Books from Emily Blunt

Lanny

Longlisted for the 2019 Booker PrizeAn entrancing new novel by the author of the prizewinning Grief Is the Thing with FeathersThere’s a village an hour from London. It’s no different from many others today: one pub, one church, redbrick cottages, some public housing, and a few larger houses dotted about. Voices rise up, as they might anywhere, speaking of loving and needing and working and dying and walking the dogs. This village belongs to the people who live in it, to the land and to the land’s past.It also belongs to Dead Papa Toothwort, a mythical figure local schoolchildren used to draw as green and leafy, choked by tendrils growing out of his mouth, who awakens after a glorious nap. He is listening to this twenty-first-century village, to its symphony of talk: drunken confessions, gossip traded on the street corner, fretful conversations in living rooms. He is listening, intently, for a mischievous, ethereal boy whose parents have recently made the village their home. Lanny.With Lanny, Max Porter extends the potent and magical space he created in Grief Is the Thing with Feathers. This brilliant novel will ensorcell readers with its anarchic energy, with its bewitching tapestry of fabulism and domestic drama. Lanny is a ringing defense of creativity, spirit, and the generative forces that often seem under assault in the contemporary world, and it solidifies Porter’s reputation as one of the most daring and sensitive writers of his generation.
Emily Blunt
Actress
Felicity keeps her sister’s bedside table stacked: Things in Jars by Jess Kidd is currently on top; below is Max Porter’s Lanny. “God, but it’s so good. Reading it was a visceral experience.”
Books from Emily Blunt

Things in Jars

A January Book of the Month Pick “Miraculous and thrilling…A few pages in and I was determined to read every word Jess Kidd has ever written.” —Diane Setterfield, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Once Upon a River “An impossible wonder: a book for everyone, and yet somehow a book just for you...A sumptuous tour of Victorian London, resurrected here with a vigor and vibrancy to rival The Crimson Petal and the White...Utterly magical.”—A.J. Finn, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Woman in the Window “A perfect mix of hilarity, the macabre, and a touch of romance, Things in Jars is ridiculously entertaining, all as it sneaks up and makes you feel things…Simply: Jess Kidd is so good it isn’t fair.” —Erika Swyler, bestselling author of The Book of Speculation and Light from Other Stars In the dark underbelly of Victorian London, a formidable female sleuth is pulled into the macabre world of fanatical anatomists and crooked surgeons while investigating the kidnapping of an extraordinary child in this gothic mystery—perfect for fans of The Essex Serpent and The Book of Speculation.Bridie Devine—female detective extraordinaire—is confronted with the most baffling puzzle yet: the kidnapping of Christabel Berwick, secret daughter of Sir Edmund Athelstan Berwick, and a peculiar child whose reputed supernatural powers have captured the unwanted attention of collectors trading curiosities in this age of discovery. Winding her way through the labyrinthine, sooty streets of Victorian London, Bridie won’t rest until she finds the young girl, even if it means unearthing a past that she’d rather keep buried. Luckily, her search is aided by an enchanting cast of characters, including a seven-foot tall housemaid; a melancholic, tattoo-covered ghost; and an avuncular apothecary. But secrets abound in this foggy underworld where spectacle is king and nothing is quite what it seems. Blending darkness and light, history and folklore, Things in Jars is a spellbinding Gothic mystery that collapses the boundary between fact and fairy tale to stunning effect and explores what it means to be human in inhumane times.
Emily Blunt
Actress
Felicity keeps her sister’s bedside table stacked: Things in Jars by Jess Kidd is currently on top; below is Max Porter’s Lanny. “God, but it’s so good. Reading it was a visceral experience.”
Books from Emily Blunt

Three Hours

THREE HOURS TO SAVE THE PEOPLE YOU LOVEA TOP 10 SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER & A BEST BOOK OF 2020 IN THE SUNDAY TIMES, TIMES, GUARDIAN, STYLIST, RED AND GOOD HOUSEKEEPINGA TIMES & SUNDAY TIMES THRILLER OF THE MONTHIn rural Somerset in the middle of a blizzard, the unthinkable happens: a school is under siege. Children and teachers barricade themselves into classrooms, the library, the theatre. The headmaster lies wounded in the library, unable to help his trapped students and staff. Outside, a police psychiatrist must identify the gunmen, while parents gather desperate for news. In three intense hours, all must find the courage to stand up to evil and save the people they love.'A brilliant literary thriller... moving, masterly' Sunday Times 'Extraordinary... Three Hours is much more than a nail-biting thriller; it is a disquisition on values: of love and hate, of sacrifice for others, of risk-taking and courage' The Times'A novel that you live rather than merely read' Telegraph'It is early days, but this could be one of the thrillers of the decade. If you read only one thriller this year; make it this one: it is that good' Daily Mail'Three Hours intersperses scenes of breath-sucking tension with stirring meditations on human nature' Sara Collins, Guardian
Emily Blunt
Actress
Last book you read? Oh, I'm reading "Three hours" right now.
Books from Emily Blunt

The Hobbit

Bilbo Baggins, the hobbit, is a peaceful sort who lives in a cozy hole in the Shire, a place where adventures are uncommon - and rather unwanted. So when the wizard Gandalf whisks him away on a treasure-hunting expedition with a troop of rowdy dwarves, he's not entirely thrilled. Encountering ruthless trolls, beastly orcs, gigantic spiders, and hungry wolves, Bilbo discovers within himself astonishing strength and courage. And at the ultimate confrontation with the fearsome dragon Smaug, the hobbit will brave the dangers of the dark and dragon fire alone and unaided.
Emily Blunt
Actress
My favorite book as a kid was The Hobbit.
Books from Emily Blunt

The Kite Runner

Winter, 1975: Afghanistan, a country on the verge of an internal coup. 12-year-old Amir is desperate to win the approval of his father, one of the richest merchants in Kabul. He's failed to do so through academia or brawn but the one area they connect is the annual kite fighting tournament.
Emily Blunt
Actress
Honestly, when I read The Kite Runner I couldn't sleep for two weeks. It clicked my brain into a different way of thinking and regarding people.
Books from Emily Blunt

To Kill a Mockingbird

Harper Lee's classic novel of a lawyer in the Deep South defending a black man charged with the rape of a white girl. One of the best-loved stories of all time, To Kill a Mockingbird has earned many distinctions since its original publication in 1960. It won the Pulitzer Prize, has been translated into more than forty languages, sold more than thirty million copies worldwide, and been made into an enormously popular movie. Most recently, librarians across the country gave the book the highest of honors by voting it the best novel of the twentieth century.
Emily Blunt
Actress
I think a good book can change your life. I think To Kill a Mockingbird is a book that did that.
Books from Emily Blunt

Life After Life

What if you could live again and again, until you got it right? On a cold and snowy night in 1910, Ursula Todd is born to an English banker and his wife. She dies before she can draw her first breath. On that same cold and snowy night, Ursula Todd is born, lets out a lusty wail, and embarks upon a life that will be, to say the least, unusual. For as she grows, she also dies, repeatedly, in a variety of ways, while the young century marches on towards its second cataclysmic world war. Does Ursula's apparently infinite number of lives give her the power to save the world from its inevitable destiny? And if she can -- will she?Darkly comic, startlingly poignant, and utterly original -- this is Kate Atkinson at her absolute best.
Emily Blunt
Actress
Read one author: Kate Adkinson.