for those who seek it out. To bring these mysterious lost capitals to life, historian Katherine Pangonis sets out on a voyage from the dawn of civilisation on the Lebanese coast to a modern-day Turkey wracked by the devastation of the 2023 earthquake. Combining on the ground research with spellbinding storytelling skills, here is a revelatory new story of the Mediterranean, and a powerful reflection on the sometimes fleeting glory of empires.

Meet Celine and Luke. To all intents and purposes, the happy couple. But Celine's more interested in playing the piano, and Luke's a serial cheater. And as their big day approaches, the complicated lives of the wedding party begin to unravel. A fed-up bridesmaid, a lovesick best man, guests and family members all find themselves searching for their own happily ever afters. From the author of Exciting Times, this is a sparkling ensemble novel about love and marriage, fidelity and betrayal.

The belly groan of a face unpeeled. A break-up poem recited knee-deep in bog water. An ancient burial mound rising and falling like a chest. The ghost of Stephen Gately reading the ingredients on a ham and cheese sandwich. Startling, sinister and irresistible, Moira Fowley's award-winning debut collection about queer, female bodies at the end of the world unravels all of our darkest impulses and deepest fears.

ONE OF THE GUARDIAN'S 100 BEST BOOKS OF THE 21ST CENTURY 'This House of Grief, in its restraint and control, bears comparison with In Cold Blood' KATE ATKINSON 'It grabbed me by the throat in the same way that the podcast series Serial did' GILLIAN ANDERSON 'Utterly gripping' MARK HADDON Father's Day, 2005. Just after nightfall, a discarded husband drove his three young sons back to their mother, his ex-wife. On that dark country road, barely five minutes from the children's home, the old white car swerved off the highway and plunged into a dam. The father freed himself and swam to the bank, but the car sank to the bottom, and all the children drowned. The court case that followed became Helen Garner's obsession, one that would take over her life until its final verdict. The resulting book is a true-crime classic and literary masterpiece, which examines just what we are capable of and how fiercely we hide it from ourselves. A W&N Essential with an introduction by Rachel Cooke