Christof, Christophe, Christopher and Cristofol are four brothers - sons of the same father and four very different mothers, yet none of them knows of the others' existence. They live in Frankfurt, Paris, London and Barcelona. Their father, Gabriel Delacruz - a truck driver - abandoned them when they were little and has never been heard from again. Then one day, Cristofol is contacted by the police: his father is officially a missing person. This fact leads him to discover that he has three half-brothers, and the four young men come together for the first time. Two decades have passed since their father last saw any of them. They barely remember what he was like, but they decide to look for him to resolve their doubts. Why did he abandon them? Why do all four have the same name? Did he intend for them to meet? Divided by geography yet united by blood, the "Cristobales" set out on a quest that is at once painful, hilarious and extraordinary. They discover a man who during thirty years of driving was able to escape the darkness of Franco's Spain and to explore a luminous Europe, a journey that, with the birth of his sons, both opened and broke his heart.

Lost Luggage

Puntí, Jordi

Short Books Ltd

We have long known that good friends can be our main source of moral support, the generous suppliers of love, humour and understanding. As Virginia Woolf put it, "Some people go to priests; others to poetry; I go to my friends."  But did you know that having good friendships makes you cleverer, richer, and healthier? Increasingly, research shows that the single most important factor in a well-lived life is not our jobs, our families, our health, education or wealth  -  it's the breadth and depth of our friendships. In this revelatory, entertaining and touching book, Carlin Flora argues that friends are the new 'nurture'. Tracing the hidden ways in which friendships mould and structure our characters and life chances from infancy to old age, she draws on the latest behavioral science and provides fascinating anecdotes and accounts of famous friendships (from those of Picasso and Matisse to the band U2) to show us how to make friends, how to stay friends and, crucially, how to be good friends. In doing so, she says, we will not only grow as human beings, but will live longer, happier lives.

Friendfluence: The Hidden Ways in Which Friendships Shape Our Characters and Life Chances from Infancy to Old Age

Carlin Flora

Parenting & Relationships

After the economic meltdown of 2008, many pundits placed the blame on "complex financial instruments" like derivatives, and the physicists and mathematicians who dreamed them up. But a young academic named James Owen Weatherall quickly began to question this narrative. Were the physicists really at fault? In this important and entertaining book, Weatherall tells the story of how physicists successfully brought their science to bear on some of the thorniest problems in economics, changing Wall Street forever. He shows how - catastrophically - this science fell into the hands of people who didn't understand it, and didn't care to. Weatherall argues that, while the mathematical models did have their faults, disaster arose because financial institutions failed to think like physicists. Mathematical sophistication is the remedy, he says, not the disease.

The Physics of Finance: Predicting the Unpredictable: How Science Has Taken Over Wall Street

Business & Money

Economics

On a hot summer s afternoon, Ursula Salter runs sobbing from the loch on her parents Scottish estate and confesses, distraught, that she has killed Michael, her 19-year old-nephew. But what really happened? No body can be found, and Ursula s story is full of contradictions. In order to protect her, the Salters come up with another version of events, a decision that some of them will come to regret. Years later, at a family gathering, a witness speaks up and the web of deceit begins to unravel. What is the white lie? Only one person knows the whole truth. Narrating from beyond the grave, Michael takes us to key moments in the past, looping back and back until - finally - we see what he sees.

The White Lie

Literature & Fiction

Andrea Gillies

Literary

The House on Paradise Street

Sofka Zinovieff

Contemporary

You don t need a country garden or an allotment to grow good fruit and veg... This book celebrates the fact that anyone can grow your own and that through veg growing you can meet your neighbours and grow your own community too. A few years ago, Naomi Schillinger got together with her neighbours to start a community gardening scheme. Today, they live in a street in which no less than 100 residents have turned their front gardens over to growing their own fruit and veg: lettuces, leeks and beetroot in raised beds, teepees billowing with sweet peas and runner beans, rhubarb by the door... Whether you live in a rented flat with a window box, a house with a front garden if you have access to a bit of pavement or decide to reclaim some unloved or forgotten corner there will be ideas in this book which will encourage you to have a go at growing your own fruit and veg (and flowers) throughout the year; and, in so doing, create your own mini Eden.

Veg Street

Crafts, Hobbies & Home

Schillinger, Naomi

Gardening & Landscape Design

It's 11pm. All you've wanted to do all day is sleep. You're overworked, underappreciated, and the only thing that got you out of bed this morning was the thought of getting back in it again. Now, finally, here you are. In bed. On the cusp of sleep, drifting off. Such a relief. For what we are about to receive may the Lord make us truly thankful. But then your mind wanders. Into territory where it should not go. From death to broken lightbulbs. From redundancy to unwritten thank-you letters. The minutes tick by. Oh, God, it's going to be one of those nights. Those nights which seem to go on for ever, when all the cares of the world weigh down on your shoulders...This is a book for anyone who has ever spent a night tossing and turning, worrying about life's worst scenarios. The Insomniac's Guide takes you on a journey that will have you laughing in your sleep (or lack of it).

Insomniac's Guide to the Small Hours

Ysenda Maxtone-Graham

I Know You're Going to be Happy In this poignant and perceptive portrait of his parents' catastrophically acrimonious divorce, Rupert Christiansen tells the story of a generation. Full description

I Know You are Going to be Happy: The Story of a Sixties Family

Rupert Christiansen

Reference

Whirligig

Macintyre, Magnus

Denmark is the country of the moment. Recently named the happiest nation in the world, it's the motherland of The Bridge, Borgen, and The Killing, and home to Noma, the world's best restaurant. But though we wear their jumpers and watch their thrillers, how much do we really know about the Danes themselves? Part reportage, part travelogue, How to be Danish is an attempt to fill in some of the gaps - an introduction to contemporary Danish culture that spans television, food, design, architecture, politics, and race. From the set of The Killing to the chefs of Noma, via the woman who knitted *that* jumper, Patrick Kingsley takes us on a journey to the mysterious heart of Denmark.

How to be Danish: From Lego to Lund ... a Short Introduction to the State of Denmark

Patrick Kingsley

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