Penguin There Once Lived a Girl Who Seduced Her Sister's Husband, And He Hanged Himself. Love Stories Петрушевская Людмила Стефановна

Love stories, with a twist, by Russia's preeminent contemporary fiction writer-the author of the prizewinning memoir about growing up in Stalinist Russia, The Girl from the Metropol Hotel • By turns sly and sweet, burlesque and heartbreaking, these realist fables of women looking for love are the stories that Ludmilla Petrushevskaya-who has been compared to Chekhov, Tolstoy, Beckett, Poe, Angela Carter, and even Stephen King-is best known for in Russia • Here are attempts at human connection, both depraved and sublime, by people across the life span: one-night stands in communal apartments, poignantly awkward couplings, office trysts, schoolgirl crushes, elopements, tentative courtships, and rampant infidelity, shot through with lurid violence, romantic illusion, and surprising tenderness

From the author of the prizewinning memoir about growing up in Stalinist Russia, The Girl from the Metropol Hotel, the masterly novellas that established her as one of the greatest living Russian writers—including a new translation of the modern classic The Time Is Night • “Love them,­ they’ll torture you; don’t love them, ­they’ll leave you anyway.” • After her work was suppressed for many years, Ludmilla Petrushevskaya won wide recognition for capturing the experiences of everyday Russians with profound pathos and mordant wit. Among her most famous and controversial works, these three novellas—The Time Is Night, Chocolates with Liqueur (inspired by Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Cask of Amontillado”), and Among Friends—are modern classics that breathe new life into Tolstoy’s famous dictum, “All happy families are alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way

A woman finds herself filling a pit in the forest in the middle of the night; a family lock each other in their bedrooms to battle a strange plague; a wizard punishes two beautiful ballerinas by turning them into one hugely fat circus performer; a colonel is warned not to lift the veil from his dead wife's face; and a distraught father brings his daughter back to life by eating human hearts in his dreams • In these blackly comic tales of revenge, disturbing deaths and haunting melancholy, Ludmilla Petrushevskaya blends miracles and madness in the darkest of modern fairy tales

Even though she's terrified of the sea, a girl who believes her mum might have been a mermaid runs away to the ocean to solve the mystery of who she really is • Stella is the odd one out. She sleepwalks, is terrified of water, yet obsessed by the ocean. Her mum who died when Stella was eight remains the biggest mystery of all. Who was she and why did she give Stella a necklace called 'the word of the sea' before she died? Nobody can give her any answers. Her father is consumed by grief and her grandmother's memories are fading with dementia • When Stella's only friend in the world, Cam, moves house, Stella runs away. She's determined to find out who her mum was and who she is too. She ends up in the Crystal Cove, a run-down aquarium with a mermaid show

Arty has always lived in the Clearing, a commune hidden in the forests of south India. But her happy life, separate from the rest of the world, is shattered after a terrible event • For the first time, Arty must leave her home, and head into the intriguing but frightening outside world. On the streets of India, a chance encounter leads to her becoming an unwilling overnight celebrity • As she embarks on her journey, she discovers she is being followed by thousands of strangers, who seem to know her every move • Forced to fight against mysterious hashtags and being constantly photographed, how can she find the help she desperately needs? • Everything is changing too fast for this girl who came out of the woods... could she be running into a trap? • The new thriller from the acclaimed author of The One Memory of Flora Banks, perfect for fans of Karen McManus, E

Little Lien wasn't taken from her Jewish parents in the Hague - she was given away in the hope that she might be saved. Hidden and raised by a foster family in the provinces during the Nazi occupation, she survived the war only to find that her real parents had not. Much later, she fell out with her foster family, and Bart van Es - the grandson of Lien's foster parents - knew he needed to find out why • His account of tracing Lien and telling her story is a searing exploration of two lives and two families. It is a story about love and misunderstanding and about the ways that our most painful experiences - so crucial in defining us - can also be redefined

Charlie, a brilliant and beautiful young actress, is lured into 'the theatre of the real' by an Israeli intelligence officer. Forced to play her ultimate role, she is plunged into a deceptive and delicate trap set to ensnare an elusive Palestinian terrorist • The Little Drummer Girl is a thrilling, deeply moving and courageous novel of our times

'Teacher wanted at the edge of the world . . .' • After the loss of her father, Una sees a chance to escape Reykjavik to tutor two girls in the tiny village of Skalar - population just ten - on Iceland's storm-battered north coast • But city life hasn't prepared her for the unforgiving weather nor inhospitable village life. Worse, the creaky old house where she lives is playing on her already fragile mind when she's convinced she hears the ghostly sound of singing • Then, at midwinter, a young girl is found dead • And one of the villagers must have blood on their hands

Andrew Brown works at a big international bank. He makes lots of money every day, but he never has enough time. Now, he might have found a way to borrow some. But, instead of making his life easier, more time might just give him more problems. Maybe the time-travelling Doctor can help! • Penguin Readers is a series of popular classics, exciting contemporary fiction, and thought-provoking non-fiction written for learners of English as a foreign language. Beautifully illustrated and carefully adapted, the series introduces language learners around the world to the bestselling authors and most compelling content from Penguin Random House. The eight levels of Penguin Readers follow the Common European Framework and include language activities that help readers to develop key skills

In 2015, climber Tommy Caldwell took on the hardest challenge of his life, spending 19 days freeclimbing Yosemite's vertical, 3000-foot Dawn Wall - regarded as the most difficult climb in history and a route nobody had ever done before • This odds-defying feat was the culmination of seven years planning and a lifetime of determination • Here, he recounts how he got there, the falls and setbacks - being held hostage, losing his index finger, the break-up of his marriage - the summits conquered and the fears overcome • Fans of Free Solo and Dawn Wall, and climbers and non-climbers alike, will be gripped by this story of drive, focus and achieving the impossible

These are the stories of some of the women who changed our world. Read about the women who fought to be equal to men, and learn about the things that women have done in education, science, sport and politics • Penguin Readers is a series of popular classics, exciting contemporary fiction, and thought-provoking non-fiction written for learners of English as a foreign language. Beautifully illustrated and carefully adapted, the series introduces language learners around the world to the bestselling authors and most compelling content from Penguin Random House. The eight levels of Penguin Readers follow the Common European Framework and include language activities that help readers to develop key skills • Women Who Changed the World, a Level 4 Reader, is A2+ in the CEFR framework

Doris is going to be a big star. Wearing a stolen fur coat and recently fired from her office job, she takes an all-night train to Berlin to make it in the movies. But what she encounters in the city is not fame and fortune, but gnawing hunger, seedy bars, and exploitative men - and as Doris sinks ever lower, she resorts to desperate measures to survive. Very funny and intensely moving, this is a dazzling portrait of roaring Berlin in the 1920s, and a poignant exploration of the doomed pursuit of fame and glamour • The Artificial Silk Girl was a huge bestseller in Weimar Germany before the Nazis banned it, and is today Keun's best-loved book in Germany. Funny, fresh and radical in its dissection of the limited options available to working women, it is a novel that speaks to our times