{"title":"Shirley Barrett","description":null,"products":[{"product_id":"bus-on-thursday-book-shirley-barrett-9780708898802","title":"The Bus on Thursday","description":"'Intoxicating' Jeff VanderMeer, author of Annihilation  'Barrett's brilliant second novel plummets headlong into a darkly funny tale' Mail on Sunday  Bridget Jones meets Twin Peaks in this black comedy about a woman's retreat to a remote Australian town and the horrors awaiting her.  It wasn't just the bad breakup that turned Eleanor Mellett's life upside down. It was the cancer. And all the demons that came with it.  One day she felt a bit of a bump when she was scratching her armpit at work. The next thing she knew, her breast was being removed by an inappropriately attractive doctor, and she was subsequently inundated with cupcakes, besieged by judgy support groups, and the ungrateful recipient of hand-knitted sweaters from her mum.  Luckily, Eleanor finds that Talbingo, a remote little town, needs a primary-school teacher. Their Miss Barker upped and vanished in the night, despite being the most caring teacher ever, according to everyone. Unfortunately, Talbingo is a bit creepy. It's not only the communion-wine-swigging priest prone to rants about how cancer is caused by demons. Or the unstable, overly sensitive kids, always going on about Miss Barker and her amazing sticker system. It's living alone in a remote cabin, with no phone service or wifi, wondering why there are so many locks on the front door, and who is knocking on it late at night.  Riotously funny, deeply unsettling, and surprisingly poignant, Shirley Barrett's The Bus on Thursday is a wicked, weird, wild ride for fans of Maria Semple, Stephen King and Henry James's The Turn of the Screw. And when have those three writers ever appeared in the same sentence?","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"GB \/ VERY_GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":49528559993105,"sku":"GOR010083219","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":49547167564049,"sku":"GOR010635026","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ NEW \/ GARDNERS","offer_id":49728271417617,"sku":"NGR9780708898802","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"GB \/ WELL_READ \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":52495013314833,"sku":"GOR014538077","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/0708898807.jpg?v=1751327654"},{"product_id":"bus-on-thursday-book-shirley-barrett-9780708898796","title":"The Bus on Thursday","description":"'Intoxicating' Jeff VanderMeer, author of Annihilation  'Barrett's brilliant second novel plummets headlong into a darkly funny tale' Mail on Sunday  Bridget Jones meets Twin Peaks in this black comedy about a woman's retreat to a remote Australian town and the horrors awaiting her.  It wasn't just the bad breakup that turned Eleanor Mellett's life upside down. It was the cancer. And all the demons that came with it.  One day she felt a bit of a bump when she was scratching her armpit at work. The next thing she knew, her breast was being removed by an inappropriately attractive doctor, and she was subsequently inundated with cupcakes, besieged by judgy support groups, and the ungrateful recipient of hand-knitted sweaters from her mum.  Luckily, Eleanor finds that Talbingo, a remote little town, needs a primary-school teacher. Their Miss Barker upped and vanished in the night, despite being the most caring teacher ever, according to everyone. Unfortunately, Talbingo is a bit creepy. It's not only the communion-wine-swigging priest prone to rants about how cancer is caused by demons. Or the unstable, overly sensitive kids, always going on about Miss Barker and her amazing sticker system. It's living alone in a remote cabin, with no phone service or wifi, wondering why there are so many locks on the front door, and who is knocking on it late at night.  Riotously funny, deeply unsettling, and surprisingly poignant, Shirley Barrett's The Bus on Thursday is a wicked, weird, wild ride for fans of Maria Semple, Stephen King and Henry James's The Turn of the Screw. 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Mary Davidson has got used to looking after her five siblings whilst catering for her father's boisterous whaling crew. But when John Beck, an itinerant whaleman with a murky past, arrives on the doorstep wanting to join her father, Mary promptly develops an all-consuming crush which upends her world...  Swinging from Mary's hopes and disappointments, both domestic and romantic, to the challenges that beset their tiny whaling operation, Rush Oh! is an enchanting celebration of both Mary's unique voice and an extraordinary episode in Australian history when a family of whalers formed a fond, unique allegiance with a pod of frisky killer whales - led by one named Tom.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"GB \/ VERY_GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":49584315105553,"sku":"GOR008003241","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"GB \/ NEW \/ GARDNERS","offer_id":49729030226193,"sku":"NGR9780349006659","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":50336131416337,"sku":"GOR008666774","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/0349006652.jpg?v=1751438152"},{"product_id":"bus-on-thursday-book-s-barrett-9780374110444","title":"The Bus on Thursday","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003e\"A horror novel about a breast cancer survivor told in the voice of your funniest but most anxious friend, \u003ci\u003eThe Bus on Thursday\u003c\/i\u003e is an appealing mix of genres that is both fluffy and deeply affecting at the same time.\" --Maris Kreizman, \u003ci\u003eVulture\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e \u003cb\u003e\"Funny, angry, feminist . . . [Barrett is] a masterly world-builder.\" --Melissa Maerz, \u003ci\u003eThe New York Times Book Review\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e Bridget Jones meets \u003ci\u003eThe Exorcist\u003c\/i\u003e in this wickedly funny, dark novel about one woman's post-cancer retreat to a remote Australian town and the horrors awaiting her\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e It wasn't just the bad breakup that turned Eleanor Mellett's life upside down. It was the cancer. And all the demons that came with it.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e One day she felt a bit of a bump when she was scratching her armpit at work. The next thing she knew, her breast was being dissected and removed by an inappropriately attractive doctor, and she was suddenly deluged with cupcakes, judgy support groups, and her mum knitting sweaters.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e Luckily, Eleanor discovers Talbingo, a remote little town looking for a primary-school teacher. Their Miss Barker up and vanished in the night, despite being the most caring teacher ever, according to everyone. Unfortunately, Talbingo is a bit creepy. It's not just the communion-wine-guzzling friar prone to mad rants about how cancer is caused by \u003ci\u003edemons\u003c\/i\u003e. Or the unstable, overly sensitive kids, always going on about Miss Barker and her amazing sticker system. 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But when the handsome John Beck -- a former Methodist preacher turned novice whaler with a mysterious past -- arrives at the Davidson's door pleading to join her father's crews, suddenly Mary's world is upended.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e As her family struggles to survive the scarcity of whales and the vagaries of weather, and as she navigates sibling rivalries and an all-consuming first love for the newcomer John, nineteen-year-old Mary will soon discover a darker side to these men who hunt the seas, and the truth of her place among them.\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e Swinging from Mary's own hopes and disappointments to the challenges that have beset her family's whaling operation, Rush Oh! is an enchanting blend of fact and fiction that's as much the story of its gutsy narrator's coming-of-age as it is the celebration of an extraordinary episode in history.\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"US \/ VERY_GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":50163678445841,"sku":"CIN0316261548VG","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"US \/ WELL_READ \/ SBYB","offer_id":52391420526865,"sku":"CIN0316261548A","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/0316261548.jpg?v=1751357419"},{"product_id":"rush-oh-book-shirley-barrett-9780316261531","title":"Rush Oh!","description":"\u003cdiv\u003e\n\u003cb\u003eAn impassioned, charming, and hilarious debut novel about a young woman's coming-of-age, during one of the harshest whaling seasons in the history of New South Wales.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e \u003cbr\u003e 1908: It's the year that proves to be life-changing for our teenage narrator, Mary Davidson, tasked with providing support to her father's boisterous whaling crews while caring for five brothers and sisters in the wake of their mother's death. 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