“Donoghue’s talents are at such glorious heights in this novel, the reader feels as though they are on the titular train, bustling next to strangers, staring out the window, and hurtling towards Paris. And it’s near impossible to put the book down until it reaches its final destination.”–Heather O’Neill (The Capital of Dreams)

Set over a single day, as the morning train travels from the Normandy coast to Paris, men, women and children take their seats in the passenger cars, which are divided by wealth and status. Among the passengers is an anarchist intent on destruction, a young boy travelling alone, a pregnant woman fleeing her home village for the anonymity of the big city, a medical student who suspects a girl may have a fatal disease, and the railway men, devoted to the train, to the company and to each other. 

Based on an 1895 railway disaster that went down in history when it was captured in a series of surreal, extraordinary photographs, The Paris Express is a thrilling ride and a literary masterpiece that captures the politics, fears and chaos of the end of the 19th century.

Drawing on years of investigation and Anne Lister’s five-million-word secret journal, Learned by Heart is the long-buried love story of Eliza Raine, an orphan heiress banished from India to England at age six, and Anne Lister, a brilliant, troublesome tomboy, who meet at the Manor School for Young Ladies in York in 1805 when they are both fourteen.

In a time of plague and terror, three men abandon their familiar world and set out in a small boat for an island they don’t know exists, with only faith and devotion to guide them.