A novel full of surprises weaves together stories of disparate characters – all mysteriously connected to the elderly novelist Dora Frenhofer

On the anniversary of Hendrix’s death, ageing hippies gather in Lviv to perform a bizarre ritual by a grave marked with his name

When Michael Laudor’s schizophrenia spiralled out of control in 1998, it made headline news in America. Jonathan Rosen remembers earlier, happier days with his friend

Heydrich had microphones installed throughout Madam Kitty’s salon in the hope of obtaining ‘useful’ information from visiting diplomats and political rivals

Eight eclectic fables draw on magic realism, science fiction, fairy tales, the Gothic, religion, brutal realism and horror movies

Louise Erdrich explores her Ojibwe heritage, learning to read ancient painted signs on rocks and making ritual offerings to the spirits

The official policy in the event of nuclear war veered from fatuous evacuation plans to a directive to stockpile food, stay home and hope for the best

Katja Hoyer evokes the tears and anger – but also the laughter and pride, as citizens raised their children, went on holidays and joked about their politicians

When Cecilia disappears, her husband and children are left haunted by the mystery – until a character in a German novel strikes the daughter as strangely familiar

Through her interviews with the exuberant countryman ‘Tommy’ Collard, Catrina Davies provides a vivid picture of nature in the raw

The Polish-Jewish writer and artist enjoyed all too brief acclaim before his murder in 1942. Benjamin Balint describes the ongoing battle for ownership of his final works

The politics of late Georgian England provided Gillray, Cruickshank and Rowlandson with perfect fodder for robust, merciless satire

A young stage illusionist is recruited by the British secret service to extract a list of double agents concealed in a Russian magician’s stage prop

A deranged anarchist plans to commit the crime of a century – with Polari, coded messages and a faulty typewriter contributing to the mayhem

Jonathan Kennedy explores the (mainly) devastating effects of bacteria in the past – and now, as they proliferate and our resistance diminishes

There are vignettes of many Cambridge contemporaries – including the mysterious John Sackur, the inspiration for the invisible man in Donkeys’ Years

He dismisses the philosophy of religion as sixth-formish point-scoring. But are his own ruminations any more profound?

Edward VII’s reign is generally seen as a bright interlude between Victorian primness and the Great War – but there was considerable unrest on many fronts

After the Amboyna massacre of 1623, the newly-fledged East India Company conceded the spice trade to the Dutch – to focus instead on the riches of India

A counterfactual history of modern America serves as a backdrop to the life of the enigmatic ‘X’ – a woman of multiple personae and impenetrable disguises

In the wake of their father’s death, a brother and sister recall the violent domestic dramas of their childhood

A merciless ETA terrorist is in hiding in Spain – but which of three seemingly innocent women is she?

Timothy Garton Ash weighs the consequences of the push towards a single currency, the West’s dependence for energy on Russia, and Brexit, among much else