Kate Pullinger

Exploring a host of female parts, rites of passage, love, loss, danger, revelations, strange relationships, the pleasures and pains of growing up female, a fantastic collection of short stories from some of the best women writers today dealing with all aspects of female life from youth to old age. Includes stories from: Hilary Bailey, Sally Cameron, Betzy Dinesen, Souad Faress, Chrissie Gittins, Bonnie Greer, Vicky Grut, Kirsty Gunn, Brigid Howarth, Mizzy Hussain, Geraldine Kaye, Carolyn Patrick, Ellen Phethean, Kate Pullinger, Stella Rafferty, Ravinder Randhawa, Máire Ní Réagáin, Michéle Roberts, Daphne Rock, Elisa Segrave, Kirsty Seymour-Ure, Susanna Steele & Karen Whiteson.

From the award-winning author of The Mistress of Nothing comes a highly imaginative story of colliding worlds and extraordinary connections, revealing the tenuous, often unexpected ties that bind us together. When everything was falling apart, someone fell into place... Suburban London housewife Harriet spends her days doing what she's worst at. She grocery shops for her family who eats too much, parents a son who refuses to communicate, and tries to be a wife to a man who hasn't embraced her in years. But what starts out as a mundane trip to the supermarket turns her world upside down when a mysterious man named Yacub falls out of the sky from the landing gear of an airplane and lands on her car in the parking lot--and survives. He's starving and freezing cold--what else can she do other than bring him home to her family? Suddenly her son has stepped away from the video games and her husband is looking at her once again--even if it's because they think she's crazy for taking in a complete stranger who stinks of gas. And just who is Yacub, this young man who escaped from a Dubai labor camp and stowed away in the belly of the plane to travel around the world? Is it an extraordinary coincidence that he's dropped into Harriet's life just as a long-buried secret from her past threatens to come to light? Inspired by real-life accounts of airplane stowaways, Landing Gear showcases the complex texture of modern life, and how we sometimes need help seeing what's right in front of us.

The American debut of an award-winning novel about a lady's maid's awakening as she journeys from the confines of Victorian England to the uncharted far reaches of Egypt's Nile Valley When Lady Duff Gordon, paragon of London society, departs for the hot, dry climate of Egypt to seek relief from her debilitating tuberculosis, her lady's maid, Sally, doesn't hesitate to leave the only world she has known in order to remain at her mistress's side. As Sally gets farther and farther from home, she experiences freedoms she has never known--forgoing corsets and wearing native dress, learning Arabic, and having her first taste of romance. But freedom is a luxury that a lady's maid can ill afford, and when Sally's newfound passion for life causes her to forget what she is entitled to, she is brutally reminded she is mistress of nothing. Ultimately she must choose her master and a way back home--or a way to an unknown future. Based on the real lives of Lady Duff Gordon and her maid, The Mistress of Nothing is a lush, erotic, and compelling story about the power of race, class, and love

'As a woman I have no country. As a woman my country is the whole world' Virginia Woolf Asham House in Sussex was once home to Virginia and Leonard Woolf and is the inspiration behind the Asham Award. Launched in 1996 to support and encourage new writers, it is Britain's only prize for short stories by women. Waving at the Gardener presents the twelve fresh, engaging and original voices shortlisted for the Asham Short-Story Award 2009, as well as four specially commissioned new stories by beloved authors Margaret Atwood, Esther Freud, Alison MacLeod and Yiyun Li.

_______________ The novelization of the stunning film starring Holly Hunter, winner of the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay _______________ Ada, together with her nine-year-old illegitimate daughter Flora, and her piano, leave Scotland to arrive in the remote bush of 19th-century New Zealand for a marriage arranged by her father. Although mute, she does not consider herself silent, as her piano is the vehicle of her expression . . . In her award-winning film The Piano, Jane Campion told a love story so stunningly original that it transfixed millions of film-goers all over the world. Although she had already spent ten years writing and making the film, Campion continued to be haunted by her characters and decided to tell the whole story. Delving deeply into the characters' pasts, the novel reveals why Ada has stopped speaking, the history of the piano, and the secret of Flora's conception. We also find out about Baines's mysterious past, and discover what lies behind Stewart's stark loneliness.