19 Pan Macmillan titles on Better Reading’s Top 100 Fiction 2021
13 May 2021
19 Pan Macmillan titles on Better Reading’s Top 100 Fiction 2021
We are proud to announce that 19 Pan Macmillan titles have made Better Reading’s Top 100 Fiction for 2021. This year, we have three books in the Top 10: The Dryby Jane Harper, The Book Thiefby Markus Zusak and I Give My Marriage a Yearby Holly Wainwright.
Better Reading is a growing online community of readers who love to talk about books, old and new. See below for the full list of our books or visit Better Reading to find out more.
‘Every so often a debut novel arrives that is so tightly woven and compelling it seems the work of a novelist in her prime. That’s what Jane Harper has given us with The Dry’ John Hart, New York Times bestselling author of Redemption Road
After the death of his childhood friend, protagonist and Federal Police Investigator Aaron Falks returns to his home town that is small but has big secrets. He is loath to face the townsfolk who turned their backs on him twenty years earlier, but as questions mount, Falk is forced to probe deeper into the deaths of his hometown. Secrets long buried bubble to the surface in this thrilling Australian crime novel.
NOW A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE STARRING ERIC BANA AS AARON FALK.
‘Brilliant and hugely ambitious…the kind of book that can be life-changing’ New York Times
1939. Nazi Germany. The country is holding its breath. Death has never been busier and will become busier still.
Follow Liesel Meminger as she comes of age in Nazi Germany during WWII whose life is changed when she picks up an object, partially hidden in the snow. It is The Gravedigger’s Handbook, and it is her first act of book thievery.
‘The most insightful novel on marriage I’ve ever read. I can’t stop thinking about it.’ Mia Freedman
Lou and Josh have been together for 14 years. They share two kids, a mortgage, careers and plenty of history. Now, after a particularly fraught Christmas, Lou is ready to ask herself: is this marriage worth hanging on to?
I Give My Marriage a Year paints a sharply accurate, often hilarious picture of a modern Australian marriage. Lou and Josh are a couple on the edge, and their efforts to bring their relationship back from the brink will resonate with anyone who has ever asked themselves: is this enough?
A spellbinding epic tale of ambition, anarchy, and absolute power set against the sprawling medieval canvas of twelfth-century England, this is Ken Follett’s classic historical masterpiece.
The Pillars of the Earth tells the story of Philip, prior of Kingsbridge, a devout and resourceful monk driven to build the greatest Gothic cathedral the world has known . . . of Tom, the mason who becomes his architect – a man divided in his soul . . . of the beautiful, elusive Lady Aliena, haunted by a secret shame . . . and of a struggle between good and evil that will turn church against state, and brother against brother.
‘Compelling story, plenty of twists and a satisfying ending. Sally is an exceptional observer of people and their relationships.’ Graeme Simsion, author of The Rosie Result
Fern Castle works in her local library. She has dinner with her twin sister Rose three nights a week. And she avoids crowds, bright lights and loud noises as much as possible. Fern has a carefully structured life and disrupting her routine can be … dangerous.
When Rose discovers that she cannot fall pregnant, Fern sees her chance to pay her sister back for everything Rose has done for her. Fern can have a baby for Rose. She just needs to find a father. Simple.
Fern’s mission will shake the foundations of the life she has carefully built for herself and stir up dark secrets from the past, in this quirky, rich and shocking story of unexpected love.
Despite their differences, sisters Viann and Isabelle have always been close. Younger, bolder Isabelle lives in Paris while Viann is content with life in the French countryside with her husband Antoine and their daughter. But when the Second World War strikes, Antoine is sent off to fight and Viann finds herself isolated so Isabelle is sent by their father to help her.
Vivid and exquisite in its illumination of a time and place that was filled with atrocities, but also humanity and strength, Kristin Hannah’s The Nightingale will provoke thought and discussion that will have readers talking long after they finish reading.
“A singularly profound and moving work . . . It’s not often that you read a book of this length and find yourself thinking “I wish it was longer” but Yanagihara takes you so deeply into the lives and minds of these characters that you struggle to leave them behind.” The Times
A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara, is an immensely powerful and heartbreaking novel of brotherly love and the limits of human endurance. Following four best friends as they navigate life in New York City, A Little Life, is a harrowing, complex and incredible story of resilience.
FBI investigator, Amos Decker and his colleague, Alex Jamison, are summoned to seek answers in the local community of London, North Dakota, which sits at the very heart of the fracking industry. Enriched with oil money, jealousy and a deep-set rivalry lie beneath a veneer of glitz and opulence.
Decker soon realizes that the nearby ‘eye in the sky’, the Air Force Station, may hold the vital clues and that this town holds secrets so explosive that they could destabilize the entire country…
‘I absolutely loved The Lost Man. I devoured it in a day. Her best yet!’ Liane Moriarty
Two brothers meet at the border of their vast cattle properties under the unrelenting sun of outback Queensland, in this stunning new standalone novel from New York Times bestseller Jane Harper
They are at the stockman’s grave, a landmark so old, no one can remember who is buried there. But today, the scant shadow it casts was the last hope for their middle brother, Cameron. Did he lose hope and walk to his death? Because if he didn’t, the isolation of the outback leaves few suspects…
Joanne Flack is on the run – suspected of stealing a rare African plant thought to be extinct and worth millions of dollars.
Danger.
Sonja Kurtz is hired by the CIA to hunt down Joanne and find the link between the missing plant and a terrorist group hiding out in South Africa.
Treachery.
Joanne is a member of the Pretoria Cycad and Firearms Appreciation Society who take it upon themselves to track down the plant … and the traitor in their midst who is willing to kill for it.
From Australia’s favourite storyteller with the new novel Before the Storm out now.
In the ashes of her marriage, she finds the truth about his past and the courage to start again in . . . The Last Paradise.
Grace has the perfect life: a job she loves, a beautiful daughter and a rich, successful husband. But one night, when their world falls apart in a shocking disaster, Grace suddenly sees what she couldn’t admit – her marriage and her husband are a fraud.
It is 1953 and Melbourne society is looking forward to coronation season, the grand balls and celebrations for the young queen-to-be. Tilly Dunnage is, however, working for a pittance in a second-rate Collins Street salon. Her talents go unappreciated, and the madame is a bully and a cheat, but Tilly has a past she is desperate to escape and good reason to prefer anonymity.
Meanwhile, Sergeant Farrat and the McSwiney clan have been searching for their resident dressmaker ever since she left Dungatar in flames. And they aren’t the only ones. The inhabitants of the town are still out for revenge (or at least someone to foot the bill for the new high street). So when Tilly’s name starts to feature in the fashion pages, the jig is up. Along with Tilly’s hopes of keeping her secrets hidden…
“Liane Moriarty produces novels that are miracles of structure as well as human insight” Sydney Morning Herald
A murder…A tragic accident…Or just parents behaving badly? What’s indisputable is that someone is dead. Following the lives of women at different crossroads, but they will all wind up in the same shocking place as their secrets bubble to the surface.
Big Little Lies is a brilliant take on ex-husbands and second wives, mothers and daughters, schoolyard scandal, and the little lies that can turn lethal.
“The story is cleverly plotted, full of suspense and so well-written that it pulls you in from the first page” Sunday Mirror
How well do you know your husband? How well do you know yourself?
Celia is a devoted mother and wife but he suburban bliss is thrown into turmoil when she stumbles across a letter title “For my wife, Cecilia Fitzpatrick, to be opened only in the event of my death”.
The new book from Liane Moriarty, Apples Never Fall releases September 2021. Pre-order now.
‘So gripping I wanted to rush through the pages, but so beautifully written I wanted to linger over every sentence. Hannah Kent’s debut novel is outstanding.’ Madeline Miller
Based on the gripping true story of the last woman ever executed in Ireland, Burial Rites follows Anges Magnusdottir who is condemned to death for her part in the brutal murder of two men. Burial Rites is a deeply moving novel about freedom and the ways we will risk everything for love. In beautiful, cut-glass prose, Hannah Kent portrays Iceland’s formidable landscape, and asks: how can one woman endure when her life depends upon the stories told by others?
“She is…both hugely popular yet subversive…Nine Perfect Strangers shows Moriarty still taking risks with fiction…weighty issues writ with humour and a light touch. The hammer is still in the handbag, ready to smash a glass window or two.” Lucy Sussex, The Australian
With her wit, compassion and uncanny understanding of human behaviour, Liane Moriarty explores the depth of connection that can be formed when people are thrown together in… unconventional circumstances.
The new book from Liane Moriarty, Apples Never Fall releases September 2021. Pre-order now.
A magnificent golden capstone once sat atop the Great Pyramid of Giza. It was a source of immense power, capable of bestowing upon its holder absolute global rule for a thousand years . . .
But then, in 323 BC, the capstone was broken into seven pieces and hidden within The Seven Wonders of the Ancient World.
‘I am pleased to recommend…Markus Zusak’s extraordinary novel Bridge of Clay, which I suspect I’ll reread many times. It’s a sprawling, challenging, and endlessly rewarding book. But it also has the raw and real and unironized emotion that courses through all of Zusak’s books. I’m in awe of him.’ John Green
The Dunbar boys bring each other up in a house run by their own rules. A family of ramshackle tragedy – their mother is dead, their father has fled – they love and fight, and learn to reckon with the adult world.
It is Clay, the quiet one, who will build a bridge; for his family, for his past, for his sins. He builds a bridge to transcend humanness. To survive.
The compelling new novel from Jane Harper, the New York Times bestselling author of The Dry.
Kieran Elliott’s life changed forever on the day a reckless mistake led to devastating consequences.
The guilt that still haunts him resurfaces during a visit with his young family to the small coastal community he once called home.
Kieran’s parents are struggling in a town where fortunes are forged by the sea. Between them all is his absent brother, Finn.
When a body is discovered on the beach, long-held secrets threaten to emerge. A sunken wreck, a missing girl, and questions that have never washed away…