Travel writing Books

Book SynopsisAn edited collection with contributions by leading scholars and writers brought together by a prize-winning author who has edited the text and contributed chapters.The Grand Tour and touiing was a part of the education of every young lady and gentleman in the eighteenth century and also scholars, poets, writers. scientists and commentators. Visits to Greece and Italy via France and Switzerland, and taking in Turkey, were usual. Both sexes travelled extensively taking extended trips The book will examine first-hand accounts of the impact of foreign travel, and will include written sources including letters, travel diaries, journals and creative response in poems, music and paintings. The book is especially important, original and relevant in light of possible xenophobia and views of Europe and near-Europe as ''foreign''; and there have been several works expressing negative views. But travellers here saw their visits in a positive light and questions of ''otherness'' and exoticism are e

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Book SynopsisIn this inspiring collection of essays, acclaimed author David Quammen journeys to places where civilization meets raw nature and explores the challenge of balancing the needs of both.For more than two decades, award-winning science and nature writer David Quammen has traveled to Earth’s most far-flung and fragile destinations, sending back field notes from places caught in the tension between humans and the wild. This illuminating book features 20 of those assignments: elegantly written narratives, originally published in National Geographic magazine and updated for today, telling colorful and impassioned stories from some of the planet’s wildest locales. Quammen shares encounters with African elephants, chimpanzees, and gorillas (and their saviors, including Jane Goodall); the salmon of northeastern Russia and the people whose livelihood depends on them; the lions of Kenya and the villagers whose homes border on parks created to preserve

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Book Synopsis''A book that stays with you and widens your perception of how people and place intertwine'' MATT COLLINSFor over five decades, Beth Lynch has been repeatedly drawn to a rocky spot on the North Cornwall coast, where her earliest memories are rooted in idyllic family holidays. Following the deaths of her parents, strange occurrences around the cove leave Lynch questioning how well she truly knows this place of slate that so irresistibly calls to her. Why has it become so unsettling? Is she safer staying away?Through encounters with quarrymen, wartime women and an enigmatic archaeologist - along with JMW Turner, Tennyson, Trollope and the Hardys - The Cove reflects lyrically on change: in ourselves, in places and in the transformative dance between the two.

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Book Synopsis''Once a traveller, always a traveller, and as long as there were maps and guide books and airline schedules I was still fatally susceptible to the lure of the open road . . .''Brazil: a growing global superpower, the size of half a continent, home to some of the world''s most astonishing natural habitats. But despite having journeyed around the world and from pole to pole, Michael Palin had never explored this extraordinary country for himself. Here, he sets out to discover this vast and diverse nation in the adventure of a lifetime. Taking in shanty towns and waterfalls, pristine beaches and bustling cities, Brazil is the record of a journey of dazzling extremes.

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Book SynopsisThrough the centre of China’s historic capital, Long Peace Street cuts a long, arrow-straight line. It divides the Forbidden City, home to generations of Chinese emperors, from Tiananmen Square, the vast granite square constructed to glorify a New China under Communist rule. To walk the street is to travel through the story of China’s recent past, wandering among its physical relics and hearing echoes of its dramas. Long Peace Street recounts a journey in modern China, a walk of twenty miles across Beijing offering a very personal encounter with the life of the capital’s streets. At the same time, it takes the reader on a journey through the city’s recent history, telling the story of how the present and future of the world’s rising superpower has been shaped by its tumultuous past, from the demise of the last imperial dynasty in 1912 through to the present day.Trade Review‘Filled with insights, observations and anecdotes, Chatwin brings to life the past – and present – of one of the world’s great cities in an account that is as thoughtful as it is informative.’Peter Frankopan, Professor of Global History, Worcester College, University of Oxford'Bringing together past and present, personal and political, Jonathan Chatwin gives readers a thoughtful and deeply-informed account of modern China through the marvellous device of a stroll down Beijing's longest avenue - and all in lucid and compelling prose.'Rana Mitter, Director of the University China Centre, University of Oxford'Even the most dedicated flâneur has to work hard to find the charm in Chang’an Avenue, the main thoroughfare of, as Jonathan Chatwin rightly describes it, the "glorious mess of Beijing". Industrial relics, bankrupt theme parks, rabbit hutch housing, paranoid Communist Party elite boltholes and Tiananmen’s ghosts all loom large. But Chatwin walks the walk and, along the way dissects the street, its denizens and its enduring role in China’s history and collective modern traumas. 'Paul French, New York Times bestselling author of Midnight in Peking and City of Devils: A Shanghai Noir'Jonathan Chatwin offers a distinctive window onto Beijing's past and present by taking readers along with him on a long trek down an important thoroughfare. An appealing mix of anecdotes from a journey and digressions backward in time make Long Peace Street a novel addition to the rich literature on China's sprawling capital.' Jeffrey Wasserstrom, Chancellor's Professor of History at the University of California, Irvine, coauthor of China in the 21st Century: What Everyone Needs to Know'This three-dimension, moving timeline along the heart of imperial and contemporary Beijing made me want to head out the door and follow Chatwin's flaneur footsteps. "Long Peace Street" seamlessly blends history and reporting, shining a light on both the capital's neglected bookends and its dense core. I couldn't put it down.'Michael Meyer, author of The Last Days of Old Beijing, In Manchuria, and The Road to Sleeping Dragon'Long Peace Street is a brilliant achievement. To read this book is to travel with an engaging writer as he explores the China of today and the raw pathos of its past. Long Peace Street gives its readers an insight essential for a sophisticated understanding of Chinese society today.'M. A. Aldrich, author of The Search for a Vanishing Beijing: A Guide to the Capital of China through the Centuries'As a dive into Beijing’s history and an excursion through its present, Long Peace Street is entertaining, informative, well-written and companionable.'Post Magazine -- .Table of ContentsIntroductionDay one: Shougang Iron and Steel to Tiananmen1 Capital Iron and Steel – origins – the Great Leap Forward – a bad neighbour – future plans2 New suburbia – the city in history – the hutong – Shijingshan Amusement Park3 Change – ring roads and the New Beijing – Great Olympics4 Babaoshan ghosts – the cemetery – the life of Peng Dehuai – return to Hunan5 A diversion – straightness – the road as metaphor6 Military markings – Tomb of the Princess – new regime, new capital? – the Military Museum7 Diaoyutai State Guesthouse – December 1980 – ‘To Rebel is Justified’ – Chairman Mao’s dog8 Big roofs – Capital Museum – pailou – some history9 Muxidi Bridge – petitions and protests – May Fourth – Democracy Movement – 1976 – 1978 – 1989 – the aftermath10 Rainbows – walls, walls, and yet again walls – breaches – New Year’s Day in Xi’an – demolition – socialist core values11 A hungry refrain – little grey streets – reform and opening-up – state owned enterprises12 An assassination – Middle and Southern Seas – imperial pretensions – Xinhuamen – paranoia – hidden places – Mao at ZhongnanhaiDay two: Tiananmen to Sihui Dong subway station13 The middle of the Middle Kingdom – hidden tales of Tiananmen – the Great Helmsman14 A walk to Tiananmen – into the Forbidden City – intruders15 Four days in the Forbidden City16 Out of the Forbidden City – scholar trees – dislocation – destruction – impressions of Beijing – going native – Legation Street today – fireworks over Tiananmen17 The man who died twice – Wangfujing – a literary traveller – the end of the Qing – Morrison and Yuan Shikai – a sad coda – Palm Sunday in Sidmouth18 Oriental Plaza – walking in cities – the Imperial Observatory – origins of the Chinese calendar – the Jesuits – the Republican calendar – time in modern China19 Outside the wall – the Grand Canal and the eastern suburbs – 22nd August 1967 – all palaces are temporary palaces – Forsan et haec olim – red20 One city – the east is rich – weird architecture – mall life – underground21 G103 – the story of a nation – the endEpilogueIndex

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Book Synopsis‘[A] delightful hymn of praise to the most extraordinary of all the world's bird families – hummingbirds’ STEPHEN MOSS ‘A brilliant read’ MARK AVERY 'Ever thoughtful and engaging, Jon Dunn pursues these dazzling creatures through dust and jungle' BENEDICT ALLEN 'A warm-hearted and enthusiastic triumph of nature writing' TIM DEE _____________________ For centuries hummingbirds have captured our imaginations: revered by Native Americans, coveted by European collectors and admired worldwide for their jewel-like plumage, acrobatic flight and immense character. Though their renown extends throughout the world, hummingbirds are found exclusively in the Americas. Small in stature yet fiercely tenacious, they have conquered every habitat imaginable: from boreal woodlands to deserts, mangrove swamps to volcanic slopes, and on islands both tropical and sub-polar. The Glitter in the Green takes us on an unforgettable journey in search of the most remarkable examples of this wildly variable family. There’s the Bee Hummingbird in Cuba, the smallest species of bird to have ever lived; the diminutive Rufous Hummingbird, whose annual migration exceeds 3,000 miles; and the critically endangered Juan Fernández Firecrown, marooned on the remote Pacific island that inspired Robinson Crusoe. Jon Dunn brings us closer than ever before to these magnificent creatures, exploring a heady mix of rare birds, a history redolent with mythology, and the colourful stories of the people obsessed with hummingbirds through the ages. With great passion for his subject and a taste for adventure, Dunn transports us to wondrous landscapes from Alaska to Tierra del Fuego, and invites us into the kaleidoscopic world of the hummingbird – the bird that has won the hearts and minds of mankind for millennia.Trade ReviewDunn's vast love letter is as gleaming and mesmeric as its tiny subject. His travels to observe the often elusive family Trochilidae take him from the smoky air of an Alaska besieged by wildfire, to coastal Santa Marta, Colombia. The book ... is as much an ode to our world writ large as it is to one of its most captivating birds * Vanity Fair *The Glitter in the Green braids the cultural history and daunting needs and feats of these wondrous birds with vivid accounts of the author’s sometimes hazardous, far-flung mountain, forest and island expeditions ... Exceedingly well-researched and packed with fascinating lore, it should appeal to avid birders and general readers alike -- Heller McAlpin * Wall Street Journal *Ever thoughtful and engaging, Jon Dunn pursues these dazzling creatures through dust and jungle to the chillier shores at the far end of the world -- Benedict AllenEnticing ... brilliant ... a warm-hearted and enthusiastic triumph of nature writing, passionate yet expert, human and humane as well as biologically spot on, freighted with life that is troublingly exciting, and sparkling with its subject ... a memorable and essential book -- Tim DeeAn adventure-filled, continent-spanning travelogue ... By carefully peeling back layers of history to find shimmering hummingbirds hidden within, Dunn has created essential reading to understand human obsession—past and present—with these remarkable creatures -- Jonathan C. SlaghtGlittering gems of the Americas and nowhere else on Earth, hummingbirds lure Jon Dunn from Alaska to Chile in this whizzing travelogue of hummer natural history ... exquisite -- Dan FloresMore than just an observant birdwatcher, Jon Dunn is a talented traveler and writer ... The Glitter in the Green is a vivid exploration of a dazzling subject -- Thor HansonAt a time when we are confined to our home patch, Jon Dunn transports us to the Americas, in this delightful hymn of praise to the most extraordinary of all the world’s bird families – hummingbirds -- Stephen MossFull of natural history, quotes from early explorers, local history, and adventure, Dunn’s chronicle of his hummingbird quests will make readers just as obsessed with these small, quick birds dipped in rainbows * Booklist, starred review *This is more than a bird book ... It combines one person’s adventure with arguably the most spectacular group of birds in the world: hummingbirds! The immensely talented writer Jon Dunn follows these highly diverse jewels from Alaska, down the Americas to Tierra del Fuego, and weaves an environmental and cultural dialogue around these hummers and the human-dominated world they live in -- Dr. Joel CracraftThe author chronicles his travels from his home in the Shetland Islands to the Americas in search of this alluring bird… A mesmerizing, wonder-filled nature study that also serves as a cautionary tale about wildlife conservation. * Kirkus Reviews, starred review *An engaging history of the species ... This inviting narrative describes the author’s search for the rare Mangrove Hummingbird in Costa Rica, as well as others threatened with habitat loss in Cuba and Mexico ... An essential book for bird watchers, especially hummingbird lovers, as well as anyone interested in natural history -- Mark Jones * Library Journal *Natural history writer Dunn takes readers on a wondrous globe-trotting pilgrimage to seek out hummingbirds... Dunn’s vivid prose, balanced with just the right amount of detail, will captivate birders and non-birders alike * Publishers Weekly, starred review *A delightful and rich adventure into hummingbird territory, recounted with a deftly literate touch. A glittering treat -- Dominic Couzens, author of 'A Bird a Day'A rich, fascinating and absorbing book, combining personal adventure with the natural history of the most magical birds on the planet -- Lev Parikian, author of 'Why Do Birds Suddenly Disappear' and 'Into the Tangled Bank'Jon Dunn's wide-ranging journey underlines how hummingbirds’ famous beauty has often blinded us to the deeper wonders of their daring, passionate lives. -- Jonathan Meiburg, author of 'A Most Remarkable Creature'Jon Dunn’s searching book on these tiny, enigmatic birds takes on a tour of brilliance ... In beautiful, measured prose, Dunn shows us the hummingbirds’ worlds and, of course, the challenges they face at our hands. It is a lovesong to the hummingbird that will make you wonder and hope for their survival in equal measure. -- Melanie Challenger, author of 'How to be Animal'It’s a brilliant read, and not only if you are keen on hummingbirds but just if you are keen on nature, and places, and people and history -- Mark AveryA good place to begin to understand the birds’ dramatic pleasures is with this entertaining book. One of Jon Dunn’s real achievements is his ability to conjure the plastic form and astonishing chromatic architecture of many hummingbird species -- Mark Cocker * Spectator *The Glitter In The Green contains astonishing photographs and stories about these rare and beautiful birds * Herald *At times, just reading the book was an adrenaline burner. Epic quest followed epic quest. I was swept along, wide-eyed at the places, the friendly people and the nail-biting conclusion of wondering if, after all the effort, the hummingbird in question would materialise -- Anthony Mcgeehan * Rare Bird Alert *

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Book SynopsisINTRODUCED BY ADAM WEYMOUTH, award-winning author of The Kings of Yukon'A wonderful book -- and a highly original contribution to the literature of travel' PAUL THEROUX'The Mississippi. Mighty, muddy, dangerous, rebellious and yet a strong, fathering kind of river. The river captured my imagination when I was young and has never let go.' Mississippi Solo tells the story of one man's voyage by canoe down the Mississippi River from its source in Minnesota to the Gulf of Mexico - a longtime dream, and a journey of over 2,000 miles through the heart of America. Paddling into the Southern states - going from 'where there ain't no black folks to where they still don't like us much' - Eddy is confronted by the legacy of slavery and modern racism, including an incident with a pair of shotgun-toting bigots. There are also the dangers of passing barges, wild dogs roaming the wooded shore, and navigating a waterway that grows vaster, and more hazardous, every day. But Eddy also encounters immense human kindness, friendship and hospitality, as well as coming to know the majestic power - and the awesome dangers - of the river itself. Mississippi Solo is an unforgettable American adventure.

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Book Synopsis"A deeply thoughtful, gripping and scrupulous book told in Sayarer's trademark style from the saddle and the roadside" CAROLINE EDENBy a winner of the Stanford Dolman Award for Travel Writing"The best travelogues should make you question your preconceptions of a place and force you to engage with what the author is saying. Türkiye succeeds on both fronts" Cycle Magazine"We need writers who will go all the way for a story, and tell it with fire. Sayarer is a marvellous example" HORATIO CLAREOn the eve of its centenary year and elections that will shape the coming generations, Julian Emre Sayarer sets out to cycle across Türkiye, from the Aegean coast to the Armenian border.Meeting Turkish farmers and workers, Syrian refugees and Russians avoiding conscription, the journey brings to life a living, breathing, cultural tapestry of the place where Asia, Africa and Europe converge. The result is a love letter to a country and its neighbours - one that offers a clear-eyed view of Türkiye and its place in a changing world. Yet the route is also marked by tragedy, as Sayarer cycles along a major fault line just months before one of the most devastating earthquakes in the region's modern history.Always engaged with the big historical and political questions that inform so much of his writing, Sayarer uses his bicycle and the roadside encounters it allows to bring everything back to the human level. At the end of his journey we are left with a deeper understanding of the country, as well as the essential and universal nature of political power, both in Türkiye and closer to home."A persuasive corrective to western views of a place he loves" GuardianTrade ReviewA persuasive corrective to western views of a place he loves * Guardian *The best travelogues should make you question your preconceptions of a place and force you to engage with what the author is saying. Turkiye succeeds on both fronts. * Cycle Magazine *

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Book SynopsisDiscover the many lives of Peter Matthiessen writer, naturalist, activist, CIA agent, Zen master in this kaleidoscopic biography of an American literary giant. Author of The Snow Leopard, co-founder of the Paris Review and the only writer to have ever won the National Book Award for both fiction and nonfiction, Peter Matthiessen was a towering figure of twentieth-century American literary culture. He was also, briefly, an undercover agent for the fledgling CIA; an environmental activist; an advocate for Native American rights and California farmworkers; friends with the likes of Truman Capote and William Styron; and a daring explorer who visited every continent on Earth, scaling the Himalayas and floating through the Amazon on a balsawood raft. Across these many lives, Matthiessen was always searching for what he called his true nature' an enlightened state of being, without ego and this spiritual quest ultimately led him, even as he inflicted great pain on three wives and multiple children, to the highest ranks of Zen. Readers and critics have struggled to reconcile Matthiessen's extraordinarily varied achievements and literary output, which included everything from experimental novels to advocacy journalism. Now, for the first time, drawing on rich primary sources and hundreds of interviews, acclaimed biographer Lance Richardson pulls together the seemingly disparate threads of Matthiessen's story. With page-turning immediacy, Richardson illuminates how the writer's uncanny gifts enabled him to sense connections between ecological decline, racism and labour exploitation to express, eloquently and presciently, that in a damaged human habitat, all problems merge'. Splendidly readable [Richardson] writes with flair and erudition' The Observer on House of NutterIlluminating and vividly drawn' Sunday Telegraph on House of Nutter

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Book SynopsisFollow the call of the wild with these incredible true stories from an international group of nature lovers, nomads and adventurers. In these pages, you are invited to share the wisdom they gained on their wild journeys. You will walk across the Australian desert with American explorer Angela Maxwell; live with Hamza Yassin and a family of eagles in Scotland; survive for 10 years in an Australian forest with Gregory Smith; hunt in the wilderness with Miriam Lancewood in New Zealand; chart Karl Bushby's passage through the formidable Darien Gap; and set up a surf school for people of colour in California with David Malana. With beautiful illustrations, a foreword from explorer Belinda Kirk and contributions from leading poets, including David Whyte and Fatimah Asghar, this book will inspire you to get out of your comfort zone and connect to your wild, animal soul.Trade Review"A life-changing and inspiring collection" - Ben Fogle, broadcaster, writer and adventurer "These inspiring stories speak to the adventurous spirit in us all, urging us to get out of the comfort of our houses and explore the natural beauty of the world." - Sir Christian Bonington, British mountaineer "Wilder Journeys is a great example of why connecting to nature and adventure is so important for our souls." - The Happy Pear twins "These remarkable stories reveal a multitude of ways in which we can radically rethink our place in the world." - Oli Broadhead, explorer and photographer "This wonderful collection of initiatory tales is a potent reminder of what we know to be true but may have forgotten - that we are of this Earth and that our relationship with nature is sacred." - Max Girardeau, director of The Visionaries

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Book SynopsisIn the spring of 2021, as the UK's latest pandemic lockdowns were lifted, Nick Butter set out from the Eden Project to become the fastest person to cover every mile of Britain's mainland coastline on foot.Battling the most extreme winds Britain had seen in 100 years, days of torrential rain and the unrelenting hills of Western Scotland and Cornwall, Nick suffered two broken bones and countless injuries, whilst taking on two marathons a day, every day, for 100 days.Covering an extraordinary 5,250 miles, running for over 12 hours a day, struggling to take in the 8,000 daily calories required to fuel his body, Nick battled sleep deprivation and extreme weight loss as he pushed his body and mind to their limit.Supported by close friends and family (including his ever-dependable right-hand man, Andy Swain, whose diary extracts feature in this book), Nick experienced spiralling lows and euphoric highs. As he traversed footpaths, country lanes and busy A roads, he passed through over two thousand coastal communities, buoyed along by supporters cheering from windows, balconies, passing cars and pavements, by school children and fellow runners, and by the stunning sights and sounds of the British coast.Run Britain is Nick's account of his extraordinary adventure.

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Book Synopsis'An impassioned tour around France which is best enjoyed with a bottle of red ... or two.' The Sunday Times'I've known Peter for some years and I'm sure you will enjoy his personal journey to the heart of rugby in this superb country.' Dan Carter, Former All Black and Rugby World Cup winner'Bills' wondrous travelogue features so many great tales from the mouths of legends.' Irish Independent'I really enjoyed this book ... A great memoir of France and its people through the eyes of rugby.' Michael Lynagh, TV analyst and Australian Rugby World Cup winner'Wonderful! This is a great read. I simply loved it and I am sure that many others will also.' Bob Dwyer, Australian World Cup winning coach 1991From French rugby's origins in Le Havre to the Catalan coast, acclaimed rugby writer Peter Bills travels the length and breadth of France, visiting the big cities and regional heartlands of the game, to reveal a country whose deep love of rugby has created a culture and playing style like no other.Featuring exclusive interviews with many of the greatest international players to have played club rugby in France, from Ronan O'Gara to Dan Carter, as well as French legends of the sport, from Serge Blanco and Jean-Pierre Rives to Antoine Dupont, Le Coq brings to life the passion, colour, excitement, characters, anecdotes, locations and great moments of French rugby's near 150 years of existence.Former French Grand Slam captain Jacques Fouroux talked of 'Rugby; the game, the life'. This book will show you exactly what he meant.Trade ReviewAn impassioned tour around France which is best enjoyed with a bottle of red or two ... Part history lesson, part travelogue, part paean, part autobiography, part restaurant guide and cookbook ... What is undeniable is Bills's passion for all things French, and the nation's rugby most of all ... It's full of the joys of France and its rugby as seen by an enthusiast. Bills loves his subject and was never going to find anything beyond delight within. -- Martin Samuel * The Sunday Times *It is at once a journey to the heart of the French club forces, old and new, as well as a gastronomic odyssey; the stories, and wine, rarely stop flowing as [Bills] visits the four corners of this intoxicating land ... All the greats are here, from Pierre Villepreux to Serge Blanco, as well as some familiar visitors, like former Ireland coach Joe Schmidt, defending European champion coach Ronan O'Gara and current French defence supremo Shaun Edwards ... Bills' wondrous travelogue features so many great tales from the mouths of legends * Irish Independent *Table of Contentsi: Foreword by Dan Carter ii: Prologue 1: The Ruggers of HAC: Le Havre-Paris 2: City of Mayhem: Paris 3: The Journey South: Paris-Bourges-Vichy-Clermont-Ferrand 4: The Lost Corridor: Strasbourg-Lille-Besançon-Dijon-Mâcon-La Voulte-sur-Rhône-Cavaillon-Nice 5: A Day at The Lake: Sète 6: A Litany of Tragedies: Sète-Béziers 7: Split Personalities: A small town, a quiet South of France café. For reflection on the violence... 8: The Elixir of Life... and a Force of Nature: Béziers-Narbonne 9: La Ville Rose: Narbonne-Castelnaudary-Toulouse-Auch 10: Peter Pan and The Legend of Lourdes: Auch-Lourdes-Bagnères-de-Bigorre 11: The Man Who Put Men To Sleep: Biarritz-Bayonne-Perpignan 12: Way Out West: Mont-de-Marsan-La Rochelle 13: A Golden Era: Toulouse-Castres-Narbonne-Perpignan 14: The Rugby-Loving Abbot: Clermont Auvergne-Toulouse-Albi-La Rochelle iii: Acknowledgements iv: Bibliography

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Book SynopsisFrom the 1960s to the 1980s, Sweden was an affluent, egalitarian country envied around the world. Refugees were welcomed, even misfit young Englishmen could find a place there. Andrew Brown spent part of his childhood in Sweden during the 1960s. In the 1970s he married a Swedish woman and worked in a timber mill while helping to raise their small son. Fishing became his passion and his escape. In the mid-1980s his marriage and the country fell apart. The Prime Minister was assassinated. The welfare system crumbled along with the industries that had supported it. Twenty years later, Andrew Brown travelled the length of Sweden in search of the country he had loved, and then hated, and now found he loved again.Trade Review'... Mr Brown's prose is as clear and bewitching as the lake waters which he learns to fish ... Readers who know the Nordic countries will delight in the author's keen ear and eye for the nuances of language, landscape and social customs' - Economist' - he is a deft writer with a real descriptive talent and a humorous touch - this is an affectionate and insightful portrait, offering a much deeper understanding of the country than the usual, often politically motivated, tendency to stereotype' - Financial Times'Fishing in Utopia is a lament for a lost Eden. But it is more than that. Essentially it is a story of modern rootlessness and the search for something to believe in. The fact that that something turns out, absurdly, to be fishing only makes it more tragic. I can see it becoming a cult book, and not just among anglers' - Sunday Times 'His evocations of his early years in the country are miracles of sensuous recollection' - Telegraph

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Book Synopsis"Robert Hughes is probably the best - and certainly the most accessible - art critic in the world . . . in Barcelona his art-historical and his sociological talents converge in what is often a dazzling collage of Catalan peculiarities" FREDERICK RAPHAEL, Sunday TimesA modern homage to a proud, cosmopolitan city where Gaudí, Picasso and Miró learned how to break all the rules.Before Spain there was Catalunya, a thriving maritime empire with its own language and Barcelona as its capital, last bastion of resistance to Franco in the Spanish Civil War. Exploring 2000 of the city's history, Robert Hughes takes us down the Ramblas, through the "intestinal windings" of the ancient Gothic Quarter, past the bountiful Boqueria market to the Eixample, showcase of the daring, mannered architecture of Catalan modernisme, before resting at Gaudí's celebrated Sagrada Familia: crazy, unfinished symbol of this fiercely independent city of extremes."The pace is brisk, the narrative grasp cool, firm and confident . . . Hughes' prose has the 'capriciousness, symbolic precision and stylistic punch' he attributes to Catalan moustaches" HILARY SPURLING, Daily Telegraph"Nobody has ever represented Catalonia's character more powerfully, or illustrated its claims to self-destiny more persuasively, than Robert Hughes in this monumental work" JAN MORRISTrade ReviewNobody has ever represented [Barcelona's] character more powerfully, or illustrated its claims to self-destiny more persuasively, than has Robert Hughes in this monumental work -- Jan Morris * Los Angeles Times *Whether untangling the unlikely legends of Wilfred the Hairy or tangling with the likes of Antoni Gaudi, Hughes has shaped Catalan art, architecture and politics into the ultimate guidebooks -- David Newnham * Guardian *A wonderful book, by far the best yet to have appeared in the current flood of books on Spain - and one that fills a genuine gap -- Martin Gayford * Sunday Telegraph *Barcelona is unlikely to be rewarded with a better history than this. Robert Hughes is a master of the big canvas, scooping up the detail of social, economic, political and artistic life and producing images of captivating richness * Sunday Times *

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Book SynopsisThe book begins by the North Sea. It is a late summer's afternoon, and a bright sun has dispersed the greyness of the day. Two Englishmen are enjoying a swim off the Essex coast when all at once both have the feeling that they are back at the French seaside. They find themselves starting to tell each other of their youthful experiences of living in France. The adventures they narrate follow one after another like waves rolling onto the shore. Clive, coming from London, had found himself spending a year deep in the French countryside within sight of the western Pyrenees; John, hailing from Devon, had ended up living for a while in the City of Light within sight of the Folies Bergere. Outsiders though they were, they momentarily became part of French society, their adventures fuelled by the culinary delights of their adopted land. They tell their tales with humour and relish as they recall their initiation into the French way of life of decades ago - and how it shaped their own.Trade Review"I predict this slim volume will become a quiet best seller. It has all the quirky fun of an authentic adventure, a trove of fascinating real-life tales - whilst it reveals the real France in all its remarkable differentness." -- Anne Garvey, Cambridge Critique; "The incidents and experiences [the authors] relate are very sympathetic to me, and induce a measure of nostalgia." -- Sir Quentin BlakeTable of ContentsFrontispiece; Prologue; 1. An Englishman in the ninth district; 2. Clive's voyage into the unknown; 3. Rene; 4. Clive the grape-picker; 5. John's stroll through Paris; 6. Clive arrives at Salies-de-Bearn; 7. John finds a job in the big city; 8. Clive settles in Salies-de-Bearn; 9. John's apprenticeship at a Paris bank; 10. Sad news for Clive from London; 11. Cinema verite: on location in Paris; 12. Clive back in the vineyard; 13. New waves for John; 14. Clive on a Mobylette to the Basque Country; 15. John and the elusive film world; 16. Bearnaise sauce; 17. John, the gourmet banker; 18. Clive rolls up his sleeves in the provinces; 19. John and the newly-weds; 20. Clive tries his hand at rough shooting; 21. John moves house; 22. Clive and Marianne; 23. John settles in on the rue Sainte-Anastase; 24. Provincial doctor to Clive's rescue; 25. John meets Luisa; 26. Clive learns his lesson skiing at Cauterets; 27. John's friends find connubial bliss; 28. Crossing the border into Spain; 29. John meets Chuchi; 30. Clive heads for the metropolis; 31. John joins the Paris rag trade; 32 Live pop music a la francaise; 33. John and the Marais copper-engraver; 34. Clive answers the call of the south; 35. The need to feed the inner man; 36. Clive enjoys good company in the cafe at Carresse; 37. John uses his Metro ticket; 38. Summer festivals - and Clive takes the mike; 39. John and the Irishman; 40. Small-town wedding; 41. John afloat in Paris; 42. Clive goes under at Saint-Jean-de-Luz; 43. John working with the Galerie Genot; 44. Clive on horseback in the Camargue; 45. John the balloon man; 46. Clive wields his knife and fork at Les Baux-de-Provence; 47. John's private view; Epilogue; Acknowledgements; Tailpiece

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Book SynopsisIn Heavy Time psychogeographer Sonia Overall takes to the old pilgrim roads, navigating a route from Canterbury to Walsingham via London and her home town of Ely. Vivid in her evocation of a landscape of ancient chapels, ruined farms and suburban follies, Overall's secular pilgrimage elevates the ordinary, collecting roadside objects - feathers, a bingo card, a worn penny - as relics. Facing injury and interruption, she takes the path of the lone woman walker, seeking out 'thin places' where past and present collide, and where new ways of living might begin. 'It is a talisman of a book. Heavy Time doesn't just describe a pilgrimage, it becomes one, for both writer and reader. It is an invitation to resist 'busyness', to think of ourselves as explorers, to seek out 'the everyday divine'. It has sent me out looking for 'thin places: pockets in the landscape where the membrane is so tightly stretched that other worlds might shine through.' Beautiful and essential.' - Helen MortTrade Review'It is a talisman of a book. Heavy Time doesn't just describe a pilgrimage, it becomes one, for both writer and reader. It is an invitation to resist 'busyness', to think of ourselves as explorers, to seek out 'the everyday divine'. It has sent me out looking for 'thin places: pockets in the landscape where the membrane is so tightly stretched that other worlds might shine through.' Beautiful and essential.'- Helen Mort; 'A fabulous read.' - James Canton; 'Heavy Time draws the reader in to join Sonia Overall on her pilgrimage... The book has the immediacy of a notebook completed on a journey, with marginal notes clocking up progress and beautiful little pen and ink miniatures by Oliver Barrett punctuating the text.' -Bobby Seal, Psychogeographic Review; 'This is a fabulously grounded, earthy book of practicalities. It’s immediate and intimate, a deeply personal story.' -Clare Wadd, Caught by the River

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Book SynopsisIain Sinclair, the celebrated author and psycho-geographer, walks back along the blue-grey roads and cliff-top paths of his childhood in south Wales, rediscovering the Gower peninsula. Provoked by the strange and enigmatic series of paintings Afal du Brogwyr (Black Apple of Gower) made by the artist Ceri Richards in the 1950s, Sinclair leaves behind the familiar "murky elsewheres" of his life in Hackney, London, carrying an envelope of photographs and old postcards, along with fragments of memory. He soon realises that a series of walks over the same ground - Port Enyon Point to Worm's Head have become significant waymarks in his life. His recollections of a meeting with the poet Vernon Watkins, the art of Richards and the poetry of Dylan Thomas lead him to his final quest, the Paviland Cave where in 1823 human remains 36,000 years old were discovered.Trade Review"Luxuriant prose, has a dark ascorbic bite, lingering on the tongue just as surely as it does in the mind." Jon Gower, Caught by the River. "Black Apples of Gower fuses anecdote, memoir, biography, history, archaeology and geography in an essay on mortality and memory that sweeps like Rhossili Bay. But is is also a visit to this island of otherness, whose scents, sounds, flora and fauna accompany every step of the way, and there is not a page in which Mr Sinclair's prose is any less musical, rich or sharp than his ghost-guides finest poetry." Mark Griffiths, Country Life.

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Book SynopsisRichard Skelton spent nearly half a decade living in a small valley high in the Furness hills of Cumbria, in northern England. When not writing or composing music, most of his days were spent beating the valley's bounds, exploring its network of paths, streams and walls. Beyond the Fell Wall is a distillation of his observations and thoughts about this particular patch of land. It is a poetic enquiry into the life of an seemingly inanimate landscape - its otherwise unheard melodies and unseen movements. It considers both vast geological epochs and brief moments of intimacy, and in turn it asks us to consider sentience in all things, whether animal, vegetable or mineral. At the heart of the book is the fell wall itself: vast and serpentine - a vessel for the lives, voices and myths of the landscape.Trade ReviewBeyond the Fell Wall is a graceful meditation upon the relationship between landscape, language and sound - The Spectator

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Book SynopsisOn foot the world comes our way. We get close to the Continent’s alpine ranges, arterial rivers, expansive coastlines. Close to its ancient cities and mysterious thoroughfares; and close to the walkers themselves—the Grand Tourers and explorers, strollers and saunterers, on their hikes and quests, parades and urban drifts. Sauntering features sixty walker-writers—classic and current—who roam Europe by foot. Twenty-two countries are traversed. We join Henriette d’Angeville, the second woman to climb Mont Blanc; Nellie Bly roaming the trenches of the First World War; Werner Herzog on a personal pilgrimage through Germany; Hans Christian Andersen in quarantine; Joseph Conrad in Cracow; Rebecca Solnit reimagining change on the streets of Prague; and Robert Macfarlane dropping deep into underground Paris. Contributors include: Patrick Leigh Fermor; John Hillaby; Robert Walser; Henriette d’Angeville; Joseph Roth; Joanna Kavenna; Richard Wright; Werner Herzog; Robert Antelme; George Sand; Rainer Maria Rilke; Robert Macfarlane; Rebecca Solnit; Kate Humble; Nicholas Luard; Edith Wharton; Elizabeth von Armin; Joseph Conrad; D. H. Lawrence; Vernon Lee; Guy Debord, Mark Twain, Thomas Coryat, and more.Trade Review“Sauntering is a superior feast, a high-class tasting menu, sometimes deliciously incongruous but always organised with intelligent care…It is hard to think that it could be better done." - Times Literary Supplement "Here is an odd development: I have decided to carry a book. For at least the coming season, when, with hope, we head out once again for afternoon or evening walks, I want this book with me. I plan to open it, often, every day. Read one selection and you will smile. Read three and you’ll be lacing your boots… The genius of Sauntering is that it celebrates the act itself, the joy as well as pain of walking. There are narratives of sunny valleys as well as of frightening wartime trenches. The book has nothing to do with exercise and everything to do with a way of seeing.’ —Scott Olsen, Minneapolis Star Tribune “Sauntering is full of those free associations in place and space that are the very essence of walking pursued as a writerly act, and writing undertaken as an ambulatory art. The perfect companion for a summer ramble, or a winter fireside.” —Will Self “A beguiling panorama of wanderers from different eras and geographies. . . Like his subjects, Minshull wanders, lifting contributions from people all over the literary map: philosophers, novelists, essayists, critics, children’s authors. . . . [His] goal, one gathers, is less to trace a historiography of the rambler than to expand the genre of flânerie, with an open-endedness true to its spirit.” —Alejandro Chacoff, The New Yorker

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Book SynopsisIn the summer of 2017, Will and his wife Amy lost their baby, Elowen, a few days before their due date. After a traumatic induced birth, they returned from hospital to their cottage in the New Forest, grief-stricken and struggling to make sense of what happened to them. Unmoored by sadness, what became clear in the weeks and months following Elowen's death is that there is no established vocabulary with which to understand this experience, either for Will or the people around him. Indeed, as he discovers, there is no word in the English language for a parent who has lost a child. Without any linguistic or emotional scaffold, the disorientation of his grief feels ever more lonely and alienating. Elowen charts the darkness of Will's grief over the course of two years with unflinching honesty, but it also describes in sonorous prose what sustained him: the natural world, and in particular the silence and attentiveness of tracking wolves in the forests of Sweden. These animals, only ever fleetingly seen, nonetheless provided profound solace, and in the act of searching for them he began to find a way to live with his grief. This profoundly moving, ultimately uplifting book challenges the way we think about loss and help us to re-evaluate our relationship to the natural world. Elowen is not only a remarkable portrait of grief, but also an impassioned hymn to the wild and a treatise on the restorative potential of nature in uncertain times.Trade Review'A beautiful portrayal..raw, visceral, delicately tender.' Raynor Winn. 'A deeply moving portrait of a family that dares to be completely open and completely vulnerable. It is an extraordinary generous and brave book, and I am grateful to this writer, to this family.' Barney Norris.

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Book SynopsisNovember 1925: In search of health and sun, the writer D. H. Lawrence arrives on the Italian Riviera with his wife, Frieda, and is exhilarated by the view of the sparkling Mediterranean from his rented villa, set amid olives and vines. But over the next six months, Frieda will be fatally attracted to their landlord, a dashing Italian army officer. This incident of infidelity influenced Lawrence to write two short stories, "Sun" and "The Virgin and the Gypsy," in which women are drawn to earthy, muscular men, both of which prefigured his scandalous novel Lady Chatterley's Lover. In DH Lawrence in Italy, Owen reconstructs the drama leading up to the creation of one of the most controversial novels of all time by drawing on the unpublished letters and diaries of Rina Secker, the Anglo-Italian wife of Lawrence's publisher. In addition to telling the story of the origins of Lady Chatterley, DH Lawrence in Italy explores Lawrence's passion for all things Italian, tracking his path to the Riviera from Lake Garda to Lerici, Abruzzo, Capri, Sicily, and Sardinia.Trade Review"Beautifully produced. . . . This is a story of friendships and a valuable portrait of a great writer at work."-- "Country Life" "Owen agrees with Anthony Burgess and Aldous Huxley that Lawrence served English literature and himself all the better for staying away from England. Gracefully, he portrays the Riviera and warmth of Italian society in which Lawrence was slowly resurrected and enabled to write."-- "The Times" "Owen offers an engaging picture."-- "Literary Review" "The former Rome correspondent of The Times reconstructs the drama leading to the creation of one of history's most controversial novels and explores DH Lawrence's passion for all things Italian."-- "Sunday Telegraph"Table of ContentsNovember 1925: in search of health and sun, DH Lawrence arrives on the Italian Riviera with his wife Frieda and is exhilarated by the view of the sparkling Mediterranean from his rented villa, set amid olives and vines. But over the next six months Frieda will be fatally attracted to their landlord, a dashing Italian army officer, and Lawrence will write two stories prefiguring Lady Chatterley s Lover: Sun and The Virgin and the Gypsy, both tales of women drawn to earthy, muscular men. Drawing for the first time on the unpublished letters and diaries of Rina Secker, the Anglo-Italian wife of Lawrence s publisher, Owen reconstructs the drama leading up to the creation of one of the most controversial novels of all time, and explores DH Lawrence s passion for all things Italian, tracking his path to the Riviera from Lake Garda to Lerici, Abruzzo, Capri, Sicily and Sardinia.

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Book SynopsisMeet Chris Stewart, the eternal optimist. A man who flies to Spain, sees a peasant farm on the wrong side of the river and, with scarcely a second thought, hands over a cash deposit. And then finds he has acquired not just the farm, but the farmer, too, who has no intention of leaving. Not to mention the lack of running water, electricity or even a bridge. It would be enough to send most people straight back home. But Chris and his wife Ana are made of stronger stuff - and besides, they have sunk all their savings into their farm, El Valero, and buying a flock of sheep. So there is no turning back. Life gets tough, but it also gets good. Driving Over Lemons is that rare thing - a funny, insightful book that charms you from the first sun-lit page to the last. And one that makes running an Andalucian mountain farm seem like a half-decent career move. It has been a major bestseller both in Britain and Spain.Trade ReviewChris Stewart is one of life's bold originals * Independent *When an author is as modest and humorous as this, his story cannot be told too often. -- Elizabeth Buchan * The Times *Exquisite. In Driving Over Lemons the anecdote flourishes once more. -- Penelope Lively * Daily Telegraph *It is easy to enthuse about the simple pleasures of life, but hard to write about them well. Stewart's gift is to do so with the carefree manner of someone you've just met in a bar, and who is buying the drinks. -- Hugh Thomson * Independent *A wonderful book - funny, affectionate and reaching deep beneath the skin. Tuck it into your holiday luggage and dream -- Elisabeth Luard * Daily Mail *A funny, observant and personal account of what a man can learn, and what there is to appreciate in life. Marvellous -- John S. Doyle * Sunday Tribune *You just can't fail to like him and the world he spreads out for you: wayward sheep, eccentric ex-pats, hospitable (and slightly barmy) neighbours... Mr Stewart is that rare thing, the real McCoy -- Rosie Boycott * Guardian *Endearing, heart warming, self-deprecating, sometimes surreal... charming stuff -- William Leith * Standard *

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Book SynopsisThe engaging, funny and essential guide to communicating with the FrenchTrade Review'This book confirms what the English have suspected for many years, that French is not so much a language as a dance, a ritual, a code to be cracked. The Bonjour Effect cracks it' David Boyle, author of How to be English'An indispensable linguistic roadmap. A highly enjoyable romp through French culture and its language, written with wit and aplomb' Debra Ollivier, author Entre Nous: A Woman's Guide to Finding Her Inner French Girl'Whether you're an expat in France, or simply dream of living there one day, The Bonjour Effect is a helpful resource to cracking the arcane cultural code. Engaging and often funny, filled with examples drawn from the authors' experiences, this is a guide to the most essential of French arts: conversation' Ann Mah, author of Mastering the Art of French Eating'Whether 'bonjour' is the beginning or the end of your French vocabulary, you'll find something fascinating, surprising, or just plain fou on nearly every page. Before reading this invaluable codebook to French language and culture, I feared that I'd somehow insulted every French waiter, shopkeeper, and clerk between Paris and Nice. Now I know I did, but at least I know why!' William Alexander, author of Flirting with French'The ability to speak French doesn't mean you know how to have a conversation in French in France. Journalists Julie Barlow and Jean-Benoit Nadeau break down the 'rules' of French conversation in their new book The Bonjour Effect' CBC'A lively and informative description of the country's cultural habits...' Lysiane Gagnon, The Globe and Mail'Julie Barlow and Jean-Benoît Nadeau unravel the mysteries of French conversation. They take readers beyond what the French are actually saying to explain what it is they really mean' Shannon Broderick, Gonomad.com'Very funny' Rudy Maxa's World with the Careys'Packed with fascinating insights' 49th Shelf

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Book SynopsisWinner of the Prix Renaudot 2019 A New York Times Best Book of 2021 ‘Extraordinarily beautiful… a long last loving glance at the planet.’ Carl Safina, author of Becoming Wild The Art of Patience sees the renowned French adventurer and writer set off for the high plateaux of remotest Tibet in search of the elusive snow leopard. There, in the company of leading wildlife photographer Vincent Munier and two companions, at 5,000 metres and in temperatures of -25ºC, the team set up their hides on exposed mountainsides, and occasionally in the luxury of an icy cave, to await a visitation from the almost mythical beast. This tightly focused and tautly written narrative is simultaneously a dazzling account of an exacting journey, an apprenticeship in the art of patience, an acceptance of the ruthlessness of the natural world and, finally, a plea for ecological sanity. A small masterpiece, it is one of those books that demands to be read again and again.Trade Review‘In The Art of Patience: Seeking the Snow Leopard in Tibet, the French writer Sylvain Tesson chronicles his rapturous journey through Tibet’s Chantang plateau with the wildlife photographer Vincent Munier. Tesson’s words, in a ravishing translation by Frank Wynne, paint pictures as vivid as any photograph.’ -- Liesl Schillinger, New York Times, 'Best Books of 2021', Travel‘Tesson is a transcendent travel writer… [The Art of Patience] inspires action, thought, silence – and perhaps also prayer.’ -- BBC Countryfile Magazine, Best Books of 2021‘A wonderful evocation of waiting and watching for nature.’ -- Tim Birkhead, author of Bird Sense‘Beautifully written, beautifully translated, intensely moving and totally absorbing.’ -- Stanley Johnson, author of Where the Wild Things Were‘The Art of Patience is extraordinarily beautiful, a narrative of prose that flows with poetry, a long last loving glance at the planet, a visit to the vital bedside of a living world determined to stay alive.’ -- Carl Safina, author of Becoming Wild: How Animals Learn to be Animals‘I found it hard to resist… there is so much more to this elegantly written book than the story of a search. It is also a philosophical consideration of the benefits of silence, waiting and personal reflection; an ode to the psychological effect of natural beauty; and a poetic eulogy to the planet.’ -- Big Issue‘[One of] the best books of the year.’ * Financial Times on Consolations of the Forest *‘I thought I’d rip through this book. But it’s not something you want to read fast. Tesson, who I came to like more and more, is trying to rearrange his relationship with time. Being alone, miles from anywhere, encourages him to sit still and watch things.’ * Spectator on Consolations of the Forest *‘He comes across as the brainiest, daftest, sternest, funniest, most companionable hermit you'll ever meet.’ * Guardian on Consolations of the Forest *

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Book SynopsisThe award-winning travel book by the author of Travels with a TangerineTrade Review'Mackintosh-Smith's achievement is to create an entertaining and enlightened view of Yemen, free from the familiar prejudices about Arabs, touched instead by sophistication and savagery, by grim reality and fabulous tales ... masterful' -- Sunday Times 'Yemen ... is assured and agile: witty, quirky, gossipy, learned, poetic ... [Tim Mackintosh-Smith] has created a work that will endure' -- The Times 'Mackintosh-Smith seems incapable of writing a dull sentence, and in him the scholar, the linguist and the storyteller swap hats with marvellous speed' -- New York Times 'Mackintosh-Smith succeeds admirably in shining a light on an obscure corner of the world' -- Financial Times 'He freshens the genre, adding a street-wise sensibility to impressive erudition ... very promising and accomplished' -- Times Literary Supplement

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Book SynopsisTrade Review"one of the best post-war travel books and, in retrospect, the most heart-rending" The Observer

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Book SynopsisThis beautifully written, informative study is a portrait, a history and a superb guide book, capturing fully the seductive beauty and the many layered past of the Eternal City. It covers 3,000 years of history from the city's quasi-mythical origins, through the Etruscan kings, the opulent glory of classical Rome, the decadence and decay of the Middle Ages and the beauty and corruption of the Renaissance, to its time at the heart of Mussolini's fascist Italy. Exploring the city's streets and buildings, peopled with popes, gladiators, emperors, noblemen and peasants, this volume details the turbulent and dramatic history of Rome in all its depravity and grandeur.Table of ContentsPart 1: myths, monarchs and republicans; imperial Rome; bread and circuses; catacombs and Christians; infamy and anarchy; saints, tyrants and anti-popes; "the refuge of all the nations"; Renaissance and decadence; patrons and parasites; the sack of Rome. Part 2: recovery and reform; Bernini and the Baroque; il settecento; Napoleonic interlude; the Risorgimento and the Roman question; royal Rome; Roma fascista; epilogue - the eternal city. Part 3: notes on topography, buildings and works of art.

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Book SynopsisFollowing a successful career as an award-winning, best-selling novelist, in 2004 Lisa St Aubin de Teran retreated to a remote village in northern Mozambique. There she found her own African roots, founded a charity, and confronted new challenges. Much has been written about her life and escapades with a trio of Venezuelan exiles, life on an Andean hacienda, her return to literary fame, and two decades living in a crumbling Umbrian palace. But despite all the media hype about her, she managed to hide much of her actual life. Now, like the Japanese art of kintsugi, in this new memoir Lisa puts the shattered pieces of her life back together, filling in many of the dramatic, and often scandalous, gaps. While her life has been said to be stranger than fiction, it is fiction that has kept her afloat. This autobiography sets the record straight and shows a writer who for over half a century has enjoyed following her dreams, even when those dreams outdistanced her reach.Trade Review"Lisa St Aubin de Teran writes with extraordinary vividness and clarity... She faces reality with a courage and skill that left me not knowing which to admire more: her gift as a writer or that she had the guts to carve out a place for herself in such an unforgiving world." (Independent) "Sensual, impressionistic prose that recreates vividly her experiences." (The Times) "An extraordinary woman... if you encountered her as a character in a novel, you'd want to read on." (Express) "She has the surrealist's gift for making the mundane exotic." (Financial Times) "Combines a powerful sense of place with an unusually compassionate understanding of human complexity." (Daily Telegraph) "The author has an enviable narrative gift, and there is something magical about her deployment of it." (Guardian) "A spellbinding storyteller." (The Listener)

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Book Synopsis**LONGLISTED FOR THE POLARI FIRST BOOK PRIZE**'You've never read a travel memoir like this before' The Sunday Times, 'Pride Culture Guide''Sweet and fun, with real emotional depth and a rousing, feisty spirit'Matt Cain***In the spring of 2012, Calum finds himself single again after his relationship of six years comes to an end. Heartbroken, unhappy and unsure of what to do next, he leaves the hometown he has been in all his life to embark on a journey that takes him all around the world, from teaching in a school on the outskirts of Rome to exploring the sex clubs of Berlin, to raising tigers in an animal sanctuary deep in the jungles of Thailand. Along the way, he meets LGBT+ people from all walks of life and every part of the rainbow - from an Italian teenager struggling with a homophobic father to a kathoey navigating life as a trans person in Thailand, to a young HIV-positive man living on the streets of London. Their individual stories, not only of hardship and sorrow but also of profound strength and hope, show the breadth and depth of queer life and experience, shedding light on themes such as homophobia, sexual violence, marriage equality and gender identity. Through these meetings and friendships, Calum not only finds the encouragement to embrace life after heartbreak, but also discovers a beautiful, loving global community who support and uplift him through the best and worst moments of his time on the road. A travel memoir with a difference, Eat, Gay, Love is a celebration of the power of community and a personal tribute to the extraordinary lives of LGBT+ people everywhere in the world.

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Book SynopsisReborn from the ashes of a Pakistan rubbish heap, this volume tells of a friendship between a writer and an artist, forged on an impecunious, life-enhancing journey from Serbia to Afghanistan in the 1950s.

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Book SynopsisHoratio Clare is the bestselling author of numerous books including the memoirs Running for the Hills and Truant and the travel books A Single Swallow, Down to the Sea in Ships, Orison for a Curlew, Icebreaker and The Light in the Dark. His books for children include Aubrey and the Terrible Yoot and Aubrey and the Terrible Ladybirds. Horatio's essays and reviews appear on BBC radio and in the Financial Times, the Observer and the Spectator, among other publications. He lives with his family in West Yorkshire.Trade ReviewClare's extraordinary and mesmerising odyssey following the migration of the swallow from South Africa to South Wales -- Annabel Goldie * Herald *A gifted and lyrical travel writer * Financial Times *The author deploys some fine lyrical writing and a gift for inventive, unexpected metaphor ... Clare's other great asset is his brave, modern, multicultural and open-hearted approach to travel itself -- Mark Cocker * Guardian *Fizzingly entertaining. His own prose has something of their flight: daring, sharp-edged, fast-moving, graceful, full of surprises. This is a great adventure, thrillingly realised -- Tom Fort * Literary Review *Remarkably insightful and entertaining, with Clare proving himself to be the most enthusiastic, open-minded, intelligent and incorrigibly romantic of travellers * Mail on Sunday *

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Book SynopsisThis book is my love letter to the UK, and a celebration of all of the things that I have come to adore, from its food and wine to its history and villages. Vive les Anglais!'This is what (a lot of) the French think about the UK:the food is bland and boringthe wine is undrinkableit''s always raining and greythe British don''t have sexthey''re meek, mild and reservedthey''ve got no sense of stylethey''re arrogantAnd anyway, who would want to swap a juicy steak au poivre for deep fried cod and chips?Fred Sirieix would. Ever since he boarded a P&O ferry bound for Dover with a one-way ticket and just two suitcases, he has been in love with the UK. Working as a waiter at the famous three-Michelin-starred restaurant La Tante Claire in Chelsea aged just 20, he learned English, met people from all walks of life, and went dancing until dawn. It was glorious madness. His appetite for life propelled him to sample

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Book Synopsis''A highly readable and spiritually uplifting book about a dream come true'' Wanderlust ''Touching and memorable ... one for armchair travellers and bike freaks'' Daily MailFrom London to New York, Ewan and Charley chased their shadows through Europe, the Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Mongolia and Russia, across the Pacific to Alaska, then down through Canada and America. But as the miles slipped beneath the tyres of their big BMWs, their troubles started. Exhaustion, injury and accidents tested their strength. Treacherous roads, unpredictable weather and turbulent politics challenged their stamina. They were chased by paparazzi in Kazakhstan, courted by men with very large guns in the Ukraine, hassled by the police, and given bulls'' testicles for supper by Mongolian nomads. And yet despite all these obstacles they managed to ride more than twenty thousand miles in four months, changing their lives forever in the process. As they travelled they documented their trip, taking photographs, and writing diaries by the campfire. Long Way Round is the result of their adventures - a fascinating, frank and highly entertaining travel book about two friends riding round the world together and, against all the odds, realising their dream.Trade ReviewBoth McGregor and Boorman prove themselves to be engaging, articulate and entertaining narrators ... a highly readable and spiritually uplifting book about a dream come true WANDERLUST Touching and memorable ... one for armchair travellers and bike freaks DAILY MAIL Barry Forshaw, AMAZON.CO.UK 'It's like Michael Palin but with added sex appeal.'

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Book SynopsisA modern classic by Britain''s foremost expert on Chinese food.Follow Fuchsia on her fascinating journey of discovery as she explores China and its culture through first-hand experiences of the country's extraordinary culinary customs. The award-winning cook and food writer vows to eat everything offered to her on arriving in China (however unusual!), covering an eclectic range of weird and wonderful dishes, from dog meat, civet cats, scorpions and rabbit heads, to the ovarian fat of the snow frog! In this unforgettable food and travel memoir spanning the vibrant markets of Sichuan to the desert oases of Xinjiang, Fuchsia seeks to discover if it's really possible for a Westerner to become a true convert to the Chinese cuisine Trade ReviewThe best writer in the West - and perhaps in the world - on Chinese food -- Bee WilsonBritain's most informed Sichuan food expert -- Terry Durack * Independent *I, for one, am grateful to be living in an era when I can read Fuchsia Dunlop's erudite writing. Her latest, Shark's Fin and Sichuan Pepper is filled with personal and humorous observations that make for fascinating reading. It is not only a memoir about food but also of culture from one of the world's oldest civilisations. -- Ken HomFuchsia Dunlop is not just one of the world's experts on Chinese regional food, but a beautiful writer too. You can almost smell the Sichuan pepper and fish fragrant aubergines wafting off every page. She captures Sichuan life with a keen eye and elegant pen, at a time where China was on the cusp of opening up to the West. It's as evocative and eloquent picture of Chinese food and culture as you'll ever read, quietly erudite yet utterly addictive. -- Tom Parker BowlesFuchsia has a rare ability to convey an encyclopaedic knowledge of Chinese cuisine in a compelling and totally delicious way; this is a great book -- Heston Blumenthal

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Book SynopsisOliver Sacks is a physician and the author of many books, including The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat, Awakenings (which inspired the Oscar-nominated film) and Musicophilia. Born in London and educated at Oxford, he held positions at Albert Einstein College of Medicine, New York University School of Medicine and was Professor of Neurology and Psychiatry at Columbia University. He is the first, and only, Columbia University Artist, and is also a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians. In 2008, he was appointed Commander of the British Empire. His memoir, On the Move, was published shortly before his death in August 2015.Trade ReviewLike all the best journals, it has a rich immediacy . . . the book is a rare treat. * Globe and Mail *Sacks’s boundless curiosity is always a reward. * New York Times *

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Book SynopsisV. S. Naipaul was born in Trinidad in 1932. He came to England on a scholarship in 1950. He spent four years at University College, Oxford, and began to write, in London, in 1954. He pursued no other profession.His novels include A House for Mr Biswas, The Mimic Men, Guerrillas, A Bend in the River, and The Enigma of Arrival. In 1971 he was awarded the Booker Prize for In a Free State. His works of nonfiction, equally acclaimed, include Among the Believers, Beyond Belief, The Masque of Africa, and a trio of books about India: An Area of Darkness, India: A Wounded Civilization and India: A Million Mutinies Now.In 1990, V. S. Naipaul received a knighthood for services to literature; in 1993, he was the first recipient of the David Cohen British Literature Prize. He received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2001. He lived with his wife Nadira and cat Augustus in Wiltshire, and died in 20Trade ReviewHow few writers there are, if any, who share his sense of mission and moral authority, who have his willingness to learn and to travel and his miraculous gift of language. * Observer *All [of these essays] are worth reading (and rereading), both for the contemporary and historical information and insight they artfully impart and for what they tell us about a uniquely complex writer. * Spectator *

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Book SynopsisThe Great Railway Bazaar is Paul Theroux''s classic and much-loved homage to train travel.The Orient Express; The Khyber Pass Local; the Delhi Mail from Jaipur; the Golden Arrow of Kuala; the Trans-Siberian Express; these are just some of the trains steaming through Paul Theroux''s epic rail journey from London across Europe through India and Asia. This was a trip of discovery made in the mid-seventies, a time before the West had embraced the places, peoples, food, faiths and cultures of the East. For us now, as much as for Theroux then, to visit the lands of The Great Railway Bazaar is an encounter with all that is truly foreign and exotic - and with what we have since lost.Praise for Paul Theroux:''Theroux''s work remains the standard by which other travel writing must be judged'' Observer''One needs energy to keep up with the extraordinary, productive restlessness of Paul Theroux ... [He is] the most gifted, most prodigal wrTrade ReviewOne of the most entertaining books I have read in a long while . . . Superb comic detail -- Angus Wilson * Observer *He has done our travelling for us brilliantly * William Golding *He has done our travelling for us brilliantly * William Golding *

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Book SynopsisSHORTLISTED FOR STANFORD DOLMAN TRAVEL BOOK OF THE YEARFrom a trip to The Lightning Field in New Mexico, to chasing Gauguin's ghost in French Polynesia, White Sands is a creative exploration of why we travel. Episodic, wide-ranging and funny, Geoff Dyer blends travel writing, essay, criticism and fiction with a smart and cantankerous wit that is unmatched. From one of the most original writers in Britain, this is a book for armchair travellers and procrastinating philosophers everywhere.Trade ReviewBrilliant . . . Dyer's eyes miss nothing -- PETER CONRAD * * Observer * *An examination of some of the most fundamental questions of life . . . Inspiring and informing * * Guardian * *Even Chekhov might have envied Geoff Dyer's talent . . . Almost perfect -- JAN MORRIS * * Spectator * *[A] disregard for genre boundaries is a hallmark of his work, along with erudition, a brilliant use of language and irreverent humour . . . The nearest thing to White Sands in Dyer's back catalogue is Yoga for People Who Can't Be Bothered to Do It * * Daily Telegraph * *Surpassingly eloquent . . . there's no other writer quite like Dyer * * Time * *Illuminating . . . A collection unified by a focus on our impermanence. Why are we here? Dyer asks. With his customary elegance of thought, he sees that our attempts to transcend our situation through travel and art are motivated by our awareness of our final destination: "We are here to go somewhere else". -- LUKE BROWN * * Financial Times * *A national treasure -- ZADIE SMITHDyer's virtue is not the whole-hearted embrace of experience and exotic locales but the parsing of degrees of disappointment. He also doesn't pretend to be heading anywhere, but then White Sands turns into a memoir and becomes unexpectedly moving . . . Dyer's tone as he relates his frightening brush with tragedy is calm and full of curiosity, possibly as a result of eschewing drama for his entire life. -- JANE SMILEY * * Los Angeles Times * *White Sands isn't just a catalog of travel mishaps, with Mr. Dyer cast as an English-speaking Monsieur Hulot. It is also a rumination on the meanings we assign the strange destinations of our pilgrimages. * * New York Times * *Reading Dyer is akin to the sudden elation and optimism you feel when you make a new friend, someone as silly as you but cleverer too, in whose company you know you will travel through life more vagrantly, intensely, joyfully * * Daily Telegraph * *Geoff Dyer is a true original - one of those rare voices in contemporary literature that never ceases to surprise, disturb and delight -- William BoydQuite possibly the best living writer in Britain * * Daily Telegraph * *A collection of essays fusing travel writing and fiction . . . Dyer plays fast and loose with genre and category * * Telegraph * *The title essay, about picking up an ex-con hitchhiker on US Route 54 before passing a warning sign against doing exactly that, reads like a brilliant short story. It's electrifying - unlike the Northern Lights * * Tatler Magazine * *Cleverer, more self-deprecating and funnier in these essays, set all over the world and in his unique mind. Dyer's last travel book, Yoga for People Who Can't be Bothered to Do It, sold over 50,000 copies in the UK alone, and this is just as good: a travel title that asks not just where, but why, with Dyer's typical sardonic wit * * The Bookseller * *

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Book SynopsisOver the summer of 2011, Dervla Murphy spent a month in the Gaza Strip. She met liberals and Islamists, Hamas and Fatah supporters, rich and poor. Used to western reporters dashing in and out of the Strip in times of crisis, the people she met were touched by her genuine, unflinching interest and spoke openly to her about life in their open-air prison. What she finds are a people who, far from the story we are so often fed, overwhelmingly long for peace and an end to the violence that has so grossly distorted their lives. The impression we take away from the book is of a people whose real, complex, nuanced voice has rarely been heard before. A MONTH BY THE SEA gives unique insight into the way in which isolation has shaped this society: how it radicalises young men and plays into the hands of dominating patriarchs, yet also how it hardens determination not to give in and turns family into a towering source of support. Underlying the book is Dervla's determination to try to understand how Arab Palestinians and Israeli Jews might forge a solution and ultimately live in peace. Dervla looks long and hard at the hypocrisies of Western and Israeli attitudes to peace', and at Palestinian attitudes to terrorism. While this shattered people long for a respite from the bombings that have ripped a hole, both literally and psychologically, in their world, it seems that politicians have an agenda that pays little attention to their plight.

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Book SynopsisThis collection On Travel is clever, funny, provoking and confrontational by turn. In a pyrotechnic display of cracking one- liners, cynical word play and comic observation, it mines three thousand years of wit and wisdom: from Martha Gellhorn to Confucius and from Pliny to Paul Theroux.Trade ReviewI met a lot of people in Europe. I even encountered myself. James Baldwin

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Book SynopsisA BBC Radio 4 Book of the Week Lake Ohrid and Lake Prespa. Two vast lakes joined by underground rivers. Two lakes that have played a central role in Kapka Kassabova's maternal family. As she journeys to her grandmother's place of origin, Kassabova encounters a civilizational crossroads. The Lakes are set within the mountainous borderlands of North Macedonia, Albania and Greece, and crowned by the old Roman road, the via Egnatia. Once a trading and spiritual nexus of the southern Balkans, it remains one of Eurasia's oldest surviving religious melting pots. With their remote rock churches, changeable currents, and large population of migratory birds, the Lakes live in their own time. By exploring the stories of dwellers past and present, Kassabova uncovers the human history shaped by the Lakes. Soon, her journey unfolds to a deeper enquiry into how geography and politics imprint themselves upon families and nations, and confronts her with questions about human suffering and the capacity for change.Trade ReviewTo the Lake is an exquisitely written rallying cry to embrace the notion that the people of the Balkans-and indeed humanity as a whole-have more in common than what divides them, despite generations of strife suggesting otherwise * Financial Times *[An] extraordinarily haunting mixture of travelogue, history and family memoir...a delight, exquisitely written and brimming with compassion... [a] wonderful book * Sunday Times *From the deep labyrinths of the Balkan past, Kapka Kassabova has returned with another hoard of extraordinary lives, tales of survival, dark comedy and horror. Humanity glitters under her gaze in all its facets. Her prose is spectacularly good and her storytelling is a joy -- Philip MarsdenNeatly adhering to rules of three, Kassabova's well-researched and personal book contains three strands: vivid travelogue, ancestral memoir and historical analysis... excellent... deft storytelling * New Statesman *To the Lake's objective is not healing so much as reconciliation, a quest for spiritual wholeness... The book's achievement [...] is to reconcile, thrillingly, what those twin bodies of water represent to Kassabova: the unconscious and the conscious; the darkness of history and the radiance of life and love * Guardian *Kapka Kassabova made her name with a travel book about the turbulent lands on the fringes of the former Ottoman empire. Now she's back in the Balkans in search of her family history -- Best books of 2020 * Times *Kassabova writes with such energy and style that you feel she could visit the dullest place on earth and still make it burst into life -- Philip MarsdenKassabova is a brilliant traveller, an astonishing interviewer and a writer with near clairvoyant understanding of the real lives of men and women -- Horatio ClareA beguiling mixture of memoir, travelogue and historical investigation... The book is marbled with memorable images * Scottish Sunday Times *An intimate portrait of loss * Wanderlust *Kassabova attempts to bring out... the quiet lives that get hidden by history... she is too good a writer not to allow us many individual pleasures... any writer who uses the marvellous word "lacustrine" - "of the lake" - deserves to be celebrated * Spectator *Enlightening, surprising and elegiac ... a joy to read... very elegantly written ... The actual descriptions of the lakes are written with a filigree grace, unostentatious, not overly "poetic", and with a sharp eye for telling detail... I always like books that I leave feeling bigger on the inside, and Kassabova certainly achieves that * Scotland on Sunday *Evocative... Kassabova is an excellent describer of nature... At times, Kassabova's prose seems to literally dissolve into poetry. Her narrative glides through different locations, time periods and perspectives so subtly that you don't quite realise the full scope of its ambition until it's over... You could open this book at any page and immediately get sucked into the beauty of her writing * Open Democracy *

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Book SynopsisThe incredible memoir by international bestselling author of Where The Crawdads Sing, Delia Owens and her then partner Mark Owens'', charting their time researching wildlife in the Kalahari Desert. Reissued and in full colour, for the first time since its original publication. In the early 1970s, carrying little more than a change of clothes and a pair of binoculars, Mark and Delia Owens caught a plane to Africa, bought a third-hand Land Rover, and drove deep into the Kalahari Desert. There they lived for seven years, in an unexplored area with no roads, no people, and no source of water for thousands of square miles. In this vast wilderness the Owenses began their zoology research, working alongside lions, brown hyenas, jackals, giraffes, and the many other creatures they came to know.Cry of the Kalahari is a gripping account of how two young Americans survived the dangers of living in one of the last pristine areas on Earth. Reissued for the fiTrade ReviewFor anyone interested in animals or in real live adventure, this book is a must * Jane Goodall *Extraordinary... How the couple overcame the hazards of the desert and came to appreciate its living richness makes fascinating reading... Read their remarkable book to be delighted, moved and awed * People Magazine *Leaps off the page and sweeps you away * Los Angeles Times *Splendid...If [the Owenses's] survival is a wonder, so is their book - stirring, heartening and elegiac all at once * Newsweek *One of the best testimonials to the perseverance, idealism and general spunk of passionate animal students * Washington Post *Mark and Delia Owens's simple human passion and dedication are invigorating. This is a remarkable and important story * Barry Lopez *

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Book SynopsisWith the help of a Maratha nobleman, Mark Shand buys an elephant named Tara and rides her over six hundred miles across India to the Sonepur Mela, the world's oldest elephant market. From Bhim, a drink-racked mahout, Shand learned to ride and care for her. From his friend Aditya Patankar he learned Indian ways. And with Tara, his new companion, he fell in love. "Travels on my Elephant" is the story of their epic journey across India, from packed highways to dusty back roads where communities were unchanged for millennia. It is also a memorable, touching account of Tara's transformation from scrawny beggar elephant to star attraction, and of the romance that developed between her and her owner Mark Shand. For what began as an adventurous whim has developed, decades later, into a life of campaigning to provide vital migratory corridors for these magnificent creatures whose habitat is under constant assault from man.

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Book SynopsisBurma is currently ruled by a harsh dictatorship unmoved by Western activists and sanctions. It is also the sight of the longest-running conflict in the world. Drawing both on his own family''s stories and his years of hands-on political experience working with the United Nations, Thant Myint-U has written an illuminating account of how Burma''s rich past informs its violent present, and of how the world might transform the country''s future. In The River of Lost Footsteps, Thant Myint-U tells the story of modern Burma, in part through a telling of his own family''s history, in an interwoven narrative that is by turns lyrical, dramatic, and appalling. His maternal grandfather, U Thant, rose from being the schoolmaster of a small town in the Irrawaddy Delta to become the UN secretary-general in the 1960s. And on his father''s side, the author is descended from a long line of courtiers who served at Burma''s Court of Ava for nearly two centuries. Through their stories aTrade Review"'It is hard to imagine a more thought-provoking or eloquently written elucidation of Burma's afflictions and their causes - nor one more heartfelt.' Sunday Times"

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Book SynopsisV. S. Naipaul’s Booker Prize winning novel about displacement, the yearning for the good place in someone else’s land and the attendant heartache.Part of the Macmillan Collector’s Library, a series of stunning, clothbound, pocket-sized classics with gold-foiled edges and ribbon markers. These beautiful books make perfect gifts or a treat for any book lover. This edition is introduced by acclaimed author, Robert McCrum. In a Free State tells the story first of an Indian servant in Washington, who becomes an American citizen but feels displaced. Then of a disturbed Asian West Indian in London who, in jail for murder, has never really known where he is. Then the central novel moves to a fictional African country. There, the central characters have to make the long drive to the safety of their compound. By the end of this drive we know everything about the English characters, the African country and the Idi Amin-like future awaiting it.Trade ReviewA book of such lucid complexity and such genuine insight, so deft and deep, that it somehow manages to agitate, charm, amuse and excuse the reader all at the same pitch of experience -- Dennis Potter * The Times *Naipaul’s travel writing is perhaps the most important body of work of its kind in the second half of the century -- Martin Amis

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