Headline Books

A tongue-in-cheek field guide to the deadliest animals on Earth from TikTok star @mndiaye_97.

Let's be clear: Mamadou Ndiaye knows a whole lot of animals that can and will end you, but he has no plans to let these strange and horrifying creatures cash in his life insurance policy. Now the TikTok star is turning his engaging, entertaining and informative takes on animal biology and behaviour into this hilarious guide to the world's most deadly creatures. These include:

Sperm whales with a call so strong it can vibrate you to death

Meerkats or 'the most homicidal mammals on Earth'

Hyenas, which eat their prey while it is still alive

Hippos, which 'have no soul and answer to no god'

...and a golf-ball-sized octopus that can erase twenty-six people with one bite

You'll learn not only which animals to avoid, but which ones can beat you in a footrace, which ones create surprisingly high body counts, and which ones will give you a good reason never to venture into the ocean.

Mamadou also offers the occasional survival tip, even if it is just to make peace with your higher power. From the moose (aka 'the antlered Grim Reaper') to the Cassowary ('Jurassic bullshit with feathers'), this is nature like you never want to meet it in real life.

'I hope this Christmas is better than last year's.'

Following a scandalous affair, wayward Emma Devaney is sent in disgrace from her home in Ireland to Ryhope, where she will live with her widowed aunt, Bessie Brogan, and help run her pub. Bessie is kind but firm, and at first, Emma rebels against her lack of freedom. Struggling to fit in, she turns to the wrong person for comfort, and becomes pregnant.

Accepting she must embrace her new life for the sake of her baby, Emma pours her energy into making the pub thrive and helping heal the fractured relationship between Bessie and her daughters. She catches the attention of Robert, a gruff but sincere farmer, who means to win her heart.

As December approaches, thankful for the home and acceptance she's found, Emma is determined to bring not just her family but the whole Ryhope community together to celebrate—and to make one very special mother's Christmas dreams come true.

Love Glenda's sagas? Don't miss her cosy-crime mystery series staring Helen Dexter and her trusty greyhound, Suki, starting with Murder at the Seaview Hotel and Curtain Call at the Seaview Hotel.

From everyone's favourite online cleaning expert and 'TikTok Auntie', this is the only cleaning book that you will ever need.

How to Clean Everything is full of genuinely useful tips and tricks, and advice about not just what but also what not to do. Covering everything from laundry to accidents, and cleaning room by room, this audiobook also contains sections on more general household maintenance, particularly useful for renters or anyone living away from home for the first time. Ann's approach is realistic, reassuring and easy to follow, whatever your circumstances.

A humorous deep-dive into the varied—and oft-gruesome—deaths of the king and queens of England and Scotland.

How the monarchs of England and Scotland met their deaths has been a wonderful mixture of violence, infections, overindulgence and occasional regicide. In Mortal Monarchs, medical historian Dr Suzie Edge examines 1,000 years of royal deaths to uncover the plots, accusations, rivalries and ever-present threat of poison that the kings and queens of old faced.

From the "bloody" fascinating story behind Oliver Cromwell's demise and the subsequent treatment of his corpse and whether the arrow William II caught in the chest was an accident or murder, to Henry IV's remarkable skin condition and the red-hot poker up Edward II's rear end, Mortal Monarchs captivates, grosses-out and informs.

In school, many of us learned the dates they died and who followed them, but sadly never heard the varied—and oft-gruesome—way our monarchs met their maker. Featuring original medical research, this history forms a rich record not just of how these people died, but how we thought about and treated the human body, in life and in death.

Cleo Forsum is a best-selling novelist turned scriptwriter whose TV series The Baking Detective is a huge success. Writing is all she's ever wanted to do, and baking and murder stories have proved a winning combination.

But now she has decided to walk away from it all—including divorcing her husband, Wallace—before her past secrets catch up with her.

As Cleo drafts the final ever episodes of the series, people she knows start getting hurt. And it's soon clear that someone is trying to frame her for murder.

She thinks she knows why, but Cleo can't tell the police or prove her innocence. Because then she'd have to confess about her other husband....

A series of terrifying murders. A set of complex lies.

And a woman with no way to clear her name.

My Other Husband is the latest gripping thriller from the Queen of the Big Reveal.

The truth of what happened that night lies with a secret witness.

Quarter to Midnight is the first thrilling novel in a brand-new series by Sunday Times bestselling author Karen Rose, set in New Orleans.

Rocky Hebert walks into his death at quarter to midnight one New Orleans night.

His son Gabe cannot accept the official verdict of suicide and enlists the help of the Burke Broussard Private Investigation Agency to discover the real cause of death.

PI Molly Sutton knows what it's like to lose a father in tragic circumstances and will go to any lengths to crack the investigation, as she tries to fight off her growing feelings for Gabe.

They soon realise Rocky was working on an investigation of his own; one that threatened to expose the deep corruption going all the way to the top of the police department. And that the key to the puzzle lies with a young witness to a murder that happened years earlier: Xavier Morrow.

Just what did Rocky know? And who might have shut him up?

As they get closer and closer to the truth, they realise that the killer is not going to stop at Rocky. And that Xavier is in very real danger. Someone will go to any lengths to protect what he witnessed that night coming out....

Small Angels updates the classic ghost story for the 21st century: a wedding in a Suffolk village sees the woods begin to stir with an unsettling magic, and forces a troubled family's secrets out into the open.

When Chloe turns the key to Small Angels, the church nestled at the edge of Mockbeggar Woods where she is to be married, she is braced for cobwebs and dust. What she doesn't expect are the villagers' concerned faces, her fiancé's remoteness or the nagging voice in her head that whispers to her of fears she didn't even know she had.

Something in the woods is beginning to stir, to creep closer to the sleeping houses. Something that should have been banished long ago.

Whatever it is, it's getting stronger, and pretending it's not there won't keep the wedding, or the village—or Chloe—safe.

This audiobook is a celebration of snacks in all their glorious forms, guaranteed to fill your day with snacking joy.

It will take you from your morning coffee (cinnamon crumble cakes and cherry-marzipan hand pies) to your evening wine (oeufs durs mayonnaise and mushroom pate) via salsas, hot dips, crispy bits, crab nachos and frozen piña coladas in the sun. The Joy of Snacks will lift your spirits while satisfying your deepest snacking desires, helping you squeeze the joy out of life's big and small moments, whether it's party time or Monday morning.

The first memoir by Deacon Blue singer and music icon Ricky Ross.

In 1986, Ricky Ross started a full-time career in music, which has lasted for over 35 years. His earlier working life was spent in youth work and teaching in his home city of Dundee, and his adopted home of Glasgow. It was in these two cities where he spent his formative years learning how to write and play songs.

Having always written about the people and places who've made an impact on his life, it's no surprise that this is how he has approached Walking Back Home, his first-ever memoir, which takes the listener on a journey from Ricky's childhood to the roller coaster of leading his band Deacon Blue to top of the charts and the band's eventual break-up and his solo career.

"I started to write about the years I spent putting the band together, on the first time we ever played in America, and about some of the musical characters I've met along the way. I gave some thought to growing up in suburban Dundee in a family with no record player and no sense that someone like me could, one day, make a record. That's one part of the story. However, I still want to talk about the smell of Born to Run when I first got it home and how I saw the Buzzcocks looking at a Cliff Richard album sleeve in a Dundee Record Shop window. I still want to tell the stories of my grandparents and parents and the woman whose voice was so vulnerable when she got up to sing at our church.

For all these years I've told stories. Sometimes these days I also tell them on the radio. I've met some amazing people and their stories need told, too. The first time Deacon Blue ever played Wembley Arena I started to introduce a song only to hear, 'Get on with it' shouted from Row Z. We proceeded with the song, but I often thought I'd quite like to finish that story."

A stunning and evocative new dual-time standalone epic novel from the bestselling author of Echoes of the Runes.

Brimming with romance, adventure and vivid historical detail, Christina Courtenay does for the Vikings what Diana Gabaldon's Outlander and Clanlans does for Scottish history.

A love forged in fire lives on through the ages . . .

Skye Logan has been struggling to run her remote farm on Scotland's west coast alone ever since her marriage fell apart. When a handsome stranger turns up looking for work, it seems that her wish for help has been granted.

Rafe Carlisle is searching for peace and somewhere he can forget about the last few years. But echoes of the distant past won't leave Skye and Rafe alone, and they begin to experience vivid dreams which appear to be linked to the Viking jewellery they each wear.

It seems that the ghosts of the past have secrets . . . and they have something that they want Skye and Rafe to know.