Memoirs Books

Book SynopsisDr Liz O’Riordan is a breast cancer surgeon who has battled against social, physical and mental challenges to practise at the top of her field. Under the Knife charts Liz’s incredible highs: performing like a couture dressmaker as she moulded and reshaped women’s breasts, while saving their lives; to the heart-breaking lows of telling ten women a day that they had cancer.But this memoir is more than just an eye-opening look at the realities of training to be a female surgeon in a man’s world. In addition to this high-powered, high-pressured role, Liz faced her own breast cancer diagnosis, severe depression and suicidal thoughts, in tandem with commonplace sexual harassment and bullying. And by revealing how she coped when her life crashed around her, she demonstrates there is always hope.Trade Review 'What stays with me is O’Riordan’s compelling description of training, which doctors will recognise as a sort of Hunger Games with the post of consultant as a prize, though with no guarantee that you will be left happy or healthy enough to enjoy the role. The author succeeds not only in telling us how she learned to love her life after cancer, but how a life after medicine can offer fulfilment too' Roopa Farooki, Guardian 'Gave me a real insight into what it takes to become a surgeon, and how hard it is to be a breast cancer patient when you know far too much about it' Jane Garvey 'Liz opens herself up to us like a patient opened up on an operating table, shining a bright light onto what it is to be a human being who holds the fates of other human beings in their hands' Greg Wise 'This riveting memoir lays bare the highs and lows of life as a lady surgeon. Liz O'Riordan takes us behind the scenes with the ruthless precision of someone who knows how to wield a scalpel and a pen. A real action-driven page-turner, the book also makes a thought-provoking contribution to the wider debate on how we as a society look after our healthcare professionals, and highlights the different way we treat physical and mental illness. I cannot praise it highly enough and long for it to be available in all good bookshops so that I can urge people to buy it!' Cathy Rentzenbrink '[This] is, in fact, the story of two women: one is driven by ambition to be at the top of her game, to face down adversity whether that is sexism in the medical profession or fatigue in the quest for triathlon medals; the other is her hidden self, ravaged by misgivings – will she ever be enough? With extraordinary candour, breast surgeon Liz O'Riordan reveals the emotional journey unleashed by her own diagnosis of breast cancer, a confrontation that will strip her of her breast, her fertility and her career, yet finally show her that she is, indeed, enough. Liz's story reminds us all that our achievements do not define us. In the end, we find wisdom by living authentically, and that decision is the root of fulfilment' Dr Kathryn Mannix

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Book SynopsisA SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER''Emily''s moving book is a powerful testimony that shines a light on the continued failure of health services to provide any kind of meaningful improvement for autistic people. Should be essential reading for mental health professionals and anyone with autism in their lives.'' - FERN BRADY, author of Strong Female Character ''This book will bring so many readers self-recognition and comfort.'' - DEVON PRICE, author of Unmasking Autism''Vulnerable, affecting and deeply personal, this book will go from a message in a bottle to a rallying cry for many autistic women, girls and young people. We are not alone.'' - Elle McNicoll, bestselling author''A brilliant, thorough exploration of autistic experience, delivered with humanity, compassion and vivid clarity.'' - Pete Wharmby, author of Untypical''A magnificent read which manages to be informative, engaging, sa

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Book SynopsisOtto Skorzeny, Germanys top commando in the Second World War, is one of the most famous men in the history of special forces. His extraordinary wartime career was one of high risk and adventure and here he tells the full story. Skorzeny quickly proved his worth in Yugoslavia and then Russia. In 1942 he was awarded the Iron Cross, and in April 1943 he was promoted to captain and named Chief of Germany's Special Troops, Existing or to be Created in the Future. When Mussolini was imprisoned in Italy in 1943, it was Skorzeny who successfully led the daring glider rescue, winning the Knights Cross and promotion as a result. Skorzenys talents were brought into play again when he was sent to Budapest to stop the Hungarian regent Admiral Horthy from signing a peace with Stalin in 1944. Now dubbed the most dangerous man in Europe by the Allies Skorzeny was awarded the German Cross in Gold. A few months later he took a critical role in the Ardennes offensive with a controversial plan to raise a brigade disguised as Americans with captured Sherman tanks. His captured colleagues spread a false rumour that he was planning to assassinate Eisenhower, who was consequently confined to his headquarters for weeks.

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Book SynopsisThis second volume of a memoir shows, in some detail, what it was like to be brought up as an Englishman in that very different world of the 1950s. For all those interested in the life of the poet and novelist Robert Graves who was the authorâs uncle. Volume one of this memoir, 'A Very English Family', is also available from Troubador.

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Book SynopsisAn essay with the reach and momentum of a novel, Kate Briggs’s This Little Art is a genre-bending song for the practice of literary translation, offering fresh, fierce and timely thinking on reading, writing and living with the works of others. Taking her own experience of translating Roland Barthes’s lecture notes as a starting point, the author threads various stories together to give us this portrait of translation as a compelling, complex and intensely relational activity. She recounts the story of Helen Lowe-Porter’s translations of Thomas Mann, and their posthumous vilification. She writes about the loving relationship between André Gide and his translator Dorothy Bussy. She recalls how Robinson Crusoe laboriously made a table, for him for the first time, on an undeserted island. With This Little Art, a beautifully layered account of a subjective translating experience, Kate Briggs emerges as a truly remarkable writer: distinctive, wise, frank, funny and utterly original.Trade Review‘Kate Briggs’s This Little Art shares some wonderful qualities with Barthes’s own work – the wit, thoughtfulness, invitation to converse, and especially the attention to the ordinary and everyday in the context of meticulously examined theoretical and scholarly questions. This is a highly enjoyable read: informative and stimulating for anyone interested in translation, writing, language, and expression.’ — Lydia Davis, author of Can’t and Won’t‘I have been thinking, many weeks after having finished it, of Kate Briggs’ truly lovely This Little Art, a book-length essay on translation that's as wry and thoughtful and probing as any book I’ve read in the past year. My favourite works are those in which one feels the writer wrestling with genre even as she is writing; Kate Briggs does this with her own kind of magic, never failing to write beguilingly and intelligently and passionately about the little art of translation, which in the end shows itself to be not so little, at all.’ — Lauren Groff, author of Fates and Furies‘In This Little Art, a digressive, scholarly, absorbing 350-page essay, Kate Briggs roams across the vast terrain – practical, theoretical, historical, philosophical – of translation. Briggs’s writing is erudite and assured, while maintaining a tone that is modest and speculative; this paradox encapsulates something of the essence of translation, which is always contingent (no translation is ever definitive) yet also – for its time at least – authoritative.... There have been many books written about translation, but few as engaging, intriguing or exciting as Kate Briggs’s exploration, with its digressive forays, infinite self-questioning, curiosity, modesty and devotion to the concrete – the very qualities, as it happens, that distinguish the translator’s labour.’ — Natasha Lehrer, Times Literary Supplement‘Maurice Blanchot once wrote that translators are “the silent masters of culture”. Kate Briggs amends this, commenting that Blanchot wrote “hidden masters of culture” and that it’s “our recognition” of translators’ “zeal” that “remains silent”.... Her engaging memoir unfolds in unnumbered, untitled, unstructured short chapters: a pillow book on the translator’s love affair with words and writers. ... Briggs can sound like a visionary.’ — Marina Warner, London Review of Books‘Lucid and engaging, Briggs’s book is essential, not just for translators, but anyone who has felt the magic of reading.’ — Publishers Weekly, starred review

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Book SynopsisShortlisted for the James Cropper Wainwright Prize 2022 for Nature Writing - Highly Commended Winner for the Richard Jefferies Award 2021 for Best Nature Writing 'A rural, working-class writer in an all too rarefied field, Chester’s work is unusual for depicting the countryside as it is lived on the economic margins.' The Guardian 'An important portrait of connection to the land beyond ownership or possession.' Raynor Winn ‘It’s ever so good. Political, passionate and personal.’ Robert Macfarlane ‘Evocative and inspiring…environmental protest, family, motherhood and…nature.’ Claire Fuller, author of Unsettled Ground, Costa Novel Award Winner 2021 Nature is everything. It is the place I come from and the place I got to. It is family. Wherever I am, it is home and away, an escape, a bolt hole, a reason, a place to fight for, a consolation, and a way home. As a child growing up in rural England, Guardian Country Diarist Nicola Chester was inexorably drawn to the natural landscape surrounding her. Walking, listening and breathing in the nature around her, she followed the call of the cuckoo, the song of the nightingale and watched as red kites, fieldfares and skylarks soared through the endless skies over the chalk hills of the North Wessex Downs: the ancient land of Greenham Common which she called home. Nicola bears witness to, and fights against, the stark political and environmental changes imposed on the land she loves, whilst raising her family to appreciate nature and to feel like they belong – core parts of who Nicola is. From protesting the loss of ancient trees to the rewilding of Greenham Common, to the gibbet on Gallows Down and living in the shadow of Highclere Castle (made famous in Downton Abbey), On Gallows Down shows how one woman made sense of her world – and found her place in it.Trade Review‘I couldn’t put it down! A must read!’—Dara McAnulty, author of Diary of a Young Naturalist 'From treetop protests at the Newbury Bypass to the grand Highclere Estate, On Gallows Down is that rare thing: nature writing as political as it is personal.'—Melissa Harrison, author of The Stubborn Light of Things: A Nature Diary'A powerful personal and political journey through place that charts the profound influence we have on nature, and that nature has on us.'—Rob Cowen, author of Common Ground and The Heeding'An evocative and inspiring memoir which touches on environmental protest, family, motherhood and most importantly, nature. Her passion for the natural world and especially birds, shines through in this wonderful book.'—Claire Fuller, author of Unsettled Ground'Nicola Chester deserves many readers. On Gallows Down is an impassioned study of a contested landscape, which interrogates our attitudes towards land stewardship, ownership and living in the right relationship with both human and other-than-human neighbours. Charged with love and fire, On Gallows Down is a beautiful exploration of a much-mapped, multi-faceted landscape.'—Katharine Norbury, author of The Fish Ladder'Chester’s writing has a lovely elasticity, dancing between wonder, introspection and anger as she moves from the particular to the universal…She belongs to the disappearing English, rural working class, and is intent on handing this baton to her three children, who play a part in the book. Chester also explores the familiar tension between wanting to write and being needed at home. The heady ecstasy of time carved out alone, in nature. The scrabble to earn a precarious living, and the insecurities of occupying a tied cottage. The idea of ‘home’ lies at the heart of this fierce, beautifully written, immersive book about one’s place within the landscape.'—Tessa Boase, author of Etta Lemon: The Woman Who Saved the Birds'Nicola’s passionate and enduring love of nature shines through every single word, paragraph and page of this book, as she seamlessly weaves memoir with stories of the landscape in which she is so deeply rooted that it seems to speak through her. Powerful, enlightening, dazzling, hopeful, On Gallows Down is a rare and precious gem – to be savoured, not rushed, and returned to again and again. My words cannot do this book justice – it simply needs to be read.'—Brigit Strawbridge Howard, author of the Wainwright-shortlisted Dancing with Bees

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Book SynopsisHenry David Thoreau is considered one of the leading figures in early American literature, and Walden is without doubt his most influential book. Part of the Macmillan Collector’s Library; a series of stunning, clothbound, pocket sized classics with gold foiled edges and ribbon markers. These beautiful hardbacks make perfect gifts for book lovers, or wonderful additions to your own collection. This edition includes a new afterword by Sam Gilpin.Walden recounts the author's experiences living in a small house in the woods around Walden Pond near Concord in Massachusetts. Thoreau constructed the house himself, with the help of a few friends, to see if he could live 'deliberately' - independently and apart from society. The result is an intriguing work which blends natural history with philosophical insights, and includes many illuminating quotations from other authors. Thoreau's wooden shack has won a place for itself in the collective American psyche, a remarkable achievement for a book with such modest and rustic beginnings.

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Book Synopsis'We come for the glitter, but instead we get the grit, in stories told with insight, tenderness and joy.' - Russell T DaviesWith a foreword by Steph McGovern'I never thought I'd write a memoir. I never thought I'd do a lot of the things I have done in my thirty-four years, but life has a wonderful way of surprising us.'Well-known as the winner of the third series of The Great British Bake Off and runner up of Strictly Come Dancing with his same-sex dance partner Johannes Radebe, John Whaite's personal story is a complicated narrative of contradictions, highs and lows, told with tenderness, joy, insight and wit, but also unflinching honesty. A shy little boy from rural Lancashire, who was scared to sleep alone and danced a little 'too gay' at family weddings, he was also an unruly teen who shaved a checkerboard pattern into his hair and refused to conform. From childhood his life has revolved around food - his parents owned a fish and chip shop where John worked in the back peeling potatoes - but for long periods he has been haunted by bulimia and body dysmorphia and not a day goes by when he doesn't worry about what or how much he eats. He achieved TV fame but then seemingly wilfully chose to self-destruct, before finding the strength to pull back when he woke up in a car with half a kebab at his feet and chilli sauce on his shoes. Through it all, his essential optimism has meant that he has chosen to take every step back as a chance to reassess and begin again, finally arriving at the realisation that external validation and fulfilment is transient - a distraction from the sometimes painful pilgrimage we make as we gain wisdom from our experiences.

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Book SynopsisAn Irish Times book of the year 2022A powerful, probing book about PTSD.As a journalist Keane has covered conflict and brutality across the world for more than thirty years, from Rwanda, Sudan, South Africa, Somalia, Iraq, Afghanistan, Ukraine and many more. Driven by an irresistible compulsion to be where the night is darkest, he made a name for reporting with humanity and empathy from places where death and serious injury were not abstractions, and tragedy often just a moment's bad luck away.But all this time he struggled not to be overwhelmed by another story, his acute complex post-traumatic stress disorder', a condition arising from exposure to multiple instances of trauma experienced over a long period. This condition has caused him to suffer a number of mental breakdowns and hospitalisations. Despite this, and countless promises to do otherwise, he has gone back to the wars again and again.Why?In this powerful and intensely personal book, Keane interrogates what it is that draws him to the wars, what keeps him there and offers a reckoning of the damage done.PTSD affects people from all walks of life. Trauma can be found in many places, not just war. Keane's book speaks to the struggle of all who are trying to recover from injury, addiction and mental breakdown. It is a survivor's story drawn from lived experience, told with honesty, courage and an open heart.Trade Review Praise for The Madness ‘Keane has not just the courage to risk death so that the most important stories can be told, as well as the eye to tell them with vivid subtlety, but also the humility to reveal the havoc that this task visits on the beholder’ Spectator ‘A brutally honest exploration of what motivates Keane to keep reporting on atrocities despite the toll on his mental health… Gentle but unflinching’ Guardian, Book of the Day ‘The Madness is engaging without resorting to sensation. Fluent prose follows the decline of the political situation – and of Keane’s own mental health – in chilling, compelling detail’ Observer ‘Fergal Keane opens doors into closed places. He lets us look inside those complex compartments where fear, anxiety, anger and panic lurk, and he tells a story of being afraid all of his life… beautifully written… This is an important book’ Irish Times ‘Fergal Keane’s torments might be as nothing compared to the sufferings he has observed, and his work can do nothing to alleviate those sufferings, but what chance is there of any restitution, no matter how inadequate it may be, without witnesses to the crimes of the truly guilty?’ TLS ‘The Madness is a heady reckoning with trauma, adrenaline and that mixture of moral courage and compulsion that drives the news cycle, Fergal Keane tells difficult, sometimes horrible truths about the world, but it is the truths he finds about himself that make this book a necessary read’ Annie Enright ‘A really important piece of work’ Susanna Reid, on Good Morning Britain ‘An immensely brave book’ Tortoise 'Powerful, and heartbreaking’ Audrey Magee ‘The Madness is an extraordinary, captivating account of one man's journey in search of truth, as he excavates the human story from chaos’ Elaine Feeney

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Book SynopsisWhat would it be like to sit down for an impassioned, entertaining conversation with Hillary Clinton? In Something Lost, Something Gained, Hillary offers her candid views on life and love, politics, liberty, democracy, the threats we face, and the future within our reach. She describes the strength she draws from her deepest friendships, her Methodist faith, and the nearly fifty years she’s been married to President Bill Clinton—all with the wisdom that comes from looking back on a full life with fresh eyes. She takes us along as she returns to the classroom as a college professor, enjoys the bonds inside the exclusive club of former First Ladies, moves past her dream of being president, and dives into new activism for women and democracy. From canoeing with an ex-Nazi trying to deprogram white supremacists to sweltering with salt farmers in the desert trying to adapt to the climate crisis in India, Hillary brings us to the front l

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Book SynopsisNow with an updated foreword by Elizabeth Day and afterword by Nigel Slater, twenty years later Toast has become a classic food memoir, detailing all the food, recipes and cooking that have marked Nigel's passage from greedy schoolboy to great food writer.Whether relating his mother's ritual burning of the toast, his father's dreaded Boxing Day stew or such culinary highlights of the day as Arctic Roll and Grilled Grapefruit (then considered something of a status symbol in Wolverhampton), this incredibly moving and deliciously evocative memoir of childhood, adolescence and sexual awakening vividly recreates daily life in sixties and seventies suburban England.Wonderful, precise, extraordinary'GuardianToast connects emotions, memory and taste buds. Genius'Sunday TimesYou read this remarkable memoir partly cringing, partly marvelling at Slater's hallucinogenic retrieval of times past. He is the Proust of the Nesquik era' IndependentAcutely observed, poignant and beautifully written Slater tells his heartbreaking story with great subtlety' Daily TelegraphTrade Review Winner of the British Book Awards Biography of the Year ‘Acutely observed, poignant and beautifully written . . . Slater tells his heart breaking story with great subtlety' Daily Telegraph ‘Toast connects emotions, memory and taste buds. Genius’ Sunday Times ‘An ingenious and touching treat’ TLS ‘Exquisitely written . . . You read this remarkable memoir partly cringing, partly marvelling at Slater’s hallucinogenic retrieval of times past. He is the Proust of the Nesquik era’ Independent ‘Wonderful, precise, extraordinary’ Matthew Fort

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Book SynopsisWho gave Jonathan Van Ness permission to be the radiant human he is today? No one, honey.The truth is, it hasn’t always been gorgeous for this beacon of positivity and joy.Before he stole our hearts as the grooming and self-care expert on Netflix’s hit show Queer Eye, Jonathan was growing up in a small Midwestern town that didn’t understand why he was so…over the top. From choreographed carpet figure skating routines to the unavoidable fact that he was Just. So. Gay., Jonathan was an easy target and endured years of judgement, ridicule and trauma - yet none of it crushed his uniquely effervescent spirit.Over the Top uncovers the pain and passion it took to end up becoming the model of self-love and acceptance that Jonathan is today. In this revelatory, raw, and rambunctious memoir, Jonathan shares never-before-told secrets and reveals sides of himself that the public has never seen. JVN fans may think they know the man

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Book SynopsisThe 32nd fostering memoir from international bestseller Cathy GlassStruggling to cope with three young children, Janie turns to experienced foster carer Cathy Glass. Helping the family each morning, Cathy soon uncovers how dangerous their situation has truly become.Riley and his two little siblings, Jayden and Lola, are not safe at home.With all three children in her care, will Cathy be able to rebuild their lives and Janie's?

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Book Synopsis'I beseech you to read this account' - Christopher HitchensA magnificent, harrowing testimony to the voiceless victims of North Korea.Kang Chol-Hwan is the first survivor of a North Korean concentration camp to escape the 'hermit kingdom' and tell his story to the world. This memoir reveals the human suffering in his camp, with its forced labour, frequent public executions and near-starvation rations. Kang eventually escaped to South Korea via China to give testimony to the hardships and atrocities that constitute the lives of the thousands of people still detained in the gulags today. Part horror story, part historical document, part memoir, part political tract, this story of one young man's personal suffering finally gives eye-witness proof to this neglected chapter of modern history.Trade ReviewOne of the most terrifying memoirs I have ever read. As the first such account to emerge from North Korea, it is destined to become a classic. * Iris Chang, author of The Rape of Nanking *I beseech you to read this account -- Christopher Hitchens

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Book SynopsisA Second Edition of Thomas Friedman's stunning book, the first edition of which won the American National Book Award.If you're only going to read one book on the Middle East, this is it.' Seymour HershIn this lucid, incisive and memorable book, acclaimed on both sides of the Atlantic, Friedman reaches deeper into the traumatic and complex recent history of the conflicts in the Middle East than any previous writer.For this new edition, Friedman has added a further two chapters that bring the book up to 1995 and the unfolding and stalling of the Middle Eastern peace process.From Beirut to Jerusalem is wonderully shrewd, surprisingly funny and indispensable to anyone seeking a fuller understanding of the political causes and psychological effects of the seemingly endless strife which besets this embattled region.Trade Review‘Jubilantly intelligent – a dashing hybrid of autobiography and journalism… a lifeline to the sane, a beacon to the hopeful.’Michael Coren, The Times ‘Friedman fills the yawning gap between verbiage and understanding with grace, precision and insight.’Economist. ‘A striking achievement.’Financial Times.

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Book Synopsis'Wonderful ... I fell immediately into her world' Frances Mayes, author of Under the Tuscan SunKinta Beevor was five years old when she fell in love with her parents' castle facing the Carrara mountains. She and her brother ran barefoot, exploring an enchanted world. They searched for wild mushrooms in the hills with Fiore the stonemason, and learned how to tickle trout. The freedom and beauty of life at the castle attracted poets, writers and painters, including D.H. Lawrence and Rex Whistler. The other side to Kinta's childhood was very different, for it was spent with her formidable great aunt, Janet Ross, in a grand villa outside Florence. But soon the old way of life and Kinta's idyllic world were threatened by war.Nostalgic, yet unsentimental and funny, A TUSCAN CHILDHOOD is a book which transports the reader to bohemian, aristocratic Italy and the sound of bells from a distant campanile.Trade ReviewA loving and intimate portrait of Tuscany's many faces; but it is in her feeling for the landscape that Beevor excels. One can hear the buzzing of the cicadas, smell the wild thyme and feel the crunching of pine needles underfoot * SUNDAY TIMES *A paean to an idyllic upbringing. Beevor's masterful prose evokes time and place, scent and taste, humour and superstition, the yearly rhythms of rural life ... A delightful read - and likely to inspire many an Italian holiday * THE LADY *Kinta Beevor's distinctive contribution is in her detailed and unsentimental account of the peasant life of the time, its surrounding, its labours and its joys, and in her ability to convey the remembered happiness of a childhood spent in the freedom of two exceptionally beautiful houses amid some of the most delectable countryside in the world -- Isabel Colegate * TIMES LITERARY SUPPLEMENT *Its unpretentiousness and authenticity, and above all the sincreity of the writer's affection for an Italy now long lost, make it an attractive and engaging read * THE SPECTATOR *A delightful corrective to the sickly Chiantishire school of writing. The descriptions of the harvesting and preparation of food and wine by the locals could not be bettered and the pages are alive with vivid characters, from stonemasons and farm workers to foreign bohemians ... a joy * OBSERVER *A beautifully written book * SUNDAY TIMES *A delightful memoir * MARIE CLAIRE *

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Book SynopsisThe shocking first-hand account of one man's remarkable fight for freedom; now an award-winning motion picture.Trade Review‘The most remarkable book ever issued from the American press.’ Detroit Tribune ‘For sheer drama, few accounts of slavery match Solomon Northup's tale of abduction from freedom and forcible enslavement.’ Ira Berlin

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Book Synopsis'Hilarious, informative, enlightening, instructive ... It's the funniest book I've read all year' - Chris EvansYou're About to Die. What Would Your Final Meal Be?This question has long troubled Jay Rayner. But why wait for death? Why not eat your 'last meal' now, when you can enjoy it? So, he had a simple plan: he would embark on a journey through his life in food in pursuit of the meal to end all meals. It's a quest that takes him from necking oysters on the Louisiana shoreline to forking away the finest French pastries in Tokyo, and from his earliest memories of snails in garlic butter, through multiple pig-based banquets, to the unforgettable final meal itself. This is the story of one hungry man, in eight courses. 'Witty, wise, and, obviously, delicious.' Guardian'A raucous, joyous celebration of life.' Irish Times

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Book SynopsisA RICHARD AND JUDY BOOK CLUB PICKWINNER STANFORD TRAVEL WRITING AWARDS 2020SHORTLISTED FOR THE WILLIAM HILL PRIZE 2019'Such an addictive and likeable book...One of this year's best memoirs' The Telegraph'It's the resistance to the obvious narratives that makes Rough Magic so appealing: the book undermines lazy women-in-the-wilderness tropes at every turn.' Sarah Moss, Guardian'Think Educated meets Wild' Entertainment Weekly'Rough Magic is transporting, beguiling and terrifically entertaining' Daily MailThe Mongol Derby is the world's toughest horse race. A feat of endurance across the vast Mongolian plains once traversed by the people of Genghis Khan, competitors ride 25 horses across a distance of 1000km. Many riders don't make it to the finish line.In 2013 Lara Prior-Palmer - nineteen, underprepared but seeking the great unknown - decided to enter the race. Driven by her own restlessness, stubbornness, and a lifelong love of horses, she raced for seven days through extreme heat and terrifying storms, catching a few hours of sleep where she could at the homes of nomadic families. Battling bouts of illness and dehydration, exhaustion and bruising falls, she found she had nothing to lose, and tore through the field with her motley crew of horses. In one of the Derby's most unexpected results, she became the youngest-ever champion and the first woman to win the race.A tale of adventure, fortitude and poetry, Rough Magic is the extraordinary story of one young woman's encounter with oblivion, and herself.Trade ReviewThink the next Educated or Wild. Palmer’s memoir of beating the odds to become a horse champion is an inspiring saga of perseverance — and a classic underdog tale. * Entertainment Weekly *Prior-Palmer's style is a fascinating mix of pep and poignancy. A really terrific story by a spirited new voice. * Sara Baume *[Prior-Palmer's] gorgeous, sensual depiction of this race is a literary marvel; it feels like you are riding alongside her across the desolate steppes; her verbal acuity makes vivid the most elusive of landscapes; her triumph becomes ours. * NYLON *In this sensual, spiritual memoir, Prior-Palmer recounts her grueling journey through immense physical hardship, and her surprising transformation from underdog to champion * Esquire *Absolutely riveting. * Buzzfeed *

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Book SynopsisA WONDERFUL READ Christine's deep love for turtles comes through on each page.CRAIG FOSTER, MY OCTOPUS TEACHER Will appeal to anyone interested in the world around us.DR. JANE GOODALLFilled with reverence and wonder for the natural world, this captivating book reveals the secret life of sea turtles, one of the oldest living creatures on Earth, and the story of one female scientist's fight to save their future. In 2015, a team of researchers carefully removed a plastic straw from a sea turtle's nostril off the coast of Costa Rica. The disturbing incident, which was captured on video, went viral, leading to corporate straw bans around the world. In this evocative book, reminiscent of Jane Goodall's memoir In the Shadow of Man, the marine biologist behind the camera, Christine Figgener, recounts her own life spent studying and protecting sea turtles. From the time she was a young girl, Figgener was determined to become a biologist, and study the marvels of the marine world. In My Life With Sea Turtles, she shares how she went from a small, gray town on the edge of industry to the lush coastline of Costa Rica, where she fell in love with the local environment and its famous residents: the sea turtles. Figgener describes patrolling the beach at night, swimming with turtles in the open ocean, watching tiny turtles emerge from sandy nests, and risking her life during tropical storms. We learn about her experience as a woman in conservation, a male dominated space where she struggles to be taken seriously. Through discovering the fascinating science of sea turtles and the threats they face today, readers will be inspired to live their own lives differently to ensure the survival of these magnificent creatures.

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Book SynopsisSo wise and so well done. It made me wish it were much longer than it is' Chimamanda Ngozi AdichieFrom the award-winning author of Five Star Billionaire and We, The Survivors comes a whirlwind personal history of modern Asia, as told through his Malaysian and Chinese heritage.If we are lucky we will find writing that grips us with its vitality, beauty and significance Strangers on a Pier is like that' Deborah LevyIn Strangers on a Pier, acclaimed author Tash Aw explores the panoramic cultural vitality of modern Asia through his own complicated family story of migration and adaptation, which is reflected in his own face. From a taxi ride in present-day Bangkok, to eating Kentucky Fried Chicken in 1980s Kuala Lumpur, to his grandfathers'' treacherous boat journeys to Malaysia from mainland China in the 1920s, Aw weaves together stories of insiders and outsiders, images from rural villages to megacity night clubs, and voices in a dizzying variety of languages, dialects, and slangs, to create an intricate and astoundingly vivid portrait of a place caught between the fast-approaching future and a past that won''t let go.Trade Review‘Strangers on a Pier offer a unique and thought-provoking perspective of a life lived out in interesting times, places, and circumstances’ Carl Logan, Midwest Book Review ‘Aw always writes well, but this small volume is particularly lyrical. The extended essay format suits him: long enough for some structure – the chronology is not linear, and he bounces from story to social commentary to introspection – and to explore issues in depth, while short enough for immediacy. He covers a tremendous amount of ground … Strangers on a Pier is a wealth of pithy observation’ Peter Gordon, Asian Review of Books Aw digs deep into the meaning of this move, the meaning of Chineseness in Malaysia, the meaning of inherited immigrant markings, and the meaning of leaving the immigrant perspective behind. He charts what it looks like to reprise history, to move for greater opportunity and more education, leaving behind those with less money and shedding the ancestral memory and choreography of poverty’ Sharrona Pearl, Public Books

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Book SynopsisAn inspiring memoir of finding strength and resilience from the former England Lioness.From the football cages of East London to broadcasting to millions, the engine powering Alex Scott's remarkable journey has always been her resilience. But thanks to a 'push-through mentality' the world has only ever seen the 'strong' side of Alex. Now, she is ready to lower the shield.In her candid memoir How (Not) to Be Strong, Alex shares the lessons that have shaped her, from finally confronting the legacy of a tumultuous childhood to tarnished truth behind the gleaming football trophies.With raw honesty, Alex shows how she's tackled life's challenges and that sometimes the strongest thing you can do is show your most vulnerable side to the world.Trade ReviewAn inspiration -- Taylor SwiftI was incredibly moved by Alex's story and her bravery is second to none -- Steven Bartlett, entrepreneur and host of 'The Diary of a CEOAn amazing read. What a book. -- Alex Jones * One Show *A real story of growth -- Holly Willoughby * This Morning *Such a powerful and raw story, honestly told -- Wes Streeting MP

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Book SynopsisJames Herriot (19161995) was the pen name of James Alfred Alf' Wight, whose tales of veterinary practice and country life in the Yorkshire Dales have delighted generations. Many of Herriot's works including All Creatures Great and Small, All Things Bright and Beautiful, All Things Wise and Wonderful, The Lord God Made Them All and Every Living Thing became international bestsellers and have been adapted for film and television.Rosie Page and Jim Wight are Herriot's children. Rosie became a doctor and Jim was a vet.Trade ReviewIt cleverly interweaves extracts from his novels, with an interesting commentary from his son and daughter . . . their memories and anecdotes augment the stories and make delightful reading * Yorkshire Times *I grew up reading James Herriot's books and I'm delighted that thirty years on, they are still every bit as charming, heartwarming and laugh-out-loud funny as they were then -- Kate Humble, on the works of James HerriotHerriot’s enchanting tales of life in the Dales are deservedly classics. Full of extraordinary characters, animal and human, the books never fail to delight -- Amanda Owen, bestselling author of The Yorkshire Shepherdess, on the works on James HerriotThe attraction of Herriot’s ever popular memoirs of a country vet . . . is their alternating highs and lows, humour and pathos, and gripping anecdotes about delivering lambs, grumpy farmers, hypochondriac pet-owners, stroppy cows and blunt Yorkshire characters. And, of course, there’s a powerful nostalgia element in these stories about our green and pleasant land in the day before the ravages of ribbon development -- Daily Mail, on the works of James Herriot

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Book SynopsisThis is a black and white reissue edition of Five Quarters, previously published as a full-colour cookbook in 2015. This edition contains no photography. WINNER of the André Simon Food Book Award in 2015. ''This is the most wonderful cookbook, especially - though not exclusively - if you like really reading cookbooks, possibly in bed. Rachel Roddy is a marvellous writer'' India Knight''Roddy is a gifted storyteller, and a masterful hand with simple ingredients'' Guardian Cook ''Of course I thought Rome was glorious, but I didn''t want to stay. A month, three at most, then I''d take a train back to Sicily to finish the clockwise journey I''d interrupted, before moving even further southwards . . .''Instead, captivated by the exhilarating life of Testaccio, the wedge-shaped quarter of Rome that centres round the old slaughterhouse and the bustling food market, Rachel decided to rent a flat and live there. Thus began an Italian adventure. Five Quarters charts a year in her small kitchen, shopping, cooking, eating and writing, capturing a uniquely domestic picture of life in this vibrant, charismatic city. Rachel shares over 100 simple and delicious recipes, offering you an authentic glimpse into daily Roman life. Combining her love of Italian food with a strong nostalgia for home and memories of growing up in England, this cookbook is a joy to read as well as to use in the kitchen.- Antipasti- Soup & Pasta- Meat & Fish- Vegetables- Dolci

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Book SynopsisLudwig Bemelmans came to the California home of famed interior decorator Elsie de Wolfe, Lady Mendl, for cocktails. By the end of the night, he was firmly established as a member of the family: given a bedroom in their sumptuous house, invitations to the most outrageous parties in Hollywood, and the friendship of the larger-than-life woman known to her closest friends simply as 'Mother'. With hilarity and mischief, Bemelmans lifts the curtain on a bygone world of extravagance and eccentricity, where the parties are held in circus tents and populated by ravishing movie stars. To the One I Love the Best is a luminous painting of life's oddities and a touching tribute to a fabulously funny woman.Trade Review"This book is a must." -- The New York Times"An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein."--Kirkus Reviews“Delightful... It was Bemelmans’ privilege to have known [Lady Mendl] and it’s ours to have his gorgeous recollections.” --Sunday Times “A beautiful, fun and emotion-filled piece of social history.” --Irish Independent “The charm of To the One I Love the Best lies in the peerless combination of author and subject.” --Paris Review "About a third of the way through the book I decided that Lady Mendl, was one of the great comic creations in the history of literature . . . as airy as a soufflé, full of the sun and smells of California . . . Madeline for grown ups."--The Spectator “Reissued treasure.” --The Gloss

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Book SynopsisThe hysterical, shocking and incredibly intimate memoir from one of the most original and unique comedians alive today.Hello! I'm Brian Limond, aka Limmy. You might know me from Limmy's Show. Or you might not know me at all. Don't worry if you don't.They asked me to write a book about mental health, because I sometimes talk about my mental health in tweets and interviews, like suicidal thoughts and anxiety, and what I've done to try and deal with it.I said to them, oh, I don't know if I could fill a whole book with just that. But how's about I write a general autobiography type of thing, and all the mental health stuff will naturally appear along the way? I could talk about growing up and slashing my wrist and taking acid all the time and getting done for car theft and feeling like a mad freak that would never amount to anything.And then how I made my own sketch show. I directed it and everything. Plus I'm a dad. I'm an adult. But I still feel like that mad freak from years ago. I stilTrade Review‘One of the most innovative and fearless comedians on the block’ -The Guardian ‘One of the most idiosyncratic and original comics working today’ -The Independent

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Book SynopsisThe remarkable memoir of Eva Hart, a 7-year-old survivor of the Titanic Disaster

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Book SynopsisA funny, frank and uplifting memoir of what it's like to live with bipolar disorder from model and mental health activist, Rosie Viva and how we can all learn to make peace with our minds.

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Book SynopsisHarperCollins is proud to present its incredible range of best-loved, essential classics.It is with a heavy heart that I take up my pen to write these the last words in which I shall ever record the singular gifts by which my friend Mr. Sherlock Holmes was distinguished.'This collection of eleven stories depict Holmes and Watson at their very best and solving some of their most notorious cases, culminating in The Final Problem'. In this infamous tale, Holmes comes face-to-face with his greatest opponent, the criminal mastermind Professor Moriarty, at the Reichenbach Falls.Each of the stories was previously published in The Strand magazine before being released together in a single volume in 1894. This is a quintessential collection, and a must-have for collectors and fans of one of the finest sleuths in English literature.Trade Review‘Holmes is a mesmerising creation and Conan Doyle a master storyteller’ The Times ‘The immense talent, passion and literary brilliance that Conan Doyle brought to his work gives him a unique place in English letters’ Stephen Fry

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Book Synopsis''An extraordinary story'' CLOVER STROUD''Astonishing and valuable'' THE SPECTATOR''Beautifully written'' DAILY MAIL''Intensely gripping . . . as brutal and funny as it is raw and candid'' VIV GROSKOP''As vivid an account of addiction as I can remember reading'' GUARDIAN''Will resonate with anyone who has loved a difficult parent and spent a lifetime trying to work them out'' ALI MILLARWhen Lily Dunn was six years old, her father left for India to join the cult of Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh. She grew up enthralled by the myth of him - a brilliant, charismatic writer and entrepreneur who would appear with gifts from faraway places. Yet he was also a compulsive liar whose pursuit of transcendence took him from sex addiction, via the Rajneesh cult, to a relentless chase of money, which ended in ruin and finally addiction to alcohol and prescription drugs. A daughter''s investigation into a father who was always out of reach, Sins of My FaTrade ReviewSins of My Father is Dunn's attempt to know her father, constantly on the move, impossible to rely on . . . she puts it together as if she is a detective working a long-forgotten cold case, and though its setting is very different, it reminded me of Laura Cummings' gripping memoir, On Chapel Sands . . . there is beauty in its crisp, cold clarity . . . as vivid an account of addiction as I can remember reading. Sins of My Father is a testament to the damage done, but it reads, in the end, like the slow discovery of freedom * GUARDIAN *This is a memoir of two lives: Dunn's father, who took enthusiastically to the Rajneesh cult and Dunn, whose life is overshadowed by this early abandonment. She writes with cold, controlled anger but also empathy. It's a gripping tale * THE TIMES *An extraordinary story . . . brilliantly captures the painful truth of impossible love. Sins of My Father is both page-turning and lyrical, an inspiration . . . one of the best memoirs I've read in a long time -- CLOVER STROUD, author of MY WILD AND SLEEPLESS NIGHTSConsiderable courage is needed to return to the stark, bright light of trauma in this shirking-nothing way; but writing of this intensity has delivered an astonishing and valuable memoir -- Juliet Nicolson * THE SPECTATOR *I was obsessed with Sins of My Father, a memoir which combines the emotional and the cerebral in telling the story of a life through the prism of a father's influence. The stories of the children of hippies, or parents who chose experimental lifestyles, is fascinating and fertile territory and although this story is Lily's own, she also speaks for a cohort. It is a victory of self-knowledge and compassion, as well as art -- AMY LIPTROT, author of THE OUTRUNA brutally honest consideration of toxic familial love and human frailty * i NEWSPAPER *Stunning. Beautifully crafted and brutally honest, Sins of My Father is a totally mesmerising journey through the outer limits of love -- DAVID WHITEHOUSE, author of ABOUT A SONSuperb . . . Sins of My Father is a terrific read, beautifully written and expertly structured. The book pulls off the difficult trick of laying bare just how morally bankrupt Lily's father was, while making the reader understand why she didn't give up on him until the very end * DAILY MAIL, Book of the Week *Forensic in its compassion and precise in its love: an extraordinary account of an extraordinary life that produces great empathy for the universals of human frailty -- JENN ASHWORTH, author of GHOSTEDIn Sins of My Father Lily Dunn has created an almost forensic analysis of the curse of the Charismatic Dad - on himself, his family and specifically here on his little daughter, who grows up under the desperate double shadow cast by addiction and devoted love, and finally in this memoir does all the painstaking, heartbreaking, ultimately fulfilling work that her father couldn't do -- LOUISA YOUNG, author of YOU LEFT EARLYAn intensely gripping memoir about the love between a daughter and a father. There's no end to the ways this father tests his loved ones, yet still his family keeps on trying and hoping for the best. A heart-stoppingly brilliant read that is as brutal and funny as it is raw and candid. I really wanted the craziness to stop - but I never wanted this book to end -- VIV GROSKOP, author of I LAUGHED, I CRIEDIn this compelling memoir, Lily Dunn confronts the legacies of trauma and dysfunction that surround her complicated father. She writes with searing honesty and clarity, exploring what it means to step away from the shadow of our family and find our own voice -- LULAH ELLENDER, author of ELISABETH'S LISTSSins of My Father is a moving story about a golden, gifted family and their paradise lost. About a daughter escaping the dense gravitational pull of a charismatic father through the act of writing. By turns tender and forensic, loving then fierce, this book will speak to anyone who has had to love and let go -- TANYA SHADRICK, author of THE CURE FOR SLEEPSins of My Father is a powerful, necessary, brilliantly brave book. It is superlative; it hums and flies and sings. It is moving and true -- MARINA BENJAMIN, author of INSOMNIALily Dunn manages the magic trick of rendering pain exquisite, and making beautiful the vacillation between heart and head, love and reason that characterises human relationships. The heady honesty of this book will reverberate in me for a long time -- ZOE GILBERT, author of MISCHIEF ACTSSins of My Father is a devastating work of love, pain and hope. Lily Dunn has created art and insight from chaos, joy and suffering -- SOFKA ZINOVIEFF, author of PUTNEYIn Sins of My Father Lily Dunn deftly explores the complexity of her father's choices; it's a startling book that will resonate with anyone who has loved a difficult parent and spent a lifetime trying to work them out -- ALI MILLAR, author of THE LAST DAYSUnputdownable. A love story. A horror story. The unmasking of an unfortunately still much-beloved guru. A soul-searching that can teach us much about how to analyse and escape from a cruel narcissist. It is horrifying and real and brilliantly written -- JANJA LALICH, author of ESCAPING UTOPIAWith keen insight Dunn tells her story, of a sensitive child who adores her dashing, abandoning father, who grows up, as so many adult children of narcissists do, starving for the kind of parental love and recognition a narcissist is always too self-absorbed to bestow . . . her story of healing and struggling to build a good, strong, healthy life is moving and inspiring -- DANIEL SHAW, author of TRAUMATIC NARCISSISMA notable addition to the canon of work on cults . . . At its most tender and difficult, Sins of My Father is really about the near intractable impossibility of moving beyond childhood trauma to transform a damaging legacy into something positive - and this is exactly what Dunn achieves with this remarkable book * CAUGHT BY THE RIVER *

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Book SynopsisWINNER OF THE NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD FOR AUTOBIOGRAPHY 2021 FINALIST FOR THE PULITZER PRIZE FOR GENERAL NON-FICTION 2021 A New York Times Top Book of 2020 Chosen as a Guardian Book of 2020 A BBC Culture Best Books of 2020 Nominated for Good Reads Books of 2020 One of Time's Must-Read Books of 2020 'Unputdownable ... Hong's razor-sharp, provocative prose will linger long after you put Minor Feelings down' - AnOther, Books You Should Read This Year 'A fearless work of creative non-fiction about racism in cultural pursuits by an award-winning poet and essayist' - Asia House 'Brilliant, penetrating and unforgettable, Minor Feelings is what was missing on our shelf of classics ... To read this book is to become more human' - Claudia Rankine author of Citizen 'Hong says the book was 'a dare to herself', and she makes good on it: by writing into the heart of her own discomfort, she emerges with a reckoning destined to be a classic' - Maggie Nelson, author of The Argonauts What happens when an immigrant believes the lies they're told about their own racial identity? For Cathy Park Hong, they experience the shame and difficulty of "minor feelings". The daughter of Korean immigrants, Cathy Park Hong grew up in America steeped in shame, suspicion, and melancholy. She would later understand that these "minor feelings" occur when American optimism contradicts your own reality. With sly humour and a poet's searching mind, Hong uses her own story as a portal into a deeper examination of racial consciousness. This intimate and devastating book traces her relationship to the English language, to shame and depression, to poetry and artmaking, and to family and female friendship. A radically honest work of art, Minor Feelings forms a portrait of one Asian American psyche - and of a writer's search to both uncover and speak the truth.Trade ReviewWe are so not ready for what Cathy Park Hong does in Minor Feelings. And thankfully, she does not care whether we are ready or not. ... Her vision and execution are so breathtaking. And so genius. And so absolutely scary. Read it. Reread it. It will read you. -- Kiese Laymon, author of HeavyStudded with moments [full of] candor and dark humor shot through with glittering self-awareness." * the New York Times *Formidable ... [this] book bled a dormant discomfort out of me with surgical precision. -- Jia Tolentino * New Yorker *Lands like a sucker punch to the gut ... We learned so much from Minor Feelings, not least what a dazzling writer Cathy Park Hong is. * Independent, Best Essay Collections for International Women's Day *Hong lays bare the shame and confusion she felt in her youth as the daughter of Korean immigrants, and the way those feelings morphed as she grew older .. underscores essential themes of identity and otherness * Time *Minor Feelings is anything but minor. In these provocative and passionate essays, Cathy Park Hong gives us an incendiary account of what it means to be and to feel Asian American today ... Minor Feelings is absolutely necessary. -- Nguyen Thanh Viet, author of the SympathizerHong writes masterfully ... [she] names and illuminates issues of race and gender that long went unnamed, creating a blistering new handbook to the state of race in America. -- Adrienne Westenfeld * Esquire *A fierce catalogue of that which has not been named and yet won't be ignored. An electric intervention, a provocation and a renewal. -- Alexander Chee, author of 'How To Write An Autobiographical Novel'Tremendous. The entire time I read, I was hissing yes and yes and YESSSSS ... It felt like having someone sit me down in a chair and say your feelings are real and this is how we got here and here is a way out all at once. It broke my heart with relief." -- Mira Jacob, author of Good TalkHong's essays are wry and unapologetically direct, challenging how we think, how we communicate and what we too quickly assume to understand. Minor Feelings is a sharp and urgent exploration of those hard-to-name sensations that govern racial consciousness. * Refinery 29 *In Minor Feelings, Cathy Park Hong has turned a sharp, yet tender gaze on her own life and contradictions, all while simultaneously probing and tearing apart with relentless exactitude accepted (and often lazy and ill-informed) notions of what it means to be Asian-American in the 21st Century. The book is also surprisingly funny and full of stories and characters, including Hong herself, who kept me turning the pages. It was one of my favorite reads this year. -- Attica Locke author of Heaven My Home and writer for Little Fires Everywhere (Hulu)Thought-provoking -- Curtis Sittenfeld

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Book SynopsisThe story of the relationship between the most devastating heavyweight boxer in history and the mentor who made him.Trade ReviewCompelling . . . Loaded with anecdotes about the mob, a series of fights (not just those featuring Tyson), American life in the Seventies and Eighties, this is a great read for fans of boxing as well as those who enjoy the smell and sound of authenticity to their sporting titles. And there's plenty of it * Bristol Post *

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Book SynopsisMiserable at an elegant day school for girls, Victoria Coren finds an escape in the mysterious world of poker. Twenty years later, she has won a million dollars and forgotten to have children. What price adventure? This is a true story of happiness and heartbreak, smoke and mirrors, bright lights and shady characters. It is a memoir of friendship and belonging, love and loss. It might also teach you how to win a million . . .Trade ReviewA book so rich in detail, so full of laughter, that you feel as if the coolest member of your family has just let you in on a secret so delicious you will savour it for ever * * The Times * *Vivid . . . Unflinchingly honest . . . A compulsive read which may well leave you reaching for a pack of cards * * Elle * *Superb * * Guardian * *Fresh, funny and moving. Coren writes insightfully about love, obsession, depression and illness - and poker, obviously. This is a wonderful book, worthy of comparison with the best * * Literary Review * *[An] honest, funny, highly personal and nostalgic memoir about friendship and belonging * * Financial Times * *Absorbing * * Daily Telegraph * *Vicky Coren...is funny, beautiful, clever and writes like an angel. * * The Lady Magazine * *Not only the best book about poker you are ever likely to read, but an outstanding memoir, lucid and moving, at times laugh-out-loud funny, at times heartbreaking, never less than gripping and, quite simply, the best book I have read this year. -- Cary Gee * * Tribune * *

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Book SynopsisLara was seven when her birth mother died from a drug overdose. With no extended family to look after her, she was put into foster care. The care system failed Lara and now she is failing her son.Lara and her one-year-old son, Arthur, are brought to experienced foster carer, Cathy Glass, by their social worker. Lara has fled an abusive relationship and Arthur has suspected non-accidental injuries. Cathy must monitor Lara whenever she is with her son, day and night. She cannot let them out of her sight for a minute.Lara loves her son, but she puts her own needs first. Cathy must teach Lara how to care for Arthur, but will it be enough to allow her to keep him?

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Book SynopsisA provocative, beautiful and defiant essay highlighting the pitfalls of integration in France by a talented young writer with North African roots

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Book SynopsisA renowned scholar of the English language, Tolkien is today celebrated as the father of the high fantasy genre. Drawing on his knowledge of languages, mythology and legend, he created an entire alternative reality, Middle Earth, and populated it with hobbits, orcs, ents, dragons, magicians and giant spiders.Packed with fascinating facts about Tolkien's life and labours, this delightful volume includes extracts from his works, letters and interviews, as well as from his contemporaries and admirers. It's a celebration of the writer whose imagination and creative genius changed the course of fantasy literature.'I would rather spend one lifetime with you, than face all the ages of this world alone.' The Fellowship of the Ring (1954)'I am in fact a Hobbit (in all but size). I like gardens, trees and unmechanized farmlands; I smoke a pipe, and like good plain food (unrefrigerated), but detest French cooking...' Tolkien in a letter to Deborah Webster, 25 October 1958In July 1915, Tolkien took part in the Somme offensive, the bloodiest battle of the Great War. While recovering in hospital from trench fever, he wrote his first Elvish word list, as well as the first fragments of what would become The Silmarillion.The inspiration for The Hobbit came to Tolkien unexpectedly in the summer of 1930, while he was working his way through a huge stack of student essays. On a blank page he found himself scrawling, 'In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit.'Table of ContentsTolkien the Man and the Hobbit • Languages • Storyteller • Fantasy Worlds and Fables • Ents and Elves • Tolkien's Legacy

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Book Synopsis'The funniest book I've read in a long time: its deadpan, dry humour and its accumulation of absurdities will leave you rolling on your floor with laughter' The Times She thought she was a lover of the great classics of Russian literature - until she met the superfans... Roaming from Tashkent to San Francisco, this is the true story of one budding writer's strange encounters with the fanatics who are devoted - absurdly! melancholically! ecstatically! - to the Russian classics. Combining fresh readings of the great Russians from Tolstoy to Dostoevsky with the sad and funny stories of the lives they continue to influence, The Possessed is comic, humane, charming, poignant and full of an infectious love for literature. 'Dazzlingly good ... very bookish, very clever and very funny... a preposterously engaging volume' Jane Shilling, Sunday Telegraph 'The highest compliment you can pay such a book is that it sends you back to the original authors refreshed. I can go one higher - I found my

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Book Synopsis A stunning collection of essays and memoir from twice Booker Prize winner and international bestseller Hilary Mantel, author of The Mirror and the Light Trade Review‘It shows the evolution in Mantel’s style, which has been considerable. Some of the pieces are segments of memoir, some are deeply informed historical essays loosely attached to discussions of books. In the earliest reviews – before she is given subjects big enough for her to walk around in – Mantel is sarky and snarky as well as brisk and breezy … Mantel’s own segments of memoir, which were published as diary pieces, are virtuoso performances … As a memoirist, Mantel is without parallel … It is only when her essays are laid out like this that we can see the inside of Mantel’s huge head, bulging with knowledge and a million connections. 5/5 STARS’ Telegraph ‘This is a work that is brisk and breezy, and further enhanced by her capacity to examine our hearts, register our feelings, and bring up with tenderness the enduring question of our frail and vulnerable bodies’ Evening Standard ‘Worth buying for the title pun alone, Mantel Pieces brings together three decades’ worth of Hilary Mantel’s criticism in the London Review of Books … her uncomplicated prose style is no less authorative for being highly readable’ Sunday Times ‘A volume of critical writing which often feels as if one is in the company of an exceptionally wise and generous friend, exept very few of us have friends who can be as erudite on Madonna as they are on Anne Boylen’ Sara Collins ‘Bad girls. Ecstatic masochists. Housewives with hidden depths. Revolutionaries who rebelled all the way to the madhouse. These unruly women are her enduring obsession’ Helen Lewis, New Statesman ‘Likely to leave readers in awe of the purity of Mantel’s prose, the breadth of her interests and the sharp intelligence she brings to every topic … Reading it is like downing a cold, sharp glass of lemonade on a swelteringly hot day: crisp, tart and unbelievably refreshing’ i Paper ‘Ferocious, witty and unapologetic’ Guardian

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Book SynopsisRelocating to the other side of the world, Mattâs life went from boring office job to flying in one of the most dangerous locations on the planet: Papua. 'Flying from Shangri-La' is an inspiring and unique insight into what it was like, living and working is one of the worldâs last frontiers.

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Book SynopsisA Sunday Times Book of the Year'Rahaman has, at last, written the definitive biography on his late brother, which tells the real Ali story' - Mike Tyson'The real life of the Great One' - George ForemanMore words have been written about Muhammad Ali than almost anyone else. He was, without doubt, the world's most-loved sportsman. At the height of his celebrity he was the most famous person in the world. And yet, until now, the one voice missing belonged to the man who knew him best - his only sibling, and best friend, Rahaman Ali.No one was closer to Ali than Rahaman. Born Cassius and Rudolph Arnett Clay, the two brothers grew up together, lived together, trained together, travelled together, and fought together in the street and in the ring.A constant fixture in his sibling's company, Rahaman saw Ali at both his best and his worst: the relentless prankster and the jealous older brother, the outspoken advocate, the husband and father. In My Brother, Muhammad Ali, he is able to offer a surprising insider's perspective on the well-known stories, as well as never-before-told tales, painting a rich portrait of a proud, relentlessly polarizing, yet often vulnerable man. In this extraordinary, poignant memoir, Rahaman tells a much bigger and more personal story than in any other book on the great man - that of two brothers, almost inseparable from birth to death. It is the final and most important perspective on one of the most iconic figures of the last century.Trade ReviewHeart-warming, multi-faceted and hard-hitting [...] Thanks to Rahaman's powerful storytelling ability, My Brother, Muhammad Ali shares with the world a tale unlike any other biography on Muhammad Ali * Fox Sports *No one knew Muhammad Ali better than Rahaman, and he provides a welcome and insightful addition to the extensive Ali literature * Sunday Times *Rahaman was alongside Muhammad Ali all the way, from his street-fighting teenage days, loving home life, soaring fame, marriages, troubles, notoriety, highs and lows. In this long-overdue book, he takes us inside the legend's head and home [...] And just like the man, the book never stops surprising. A must for fight fans * Sunday Sport *Rahaman has, at last, written the definitive biography on his late brother, which tells the real Ali story * Mike Tyson *The real life of the Great One * George Foreman *It seems there is a bottomless supply of revelations about Muhammad Ali, one of the most written-about men in history. Yet more insights come in a book by his brother, Rahaman. From Ali's difficult birth to how he had to be rescued from financial difficulty after he stopped boxing and on to the tenderness of his last hours with his family, the story of The Greatest Of All Time is retold from the inside by his younger sibling * Jeff Powell, Daily Mail *

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Book Synopsis''Magical'' MINDY KALING''Funny and poignant and beautiful'' JOHN MULANEY ''It made me remember I was alive'' GEORGE SAUNDERS To see the world through Jenny Slate''s eyes is to see it as though for the first time, shimmering with strangeness and possibility. As she will remind you, we live on an ancient ball that rotates around a bigger ball made up of lights and gases that are science gases, not farts (don''t be immature). Heartbreak, confusion and misogyny stalk this blue-green sphere, yes, but it is also a place of wild delight and unconstrained vitality, a place where we can start living as soon as we are born, and we can be born at any time. In her dazzling, impossible-to-categorize debut, Jenny channels the pain and beauty of life in writing so fresh, so new and so burstingly alive, we catch her vision like a fever and bring it back out into the bright day with us, and everything has changed.''Delicious'' AMY SEDARIS Trade ReviewThis book is something new and wonderful - honest, funny, positive, completely original and inspiring in the very best way: it made me remember I was alive -- George SaundersIndescribable, but eminently readable, the actor-comedian's book consists of a carnival of observations, ideas and events that may or may not make up a memoir. Basically, Little Weirds is performance art in high-calibre prose * Washington Post *[An] exuberant essay collection . . . Jenny Slate is a writer of tender prose -- Hephzibah Anderson * Guardian *A delight to read. It's a collection of beautiful, hilarious, genuine essays and really is meant for times when you feel heavy . . . I couldn't help but feel that it was written by a friend for me * Vanity Fair *Luminous, emotional, lovely and a little mysterious, this book is something you will savour like a half-remembered, gorgeous dream. You'll finish it feeling like Jenny Slate is your new best friend -- Susan Orlean, author of The Library Book and The Orchid ThiefThis book is like a stovetop goulash, delicious and varied ingredients, prepared perfectly and excellent with bread . . . I'm sorry, I lost track of the simile -- Amy SedarisSlate's voice never loses its capacity for strangeness . . . And it's this mix of sweet and sadness, real stakes and dreamy prose, that gives this book its soft, sharp and altogether overwhelming power. Like René Magritte crossed with Lana Del Rey, with strong notes of Patricia Lockwood * Teen Vogue *Completely unlike anything you've ever read -- San Francisco Book ReviewSlate invites us for a glorious swim inside her imagination as she explores romance, heartbreak and self-love in this poetry-memoir-fiction mash-up. It's a work that breaks the mould * People *At once warm, heart-breaking and erotic . . . a strange, witty, sad journey into the depths of the author's imagination * Entertainment Weekly *Slate's voice remains an eccentric and powerful central force as she comments on politics, patriarchy and her personal life * Time *A man on the 2 Express Train read some of Jenny Slate's Little Weirds over my shoulder. "What kind of book is this?" he asked. "The best kind," I replied -- John MulaneyA singularly hilarious and horny, but also poignant and tender, collection of writing that beautifully captures Slate's inimitable voice, which is one that, once you've heard it, you want to listen to forever * Nylon *A dreamy dessert for the eyeballs that uses playful language to express deep sentiments about heartbreak, anger, wonder and friendship * USA Today *Jenny's writing is wide open, tuneful, tender. She sees the world (and feels the world) like a bug might, two antennae poking out from her head like sensory wands. Reading Little Weirds made me feel tipsy -- Durga Chew-Bose, author of Too Much and Not in the MoodThe rare work of art that's somehow both delightfully bizarre and totally universal -- Lydia Wang * Bust *Little Weirds is a fairy tale, one where the prince is never all charming, where your home is never quite safe, and where you probably won't live happily ever after. But you will live, and it's pretty incredible just to do that -- John Mulaney

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Book Synopsis[A] moving, beautifully written book about love and mental health and life' BOB ODENKIRKFiercely intelligent, humane and necessary' NATHAN FILER, author of THE SHOCK OF THE FALL''At its heart a story about love an astonishing new voice'' ALI MILLAR, author of THE LAST DAYSI'm scared the bad people will hear me talking to you.'I watch him take his notebook and a marker pen from his bag. As he zips the compartment back up I see the tip of our large, serrated kitchen knife, the one that went missing last night.Zach was nineteen when Tanya discovered him rerouting the wires of their landline, sure that the phone was bugged, that his friends were Mafia, that the helicopters swirling above were deployed by spies, that he couldn't trust anyone her included.That moment upturned and unmoored everything. It would strand them both in a profound and terrifying isolation the way that perhaps only a psychotic break or loving someone who is experiencing one can.Zig-Zag Boy is a journey along the Trade Review‘By turns an eloquent meditation on the power of nature and a terrifying expose … [an] intense, readable journey … fresh with keenly observed details … What Zig-Zag Boy does best is put you inside the dark recesses of living with a mentally ill adult child, an experience that is on the rise … hopefully it will inspire the most important quality of all among providers, police officers and the public: empathy’Beth Macy, New York Times ‘A moving portrait of a mother's love for her son. It is also a fiercely intelligent, humane and necessary contribution to mental health literature’Nathan Filer, author of The Shock of the Fall 'At its heart a story about love; the lengths a mother will go to in a bid to understand her child … Rendered in prose that rings clear and true, Zig-Zag Boy announces an astonishing new voice'Ali Millar, author of The Last Days ‘Takes us to the heart of loving and parenting a child in the most intensive and often heartbreaking way. Marked by wonderful storytelling, a wry sense of humour and a determination to tell the truth no matter what, you will get lost in this story. And be the better for it’Emily Rapp, author of The Still Point of the Turning World ‘Starts by chronicling a mother’s nightmare as her promising son falls into psychosis, but ends up being far more than the story of what happens when we fear for the life of someone we love. A searing indictment of the medical industrial complex across continents’Gina Frangello, author of Blow Your House Down ‘A wonder. I loved this book and loved the family at the heart of it … This is a beautiful book’Mark Lukach, My Lovely Wife in the Psych Ward ‘In unforgettable imagery and nuanced prose, Tanya Frank gives us an incredible journey’Susan Straight ‘A beautiful, vibrant, powerful memoir about both holding tight and letting go’Gayle Brandeis

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Book SynopsisLONGLISTED FOR THE WAINWRIGHT PRIZEEye-opening and persuasive' SUNDAY TIMESBrilliant I loved it' KIT DE WAALThoughtful, moving, honest' CAL FLYN*Winner of The Lakeland Book of the Year 2024*Work in the countryside ties you, soul and salary, to the land. But often those who labour in nature have the least control over what happens there.Why have our rural industries been replaced by tourism? Why can''t people stay living in the places they grew up? In this beautifully observed book, Rebecca Smith traces the stories of foresters and millworkers, miners, builders, farmers and pub owners, to paint a picture of the working class lives that often go overlooked. This is a book for anyone who loves and longs for the countryside.

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Book SynopsisNew York Times BestsellerFeatured in the critically acclaimed documentary RBGIt was beyond my wildest imagination that I would one day become the ''Notorious RBG. — Ruth Bader Ginsburg, 2019She was a fierce dissenter with a serious collar game. A legendary, self-described “flaming feminist litigator” who made the world more equal. And an intergenerational icon affectionately known as the Notorious RBG. As the nation mourns the loss of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, discover the story of a remarkable woman and learn how to carry on her legacy. This runaway bestseller, brought to you by the attorney founder of the Notorious RBG Tumblr and an award-winning feminist journalist, is more than just a love letter. It draws on intimate access to Ginsburg''s family members, close friends, colleagues, and clerks, as well as an interview with the Justice herself. An original hybrid of reported narrative, annotated dissents, rare archival photos and documents, and illustrations, the book tells a never-before-told story of an unusual and transformative woman who transcended divides and changed the world forever.Trade Review"The authors make this unassuming, most studious woman come pulsing to life...'Notorious RBG' may be a playful project, but it asks to be read seriously...That I responded so personally to it is a testimony to [its] storytelling and panache." -- Jennifer Senior, New York Times Carmon and Knizhnik write powerfully about the progression of Ginsburg's legal career. In particular, they make vivid the development of her trademark arguments ... In her fierce honesty, resolute realness, and, yes, innate sense of style (those collars!), Ginsburg emerges as a cultural icon worthy of her own fanbase -- Kate Tuttle, The Boston Globe "What a wonderful book: The annotated dissents! The knockout photos! Why she likes to write through the night! The litany of big cases she won as a lawyer, and how she picked them! How she made Bill Clinton cry! Notorious RBG is a laugh-out-loud joy to read." -- Rachel Maddow "A deeply original mashup of pop culture and serious scholarship. I plan to give a copy to both of my daughters." -- Gilbert King, Pulitzer Prize winning author of Devil in the Grove "This breezy, fun and thoughtful take on the life of the Justice explains exactly why a new generation created and embraced the Cult of Ginsburg." -- Jeffrey Toobin, author of The Oath and The Nine "This rigorously reported book shines a new light on the groundbreaking cases Ginsburg litigated challenging gender stereotypes." -- Louise Melling, Deputy Legal Director, ACLU "If you admired RBG before, Carmon and Knizhnik will make you fall in love with her, not only as a feminist hero but a human being." -- Vogue "Clark Kent had Superman. Ruth Bader Ginsburg has Notorious R.B.G... Carmon and Knizhnik have turned R.B.G's robe into a cape." -- New York Times Book Review

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