Memoirs Books

Book SynopsisAn instant Sunday Times bestsellerJoin Sarah Beeny on her journey to live more simply and find her forever home...Throughout her life, Sarah Beeny has been obsessed with the idea of home. From her childhood growing up in a countryside cottage to renovating her very first flat in London to restoring a stately home in Yorkshire, she has never been afraid of the hard work needed to turn a house into a home. Now, in her most recent adventure, Sarah and her family have moved to a former dairy farm in Somerset to build the home of their dreams. In The Simple Life, Sarah tells the story of her life, sharing tales and experiences in everything including parenting, property, friendships, nature and the environment, all the way through to her recent cancer diagnosis and treatment. Through it all, Sarah tackles challenges and troubles with signature wit and wisdom, discovering life is never as ''simple'' as you''d lik

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Book SynopsisWith his unique and powerful voice, Tony Hadley has been a successful music artist for more than forty years, from fronting one of the biggest bands of the 80s, Spandau Ballet, to now enjoying a thriving solo career around the world. Featuring stunning imagery and behind-the-scenes photos from his musical adventures, this beautifully illustrated book also captures other professional highlights, like starring on stage in Chicago and appearing on I'm a Celebrity... Get Me Out of Here!, as well as his charity work, celebrity friends, childhood in north London and special family moments. With snaps from his personal photo albums, this amazing visual journey is accompanied by Tony's heartfelt and insightful anecdotes.

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Book SynopsisA FAMILY STORY AND THE TALE OF A NATION.Ai Weiwei - one of the world's most famous artists and activists - weaves a century-long epic tale of China through the story of his own life and that of his father, Ai Qing, the nation's most celebrated poet. 'Engrossing...a remarkable story' Sunday TimesHere, through the sweeping lens of his own and his father's life, Ai Weiwei tells an epic tale of China over the last 100 years, from the Cultural Revolution to the modern-day Chinese Communist Party.Here is the story of a childhood spent in desolate exile after his father, Ai Qing, once China's most celebrated poet, fell foul of the authorities. Here is his move to America as a young man and his return to China, his rise from unknown to art-world superstar and international rights activist. Here is his extraordinary account of how his work has been shaped by living under a totalitarian regime.It's the story of a father and a son, of exceptional creativity and passionate belief, and of how two indomitable spirits enabled the world to understand their country.'A story of inherited resilience and self-determination' Observer'A majestic and exquisitely serious masterpiece about his China... One of the great voices of our time' Andrew Solomon'Intimate, unflinching...an instant classic' Evan Osnos, author of Age of AmbitionTrade ReviewIntimate, unflinching ... an instant classic ... a glorious testament to the power of free expression -- Evan Osnos, author of Age of AmbitionThis is the rarest sort of memoir, rising above the arc of history to grasp at the limits of the soul -- Edward SnowdenAbove all a story of inherited resilience, strength of character and self-determination * Guardian *An impassioned testament to the enduring powers of art -- Michiko Kakutani, author of Ex LibrisAi Weiwei is one of the world's greatest living artists. He is a master of multiple media. His work is always thought-provoking, unpredictable and immensely personal -- Elton John

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Book SynopsisA Book of the Year in Rolling Stone, Uncut, Mojo, The Telegraph and the Glasgow HeraldThis troubadour life is only for the fiercest hearts, only for those vessels that can be broken to smithereens and still keep beating out the rhythm for a new song.Last Chance Texaco is the first-ever no-holds-barred account of the life of two-time Grammy Award-winner Rickie Lee Jones, in her own words. It is a tale of desperate chances and impossible triumphs, an adventure story of a girl who beat the odds and grew up to become one of the most legendary artists of her time, turning adversity and hopelessness into timeless music.With candour and lyricism, the 'Duchess of Coolsville' (Time) takes us on a singular journey through her nomadic childhood, to her years as a teenage runaway, through her legendary love affair with Tom Waits, and ultimately her longevity as the hardest working woman in rock and roll. Rickie Lee's stories are rich with the infamous characters of her early songs - 'Chuck E's in Love,' 'Weasel and the White Boys Cool,' 'Danny's All-Star Joint' and 'Easy Money' - but long before her notoriety in show business, there was a vaudevillian cast of hitchhikers, bank robbers, jail breaks, drug mules, a pimp with a heart of gold, and tales of her fabled ancestors.In this electrifying and intimate memoir by one of the most remarkable, trailblazing and tenacious women in music are never-before-told stories of the girl in the raspberry beret, a singer-songwriter whose music defied categorization and inspired pop culture for decades.Trade Review[A] gripping, lovely memoir...thrilling, funny, scary, sad, packed full of life and extraordinary characters....As a portrait of the artist as a young woman, this book could not be any more enthralling or fun to read. -- Nick Hornby * The Believer *a vivid memoir that traces the arc of her often turbulent life from unsettled childhood to uneasy fame...If Last Chance Texaco is haunted by the long shadows of the past, it is also a story of forgiveness and acceptance...Reading her wild and wonderful book, one senses that, in a very real way, music was a calling that saved her life. -- Sean O'Hagan * Observer *Throughout her pre-fame life she experienced moments of great adventure and shocking personal peril, all of which she has poured into her magnificent memoir...Very little seems off the table in this free-spirited book...It is at turns hair-raising, funny, melancholic and joyous. -- Ted Kessler * The New Cue *In this raw and roving life story, Jones depicts a child who recognized her humanity and worth even when others wouldn't, and a woman whose confidence helped her rise above heroin addiction, music-industry sexism and the traumas of her youth. * Washington Post *Candid, cosmic, so cool... An impassioned and cinematic trip through Jones's eventful life. I shouldn't be surprised that Jones manages to carry her originality, intimacy, and volcanic expressiveness into book form. * Boston Globe *Terrific... The prose is rich and rhythmic, filled with lines that are pithy ('Rickie Lee is a Frank Capra movie that had been overtaken by Stanley Kubrick') and poetic ('childhood traumas leave their dirty footprints on the fresh white snow of our happy-ever-afters')... Jones is as fearless in prose as she is on stage. * Minneapolis Star-Tribune *one of the most remarkable [memoirs] I've read from a musician, a first-person commentary on the life and early career of this extraordinary artist, full of romance and adventure, misadventure and indiscipline, anecdote and reflection - just the stuff we want from those free spirits who live the life so that we don't have to, inviting us to stand and watch in fascination, half admiring and half appalled. -- Richard Williams * The Blue Moment *One of the most compelling memoirs I've ever read... What really sucks you in, and lifts you up, is the dazzling magic of her prose. * Please Kill Me *This tender, fierce, intimate memoir is testament that Jones has lived a life as brave, idiosyncratic, and rich as her music - with love, heartbreak, addiction, and magic, sprinkled throughout. * O, the Oprah magazine *What makes this an inspiring memoir is her absorbing storytelling, facility with language and fealty to integrity - commerce be damned. * Mojo *In gorgeous prose ("I did drugs like I did everything else. On fire, with no back door") interspersed with her lyrics, this is as distinctive as she is, a rich, bracing, and candid memoir dancing with the love of language. * Booklist (starred review) *Table of Contents1: What Were the Skies like When You Were Little? 2: Juke Box Fury 3: On Saturday Afternoons in 1963 4: A Summer Song 5: The Winston Lips of September 6: The Moon Is Made of Gold 7: Gravity 8: You Never Know When You're Making a Memory 9: The Summer of 1969 10: Walk on Guilded Splinters 11: Olympia 12: Surfer Girl on the Waterbed 13: Turn Her Over and Go . . . 14: Doyt-Doyt-Venice Beach 15: Easy Money 16: Young Blood 17: The Man with the Star 18: Rickie Lee Jones 19: Saturday Night Live 20: The Bus Stop Blues 21: Jazz Side of Life 22: It Must Be Love

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Book SynopsisAn ache, a pain, a mysterious lump, a strange sensation in some part of your body, the feeling that something is not right. The fear that something is, in fact, very wrong. These could be symptoms of illness. But they could also be the symptoms of hypochondria - an enigmatic condition that might be physiological or psychological or both. In this landmark book, Caroline Crampton tells the story of hypochondria, beginning in the age of Hippocrates and taking us right through to the wellness industry today. Along the way, we encounter successive generations of doctors positing new theories, as well as quacks selling spurious cure-alls to the desperate. And we meet those who have suffered with conditions both real and imagined, including Moliere, Darwin, Woolf, Freud, Larkin, and Proust whose symptoms and sensitivities gradually narrowed his life to the space of his cork-lined bedroom. Crampton also examines the gendered nature of the medical response, the financial and social factors at play, and the ways in which modern technology simultaneously feeds our fears and holds out the promise of relief. Drawing on Crampton's own experience of surviving a life-threatening disease only to find herself beset by almost constant anxiety about her health, A Body Made of Glass explores part of the landscape of illness that most memoirs don't reach: the territory beyond survival or cure, where body and mind seem locked in a strange and exhausting kind of dance.

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Book SynopsisAN INSTANT SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLERSHORTLISTED FOR THE GORDON BURN PRIZEA GUARDIAN BEST MEMOIR OF 2023A WATERSTONES BEST BOOK OF 2023John Niven''s little brother Gary was fearless, popular, stubborn, handsome, hilarious and sometimes terrifying. After years of chaotic struggle against the world took his own life at the age of 42.Tracking the lives of two brothers in changing times - from illicit cans of lager in 70s sitting rooms to ecstasy in 90s raves - O Brother is a tender, affecting and often uproariously funny story. It is about the bonds of family and how we try to keep the best of those we lose alive. It is about black sheep and what it takes to break the ties that bind. Fundamentally it is about how families survive suicide, ''that last cry, from the saddest outpost.''

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Book SynopsisA luminous memoir of post-war childhood, adventure and loss on the banks of the Nile.Wonderful a brave, inventive, touching distillation of memory and imagination' JENNY UGLOWInventory of a Life Mislaid follows Marina Warner's beautiful, penniless young mother Ilia as she leaves southern Italy in 1945 to travel alone to London. Her husband, an English colonel, is still away in the war in the East as she begins to learn how to be Mrs Esmond Warner, an Englishwoman.With diamond rings on her fingers and brogues on her feet, Ilia steps fearlessly into the world of cricket and riding. But, without prospect of work in a bleak, war-ravaged England, Esmond remembers the glorious ease of Cairo during his periods of leave from the desert campaign. There, they start a bookshop, a branch of W. H. Smith's. But growing resistance to foreign interests, especially British, erupts in the 1952 uprising, and the Cairo Fire burns the city clean.Evocative and imaginative, at once historical and speculativTrade Review‘Wonderful – a brave, inventive, touching distillation of memory and imagination, shimmering with images, sounds and scents, conjuring a clash of lives, worlds and words’Jenny Uglow ‘A captivating re-creation of her childhood in a lost Cairo, so incomparably louche, sensuous and fragrant, and of her parents’ improbable marriage’Ferdinand Mount ‘An entrancing weave of memoir, history, autobiography and fiction, this adventurous book voyages through time and space to re-discover, re-imagine and reinvent a lost world. One of Marina Warner's most beautiful works’Michèle Roberts ‘Moving and original … Warner’s view of the past is always precise, at once generous and exacting. She has a gift for using objects to conjure up characters, feelings and atmospheres … Poignant and exquisitely crafted, Inventory of a Life Mislaid is bound to become a classic’Catriona Seth ‘A poignant and imaginatively transgressive exploration of her parents’ marriage, a war time love match between Southern Italy and upper class England … Evocative’Margaret Drabble ‘High-risk and multidimensional … Warner brings to these pages a lifetime of thinking about stories and the ways in which they shape our lives’Literary Review ‘This is a wonderful rich, partly mythical memoir that sifts through the past to connect a family’s secrets to the deep-rooted colonial assumptions that still resonate in a post-Brexit Britain … never dull … Eloquent and heartbreaking’TLS ‘Poignant and mythical’New Statesman ‘The most intriguing memoir … Marina Warner’s subtle, exotic and angry account of her parents’ marriage’Roy Foster, TLS, Books of the Year ‘Warner is such a skilful and imaginative writer that much of …the book reads like lived experience … the happiest of concoctions, a mix of fiction and fact, observation and speculation …This brave, painful, dazzling memoir is riveting’Spectator

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Book SynopsisThroughout his life, clothes have provided an outlet through which journalist Teo van den Broeke understands both himself and the world around him.From the blue princess dress he coveted as a child, that first led him to question whether he was normal', through to the Nike cap and Gucci loafers he wore to impress the men he first desired, fabric has long enveloped and shaped his formative moments.Using the wardrobe of his past as a lens through which to explore the myriad trials and tribulations of adolescence, The Closet charts Teo's growth from uncertainty to self-acceptance. Courageously recounting his sexual awakening, the all too familiar hesitancy around his adult future and his many, often tumultuous, relationships with family and friends Teo learns that it is only in celebrating our differences that we can learn to fully embrace the brilliance within ourselves.Trade Review“Witty and original and incredibly touching. I loved this book.” Andrew Scott “Teo van den Broeke’s clever and beautiful memoir is as chic as it is emotional.” Giles Hattersley, Features Director, Vogue “A coming-of-age story that is both completely original and hugely relatable.” Jess Cartner-Motley, Associate Fashion Editor, The Guardian “Both a love letter and an homage to any kid who feels a bit different. A life affirming read.” Dermot O’Leary “A completely original coming out tale that is dressed to kill.” Dylan Jones, Editor-in-chief, Evening Standard “I laughed, I cried, I wanted better clothes. The Closet is a tapestry of pin sharp realisations that unpicks modern manhood.” Raven Smith, The Sunday Times Bestselling Author “Funny, moving, tender and true, this memoir will resonate with anyone who has ever been young, misunderstood, and head-over-heels in love with a pair of unsuitable shoes. That’s everyone, right?” Alex Bilmes, Editori-in-chief, Esquire

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Book SynopsisBridget Christie is a stand-up comedian, idiot and feminist. On the 30th of April 2012, a man farted in the Women's Studies Section of a bookshop and it changed her life forever. A Book For Her details Christie's twelve years of anonymous toil in the bowels of stand-up comedy and the sudden epiphany that made her, unbelievably, one of the most critically acclaimed British stand-up comedians this decade, drawing together the threads that link a smelly smell in the women's studies section to the global feminist struggle. Find out how nice Peter Stringfellow's fish tastes, how yoghurt advertising perpetuates rape myths, and how Emily Bronte used a special ladies' pen to write Wuthering Heights.If you're interested in comedy and feminism, then this is definitely the book for you. If you hate both then I'd probably give it a miss. Christie is adept at turning on a sixpence between being comical, or serious, or both at once, and at pricking her own earnTrade ReviewA cool, clear glass of sane in a world of unbearable woo-hoo. * Caitlin Moran *A great feminist stand up, who gets us feminists to laugh at ourselves, as well as at the dinosaurs. * Mary Beard *Fabulous feminist polemical memoir from one of the funniest most astringent women working the upper tier of the British comedy circuit. Scrap that, she's just one of the best in entertainment. * Grazia *Part memoir, part laughter-filled rant ... Christie is a lively narrator and provides a sharp balance of hilarity and ideology. A Book For Her is both a searingly accurate portrayal of 21-century womanhood and a proper hoot. * Independent *Charm, passion and gallons of wit. Funny books seldom come so committed, nor committed books much funnier. * Sunday Telegraph *Bloody excellent. * Sarah Millican *Vulnerable, courageous and very funny * Stylist *Rewriting the feminist agenda ... a must read. * Red Magazine *A voice so idiosyncratic that it transfers uncannily well from stage to page ... it’s courageous, but more than that: it is very funny. * Guardian *Comics will find much sage advice in its pages; others simply a commonsense perspective on the world. It's a book for everyone then, not just 'for her'. * i *Must-read for any young women, or man, interested in comedy and feminism. * Hello! *A charming, eloquent, passionate and knowingly ridiculous voice, in print as she is on stage, and that's how you win people over. This is what a feminist sounds like. * Chortle *Funny, furious and staunchly feminist ... [a] brilliantly belligerent book. * S Magazine *Stand-up Bridget Christie’s autobiographical call-to-arms for gender equality is as hilarious as it is committed * Telegraph Online *Very, very funny. * Radio Times *An excellent and unputdownable book…Christie combines narrative and stream-of-consciousness brilliantly * Observer *The funny woman's memoir ... hysterical. * Vogue UK *It is a fine book, somewhere between feminist treatise, autobiography and nerdy stand-up how-to guide. Most importantly for me, it was very funny, despite also being deadly serious. This of course is Christie’s strength that sets her above her peers ... she uses the Trojan horse technique of concealing a powerful army of vital messages inside a giant horse-shaped laugh ... and she does it better than anyone. * Bruce Dessau, Beyond The Joke *We always need more feminist memoirs, when they’re funny and insightful and clever and honest. Bridget Christie’s A Book for Her is all of those things. * Stylist *[Christie] made me laugh loudly on the tube like a loud, shameless, lipstick-covered walrus…funny and passionate and inspiring, all at the same time. * Huffington Post *I think Bridget Christie has a kind of genius. It's an incredibly funny and weirdly moving memoir about a person finding her voice. I was dazzled by it. * Jon Ronson *[Christie's] humility sucks you in and makes you laugh. She is funny in all the right places. * Irish Times *It reads very much like a stand-up routine, from the running gags and callbacks. Whatever the seriousness of the subject she’s discussing, however passionately she’s laying into her pet hates, Christie never forgets also to make herself an object of mirth, and does so with charm and brio to spare. * Telegraph (Best Books for Christmas) *I’m halfway through the excellent A Book for Her. This book is like she’s sitting next to me in all her feministy, hilarious, smart glory. * Sarah Millican, Good Housekeeping *‘It’s great: she has really embraced the form and constantly goes on long digressions just for the audiobook listeners. * The Sunday Telegraph *It’s rare I purchase a hardback (they hurt when they drop on my face when I fall asleep reading!), but I was so desperate to read Bridget Christie’s A Book For Her, I braved it. I was well rewarded. Part memoir, part rant, Christie brilliantly and hilariously points out the utter absurdity and nonsensical cruelty of sexism, it left me smiling but furious. * WH Smith blog *

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Book Synopsis''Could not be more enjoyable, engaging or moving'' ObserverIt''s 1979, I''m three years old, and like all breakfast times during my youth it begins with Mum combing my hair, a ritual for which I have to sit down on the second-hand, floral-patterned settee, and lean forward, like I''m presenting myself for execution.For Sathnam Sanghera, growing up in Wolverhampton in the eighties was a confusing business. On the one hand, these were the heady days of George Michael mix-tapes, Dallas on TV and, if he was lucky, the occasional Bounty Bar. On the other, there was his wardrobe of tartan smocks, his 30p-an-hour job at the local sewing factory and the ongoing challenge of how to tie the perfect top-knot.And then there was his family, whose strange and often difficult behaviour he took for granted until, at the age of twenty-four, Sathnam made a discovery that changed everything he ever thought he knew about them. Equipped with breathtakTrade Review'I absolutely loved it. Heartbreaking and wonderful. He writes beautifully' - Maggie O'Farrell 'Could not be more enjoyable, engaging or moving' Observer 'About real secrets, in a real quest for understanding. It's tragic, funny and disturbing. It will challenge you, and may even change you' - Carole Angier, Independent 'Hilarious, engaging, tragicomic' - Meg Rosoff, Guardian "Gripping and entertaining, horrifying and tender ! Exposes all those things we take for granted as we grow up' - Hardeep Singh Kohli, The Times

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Book SynopsisHere we drink three cups of tea to do business; the first you are a stranger, the second you become a friend, and the third, you join our family, and for our family we are prepared to do anything even die.'Haji Ali, Korphe Village Chief, Karakoram mountains, Pakistan In 1993, after a terrifying and disastrous attempt to climb K2, a mountaineer called Greg Mortenson drifted, cold and dehydrated, into an impoverished Pakistan village in the Karakoram Mountains. Moved by the inhabitants' kindness, he promised to return and build a school. Three Cups of Tea is the story of that promise and its extraordinary outcome. Over the next decade Mortenson built not just one but fifty-five schools especially for girls in remote villages across the forbidding and breathtaking landscape of Pakistan and Afghanistan, just as the Taliban rose to power. His story is at once a riveting adventure and a testament to the power of the humanitarian spirit.

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Book SynopsisGeorge Orwell''s vivid memoir of his time living among the desperately poor and destitute, Down and Out in Paris and London is a moving tour of the underworld of society.''You have talked so often of going to the dogs - and well, here are the dogs, and you have reached them.'' Written when Orwell was a struggling writer in his twenties, it documents his ''first contact with poverty''. Here, he painstakingly documents a world of unrelenting drudgery and squalor - sleeping in bug-infested hostels and doss houses of last resort, working as a dishwasher in Paris''s vile ''Hôtel X'', surviving on scraps and cigarette butts, living alongside tramps, a star-gazing pavement artist and a starving Russian ex-army captain. Exposing a shocking, previously-hidden world to his readers, Orwell gave a human face to the statistics of poverty for the first time - and in doing so, found his voice as a writer.Trade ReviewThe white-hot reaction of a sensitive, observant, compassionate young man to poverty -- Dervla MurphyOrwell was the great moral force of his age * Spectator *

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Book SynopsisA TLS, FINANCIAL TIMES, NEW STATESMAN, GUARDIAN, OBSERVER AND WHITE REVIEW BOOK OF THE YEARFINALIST FOR THE 2021 ANDREW CARNEGIE MEDAL FOR EXCELLENCE IN NONFICTION From award-winning writer Claudia Rankine, the stunning follow-up to Citizen and Don''t Let Me Be Lonely ''Riveting'' Bernardine Evaristo, TLS (Books of the Year)''Brilliant'' Gary Younge, New Statesman (Books of the Year)''Timely and powerful'' Fatima Bhutto, Financial Times''One of our time''s most incisive, brilliant and necessary intellectuals'' Seán Hewitt, Irish Times''Ranking is a writer of genius'' Jeremy Noel-Tod, Sunday TimesAt home and in government, contemporary America finds itself riven by a culture war in which aggression and defensiveness alike are on the rise. It is not alone. In such partisan conditions, how can humans best approach one another across our differences?Taking the study of whiteness and white supremacy as a guiding light, Claudia Rankine explores a series of real encounters with friends and strangers - each disrupting the false comfort of spaces where our public and private lives intersect, like the airport, the theatre, the dinner party and the voting booth - and urges us to enter into the conversations which could offer the only humane pathways through this moment of division.Just Us is an invitation to discover what it takes to stay in the room together, and to breach the silence, guilt and violence that surround whiteness. Brilliantly arranging essays, images and poems along with the voices and rebuttals of others, it counterpoints Rankine''s own text with facing-page notes and commentary, and closes with a bravura study of women confronting the political and cultural implications of dyeing their hair blonde.Wry, vulnerable and prescient, this is Rankine''s most intimate work, less interested in being right than in being true, and being together.Trade ReviewClaudia Rankine marshalls the full range of her substantial talents - from poetry to essay - to explore how racism is lived, privilege is expressed and engagement might be possible. Personal, political, interrogative and, most all, impressive -- Gary YoungeThis brilliant and multi-layered work is a call, a bid, an insistent, rightly impatient demand for a public conversation on whiteness . . . bold and vital -- Judith ButlerIn my work, well-meaning white people consistently ask me how to recognize racism. Yet we might ask, "How have we managed not to know?" The information is everywhere, if we care to listen . . . With clarity and grace, Claudia Rankine delivers a gut punch to white denial. Just Us is stunning work - audacious, revelatory, devastating -- Robin DiAngeloIn Just Us, Claudia Rankine continues her remarkable and brilliant interrogation of the language, culture, and history that have shaped America, forging through poems, essays, and documents a literary archive that is utterly original and desperately needed -- Dinaw MengestuFiercely intimate, rigorous . . . [Just Us] lets all of us in on the conversations - with others and the self - that are necessary for survival -- Nuar Alsadir

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Book SynopsisA darkly funny account of family life from the author of The Haunting of Hill House and The Lottery''Sometimes, in my capacity as a mother, I find myself sitting open-mouthed and terrified before my own children''As well as being a master of the macabre, Shirley Jackson was also a pitch-perfect chronicler of everyday family life. In Life Among the Savages, her caustically funny account of raising her children in a ramshackle house in Vermont, she deals with rats in the cellar, misbehaving imaginary friends, an oblivious husband and ever-encroaching domestic chaos, all described with wit, warmth and plenty of bite. ''Jackson''s family chronicles have a genuinely subversive aspect ... Read today, her pieces feel surprisingly modern - mainly because she refuses to sentimentalize or idealize motherhood'' The New York Times Book Review''Comic masterpieces, laced with hints of the discontent that lies beneath'' GTrade ReviewIs it ironic or fitting that some of the greatest American writing about that venerated and difficult activity, motherhood, comes from a horror writer? ... There is something rather magical about how Jackson managed to so transform suffering into comic masterpieces * Guardian *As warm as it is hilarious and believable ... Never has the state of domestic chaos been so perfectly illuminated * The New York Times Book Review *Warm and funny ... Read today, her pieces feel surprisingly modern - mainly because Jackson refuses to sentimentalize or idealize motherhood * The New York Times *Charming ... You'll see every parenting stance you've ever adopted, every parent-story trope you've ever told or heard, expressed more perfectly than you ever could have ... One of the great memoirists of family life * Slate *A housewife-mother's frustrations are transformed by a deft twist of the wrist into, not a grim account of disintegration and madness, still less the poisoning of her family, but light-hearted comedy -- Joyce Carol Oates

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Book SynopsisThe compelling, witty and remarkably honest autobiography from beloved star of Just a Minute, QI, Have I Got News For You and Celebrity GoggleboxTHE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER''Hilarious, ribald, eye-popping, unforgettable, will make you laugh out loud'' DAILY MAIL''Warm, witty, charming. A moving and very affectionate family history. An enthusiast for life'' THE TIMES________Enter the world of Gyles Brandreth - broadcaster, actor, writer, former politician - as he takes us on an extraordinary journey into his past.From growing up in an apparently well-to-do but strapped-for-cash middle-class English family to his adventures in swinging London, Gyles encounters princes, presidents, pop stars and prime ministers, gets involved in everything from setting up Scrabble championships to examining Danish sex shops, and thrills us with countless tales of family, friends and acquainTrade ReviewHilarious, ribald, eye-popping, unforgettable, will make you laugh out loud * Daily Mail *A whirlwind of witticisms and of funny tales, both short and tall . . . 'I feel I have lived my life in a magic garden where the sun is always shining' he writes, and in Odd Boy Out he offers us yet another glimpse of that bright, shining sun * Mail on Sunday *Warm, witty, charming. A moving and very affectionate family history. An enthusiast for life * The Times *A fabulous raconteur with a great many tricks up his sleeve. His infectious zest for life means he has a story for almost every well-known person you can think of * Daily Telegraph *A magnificent raconteur. A witty account of a most unusual life * Independent *Brilliant pen portraits of his father and myriad friends present a framework for Gyles's contemplation of his extraordinary life. Light-hearted and dark events alike are described with his customary deceptively jaunty style, making them funny, moving, and sometimes deeply shocking -- Sheila HancockStaggeringly brilliant, funny and touching, I loved it -- Joanna LumleyA hilarious and revealing account of growing up and coming of age in an apparently well-to-do but always strapped-for-cash middle-class English family * Eastern Daily Press *Brandreth has been an expert cheerer-upper for more than 60 years . . . Ebullient. Full of fun, famous names and sparkling facts * Daily Mail *He's cheery, fun and has a fabulous grasp of the English language, so Gyles Brandreth's autobiography makes for a scintillating read. His hilarious - and sometimes moving - account of his life from early childhood days through to the adult world of politics and television is candid. It is also a story around his everyday family life, and about happiness, ambition and love. It offers a fascinating insight into a portrait of Britain, too * People’s Friend Magazine *Hugely enjoyable. Engaging * Choice Magazine *Full of fascination . . . Tantalising. Alongside his celebrity stories, his delightfully observed domestic portraits bring to life whole lost worlds * Great British Life *Fascinating * Telegraph *

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Book SynopsisThe defining experience of Chinua Achebe''s life was the Nigerian civil war, also known as the Biafran War. For more than forty years Achebe was silent on those terrible years, until he produced this towering reckoning with one of modern Africa''s most fateful events. A marriage of history, remembrance, poetry and vivid first-hand observation, There Was a Country is a work of wisdom and compassion from one of the great voices of our age.Trade ReviewIt has the tense narrative grip of the best fiction. It is also a revelatory entry into the intimate character of the writer's brilliant mind and bold spirit. Achebe has created here a new genre of literature -- Nadine GordimerEngrossing ... an elegy from a master storyteller who has witnessed the undulating fortunes of a nation ... his strongest expressions are his poems, scattered between chapters, offering affecting interludes -- Noo Saro-Wiwa * Guardian *Matchless ... what a man; what a life -- Giles Foden * Daily Telegraph *Part-history, part-memoir, [Achebe's] moving account of the war is laced with anger, but there is also an abiding tone of regret for what Nigeria might have been without conflict and mismanagement * Sunday Times *A blend of historical overview, personal memoir and political manifesto ... fascinating * Evening Standard *

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Book SynopsisWINNER OF THE NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD FOR CRITICISM 2019From the MAN BOOKER PRIZE- and WOMEN''S PRIZE-SHORTLISTED author of Changing My Mind and Swing Time - discover a second unmissable collection of essays from Zadie Smith''Generous, courageous, and tough-minded... [A] classic English essayist in the vein of Orwell, Woolf and Angela Carter'' Financial Times''Engrossing, astute... Should you read this brilliant book? Absolutely'' Independent''Generous and curious'' Evening Standard''Brilliant, lively and frequently hilarious... She''s one of the brightest minds in English literature today'' NPRNo subject is too fringe or too mainstream for the unstoppable Zadie Smith. From social media to the environment, from Jay-Z to Karl Ove Knausgaard, she has boundless curiosity and the boundless wit to match. In Feel Free, pop culture, high culture, social change and political debate all get the Zadie Smith treatment, dissected with razor-sharp intellect, set brilliantly against the context of the utterly contemporary, and considered with a deep humanity and compassion. This electrifying new collection showcases its author as a true literary powerhouse, demonstrating once again her credentials as an essential voice of her generation.Trade ReviewA writer so insistent on the possibility of imaginative connection, so generous and curious with regard to her readers * Evening Standard *Refreshingly insightful on any number of topics, from Martin Buber to Justin Bieber...Reviewing a book by her countryman Geoff Dyer, [Smith] writes that she is most struck by 'his tone. Its simplicity, its classlessness, its accessibility and yet its erudition-the combination is a trick few British writers ever pull off.' Without question, Smith is one of them * TIME Magazine *Brims with a wide-ranging enthusiasm...[Smith's] open-mindedness gives the whole of Feel Free a lively, game-for-anything spirit...Enchanting * USA Today *Fascinating stuff! * Love It! *Charmingly digressive...Smith sets an unpretentious tone...As the pages pass, there's a palpable absence of self-certainty. In its place are ample reserves of curiosity and empathy * Minneapolis Star Tribune *The joy of this collection is Smith's straightforward phrasing, often summing up her thesis with a single thoughtful sentence. Her words are not overwritten; they do not distract from her purpose, nor are they a barrier to her argument; they are welcoming. I found myself re-reading the brightest of these sentences over and again, marveling at her humor and her brevity * Associated Press *The strongest essays showcase Smith's skills as an art, literary and cultural critic...One of the pleasures of reading Feel Free is in savoring Smith's joy when she writes about formative cultural experiences. As with any book of opinions, Feel Free makes claims one might dispute...But a collection of essays that doesn't prompt disagreements would be a dull book, and Feel Free is anything but dull * Houston Chronicle *Getting In and Out' is the kind of essay that sheds light on a whole career, and it would justify this collection even if Feel Free didn't include a handful of more perfectly crafted pieces of prose * Chicago Tribune *For years, [Smith] has been one of the most important literary journalists we have. This is why * Buffalo News *Smith writes [ . . . ] with such infectious zeal and engaging accessibility that it makes you want to turn up at her house and demand tutoring * Dazed and Confused *Publisher's Description: Dazzlingly insightful, explosively funny and ever-timely, essential writer Zadie Smith is back with a second unmissable collection of essays, following up her critically acclaimed collection, Changing My Mind * Penguin *It's good to know that, while my body rusts, I can keep my mind stretched and nimble by reading Zadie Smith * Observer *A preturnaturally gifted writer with a voice that's street-smart and learned, sassy and philosophical all at the same time * The New York Times *

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Book Synopsis''I am most grateful for two things: that I was born in North Korea, and that I escaped from North Korea.''Yeonmi Park was not dreaming of freedom when she escaped from North Korea. She didn''t even know what it meant to be free. All she knew was that she was running for her life, that if she and her family stayed behind they would die - from starvation, or disease, or even execution. This book is the story of Park''s struggle to survive in the darkest, most repressive country on earth; her harrowing escape through China''s underworld of smugglers and human traffickers; and then her escape from China across the Gobi desert to Mongolia, with only the stars to guide her way, and from there to South Korea and at last to freedom; and finally her emergence as a leading human rights activist - all before her 21st birthday.''Clear-eyed and devastating'' ObserverTrade ReviewClear-eyed and devastating. * Observer *One of the most harrowing stories I have ever heard - and one of the most inspiring . . . A book to make you newly thankful for the freedom you have never been forced to fight for. * The Bookseller *An eloquent, wrenchingly honest work that vividly represents the plight of many North Koreans. * Kirkus *

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Book SynopsisFrom the best-selling author of The Circle - the gripping true story of a young Yemeni American man, raised in San Francisco, who dreams of resurrecting the ancient art of Yemeni coffee but finds himself trapped in Sana''a by civil warMokhtar Alkhanshali is twenty-four and working as a doorman when he becomes fascinated with the rich history of coffee and Yemen''s central place in it. He leaves San Francisco and travels deep into his ancestral home to tour terraced farms high in the country''s rugged mountains. He collects samples and organizes farmers and is on the verge of success when civil war engulfs the country. Saudi bombs rain down, the U.S. embassy closes, and Mokhtar has to find a way out of Yemen with only his hopes on his back.The Monk of Mokha is the story of this courageous and visionary young man following the most American of dreams.''Extraordinary... No story is more urgent'' Observer''Dramatic, aspiTrade ReviewReaders will never take coffee for granted or overlook the struggles of Yemen after ingesting Eggers's phenomenally well-written, juggernaut tale of an intrepid and irresistible entrepreneur on a complex and meaningful mission, a highly caffeinated adventure story * Booklist *A most improbable and uplifting success story... Eggers offers an appealing hybrid: a biography of a charming, industrious Muslim man who has more ambition than direction; a capsule history of coffee and its origins, growth, and development as a mass commodity and then as a niche product; the story of Blue Bottle, the elite coffee chain in San Francisco that some suspect (and some fear) could turn into the next Starbucks; an adventure story of civil war in a foreign country... It is hard to resist the derring-do of the Horatio Alger of Yemenite coffee * Kirkus *The remarkable true story of a Yemeni coffee farmer... A vibrant depiction of courage and passion, interwoven with a detailed history of Yemeni coffee and a timely exploration of Muslim American identity * Entertainment Weekly *Works as both a heart-warming success story with a winning central character and an account of real-life adventures that read with the vividness of fiction * Publishers Weekly *It'll open your eyes - very wide - to the singular origins of your single origin * Esquire (UK) *Definitely one for book club * Elle (UK) *Eggers's narrative is guaranteed to be every bit as compelling as that of any novel * The Observer *Dave Eggers returns to his "factional" mode with The Monk Of Mokha, in which a Yemeni immigrant to the US discovers an obsession with coffee, returns home, and is caught in a war. Given his previous form with What Is The What and Zeitoun I have high hopes of this book * The Scostman *This is a book that celebrates ethnic diversity and the exuberance of the human spirit * Mail on Sunday *[Dave Eggers] is on a mission to use the platform he has created as a writer/activist to give direct voice to the marginalised or unheard... No story is more urgent * Observer *Bridgemakers such as Mokhtar courageously embody America's reason for being - as a place of radical opportunity and ceaseless welcome... a blended people united not by stasis and cowardice and fear, but by irrational exuberance, by global enterprise on a human scale * The Guardian *It's hard to imagine ALkhanshali's story being told with more pace, scope or sensitivity. An extraordinary adventure * The Times *Mokhtar's story is a remarkable one, full of derring-do, tenacity and exceptional luck * Metro *It is impossible not to root for Mokhtar. And as with all good bildungsromans, it is as much the reader as the hero who receives an education * The Daily Telegraph *

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Book SynopsisSupermodel Gisele Bundchen shares personal stories, insights, and photos to explore lessons that have helped shape her life.

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Book SynopsisAbandoned as a baby, Andy McNab''s start in life was tough. Growing up in South London with foster parents, and surrounded by poverty, he attended seven schools in as many years, disillusioned and in remedial classes. It wasn't long before his life descended into petty crime. By the age of sixteen, he was in juvenile detention. Recruited into the Army from there, it soon became apparent that he had the reading age of an eleven year old. The next six months in the Army education system changed his course of his life forever. Today Everything Changes is the inspiring story of when life changed for Andy McNab.

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a huge range and FREE tracked UK delivery on ALL orders.

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Book SynopsisFrom the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Wow, No Thank You''Brilliant, hilarious and perspicacious.'' ELIZABETH DAY''One of our culture's greatest humorists is back.'' Glamour''SO funny.'' SARA PASCOEThis is not an advice book. Samantha Irby doesn't know anything.After fleeing Chicago to quarantine at home in Michigan, Irby finds herself bleaching groceries and wondering if her upper lip hairs are visible on Zoom. Her career reaches new heights: she gets to work with the iconic ladies of Sex and the City - her dream! - but behind the new-found glam, Irby is just trying to keep her life together. Our friend in print is back, on point, and ready to take us with her, from adopting Abe (her scrawny, watery-eyed firstborn dog) to her favourite, extremely specific porn searches (including two old nuns).Wildly, seditiously funny' New York TimesSam Irby is the king of sparkl

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Book SynopsisMichael Zantovský is the current Czech Ambassador to the Court of St James. He was among the founding members of the movement that coordinated the overthrow of the communist regime. In January 1990 he became the spokesman, press secretary and advisor to his lifelong friend, President Václav Havel. He has combined a career in politics and the foreign service with work as an author and translator into Czech of many contemporary British and American writers.

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Book SynopsisJohn Fury was born on 22 May 1965. He is a retired professional boxer and bare-knuckle fighter of Irish and British descent, and father to six sons including heavyweight champion of the world, Tyson Fury. When Fury Takes Over is his unfiltered autobiography.Trade ReviewMy dad is truly a man amongst men -- Tyson Fury, WBC Heavyweight Champion of the WorldA knockout account of his wild and wayward life as a bare-knuckle fighter and no-nonsense minder * The Sun *

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Book SynopsisTom had never seen Maggie - an MG Magnette - move or heard her engine roar, but the fact dad Will wouldn't let the car go added to the magic and mystique. Aged 14, Tom embarked on reviving her, but life threw many diversions in front of Maggie's journey back to the road.a tale of restoration from love to grief and back again

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Book SynopsisIn the summer of 1957, rebelling against her family and anxious to impress an admirer who had moved to Paris, Gill Johnson, aged twenty-five, gave up her comfortable job at the National Gallery in London and travelled to Venice to take up a job teaching English to an aristocratic Italian family. Love from Venice is her vivid evocation of that summer, the last hurrah of the European Grand Tour, when the international jet set lit upon the city for their fun. Drawing on letters that she wrote to David Ross, her admirer and correspondent, and to her parents in London, Johnson describes her life as she flits from palazzo to Lido to palazzo. Absorbed into the social whirl of the super-rich, how do her feelings for her love begin to change?This is a moving and witty memoir of a young woman coming to terms with her own feelings and destiny, and learning about different aspects of love from the people she meets, all set in high-season Venice in a halcyon age.

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Book Synopsis''All the charm, wonder, eccentricity and vigour of country life is here in these pages, and told with such engaging directness, detail and colour . . . Bliss'' STEPHEN FRY''A capacious work that contains multitudes . . . a work to amble through, seasonally, relishing the vivid dashes of colour and the precision and delicacy of the descriptions'' THE SPECTATOR''My favourite read of the year . . . warm, funny and moving'' SUNDAY TIMES''A writer whose pages you turn and then turn back immediately to re-read, relish and get by heart'' SUSAN HILL, SUNDAY TELEGRAPHRonald Blythe lived at the end of an overgrown farm track deep in the rolling countryside of the Stour Valley, on the border between Suffolk and Essex. His home was Bottengoms Farm, a sturdy yeoman''s house once owned by the artist John Nash. From here, Blythe spent almost half a century observing the slow turn of the agricultural year, the Trade ReviewMy favourite read of the year . . . I do not know of another work that lets you so directly into another person's mind and memory . . . a warm, funny and moving nature memoir -- John Carey * Sunday Times *Blythe is a writer whose pages you turn and then turn back immediately to re-read, relish and get by heart particular phrases and images . . . We should be grateful to have him and his beautiful pages, and for the privilege of spending so many ordinary and yet rare and precious days in his company -- SUSAN HILL * Telegraph 5* review *A capacious book that contains multitudes . . . It is a work to amble through, seasonally, relishing the vivid dashes of colour and the precision and delicacy of the descriptions * The Spectator *The greatest living writer on the English countryside . . . Blythe's writing dances with self-deprecating wit, rebellious asides, sharp portraits of fellow writers and notes of worldliness -- Patrick Barkham * Guardian *Ronald Blythe's eye and voice bring the countryside alive like a Brueghel painting. All the charm, wonder, eccentricity and vigour of country life is here in these pages, and told with such engaging directness, detail and colour. To immerse yourself in this East Anglian year is be reminded of why we love and value the rhythms and realities of rural life. Bliss -- STEPHEN FRYA book of priceless wisdom . . . to read as the year unfolds. My Blythe has a great, often droll sense of humour . . . and writes with a spry, unforced elegance * Country Life *[His diary] is the best of his writing, its light as air and full of philosophy. . . a wonderful, original, pure tapestry. He could time travel within a single sentence, going from personal to local to global. Being with Ronnie Blythe in one of his books is like being on a magic carpet, the exhilaration of being alive, and of nature, and the world -- Ian Collins * Today Programme *Next to Nature is the perfect memorial, a latter-day Book of Hours . . . I'm resolved to return to this monthly for amusement, inspiration and comfort -- Christina Hardyment * The Times, Audiobook of the Week *A near-legendary chronicler of a particular patch of countryside and country life * Times Radio *The prose is fresher than most contemporary nature writing and, unlike many still-living nature writers, Blythe is concerned with people who live and work in the countryside -- Patrick Galbraith * The Times *Praise for Ronald BlytheEngland's greatest living country writer * Independent *Blythe's observations of nature are as unforced as breathing, and his descriptions are precise, celebratory and unexpected . . . [He] seduces even the irreligious reader into an appreciation of the meshing of the temporal and the timeless * Guardian *One of our best writers . . . Next to Nature is a hoard of observation, gossip and stories designed to take you through the year, with something rich and strange on every page -- Hilary Spurling * The Spectator, Books of the Year 2022 *[Ronald Blythe] is an English institution . . . he lives with a deep, authentic sense of wonder * TLS *Some of the most beautiful and precise prose in modern English . . . an expansive exploration of how land­scapes, humans, and words interact, touched with great humanity. . . He is our tribal storyteller, plugged into a common stream of inquisitive conversation that joins us as a species -- RICHARD MABEYOne of the great prose stylists on the twentieth century . . . a modern Hazlitt -- MARK COCKERThe finest rural historian of our times * Country Life *It would be difficult to find . . . a sensibility which is richer or better fed, more deeply watered and manured, more drenched in Englishness -- ADAM NICOLSON[His] minute observation of places, people and plants, his ear for scraps of dialogue and his feeling for poetry and painting make everything about those days immediate . . . [He has] a deep of love of the place ­- and of humanity -- MAGGI HAMBLINGThe best portrait of modern rural life in England, subtle and compassionate -- ROGER DEAKIN, on AkenfieldThe doyen of writers about the natural world in England -- MICHAEL McCARTHYReading this book is to be in the company of a supremely sensitive observer who has spent a lifetime seeing and scenting nature . . . His writing delights. His wry humour surprises. * Methodist Recorder *An exquisite piece of observation, connection-making and presentation. Blythe is a master craftsman with words . . . Next to Nature is not a book to be rushed, but savoured * Reform *

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Book SynopsisCody Rigsby has a lot of opinions: Kevin is the hottest Backstreet Boy; grape jelly is a crime against nature; if you wear flip-flops in New York City, you do not love yourself. But if there is one opinion-one truth-that he holds above all others, it''s that we shouldn''t let the fear of looking stupid or being judged hold us back from living our best lives.Cody didn''t always feel this way. In XOXO, Cody, he opens up about his journey toward accepting himself, from growing up gay and poor in the South to his migration to New York City, where he went from broke-ass dancer to fitness icon. He intimately details what it was like to lose both his father and best friend to addiction and how he began to repair his relationship with his mom as an adult. He recounts his time working at a nightclub on the Lower East Side and his decision to audition for Peloton on a whim, and dishes about competing against Sporty Spice on Dancing with the Stars.

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Book SynopsisThe remarkable memoir of Zuzana Ružicková, Holocaust survivor and world-famous harpsichordist. ''Extraordinary'' Sunday Times''Compelling'' Daily Telegraph Zuzana Ružicková grew up in 1930s Czechoslovakia dreaming of two things: Johann Sebastian Bach and the piano. But her peaceful, melodic childhood was torn apart when, in 1939, the Nazis invaded. Uprooted from her home, transported from Auschwitz to Hamburg to Bergen-Belsen, bereaved, starved, and afflicted with crippling injuries to her musician's hands, the teenage Zuzana faced a series of devastating losses. Yet with every truck and train ride, a small slip of paper printed with her favourite piece of Bach's music became her talisman. Armed with this proof that beauty still existed', Zuzana's fierce bravery and passion ensured her survival of the greatest human atrocities of all time, and would continue to sustain her through the brutalities of post-war Communist rule. Harnessing her talent andTrade Review[An] extraordinary memoir … A moving record of a life well lived in the face of appalling obstacles -- Nick Rennison * Sunday Times *A compelling story of terrible suffering surmounted by incredible bravery -- Anne de Courcy * Daily Telegraph *[Zuzana’s] humanity shines through all the inhumanity … Vivid and moving -- The Jewish Chronicle

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Book Synopsis''A triumphant memoir'' Cathy Park Hong, author of MINOR FEELINGS, finalist for the Pulitzer PrizeThe highly original, blistering, and unconventional memoir by the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Sympathizer, which has now sold over one million copies worldwideWith insight, humour, formal invention, and lyricism, in A Man of Two Faces Nguyen rewinds the film of his own life. He expands the genre of personal memoir by acknowledging larger stories of refugeehood, colonization, and ideas about Vietnam and America, writing with his trademark sardonic wit and incisive analysis, as well as a deep emotional openness about his life as a father and a son. At the age of four, Nguyen and his family are forced to flee his hometown of Ban Mê Thu?t and come to the USA as refugees. After being removed from his brother and parents and homed with a family on his own, Nguyen is later allowed to resettle into his own family in subu

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Book SynopsisWINNER OF THE 2021 BOOKS ARE MY BAG READERS AWARD FOR NON-FICTIONSHORTLISTED FOR THE 2021 WAINWRIGHT PRIZEI knew in every bone of my body, in every fibre of my being, that I had to report what had happened, not only for myself but to help stop anyone else having to go through what I did. I knew I could not remain silent, or still, I could not stop walking through the world. A journey of reclamation through the natural landscapes of the North, brilliantly exploring identity, nature, place and belonging. Beautifully written and truly inspiring, I Belong Here heralds a powerful and refreshing new voice in nature writing. Anita Sethi was on a journey through Northern England when she became the victim of a race-hate crime. The crime was a vicious attack on her right to exist in a place on account of her race. After the event Anita experienced panic attacks and anxiety. A crushing sense of claustrophobia made her long for wide open spaces, to breathe deepTrade ReviewFor anyone who has ever felt out of place, I Belong Here is a moving and comforting read. For everyone else, it is an education. Punchier and more political than most nature writing, this book is a thing of beauty. * Sunday Times *Nature’s beauty and wilderness provide a welcome escape from Sethi’s city life and kickstart a healing process as she becomes enveloped in the great outdoors, taking us on an emotional journey at the same time. It’s an amazing odyssey: inspiring, powerful, encouraging and incredibly brave. * Independent *Forever asked where she’s from originally, Sethi writes that she has always felt like an ‘outsider’. Instead, this passionate and reflective book stakes her claim to the English countryside and nature writing itself. * New Statesman *A heartfelt examination of identity and place ... it is the way Sethi's connection to nature is refracted through her experience as a woman of colour that gives the book its rare power. * Guardian *Restored and enlivened by the wonders of nature, Anita Sethi finds the courage to embrace her vulnerabilities and strengths and to claim her place in the world. A brave and life-affirming book. * Sunday Express *An unforgettable journey … the genius of the author is how she takes the narrative of hatred and discrimination hurled at her and turns it upside down by ‘going back to where she is from’ – the landscapes of the north. Not only deeply moving but also quietly transformative. * The Observer *Excellent...A powerful memoir about nature and belonging and racism and Britishness, as Anita Sethi undertakes a journey to reclaim her space in Britain following a terrifying hate crime on public transport. A brilliant writer. -- Nikesh Shukla * author of Brown Baby *Anita Sethi invites her reader to walk, not just at her side, but in her shoes, and to feel for themselves both the exhilaration and the chagrin of travelling the backbone of her home country as a woman of colour. By turns joyous and humbling, I Belong Here is an urgent and necessary addition to the canon of contemporary writing about place in the island of Britain. -- Katharine Norbury * editor of Women on Nature and author of The Fish Ladder *In gorgeous prose that rolls along like the uplands, Anita Sethi opens our eyes to the beauty of our countryside and the hurt and healing found therein. It is rare to find writing that evokes landscape so finely but also conveys our inner world with such power, emotion, vulnerability and truth. I Belong Here deserves its place alongside the Macfarlanes and Macdonalds as a classic of modern British nature writing. -- Patrick Barkham * author of Wild Child *Manchester-born Sethi achieves a powerful blend of memoir, travelogue and natural history as she reflects on nature, place and belonging; and at its beating heart, her book is a stirring love letter to this troubled country of ours. I find it so moving that such a beautifully written, hate-defying book has been born from such a horrific experience. I Belong Here is a shining example of how books, at their best, can be an act of resistance and a communal force for good. -- Caroline Sanderson * The Bookseller Book of the Month, Editor’s Choice review *A brilliantly accomplished mix of powerful memoir and revelatory nature writing, Sethi’s account of finding solace in the Northern countryside following a traumatic racial attack is a defiant act of reclamation and an astonishing piece of testimony. -- Best Books to Look Forward to in 2021 * Waterstones *A powerful and moving memoir * BBC Countryfile Magazine *Incredibly powerful, moving and beautifully told. Full of wild magic. This book will make the world a better place. -- Lucy Jones * author of Losing Eden *Table of ContentsPrologue: A Place Called Hope MOUTH Onwards: A TransPennine Express Journey 1. Speaking Up 2. Bearing Witness SKIN Wanted: A Long Green Trail 3. If Your Nerve Deny You, Go Above Your Nerve 4. You Make Your Own Path as You Walk 5. Walking as a Woman of Colour 6. On Race and Place BACKBONE Malham Cove and Limestone Country 7. Protected Characteristics 8. On Strength, Courage and Trauma 9. Going Viral LIFEBLOOD Upwards: A Pennine Journy 10. Settlements 11. Scars FEET The Way: North Pennines to Hadrian's Wall (via Manchester) 12. Northern Nature 13. Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty 14. Forces 15. Walking and Witnessing Epilogue: Up From a Past that's Rooted in Pain Resources Acknowledgements Bibliography Notes Index

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Book SynopsisDeath is a whisper in the Anglo-Saxon world. But on a remote island, off the coast of County Mayo, it has a louder voice. The local radio station runs a thrice-daily roll-call of the recently departed. The islanders keep vigil with the corpse and share in the sorrow of the bereaved. The living and the dead are bound together in the oldest rite of humanity. In My Father''s Wake, Kevin Toolis gives an intimate, eye-witness account of the death and wake of his father, celebrating the spiritual depth of the Irish Wake and asking if we too can find a better way to deal with our mortality, by living and loving in the acceptance of death.Trade ReviewAs a boy, he learned to kiss the corpse at a traditional island wake. As a film-maker and witness to death in many conflict zones around the world, Kevin Toolis has written a profound book on the culture of grief and death, placing the personal alongside the political in a vivid exploration of our ancient ways of coming together around the dead. This is a moving family story, a memoir of loss and exile, a deep understanding of what makes us alive, casting a cold eye on what is precious and so often denied * HUGO HAMILTON *The 'Western Death Machine' has hidden the dead and dying, but in a remote island off the west coast of Ireland, an almost Homeric society clings to the old ways. The dying are treasured and tenderly watched over, the dead are honoured with the ancient rites and rituals. Contemporary western ideas about death are dominated by individualism; My Father's Wake is a lyrical description of how community and tradition help us deal with our mortality -- SEAMUS O’MAHONY, author of The Way We Die NowA broadside against collective [death] denial. In its alternating shifts of focus, from the intimately personal to the more journalistically detached, it lays bare the desperate numbness that accompanies that denial -- SEAN O'HAGAN * Observer *Powerful and immensely moving -- Ian Critchley * SUNDAY TIMES CULTURE *The windswept Irish island of MY FATHER'S WAKE is one of the final remote outposts of true death engagement in the Western world. Toolis's book is both memoir and anthropology, and serves as a refreshing counterpoint to the industrialized, for-profit death industry we've come to wrongly believe is our only option -- CAITLIN DOUGHTY, author of the New York Times bestsellers Smoke Gets in Your Eyes and From Here to EternityAn enlightening and unflinching dispatch from the frontline, an embedded report by an eyewitness who tries to face death squarely without recourse to mysticism, sentimentality or delusion -- Liam Fay * SUNDAY TIMES IRELAND *A heart-warming and very personal account of a life well-lived -- Mary Russell * IRISH TIMES *Toolis writes superbly ... it's as a memoir that this engrossing book works best -- Anthony Gardner * MAIL ON SUNDAY *A gut-wrenching exploration of death from an Irish perspective ... A fascinating view of what most of us try not to consider: the end of life ... This book is not for the faint of heart, as the experiences [Toolis] shares will leave readers emotionally raw. It is unquestionably rewarding, however, a thought-provoking argument against a sterile and industrial view of death ... Intimate, eye-opening * KIRKUS (starred review) *Visceral and profound * NEW YORK TIMES *His moving memoir is a powerful reminder that the end of life is as precious as its beginning. -- Jane Shilling * DAILY MAIL *

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Book Synopsis'Tense and intimate… an education.' Geoff Dyer'Written with sensitivity and humanity... a remarkable insight into prison life.' Amanda Brown'Authentic, fascinating and deeply moving.' Terry Waite'Enriching, sobering and at times heartrending... a wonder' Lenny Henry__________Can someone in prison be more free than someone outside? Would we ever be good if we never felt shame? What makes a person worthy of forgiveness?Andy West teaches philosophy in prisons. Every day he has conversations with people inside about their lives, discusses their ideas and feelings, and listens as they explore new ways to think about their situation.When Andy goes behind bars, he also confronts his inherited trauma: his father, uncle and brother all spent time in prison. While Andy has built a different life for himself, he still fears that their fate will also be his. As he discusses pressing questions of truth, identity and hope with his students, he searches for his own form of freedom too.Moving, sympathetic, wise and frequently funny, The Life Inside is an elegantly written and unforgettable book. Through a blend of memoir, storytelling and gentle philosophical questioning, it offers a new insight into our stretched justice system, our failing prisons and the complex lives being lived inside.__________'Strives with humour and compassion to understand the phenomenon of prison' Sydney Review of Books'A fascinating and enlightening journey... A legitimate page-turner' 3AM

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Book SynopsisIf we’re talking agoraphobia, we’re talking books. I slip between their covers, lose myself in the turn of one page, re-discover myself on the next. Reading is a game of hide-and-seek. Narrative and neurosis, uneasy bedfellows sleeping top to toe.When Graham Caveney was in his early twenties he began to suffer from what was eventually diagnosed as agoraphobia. What followed were decades of managing his condition and learning to live within the narrow limits it imposed on his life: no motorways, no dual carriageways, no shopping centres, limited time outdoors.Graham’s quest to understand his illness brought him back to his first love: books. From Harper Lee’s Boo Radley, Ford Madox Ford, Emily Dickinson, and Shirley Jackson: the literary world is replete with examples of agoraphobics – once you go looking for them.On Agoraphobia is a fascinating, entertaining and sometimes painfully acute look at what it means to go through life with an anxiety disorder that evades easy definition.Trade ReviewNever less than completely absorbing, simply because [Caveney] is such a nimble, exact writer, able to move swiftly but unjarringly between daft jokes and serious reflections. His descriptions of the toll the condition takes on his mental health are horrifying in their precision, but that precision makes them beautiful at the same time...the book has the merit of timeliness, in addition to its eloquence and refreshing sense of being totally unconfected * Telegraph *Intellectually curious, emotionally bracing and immensely erudite. . .bright and funny, and full of telling quotes. . .it will hearten people who have agoraphobia, enlighten medics and teach outsiders all the lessons Caveney has learned -- Blake Morrison * Guardian *A strange and many-headed work that melds personal experience with cultural criticism....thoughtful, humane and unjustly enjoyable * Sunday Times *One of my favourite living writers: intelligent, lucid and, most impressive of all, funny – even when he’s writing about the most difficult subjects. -- Jonathan CoeCaptivating . . . but also a book unscared of open white space, which feels like an act of defiance. For a book about agoraphobia it covers a huge amount of ground. -- Richard BeardGraham Caveney approaches the subject of agoraphobia diaristically, legally, and philosophically; he drinks about it, reads about it, has therapy about it, and assembles the long and fascinating history of its writers. Any of these approaches could have been its own book. But the best part of this book is the silence Caveney somehow also manages to include on the page, which holds space for the phobia’s mute, ineffable, terrifying center. -- Sarah MangusoA witty and engaging cultural history, and a frank and insightful memoir: On Agrophobia is original, smart and hugely entertaining -- David Nicholls

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Book Synopsis'With spot-on injections of humour and a frequently raised sardonic eyebrow, joy and warmth shine from this fascinating and funny book' Jo BrandA joyful celebration of amateur theatreFrom the Mystery Plays of the Middle Ages, via the Georgian aristocrats who built opulent private theatres in their own homes, to the radical lefties taking political theatre to the streets, this is the story of amateur dramatics in Britain. We meet a cast of characters who tell us about the joy amateur theatre brings them and we follow the full arc of a production, from first auditions to last night party, with all the mishaps and forgotten lines that come in between. In a triumphant mix of memoir, social history and manifesto, Jenny Landreth opens our eyes to am-dram and shows us a vibrant world that is a crucial part of our culture.Trade ReviewAn unputdownable, utterly delightful stroll through British amateur theatre and why it has a vital place for us all -- Shappi KhorsandiLandreth's charming book is both a cultural history of amateur theatre and a loving look at am-dram and its role in British life -- Sarah Hughes * i *This funny and interesting book makes you yearn for a long-lost sense of community, and then realise it’s been there all along. Jenny Landreth, take an Am Dram style bow -- John O’FarrellAmateur is not a dirty word, but implies disinterested love, dedication and a clubbable, community feeling . . . Landreth reminds us, importantly, that the word amateur includes student and community theatre, vital seed corn and support to the professional world -- Libby Purvis * The Times *With spot-on injections of humour and a frequently raised sardonic eyebrow, joy and warmth shine from this fascinating and funny book -- Jo Brand

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Book SynopsisDiscover Mya-Rose Craig's moving and life-affirming memoir about family, searching for rare birds, and the power of our natural world.'Lyrical, poignant and insightful' MARGARET ATWOOD (on Twitter)'Filled with hope and energy' GuardianIn her memoir, Mya-Rose Craig and her family travel the world in search of rare birds and astonishing landscapes. But a shadow moves with them, too - her mother's deepening mental health crisis. In the face of this struggle, the Craigs turn to nature again and again, and every time it offers joy and stillness.On these journeys, Mya-Rose also witnesses the inequality and destruction we are inflicting on our fragile planet. And so, through the simple, mindful act of looking for birds, she becomes ever more determined to campaign for all our survival.'A delightful account of a young life devoted to birding - and the fight to save birds and the places they live' Stephen Moss* Winner of a Somerset Maugham Award ** Longlisted for the Wainwright Prize for Conservation Writing ** Longlisted for the Jhalak Prize *Trade ReviewLyrical, poignant and insightful. -- Margaret Atwood, author of THE HANDMAID'S TALEMya-Rose Craig has done more than anyone to promote birding and environmental issues to young people from all backgrounds - especially women of colour - and deserves our admiration and praise. -- Stephen Moss, author of THE ROBINMya-Rose's passion and dedication for the causes she believes in are testament to what we humans can achieve when we are at our best. -- Liz Bonnin, President of the Wildlife TrustCraig manages to capture so vividly what birds mean to her and her family... filled with hope and energy. * Guardian *Reads like a cross between a travel diary, an ornithologist's guide and a thriller. * The Times *

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Book Synopsis

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