The Literary Shortlist Over the next month, book lovers from around the world will be voting on The 50 Self-Published Books Worth Reading (2013/14).

       
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The Literary Shortlist

Over the next month, book lovers from around the world will be voting on The 50 Self-Published Books Worth Reading (2013/14). We'll give you the details on how you can vote too, but first we want to introduce you to the 'contestants' and let them try to win your vote.

Here is the literary shortlist; those novels perfectly positioned at the juncture of substance and style.

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unclesam

But first, an update

23,000 votes have been cast thus far.
4,000 votes cast in a single day from 2 computers in Vietnam have been deleted. It seems someone was trying to cheat in support of one book. Because we're trusting people, we're assuming it wasn't the author himself.
The Romance and Erotica votes are the tightest, with very few votes between third and seventh in both categories.

So, if you haven't voted, what are you waiting for? Your favourite author needs you!

Vote Here

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yesterday road

Yesterday Road

Kevin Brennan

In this “coming-of-old-age” tale, Jack Peckham finds himself on a journey into his distant past, helped along the way by Joe Easterday, a young man with Down syndrome, and Ida Pevely, a middle-aged waitress with her own mountain of regrets. Jack has a hundred grand in cash that he can’t explain, since he can’t remember yesterday much less forty years ago. Setting out from Northern California for “points east,” he gets lost, carjacked, abandoned, and arrested, but he’s always homing in on the one object of his inner drive — home.

With humor and plenty of unexpected turns, Kevin Brennan’s second novel is a lyrical and poignant story of memory and identity, of how it is the whole of experience — pain and regret along with love and pleasure — that gives life its fullness. We all tow our histories behind us as we make our way down Yesterday Road.

USA

Amazon.com

 
UK

Amazon.co.uk

 
Canada

Amazon.ca

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An Untold Want

An Untold Want

Sara Stark

As if being born into a family of witches in a small Georgia town isn’t enough to brand her a social pariah, Maggie MacAllister came home from college with a PhD, baby Liz, and no husband. In the fifteen years since, she has allowed the Jacob’s Creek campaign of whispers to mold her life into a wretched existence.

Even though Maggie sees herself as rational, even scientific, she still attempts to impose logic on a situation of legendary proportions, the MacAllister family curse, but try as she might, a stroll through the family cemetery is proof enough that any man who loves a MacAllister woman dies in the prime of his life. Maggie commits to being single, but when her sixteen year old daughter, Liz, nearly dies from a self-administered abortion, Maggie is thrown together with JD Seaborne, an attractive, younger man with a teenage daughter, Desi, and psychological ghosts of his own. Despite striving to protect JD from both the curse and the neighbors’ censure by pushing him away, they become emotionally, spiritually, and eventually physically entangled.

USA

Amazon.com

 
UK

Amazon.co.uk

 
Canada

Amazon.ca

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Bits of Broken Glass

Bits of Broken Glass

Martha Reynolds

How much really changes in 25 years? Former classmates are poised to find out as their first-ever high school reunion gets closer. Some lives have improved, some have soured, but all remained connected by their shared West Alton High past...

Once the target of ridicule, one-time "ugly duckling" Kellie has transformed in both beauty and attitude, though her fears and fragility remain as deep scars within. Joe was adored by everyone in school. Well...almost everyone. Now an Oscar-winning Hollywood director, Joe is ready to return. Except that it means having to face the horrific event that ultimately pushed him away...And then there's Scott, the West Alton "lifer," who's been collecting a disability pension from the town for a suspicious back injury, among other questionable life choices.

As the months count down, long-kept secrets will be revealed as the question ever looms... Can you ever really go home again?

USA

Amazon.com

 
UK

Amazon.co.uk

 
Canada

Amazon.ca

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Broken People

Broken People

Scott Hildreth

Five broken people, five points of view, one story. From each of five characters perspective, this story unfolds and grips you from the beginning. If there is any part of you that feels broken, this book is a mirror held before you. In the end, you'll see your true reflection.

From time to time, a book comes along, and makes you stop. It makes you stop and second guess who you are, what you’re doing in life, with life, and for the ones you love. This is that book. Through colorfully painted characters, “Broken People” forces the reader to reflect on self. There will be a broken part of you in one (or all) of these characters, guaranteed.

USA

Amazon.com

 
UK

Amazon.co.uk

 
Canada

Amazon.ca

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Green Castles

Green Castles

KL Montgomery

Green Castles, a novel by Hoosier-born author K.L. Montgomery, tells the story of three former high school best friends who are reunited in their hometown when the daughter of one of the women loses her battle with mitochondrial disease. The other two friends, who had a falling out after high school, comfort their grieving friend and help her prepare for life without her daughter. Through a series of flashbacks to their teen days, the trio learns about resilience, forgiveness, and just how strong the bonds of family and friendship truly are.

USA

Amazon.com

 
UK

Amazon.co.uk

 
Canada

Amazon.ca

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The Unraveling of Bebe Jones

The Unreaveling Of Bebe Jones

Rojé Augustin

The Unraveling of Bebe Jones revolves around the rich and famous Jones family and the people who work for them as they cope through an array of personal dramas. The story begins at the height of the Global Financial Crisis, when 23-year-old Desiree Washington lands a job with her idol, legendary R&B singer Bebe Jones. Desiree quickly discovers that the outwardly perfect Bebe is in fact a troubled and lonely diva reeling from a career in decline and a marriage in tatters, and that behind all the money, glamor and fame, there are skeletons in the family closet. Throughout all of this Desiree seeks support from her best friend Sean Minton, an aspiring music producer who hails from the insulated world of New York’s black elite burdened with secrets of his own. Rounding out the cast are Bebe's husband, Magnus Chadwick, a British hedge fund manager who cares more about money than family; her disgruntled household staff -- all with strange ties to Bebe; and her children, brave casualties of their mother's nightmare.

USA

Amazon.com

 
UK

Amazon.co.uk

 
Canada

Amazon.ca

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Swimming-Upstream

Swimming Upstream

Ruth Mancini

After seven years, Lizzie wonders whether she’s truly happy with her long-term boyfriend. When one wrong step and a chance meeting set off an unexpected chain of events, her life begins to unravel. On the same day that she meets Martin, an attractive lifeguard, her old friend, Catherine, re-appears. But is Martin really all he seems? And what is the secret that Catherine is hiding? As Lizzie struggles to confront the ghosts of her past, can she survive the shocking twist that will change the course of her future?

Swimming Upstream is a life-affirming and often humorous story about a young woman's pursuit of happiness. It is also a story of female friendship, love, and divided loyalties - and the moral choices that we find ourselves making when the chips are down.

USA

Amazon.com

 
UK

Amazon.co.uk

 
Canada

Amazon.ca

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The Luck of the Weissensteiners

The Luck of the Weissensteiners

Christopher Fischer

From the moment that Greta Weissensteiner enters the bookstore where Wilhelm Winkelmeier works, and entrances him with her good looks and serious ways, I was hooked. But this is no ordinary romance; in fact it is not a romance at all, but a powerful, often sad, Holocaust story. What makes The Luck of the Weissensteiners so extraordinary is the chance Christoph Fischer gives his readers to consider the many different people who were never in concentration camps, never in the military, yet who nonetheless had their own indelible Holocaust experiences. Set in the fascinating area of Bratislava, this is a wide-ranging, historically accurate exploration of the connections between social location, personal integrity and, as the title says, luck. I cared about every one of this novel's characters and continued to think about them long after I'd finished reading.

-- Andrea Steiner, University of California Santa Cruz

USA

Amazon.com

 
UK

Amazon.co.uk

 
Canada

Amazon.ca

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One Year in Berlin

One Year in Berlin/Foreign Bride

Marina Raydun

ONE YEAR IN BERLIN:
Trying to outrun her family’s history with the Holocaust, Rachael finds herself having to live in Berlin for at least a year. Once there, she is tortured by visions and nightmares as she allows herself to try to connect the dots between her family’s past and her own present.

FOREIGN BRIDE:
Bobby was hesitant to settle for a mail-order bride from Russia and Sofiya felt like a welcome compromise. But, young, beautiful and English-speaking, she comes with her own baggage. Can the two overcome their mutual mistrust and damaging insecurities before they destroy each other trying to make their marriage work?

USA

Amazon.com

 
UK

Amazon.co.uk

 
Canada

Amazon.ca

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Massive Black Hole

Massive Black Hole

Andrea Barbosa

At 18, Cibele, a student from Rio de Janeiro, dreams of a life in New York and moves to the big Apple as an au pair girl, where she meets the precocious Amy, a young scholar whose goal in life is to study sciences and astrophysics. While visiting the MET, Cibele is impressed by a particular work of art depicting hell, in the style of Hieronymus Bosch. When Amy introduces her to astronomy, she is consumed by fear of black holes. Lost and confused with what to do with her life, she meets ambitious Agatha from Texas, who came to New York to succeed as a fashion model. While trying to survive and achieve their goals, the 3 young women question the meaning of life, death and the existence of hell, and their friendship ultimately turns into a maze of betrayal, jealousy and selfishness.

USA

Amazon.com

 
UK

Amazon.co.uk

 
Canada

Amazon.ca

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Everything Under The Heavens

Everything Under The Heavens

Dana Stabenow

Raised in a prosperous family of 14th century Chinese merchants, Wu Johanna has grown up on camelback, in bustling city marketplaces, and in the cool, shaded depths of Silk Road caravanserai. Hers is a world in which trust is more valuable than gold, and the right name can unlock a network of contacts from Japan to North Africa. Johanna is, after all, the granddaughter of Marco Polo.

In the wake of her father’s death, however, Johanna finds that lineage counts for little amid the disintegrating court of the Khan. Dynastic loyalties are shifting, petty jealousies lead to cold-blooded murders, and the long knives are coming out. If Johanna is to find a future for herself, she’ll have to rely on her wits, the vagaries of fortune, and a close-knit circle of friends and traveling companions. Her destiny—if she has one—lies more than a continent away, at the very edge of the known world.

USA

Amazon.com

 
UK

Amazon.co.uk

 
Canada

Amazon.ca

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Elly Hays

Elly Hays

Lori Crane

As the War of 1812 approached, the Creek Indian Nation was in the middle of a civil war.

It was during this time Elly's family moved to the eastern Mississippi Territory for the promise of low-cost land and fertile soil. She had no idea they were moving into Creek territory - into the middle of a hornet's nest. Tafv's band of warriors taunted them, killing their animals, and destroying their livelihood. Just when the family thought things couldn't get any worse, during one of the Indian raids as Elly's husband chased the Indians away from the farm, Tafv's young son was killed in the pursuit. Tafv vowed revenge against Elly's family.

"Elly Hays" is based on the real-life story of Elizabeth Hays Rodgers and is the epic clash between a fearless warrior with nothing to lose and a young mother on the verge of losing everything.

USA

Amazon.com

 
UK

Amazon.co.uk

 
Canada

Amazon.ca

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Click Here to Vote

The small print:
* You are entitled to FIVE votes in each category
* There are 9 other categories, ranging from romance to erotica.
* Voting ends on 18 May, 2014.

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