Guilty Thing

**LONGLISTED FOR THE BAILLIE GIFFORD PRIZE FOR NON-FICTION 2016** **New York Times Book Review, Times Literary Supplement and Guardian Best Books of 2016** 'Life for De Quincey was either angels ascending on vaults of cloud or vagrants shivering on the city streets.' The last of the Romantics, Thomas De Quincey is a name synonymous with scandal. Modelling his character on Coleridge and his sensibility on Wordsworth, De Quincey took over the latter's former cottage and turned it into an opium den. Here, in the throes of his high, he nurtured his growing hatred of his former idols and wrote the notorious and fascinatingly strange essay 'On Murder Considered as one of the Fine Arts'. Despite never achieving the literary deification of his contemporaries, his narrative style – scripted and sculptured emotional memoir – was to inspire generations of writers: Dickens, Dostoevsky, Virginia Woolf. James Joyce knew whole pages of his work off by heart and he was arguably the father of what we now call psychogeography. Guilty Thing tells the riches-to-rags story of a dazzlingly complex and troubled figure, whose life was lived on the run, and affords De Quincey the literary biography he deserves.

She took a peaceful walk in the woods—and found death waiting. . . . “The best mystery writer anywhere in the English-speaking world.”—The Boston Globe Elizabeth and Quentin Nightingale. A happy couple who lived quite graciously at Myfleet Manor in the gentle English countryside. Elizabeth Nightingale found peace and tranquility on her nightly walks through the rich, dense forests surrounding Myfleet Manor. But the peace she treasured was shattered one night when she found death waiting in the woods. Chief Inspector Wexford and his colleague Inspector Burden find a most unsavory case on their hands—and must use all their wit and wisdom to solve it . . . “Undoubtedly one of the best writers of English mysteries and chiller-killer plots.”—Los Angeles Times “You cannot afford to miss Ruth Rendell.”—The New York Times Book Review “For readers who have almost given up mysteries . . . Rendell may be just the woman to get them started again.”—Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine

Ben Slocum's marriage careens out of control, so he flees New England, only to have his progress-and nearly his life-ended. Octogenarian and psychiatrist Will Rivard saves Ben with the stroke of a T'ai Chi sword. The ensuing friendship brings to light a stunning secret that has tormented Will for six decades. Will shares this secret through his adolescent journal, transporting Ben back in time to the height of the Great Depression. Ben's glimpse back in time reveals why two lovers cross the raging floodwaters of Fountain Creek, even as a bridge washes out beneath their car. Stranded, they huddle on the roof, a spot scarcely larger than a welcome mat, as rescuers throw ropes and launch boats into the torrent. Will Rivard joins in the fight to save them. Yet questions remain: Why did the couple attempt such a desperate gambit in the first place? Did Will chase them to that spot? As the complex strands of past and present converge, romance blossoms in Ben's life and he learns, of Will's ill-fated love. Like a Guilty Thing presents parallel dramas, each with questions-and answers-that race toward its gripping end.

How to release productivity guilt and embrace the hidden values in our daily lives. Any given day brings a never-ending list of things to do. There’s the work thing, the catch-up thing, the laundry thing, the creative thing, the exercise thing, the family thing, the thing we don’t want to do, and the thing we’ve been putting off, despite it being the most important thing. Even on days when we get a lot done, the thing left undone can leave us feeling guilty, anxious, or disappointed. After five years of searching for the secret to productivity, Madeleine Dore discovered there isn’t one. Instead, we’re being set up to fail. I Didn’t Do the Thing Today is the inspiring call to take productivity off its pedestal—by dismantling our comparison to others, aspirational routines, and the unrealistic notions of what can be done in a day, we can finally embrace the joyful messiness and unpredictability of life. For anyone who has ever felt the pressure to do more, be more, achieve more, this antidote to our doing-obsession is the permission slip we all need to find our own way.

A psychiatrist and an internationally recognized expert on violence, Dorothy Otnow Lewis has spent the last quarter century studying the minds of killers. Among the notorious murderers she has examined are Ted Bundy, Arthur Shawcross, and Mark David Chapman, the man who shot John Lennon. Now she shares her groundbreaking discoveries--and the chilling encounters that led to them. From a juvenile court in Connecticut to the psychiatric wards of New York City's Bellevue Hospital, from maximum security prisons to the corridors of death row, Lewis and her colleague, the eminent neurologist Jonathan Pincus, search to understand the origins of violence. GUILTY BY REASON OF INSANITY is an utterly absorbing odyssey that will forever change the way you think about crime, punishment, and the law itself.

Whose truth is the lie? Stay up all night reading the sensational psychological thriller that has readers obsessed, from the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Too Late and It Ends With Us. #1 New York Times Bestseller · USA Today Bestseller · Globe and Mail Bestseller · Publishers Weekly Bestseller Lowen Ashleigh is a struggling writer on the brink of financial ruin when she accepts the job offer of a lifetime. Jeremy Crawford, husband of bestselling author Verity Crawford, has hired Lowen to complete the remaining books in a successful series his injured wife is unable to finish. Lowen arrives at the Crawford home, ready to sort through years of Verity’s notes and outlines, hoping to find enough material to get her started. What Lowen doesn’t expect to uncover in the chaotic office is an unfinished autobiography Verity never intended for anyone to read. Page after page of bone-chilling admissions, including Verity's recollection of the night her family was forever altered. Lowen decides to keep the manuscript hidden from Jeremy, knowing its contents could devastate the already grieving father. But as Lowen’s feelings for Jeremy begin to intensify, she recognizes all the ways she could benefit if he were to read his wife’s words. After all, no matter how devoted Jeremy is to his injured wife, a truth this horrifying would make it impossible for him to continue loving her.

"A biography of the last of the Romantics describes his rags-to-riches life and career as a journalist, translator, essayist and opium addict who inspired generations of writers with his emotional memoir Confessions of an English Opium-Eater, "--NoveList.