Search results for ""MEDINA PUBLISHING LTD""

In the early 1920's, immaculate gentleman, Jacques Doucet descends into the world of anarchist art, the occult and the dark turmoil of his past - involving the death of his beloved Madame R. A disastrous journey leads the couturier and patron of the arts to confront the celebrated bohemians of the city, including Max Jacob, Andre Breton and Picasso. When troubled Doucet acquires the world's most dangerous painting, it causes him to hack at the root of Picasso's darkest secrets, unveiling modern art's incredible genesis.

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To that which we give the name of Love, be it of the flesh or of God, is it ever less than divine? In a space of mere hours, a life and faith in their entirety are to be re-lived by Simon Chance. One-time missionary and bishop, Chance had withdrawn in mid-life to research - and teach - his enduring mentor Dante, creator of The Divine Comedy. He is recently widowed, after the prolonged descent into dementia of his devoted wife Marigold, violinist and composer. To recuperate, he is invited by a life-long confidante, Clare, to her son's villa in the hills behind St Tropez in southern France, to join a house party of old friends from their university days, each now reaping the rewards of their worldly careers. The reunion coincides with the collapse of global banking confidence - and the playing-out of Clare's own loss of love. Such is one weave of this narrative. On a walk in the forest of the Massif des Maures surrounding the remote villa, in search of a church abandoned centuries ago, Chance loses his way - in a `dark wood', as once experienced by Dante. The night turns wild. Such is a second weave. Marigold has not been the only love of Simon Chance. The passionate liaison of his earlier life, pre-ordination, was with a student botanist. This very Evie, with her Parliamentarian spouse, is about to join the house party of Clare, her greatest friend. A vital element in that searing, abandoned youthful liaison is yet to be reconciled with this scholar-cleric Chance had come to be. Now it rises to confront him. Here is the binding and defining weave of this night, unraveling in dark and storm and dawn. The working-through of the nature of love, physical and spiritual, in love's innocence and purity, will redeem Simon Chance or destroy him. Or both.

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The Isle of Wight is nationally acclaimed as a producer of quality food and drink – known as Nammet to locals. Varied produce with an island provenance now finds its way to restaurants,food markets, delicatessens and shops all over the UK, all with a passion for quality and taste. Nammet is a celebration of the very best food and drink that originate from the beautiful,warm and sunblessed shores and waters of the Isle of Wight. Nammet vividly reveals the fascinating background to the dedicated and often eccentric Islanders behind the delectable produce. The book is produced for the Earl Mountbatten Hospice. This vital Isle of Wight charity raises funds through events such as Walk the Wight which every year attracts over 10,000 participants. The book is a perfect keepsake for Islanders, visitors and armchair travellers with taste. From the Island already famed for its scenery, Queen Victoria, Lord Tennyson, music festivals, dinosaurs, hovercraft, sailing and its very own curious dialect, here is a feast of brocks including dewbit, jipper and harlens. Put on yer yepper and get ready to get the finest island Nammet. Enjoy.

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Surviving the Storm is an analysis, undertaken by the Windsor Energy Group over the past 12 years, focusing on the availability of an ample global energy supply over the next 35 to 50 years. It charts a way through the storm but warns of the many political conflicts and economic obstacles looming. With the effects of climate change and the growing damage to the Earth's atmosphere, catastrophe seems at first sight inevitable. The impact on international trade, economic growth and food supply could be critical. With a steadily rising global population and the ever-widening expectations of the billions who live in the non-OECD developing world, it is safe to assume that their global consumption of primary energy could come close to doubling within the coming years. Where is all this energy going to be found? Alternative energy is struggling hard to hang on to its tiny share of the global energy mix. Scientific research shows the dire consequences of doing nothing and the pressing need to accelerate the pace of developing much more efficient and energy-saving technology. The good news is that we have ample resources of oil, coal and gas to bridge the gap to these new technologies. However, we will have to maintain the current momentum of production of these fossil-based fuels and to invest heavily in expanding their capacity. The bad news is that we can only achieve this if we can simultaneously ensure that we can neutralise and curb their adverse impact on the atmosphere, agriculture, fisheries and urban air quality.

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A heart wrenching children's story. A little girl comes across a malnourished cheetah cub caged at the back of a small shop in an Arab souq. Her mother agrees to buy the animal to save its life, and the little girl rears the cub at their house until it grows into a fine young cheetah. The cheetah and the girl are inseparable friends, but they know one day he will need to return to Africa where he can roam free. Beautiful illustrations flow throughout the narrative and bring this enchanting tale to life.

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Windtower offers a unique insight into a past way of life, exploring Dubai's rich and storied past and heritage. This new and extended edition celebrates the 50th anniversary of the formation of the United Arab Emirates, diving deeper into the merchant community's central role in Dubai's pre-oil economy and social life. This new edition also considers the lessons to be learned from Dubai's traditional windtowers at a time of global warming and climate crisis, and how this knowledge might benefit contemporary urban design. The title features a foreword from His Highness, Charles, Prince of Wales, who writes: "I do hope this book will enable other people to join in appreciating the unique nature of these buildings and that it will encourage an awareness of how relevant many of their distinctive features are to the modern challenges of building sustainable communities in a way that maximizes the use of renewable energy." With exclusive archival photography, custom maps, as well as original architectural plans and diagrams, Windtower is a must-have book for anyone interested in Dubai's architecture, culture and fascinating historical development.

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For a time, the Isle of Wight Festivals transformed a sleepy English island into the rock'n'roll capital of the world. From promoting a one-nighter in 1968, to raise funds for a local swimming pool, the young Foulk brothers were able to out-perform Woodstock, by signing the world-exclusive appearance of rock's poet laureate, Bob Dylan. The de facto leader of the counterculture had been hidden away in the artist-town of Woodstock, rarely seen after a motor cycle accident three years earlier. He turned his back on the eponymous festival, put there to persuade him to come out and play, but Dylan left for Europe on the day their event began. For the Foulk brothers - lacking experience, resources and time - the coup and ensuing public response was almost overwhelming, but with audacious bravado and steely determination they delivered the most awaited event of the era. Devotees from hippies to celebrities flocked to the Island from mainland Britain, Europe, the Americas and as far away as Australia. As well as changing the lives of Ray and his brothers the phenomenon played its part in a highly transformative period for Bob Dylan, in which the Isle of Wight remained his one and only full concert appearance in seven-and-a-half years.

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The Art of Arabic Coffee celebrates the subtle beauty and fascinating history of this aromatic beverage, which over the centuries has become an essential feature of Arab culture and society. The art of cultivating, roasting and preparing coffee was first honed in Arabia. It is an inseparable part of almost all social occasions, celebrations, ceremonies and political negotiations in the region. Driven by her infectious passion for the topic, Medina Ilyas takes readers on a journey to discover the intriguing story of Arabic coffee, detailing the events that have shaped its development and the myriad of customs, recipes and techniques that make it one of the most versatile and culturally significant beverages in the world. Through engaging stories and surprising facts, she demonstrates how the complexity and endless varieties of Arabic coffee reflect the diversity and richness of the people and cultures of the Arab world. Whether you are a seasoned Arabic coffee drinker or have yet to try it, The Art of Arabic Coffee has something for everyone. Be prepared to discover an infinite array of subtle and tantalizing flavors as you sip and indulge this precious and iconic Arabian beverage.

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100 Treasures and Curiosities draws on the extensive collection of Carisbrooke Castle Museum to reveal some of the Isle of Wight’s most significant and historic stories, alongside some more unusual tales from the Island’s past. Established by Princess Beatrice in 1898, the museum was intended to be ‘a treasury of objects illustrative of the history of the island’ and in the 125 years since, the museum’s collection has grown to comprise of over 35,000 objects ranging from the everyday to the exotic, from utilitarian to pure novelty. Today, Carisbrooke Castle Museum is a charity-run independent accredited museum and remains dedicated to the Island’s rich and varied history.

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Two years before T E Lawrence received orders to travel to the Hejaz to liaise with the leader of the Arab Revolt, other British officers had already roamed the Arabian Peninsula's unforgiving Nejdi desert, to rally tribal support for the British war effort. The first was Captain William Henry Irvine Shakespear, a political agent from the Government of India's Political Department. Born in October 1878 in India, Shakespear spent much of his childhood away from his Anglo-Indian parents, schooling in Portsmouth and later in the Isle of Man, before entering Sandhurst as a British Indian Army Officer Cadet. On his return to India, Shakespear spent six years in military service before he joined the Political Department in 1904, serving twice in Bandar Abbas and briefly in Muscat. Shakespear's next mission was as a political agent in Kuwait, arriving at the coastal Sheikhdom in the spring of 1909. For the next four years, he travelled extensively into the Nejdi desert, providing both London and Delhi with valuable intelligence about the vastly unknown interior as well as cultivating a personal relationship with Ibn Sa'ud, the Emir of Riyadh. At a time when London and Constantinople were negotiating the Anglo-Ottoman treaty, Shakespear almost became persona non grata for advocating the need to back the emir after his tribal warriors had expelled the Ottoman garrisons in al-Hasa in 1913. When war was declared in July 1914, Shakespear was one of the first to try to join the British Army to fight in France, but when the Ottoman Empire looked set to ally with Germany, the powers that had previously shunned him now needed his unique knowledge of Central Arabia and relationship with Ibn Sa'ud. That October, as many of his peers and countrymen crossed the English Channel to reinforce those already in the trenches, Shakespear set sail for Kuwait on special duty to rendezvous with the emir. It was a mission that T E Lawrence would later commend, acknowledging the crucial role that the political agent played during the early stages the Middle Eastern theatre of war. Shakespear was a pioneer in exploring the Nejd, capturing many firsts with his camera, although there were a few other equally intrepid British officials who preceded him into the desert. From the late-18th century, the East India Company collided numerous times with the House of Sa'ud as both attempted to understand the intentions of the other, before the political agent finally laid the foundations for formal diplomatic relations with Ibn Sa'ud, and later with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

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Emirates Diaries tells the story of how Peter Clark came to love the Emirates and its people. He got to know Abu Dhabi sheikhs and Dubai merchants and people at every level of society. The country was on the cusp of enormous economic expansion and this book is an affectionate picture of the Emirates when it was still like a chain of large informal villages. The people of the UAE were aware of their good fortune and were, he found, open, generous and innovative. Clark arranged for the explorer Wilfred Thesiger to return to the country he had celebrated before it became oil-rich. Thanks to Peter, Thesiger met up with his old companions who had accompanied him in crossing the Empty Quarter 40 years earlier. Peter embedded himself in the local cultural scene and translated stories by Dubai's best known writer, Muhammad al-Murr. Emirates Diaries tells of opera in Ras Al Khaimah, how Shakespeare was brought to large audiences of young people, how to organize a royal visit, an outbreak of foot and mouth disease among the oryx in the Al Ain zoo, the culture of camel racing and an unpaid bill left by Margaret Thatcher. The diaries sparkle with mischievous humor and acute observation. This book is a prequel to Peter Clark's Damascus Diaries: Life under the Assads, described by The Economist as 'quirky, digressive and indiscreet'.

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Sir Terence Clark's My Life with Salukis is part-memoir, part-travelogue, and explores in lively and unprecedented detail the history and significance of the Saluki across the world. Indigenous to the Arabian peninsula, the desert-bred Saluki has for centuries been revered, and remains as highly valued today for its elegance and intelligence. Sir Terence's own life and work have been profoundly influenced by this ancient breed. His commitment to the study, enjoyment and preservation of these `Companions of Kings' has taken him far and wide and introduced him to extraordinary people and places: in Iraq and Oman (where he was British Ambassador), throughout the Middle East and across Syria, into Central Asia, Russia and China. Beautifully illustrated with personal photographs, artwork and calligraphy, this book interweaves Sir Terence's fascinating life story with the history of the breed throughout the region. His passion for Salukis is infectious - whether for hunting, showing, coursing, breeding or simply companionship, the reader cannot help but share the love.

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Ancient Alexandria was built by the Greek Macedonians. Ptolemy started the dynasty and in thirty years completed the first lighthouse, and the grand library and museum, which functioned as a university with an emphasis on science, known as "The Alexandrian School". Scholars attended as "the birthplace of science" from all over the ancient world. Two of the most eminent were Euclid, the father of geometry, and Claudios Ptolemy, writer of The Almagest, a book on astronomy. These are the oldest surviving science textbooks. Herein there are stories about scientists, poets and religious philosophers, responsible for influencing the western mind with their writings.Modern Alexandria was rebuilt in 1805 by multi-ethnic communities who created a successful commercial city and port with an enviable life-style for its inhabitants for 150 years. In 1952 the Free Officers of the Egyptian Army masterminded a coup to free the country from the monarchy and British domination. In 1956 the socialist regime under Colonel Gamal Abdel Nasser closed the Suez Canal, resulting in the Anglo-French-Israeli invasion. This outburst of Egyptian nationalism and military revolution by this understandably anti-Western regime included the confiscation of property belonging to foreigners and the subsequent mass exodus of business and artisan classes that hitherto had made the city so successful. The author was an eye-witness to these events and he sets out the political errors and failures of both Egyptian and Western leaders. The legacy of the resulting political and social confusions is deeply apparent in the continuing unrest in the Middle East, and in particular in Egypt.

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Ancient Alexandria was built by the Greek Macedonians. Ptolemy started the dynasty and in thirty years completed the first lighthouse, and the grand library and museum, which functioned as a university with an emphasis on science, known as "The Alexandrian School". Scholars attended as "the birthplace of science" from all over the ancient world. Two of the most eminent were Euclid, the father of geometry, and Claudios Ptolemy, writer of The Almagest, a book on astronomy. These are the oldest surviving science textbooks. Herein there are stories about scientists, poets and religious philosophers, responsible for influencing the western mind with their writings.Modern Alexandria was rebuilt in 1805 by multi-ethnic communities who created a successful commercial city and port with an enviable life-style for its inhabitants for 150 years. In 1952 the Free Officers of the Egyptian Army masterminded a coup to free the country from the monarchy and British domination. In 1956 the socialist regime under Colonel Gamal Abdel Nasser closed the Suez Canal, resulting in the Anglo-French-Israeli invasion. This outburst of Egyptian nationalism and military revolution by this understandably anti-Western regime included the confiscation of property belonging to foreigners and the subsequent mass exodus of business and artisan classes that hitherto had made the city so successful. The author was an eye-witness to these events and he sets out the political errors and failures of both Egyptian and Western leaders. The legacy of the resulting political and social confusions is deeply apparent in the continuing unrest in the Middle East, and in particular in Egypt.

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The Namib Desert is vast, arid expanse of constantly moving gravel plains and dunes. It covers more than 31,000 square miles stretching the whole of the western coast of Namibia, into Angola and South Africa. The winds blow relentlessly and thick fog frequently blankets the towering dunes along the coast. Although it supports a wide diversity of flora and fauna, it is a harsh environment for man and mammal. In the midst of this seemingly inhospitable region, near Garub, live the elusive wild horses that have fascinated people for almost a century. And into this wilderness a young slip of a girl ventured, alone and armed with little more than a camera, a tent and a burning desire to follow the call of the wild. As the weeks turned into months, Miona Janeke followed the herd from before sunrise until after dark: learning, understanding, photographing and becoming one with the free-spirited horses. This book is the result of an intrepid pilgrimage to discover the essence of the mysterious herds of feral horses. The exquisite photographs of the horses and their surroundings show a deep, almost spiritual, connection between subject and photographer.They are testament to a rare talent and an indomitable personality.

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The remarkable story of one man's journey to leadership of the world's largest energy company, The Caravan Goes On is the first published inside account of the workings of the corporation by a CEO and represents a significant addition to the literature on the turbulent development of the world's oil industry. Frank Jungers, former President, Chairman and CEO of the petroleum giant Aramco, tells the inside story of his three decades in Saudi Arabia (1947-1978) with the world's largest oil producing company. A North Dakota farm boy Jungers rose to the top of one of the most important hydrocarbon enterprises ever, a company that eventually found itself responsible for nearly one-quarter of the world's oil resources. He writes of his face-to-face encounters with King Faisal and other Saudi leaders, and his role in steering the company through major international crises that included the 1973 Arab-Israeli war, the dramatic oil price increases of the 1970s, the Arab oil embargo and the OPEC hostage incident of 1975. Central to Jungers' story is his role in helping to develop Aramco's Saudi workforce in preparation for the eventual transfer of company ownership from four American oil majors to the Government of Saudi Arabia. He explains the unique nature of the ownership transfer, which was remarkably different from the bitter nationalization process seen in Iraq, Libya, Iran and Venezuela. Jungers describes how Aramco and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia in an important sense grew up together, and he highlights the crucial role played by Aramco in the development of the young nation's infrastructure and economy. The Caravan Goes On describes the origins of the petroleum industry in Saudi Arabia, with the granting of a concession in 1933 to a subsidiary of Standard Oil of California, the first of Aramco's four oil-company parents. Jungers talks of his own origins as the son of farmer in North Dakota, the family's migration westward due to drought and depression, and his engineering studies at the University of Washington. Jungers began his career in Saudi Arabia working at Ras Tanura, site of Aramco's first oil refinery and oil tanker terminal. He describes how Aramco built its initial workforce, consisting of Americans, Italians, Saudis and other nationalities; he explains how it soon became clear that the future of the Saudi oil industry belonged not with foreign oil interest but to the people of Saudi Arabia; and he relates how he and others worked to give Saudis the training and incentives needed to take over and successfully operate what would become the world's premier oil producing and exporting company. At the same time, Aramco, with its technological expertise and its access to international specialists, began playing a central role in the development of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. The company, with support and encouragement of the Saudi Kings, took a lead role in building healthcare, agriculture, the railroads, the electric grid and other sectors of the Saudi economy. The story of the "King Faisal Era" (including the monarch's role in the oil price issue, the Arab oil embargo and his closed-door meetings with the King and his key advisers, including Oil Minister Shaikh Ahmed Zaki Yamani) are vividly described, as well as the shock of King Faisal's tragic death and the tense moments of the OPEC hostage incident that began in Vienna and ended in North Africa. Jungers speaks of his involvement in launching Saudi Arabia's Master Gas System, now a central part of the national economy and his pivotal role in the consolidation of Saudi Arabia's electrical power grid in the Eastern Province. When he returned to Saudi Arabia in 2008 to attend the celebrations of the company's 75th anniversary he fully realized the success of the Aramco venture - how it had indeed prepared large numbers of Saudis for the responsibilities of leading their country's oil industry into a new and exciting economic era. This personal, colorful and up-close view is required reading for oil-industry watchers as well as those interested in big business, geopolitics, America's role in the Middle East and the extraordinary transformation and emergence of modern Saudi Arabia since oil was discovered in its Eastern Province.

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Prison Time in Sana'a tells the story of Dr Abdulkader Al-Guneid's harrowing experience inside jail in Yemen's capital shortly after it was taken over by Houthi rebels. In his hometown of Taiz, Al-Guneid, a medical doctor, had been an outspoken figure on Yemeni politics for decades. In recent years, his social media and interviews were read around the world and attracted a global following from an audience anxious to hear an unbiased explanation of the underlying roots of the conflict. Ultimately, his activism placed him in the movement's crosshairs, leading to his abduction on 5 August 2015 and incarceration in an undisclosed Houthi jail in Sana'a. For the next 300 days, Al-Guneid shared his time with American hostages, Houthi fighters, Al Qaeda militants and ordinary Yemenis caught up in the chaos of war. Following his release, he wrote about his experience in exhaustive and gripping detail from exile in Canada. Initially typing his entire account on his mobile phone, his story has since been distilled into a deeply personal account of his incarceration offering an extraordinarily candid perspective on the Yemen crisis from deep within Houthi-held territory.

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The English may say, 'Where there's a will there's a way,' and the Japanese, 'A concentrated mind pierces even a rock', but the meaning is clearly the same; 'Too many boatmen sail the boat up the hill' may be the same as the English, 'Too many cooks spoil the broth', but the Japanese version has a delightful absurdity about it which is illustrated in Kathryn Lamb's witty cartoon. These and many more proverbs and sayings feature in Where There's a Will There's a Way, which joins the family of six other bilingual illustrated proverb books, devised in 1985 by Primrose Arnander and the late Ashkhain Skipwith: three in Arabic, and one each in Italian, French and Chinese. Each title in the series gives the proverb in its original (and where the scripts are different, provides the original script and its transliteration), the literal translation and the English equivalent. They are not intended as weighty works of scholarship, but rather as a source of entertainment. They make the perfect gift, as well as being useful to language students, whatever their native tongue. The cartoonist Kathryn Lamb has brought her skills to all seven titles.

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As the moon rises over the South African savannah, a young African girl called Thembile and her father, a wildlife ranger, are out patrolling through the night on horseback. They hear the heart-rending cries of a terrified rhino calf, and find him shivering beside the mutilated body of his mother. Help is summoned, but who will care for this orphan, look after him and pay for his milk and medicines? Ubuntu: Summer of the Rhino is brilliantly told and beautifully illustrated and will delight children from the age of eight years upwards. It tells the story of a young African girl and an English boy living in Dubai, whose love of animals and interest in wildlife inspires them to care for an orphaned Rhino, Ubuntu. The story of Ubuntu the rhino weaves back and forth across continents, at once heart-breaking and heart-warming, teaching children the importance of conservation and protecting our wildlife. All royalties will be donated to the Rhino Rehabilitation Centre of Rhino Revolution, to help rescue and rehabilitate orphaned rhinos. By buying this book you are making a difference - but do join the Revolution and help make the world a kinder place: visit rhinorevolution.org.

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From the Arab world comes a love story between an Arab man and an American woman that lasted more than half a century. Their lives spanned both sides of the Jordan River, and their love was tested by the traditions of an ancient and proud Christian tribe and the contrasts between their cultures. Although surrounded by conflicts in the Middle East, they built family hotels that survive as a tribute to his dreams and strength and her unwavering determination to support him.

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