Search results for ""oldcastle books""

Two screenwriters once walked into a Hollywood producer's office and said three words 'Jaws in space.' Those three words won them the contract for the blockbuster movie Alien. The ability to pitch well is essential for all writers, directors and producers in cinema and TV. Strong pitching skills will accelerate your career - not only helping you sell your projects, but also developing them in the first place, focusing on what makes a story work, clarifying character and plot, and working more successfully with industry collaborators. This book takes you from the essentials of what makes a good pitch to advanced skills that will help you in all kinds of pitching situations. Charles Harris gives a clear-sighted view of how pitching works in the industry and a series of very practical techniques for developing a gripping and convincing pitch. Drawing on his experience, he examines the problems that can arise with both mainstream and unconventional projects - from a range of different cultures - and explains how to solve them. He also analyses the process of taking a pitch meeting and shows you how to ensure you perform at your best.

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In this volume, Leni Dipple explores how poetry might be represented in a range of contexts, cutting across cultures and languages. An esoteric collection designed for the serious reader of poetry, Between Rivers forms a simultaneously intricate and epic narrative inspired by the epistolary of Dipple's grandfather and the work of Rainer Maria Rilke. This collection travels across time and continents, seeking its language and its roots, making connections, making sense of the present out of the past. Words are lifted from their origins, held to the light, and replanted in an eclectic and vibrant range of poems, synthesising Dipple's many journeys and charged with a personal vitality.

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'A clear, insightful and sensitive look at the work of script editors and screen writers' - Hossein Amini: writer of Drive and writer and director of The Two Faces of January The Art of Script Editing provides a comprehensive overview of this vital role, examining its responsibilities and functions during all stages of the development process, both in film and television. Detailing the nuts and bolts of the job, it looks at what's required and expected, how script editors assess a script, their approach to working with writers and producers, and their input during rewrites and pre-production, and up to a project's completion. It also examines the ways in which writers and producers can benefit from working with a professional script editor as they seek to refine and communicate their vision. The Art of Script Editing; A Practical Guide is a valuable resource for anyone developing a script no matter where they are in the process, for writers and producers interested in expanding their understanding of how a script is advanced, and for those pursuing a career in script development.

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It may be drama features that win the most awards and kudos from critics, but in the current marketplace you're unlikely to sell a drama screenplay in the way you would a genre script. Breaking down the nuts and bolts of what differentiates drama from genre, Writing and Selling Drama Screenplays will consider questions such as: What is 'emotional truth'? What separates stereotypical and authentic characters? What are the different types of drama feature screenplay? How do we make these films, when there's 'no money'? What are the distribution opportunities for dramas? Exploring the ways in which drama and authenticity work, it will empower screenwriters to make their own story and character choices, so they can write and also help to package, finance and even make their own drama features. Writing and Selling Drama Screenplays includes detailed case studies of produced dramas made on both shoestring and bigger budgets, and industry insights from their writers, directors and producers. It looks in-depth at Scottish BAFTA-winning Night People, the iconic coming out movie Beautiful Thing, the touching New Orleans drama Hours, starring the late Paul Walker, and the ambitious true story of Saving Mr Banks, based on the battle of wills between Mary Poppins author PL Travers and Walt Disney himself. It will also discuss films such as Brokeback Mountain, American Beauty, The King's Speech, Juno, Erin Brockovich, Changeling and Girl, Interrupted.

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A no-nonsense, direct down-the-lens look at the television industry written from the point of view of a television drama producer who's been there, done it, fought some battles and won the odd award. Written in an engaging, anecdotal tone, Writing for Television provides advice on: Getting an agent The type of writer television's looking for The tool kit a television writer needs The writer /script editor relationship How to structure a storyline How to write good treatments and outlines Packed full of useful insights, links and information, the book includes interviews with successful television writers working today, pointers on how to work collaboratively in the industry and how to make good contacts with the people who can further your career.

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The Art of Screenplays is a working handbook for writers with stories to tell. Addressing the key issues of creativity and craft, its aim is to connect with our natural understanding of story, to demystify the screenwriter's art, and to enable fresh, original and authentic writing. Working on the central premise that drama reflects nature, and screenplays simply echo life as we know it, the areas Mukherjee discusses include: The Writer's eye. How to gather, ferment and communicate story. The art of action. Understanding structure through observation. Who am I? Exploring the levels of characters. Vertical structure. Say what you mean. Mean what you say. Speak the speech. The art of not writing dialogue.

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This guide to anime offers an overview of the art form, looking at its development in Japan and its export to other cultures. It includes a history of Japanese animation from early examples to the relaunch of animation as a viable commercial entity and its enormous rise in popularity after WWII. Anime explains the difference between manga and anime, offering a brief history of manga including its development from traditional art form (woodblock prints) to massive commercial success with millions of readers in Japan and worldwide. Odell and Le Blanc also consider anime style and genres, its market and importance in Japanese culture, and its perception in the West including controversy, such as criticisms of sex and violence in anime that affect other national markets, including the UK (notably Urotsukidoji) and the USA, where it is considered a 'kids only' market.

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'Luca Antara is a book-lover's book, a graceful and mesmerizing blend of history, autobiography, travel and romance.' - JM Coetzee Part memoir, travelogue, history and part detective story, Luca Antara is a rich tapestry of history and the present. It parallels the life of the author, an émigré to Sydney, and the life of an historical figure, António da Nova, the servant of a Portuguese explorer who in the 1600s sends him to find out more about Luca Antara (now Australia). New to Sydney, Martin Edmond finds himself impoverished and displaced. He earns money as a taxi driver but spends his spare time frequenting second hand bookshops trying to learn more about the history of Australia and the wider region. The people Edmond encounters in his taxi and in his search for rare books are varied and strange, offering the reader a voyeuristic glimpse into Sydney's sub-culture. Sent to discover more about Luca Antara, António da Nova's crew mutiny and dump him on the West Australian coast. He is found by Aborigines, who take him on an epic walk across northern Australia. Eventually he manages to return to his master in Portugal who awaits news of his explorations. Edmond's reading centres upon da Nova, but each book he reads leads to another and the subject becomes broader and increasingly fascinating. The lives of the two men and the strange customs and unique social mores of each man's culture and time intertwine throughout the book, ending with Edmond literally walking in the footsteps of da Nova across northern Australia.

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Robin Hood is England's greatest folk hero. Everyone knows the story of the outlaw who robbed from the rich and gave to the poor. Nick Rennison's highly entertaining book begins with the search for the historical Robin. Was there ever a real Robin Hood? Rennison looks at the candidates who have been proposed over the years, from petty thieves to Knights Templar, before moving on to examine the many ways in which Robin Hood has been portrayed in literature and on the screen. He began as the hero of dozens and dozens of late medieval ballads. He appeared in plays by contemporaries of Shakespeare. In the Romantic era Robin was reinvented by Walter Scott as a Saxon champion in the struggle against the Normans. During the nineteenth century, he emerged as a hero in children's literature. More recently he has been portrayed as everything from proto-socialist man of the people to anarchist thug. In the cinema he put in an appearance as early as 1908 and Douglas Fairbanks and then Errol Flynn turned him into the typical hero of Hollywood swashbucklers. In the last twenty years, Kevin Costner and Russell Crowe have provided their own very different interpretations of the character. On the small screen, Robin has been the hero of half-a-dozen TV shows from the 1950s series starring Richard Greene, which used many writers blacklisted by Hollywood, via the well-remembered Robin of Sherwood in the 1980s to the recent BBC series. As the twenty-first century marches through its second decade, Robin Hood is still very much with us. He is the subject of graphic novels and computer games. New films are in the offing. Robin is an archetypal hero who, it seems, can never die. This engaging book charts his life so far.

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Provides a basic introduction and general advice for people wishing to develop their skills as actors or actresses. It is aimed at both the amateur enthusiast and those wishing to pursue their interest further and undertake professional training. Advice is given on the basic skills which every actor needs to develop, such as breathing, voice control, the use of body language, timing and handling the audience. The importance of understanding a text and the interaction of the characters within it is also considered.

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Spring 1971. Vera Kelly and her girlfriend, Max, leave their cosy Brooklyn apartment for an emergency visit to Max's estranged family in Los Angeles. Max's parents are divorcing - her father is already engaged to a much younger woman and under the sway of an occultist charlatan; her mother has left their estate in a hurry with no indication of return. Max, who hasn't seen her family since they threw her out at twenty-one, prepares for the trip with equal parts dread and anger. Upon arriving, Vera is shocked by the size and extravagance of the family estate which reveals a privileged upbringing that, up until this point, Max had only hinted at. Tensions boil over at dinner as Max attempts to navigate her father, who is hostile and controlling, and the occultist, St James, who is charming but appears to be siphoning family money. The next morning, when Vera wakes up, Max is gone... In Vera Kelly Lost and Found, Rosalie Knecht gives Vera her highest-stakes case yet, as Vera quickly puts her private detective skills to good use and tracks a trail of breadcrumbs across southern California to find her missing girlfriend. She travels first to a film set in Santa Ynez and, ultimately, to a most unlikely destination where Vera has to decide how much she is willing to commit to save the woman she loves.

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Julia Lerner is one of the most powerful people in Silicon Valley and an icon to professional women across the country. She is the COO of Tangerine, one of America's biggest technology companies. She is also a Russian spy. Julia has been carefully groomed to reach the upper echelons of the company and use Tangerine's software to covertly funnel information back to Russia's largest intelligence agency. Alice Lu works as a low-level analyst within Tangerine, having never quite managed to climb the corporate ladder. One afternoon, when performing a server check, Alice discovers some unusual activity and is burdened with two powerful but distressing suspicions: Tangerine's privacy settings aren't as rigorous as the company claims they are and the person abusing this loophole might be Julia Lerner herself. Now, she must decide what to do with this information - before Julia finds out she has it.

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A dead employee. A missing child. Anonymous phone calls in the dead of night. Judi Westerholme's troubles aren't over yet... Already struggling to juggle co-running the local pub with her childcare responsibilities for her orphaned niece, Judi does not need life to become any more complicated. Yet, as usual, complications arrive in spades: she starts receiving threatening, late-night phone calls before discovering one of her employees, Kate, shot dead. Judi finds herself caught up in a murder investigation, as well as the hunt for the Kate's fourteen-year-old daughter, who has been missing since the murder. Add in the uncertainty of her relationship with Melbourne-based DS Heath and the fact that her estranged mother's nursing home keeps urging her to visit, and Judi might finally be at breaking point.

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In 1935, six-year-old Emily Evans vanishes from her family's summer house on a remote Minnesota lake. Her disappearance destroys the family - her father takes his own life, and her mother and two older sisters spend the rest of their lives at the lake house, keeping a decades-long vigil for the lost child. Sixty years later, Lucy, the quiet and watchful middle sister, lives in the lake house alone. Before her death, she writes the story of that devastating summer in a notebook that she leaves, along with the house, to the only person who might care: her grandniece, Justine. For Justine, the lake house offers freedom and stability - a way to escape her manipulative boyfriend and give her daughters the home she never had. But the long Minnesota winter is just beginning. The house is cold and dilapidated. The dark, silent lake is isolated and eerie. Her only neighbor is a strange old man who seems to know more about the summer of 1935 than he's telling. Soon Justine's troubled oldest daughter becomes obsessed with Emily's disappearance, her absent mother reappears, and the man she left launches a dangerous plan to get her back. In a house haunted by the sorrows of the women who came before her, Justine must overcome their tragic legacy if she hopes to save herself and her children.

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New York City, 1962. Vera Kelly is struggling to make rent and blend into the underground gay scene in Greenwich Village. She's working night shifts at a radio station when her quick wits, sharp tongue, and technical skills get her noticed by a recruiter for the CIA. Next thing she knows she's in Argentina, tasked with wiretapping a congressman and infiltrating a group of student activists in Buenos Aires. As Vera becomes more and more enmeshed with the young radicals, the fragile local government begins to split at the seams. When a betrayal leaves her stranded in the wake of a coup, Vera learns war makes for strange and unexpected bedfellows, and she's forced to take extreme measures to save herself. An exhilarating page turner and perceptive coming-of-age story, Who is Vera Kelly? introduces an original, wry and whip-smart female spy for the twenty-first century.

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There's nothing more dangerous than revenge. Judi Westerholme has been through it. Brave and strong-willed, she's just about coping in her new role as foster parent to her orphaned niece, taking a job at the local pub to help make ends meet. Then the pub's landlord and Judi's friend, army veteran Pete 'Macca' Maccasfield, is murdered, and her world is suddenly turned upside down. Despite warnings from the city police to keep out of it, Judi can't help but get involved in the search for Macca's killer. But she soon becomes deeply entangled with some ruthlessly dangerous men. She must act fast and think smart to work out what they want - before anyone else gets hurt... Long buried secrets resurface in Sherryl Clark's pacey crime novel that pushes Judi Westerholme to her limits to protect the people she loves most.

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A French patisserie opens in the village of Ashton Mead in time for Christmas. Local residents are pleased but Hannah, owner of the Sunshine Tea Shoppe, feels threatened by the competition. When the owner of the patisserie is killed, Hannah is suspected of murdering her business rival. Her friend, Emily, is determined to clear Hannah''s name. She seems to be facing an impossible task... until her little dog Poppy makes a surprising discovery.

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1974 WAS A YEAR OF MAJOR CHANGE AROUND THE WORLD. Presidents resigned, emperors were deposed, and new governments came to power. On both sides of the Atlantic, major political figures left the scene, either through resignation or electoral defeat. Leaders of nations died. Regimes crumbled. In society, the second wave of feminism grew in strength and the rights of historically underrepresented groups were more powerfully asserted. The BBC aired the first lesbian kiss on British TV. In Italy, the right to divorce was protected in a landmark referendum. However, terrorism and the pursuit of political ends through violence became ever more commonplace. The arts and entertainment industries were in the midst of a period of great creativity and innovation. In America, Scorsese, Spielberg and Coppola were making their mark. Popular music was arguably at a low point but the first stirrings of the punk revolution to come could be heard in New York clubs. And a Swedish band that were to become a phenomenon won the Eurovision Song Contest. The roots of many aspects of today's society which we take for granted lie in the 1970s and particularly in this, the decade's pivotal year.

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Presidents resigned, emperors were deposed, and new governments came to power. On both sides of the Atlantic, major political figures left the scene, either through resignation or electoral defeat. Leaders of nations died. Regimes crumbled. In society, the second wave of feminism grew in strength and the rights of historically underrepresented groups were more powerfully asserted. The BBC aired the first lesbian kiss on British TV. In Italy, the right to divorce was protected in a landmark referendum. However, terrorism and the pursuit of political ends through violence became ever more commonplace. The arts and entertainment industries were in the midst of a period of great creativity and innovation. In America, Scorsese, Spielberg and Coppola were making their mark. Popular music was arguably at a low point but the first stirrings of the punk revolution to come could be heard in New York clubs. And a Swedish band that were to become a phenomenon won the Eurovision Song Contest. The r

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Writing and Selling Thriller Screenplays has the lowdown on how to get your thriller feature script on to the page, and how to get it in front of producers and investors. First published in 2013, this new edition offers an all-new resources section and a host of new case studies that map the considerable changes of the past decade. With marketplace disruptors such as Netflix and the first phases of The Marvel Cinematic Universe leaving their mark, new opportunities have been created for screenwriters and filmmakers who are keen to get their stories in front of industry professionals. This time around, Lucy V Hay doesn't just guide you through the writing of movies, but spec TV pilots too. Putting iconic, mixed-genre projects under the microscope -such as Stranger Things (horror thriller), Brooklyn 99 (comedy thriller) and Lost (sci fi thriller) - she considers what writers can learn from these shows. She also argues that the lone protagonist in a thriller has had its day and looks at how the genre is moving into a space beyond 'The Hero's Journey'. Case studies to support this include The Hunger Games, Captain Marvel, Iron Man and many more. Finally, the book considers how the screenplay might be sold to investors, exploring high concept ideas, pitching, packaging and the realities of film finance - all updated for the 2020s - and lays out alternative routes to sales and production, including transmedia such as novels and adaptation, and immersive storytelling online.

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After losing her job and her boyfriend, Emily is devastated. As she is puzzling over what to do with the rest of her life, she is surprised to learn that her great aunt has died, leaving Emily her cottage in the picturesque Wiltshire village of Ashton Mead. But there is one condition to her inheritance: she finds herself the unwilling owner of a pet. Not knowing what to expect, Emily sets off for the village, hoping to make a new life for herself. In Ashton Mead, she soon makes friends with Hannah who runs the Sunshine Tea Shoppe and meets other residents of the village where she decides to settle. All is going well... until Emily's ex-boyfriend turns up and against the advice of her new friends, she takes him back. When Emily decides to investigate the mysterious disappearance of a neighbour, she unwittingly puts her own life in danger...

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The Art of Wandering is a history of that curious hybrid, the writer as walker. From the Ancient world to the modern day, the role of the walker continues to evolve, from philosopher and pilgrim, vagrant and visionary, to experimentalist and radical. From Rousseau and De Quincey to Virginia Woolf and Werner Herzog, this seemingly innocuous activity has inspired a literary tradition encompassing philosophy and poetry, the novel and the manifesto. Today, this figure has returned to the forefront of the public imagination, as writers and walkers follow in the footsteps of earlier generations. For the walker is once again on the march, seeking out new territory and recording new impressions of the landscape. Newly revised and updated, The Art of Wandering explores these adventures on foot. Every walk can be expressed as a story narrated by the walker; it is these stories and the lives of those who walked them which are examined here.

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Fleabag... The Queen\'s Gambit... Peaky Blinders... Happy Valley... All phenomenally popular shows, whose creators had to work hard to hone their pitches and get their ideas noticed. And even harder to deliver on those ideas. From the initial spark of inspiration to the delivery of a creative, commercial series, From Creation to Pitch sets out to demystify the entire process of Television Series Drama Development for writers who are keen to get their voices heard and their stories read, discussed and viewed. Employing a practical, no-nonsense approach to what can be a minefield for many creatives, Yvonne Grace applies her decades of experience in development, script-editing and production. She also includes illuminating, in-depth interviews with leading practitioners about working on their own TV shows, including Tony Jordan who discusses the making of hit shows Sanditon and Death in Paradise, Ashley Pharoah who talks about his passion project The Living and the Dead and his multi-facetted drama Around the World in 80 Days, and Sarah Pinborough on her successful Netflix thriller Behind Her Eyes, adapted from her own bestseller. Perfect for anyone who is just starting out in the industry, as well as more experienced screenwriters looking to take the next step in their career.

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Noah Cross, Norma Desmond, Norman Bates, Harry Lime - these are a few of nearly a hundred names that inhabit the mind of the narrator as he starts to compose short biographies of some of the most famous characters in the history of film noir. He sketches in whole lives, lives as intense as the dreams put up on the screen. Then these characters start to meet each other outside the films as if they were real people with real needs and passions. The book is becoming a novel. The names and faces are familiar to us - Jake Gittes from Chinatown, Laura Hunt and Waldo Lydecker from Laura, Rick and Ilsa from Casablanca - but is it true that Noah Cross and Norma Desmond were lovers in the twenties, that she and Joe Gillis had a son who grew up to be Julian Kay in American Gigolo? For the narrator is not merely the author. Married to the sister of Laura Hunt, he has a mission to carry out, a lost family link to find, a thread to pull so that nearly all these disparate characters come together to form a kind of society. Suspects is the most inspired of commentaries on film noir and the forms of Hollywood story-telling. It is in its way a biographical dictionary, but it is also a dazzlingly original work of fiction, so full of America, of an old man's dread of loss and failure, and of a simultaneous love and rage for these movies that you may find its impossible world as real and as touching as any you have ever inhabited. Ultimately an examination on how movies affect the way we think and how film not only shapes our perceptions and our memories but in some ways comes to stand in for them, Suspects can be read as an unsettling examination of identity and the construction of self through the medium of narratives, or simply as a fascinating take on movie fandom. Either way, it's fabulous.

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Disease has plagued human civilisations throughout history, claiming more lives than natural disasters and warfare combined. The Black Death took the lives of one third of Europe's population in the fourteenth century. The conquest of the New World was accompanied by devastating waves of smallpox. The Industrial Revolution happened in a world blighted by the diseases of urbanisation and overcrowding, typhoid and cholera, typhus and TB. New diseases such as AIDS, Ebola, and COVID-19 present further challenges to medical science and healthcare. A Short History of Disease chronicles the historical and geographical evolution of infectious and non-infectious diseases, from their prehistoric origins to the present. It offers a comprehensive guide to ailments and the medicines developed to combat them. Analysing case studies - including the Black Death, Spanish Flu, cholera, leprosy, syphilis, cancer, and Ebola - Sean Martin maps the growth of our understanding of disease. The book offers a fascinating insight into an important area of social history, providing an accessible introduction to disease and the ongoing quest to protect human health.

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It is 1933 and wealthy Australian artist Rowland Sinclair is enjoying a leisurely sojourn in the luxury Hydro Majestic Hotel in the Blue Mountains. As ever, he is accompanied by his entourage - a poet, a fellow painter and a brazen sculptress. The Depression-era troubles of the wider world seem far away; until long-time Sinclair family ally and employee Harry Simpson disappears. Rowland must leave for the High Country to find Harry. He encounters resentful stockmen, dangerous gangsters and threatening belligerence all round. With his trusted friends' help, he uncovers a dark conspiracy which suddenly renders the beautiful Australian outback very sinister... Sulari Gentill expertly weaves real events and personalities into her tension-fuelled murder mysteries which are sure to enthral lovers of deep intrigue and history.

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What is Europe? Firstly, of course, it is a continent made up of countless disparate peoples, races and nations, and governed by different ideas, philosophies, religions and attitudes. Nonetheless, it has a common thread of history running through it; welded together by the continent's great institutions, such as the Church of Rome, the Holy Roman Empire, the European Union. Europe, however, is also an idea. From almost the beginning of time, people have harboured aspirations to make this vast territory one. The Romans came close and a few centuries later, the foundations for a great European state were laid with the creation of the Holy Roman Empire. Napoleon overreached himself in attempting to create a European-wide Empire - as did Adolf Hitler. The European Union is a club of which everyone in Europe wants to be a member; although, as the rejection of the European Constitution by the French and the Dutch, and the British situation demonstrates, we Europeans still cling to our national independence.

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Lizard Village, 1903. Cornwall is rich with natural wonders: gorgeous shorelines and imposing cliffs. But these natural beauties conceal dangerous secrets, as amateur detectives Lord and Lady Sheridan discover. Wireless telegraph companies around the world scramble to develop the new communications technology. But an Italian named Guglielmo Marconi beats them to it. His feat has bruised some egos, but no one expects sabotage, much less murder. After two apparently accidental deaths at the Marconi wireless transmission station, Charles, Lord Sheridan, is asked to head an investigation and finds that valuable equipment has disappeared. And when Kate discovers the truth behind the drowning of a local girl, it becomes clear that these deaths and the dirty tricks at the station are connected.

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Queen Victoria is dead, long live King Edward! Kate and Charles Sheridan are attending the new king's coronation ceremony when an anarchist blows himself up in Hyde Park, with a bomb that was obviously meant for the Royals. Now, it's up to Kate and Charles to discover who is threatening the crown, and how a brash and arrogant American author named Jack London is involved. Who are the terrorists and what dangers do they really pose? Are the anti-terrorists even more frighteningly dangerous? What happens to truth and innocence when Scotland Yard conspires to spin a spider's web of lies and false evidence? If you think these are only contemporary questions, join Kate and Charles Sheridan as they are unwillingly dragged into the real world of turn-of-the-century terrorism.

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The Third in the Mr & Mrs Darcy Mystery Series After the excitement of recent adventures, Elizabeth and Fitzwilliam Darcy retire to the peace and quiet of Pemberley as they await the birth of their first child. Such tranquility, however, cannot last. First, a mysterious letter from the late Lady Anne Darcy is discovered - propelling Elizabeth on a quest to learn more about Darcy's deceased mother and an unsettled matter she left behind. Then a summons to Northanger Abbey involves the young couple in an intrigue that threatens not just the Darcy family name, but Darcy's freedom as well. And just when it seems their situation could not grow worse, Darcy's overbearing aunt, Lady Catherine de Bourgh, takes up residence at Pemberley. Add to all this rumors of treasure and hints of deceptions old and new, and it becomes apparent that Pemberley is filled not with peace, but with secrets and spirits of the past. Secrets which, if exposed, could profoundly affect the generation of Darcys to come...

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Born in a gaol and raised in a workhouse, Cora Burns has always struggled to control the violence inside her. Haunted by memories of a terrible crime, she seeks a new life working as a servant in the house of scientist Thomas Jerwood. Here, Cora befriends a young girl, Violet, who seems to be the subject of a living experiment. But is Jerwood also secretly studying Cora ?

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Images of WWI in the popular consciousness normally involve the bloody attrition of trench warfare, the miles of mud, the shattered earth, the tangled miles of barbed wire. However there was another significant arena of war - the battle for control of the sea. In 1914 at the beginning of the war, Britain's maritime supremacy had remained unchallenged for around a hundred years. Many expected another Battle of Trafalgar but advances in technology saw a very different kind of warfare with the widespread use of mines, submarines and torpedoes. This book examines the events that led to war and the naval arms race between Britain and Germany. It traces the events of the war at sea looking at the major battles as well as the effects of unrestricted submarine warfare and the sinking of the Lusitania. It also profiles key figures such as Fisher, Beatty, Tirpitz and Graf von Spee.

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Euro Noir by Britain's leading crime fiction expert Barry Forshaw (author of Nordic Noir) examines the astonishing success of European fiction and drama. This is often edgier, grittier and more compelling than some of its British or American equivalents, and the book provides a highly readable guide for those wanting to look further than the obvious choices. The sheer volume of new European writers and films is daunting but Euro Noir provides a roadmap to the territory and is also a perfect travel guide to the genre. Barry Forshaw covers influential Italian authors, such as Andrea Camilleri and Leonardo Sciascia and Mafia crime dramas Romanzo Criminale and Gomorrah, along with the gruesome Gialli crime films. He also considers important French and Belgian writers such as Maigret's creator Georges Simenon to today's Fred Vargas, cult television programmes Braquo and Spiral, and films, from the classic heist movie Rififi to modern successes such as Hidden, Mesrine and Tell No One. German and Austrian greats are covered including Jakob Arjouni and Jan Costin Wagner, and crime films such as Run Lola Run and The Lives of Others. Euro Noir also covers the best crime writing and filmmaking from Spain, Portugal, Greece, Holland and other European countries and celebrates the wide scope of European crime fiction, films and TV.

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Andy Glynne subjects the whole documentary process to scrutiny with advice on: Developing your concept Funding Writing pitches and treatments Interview technique Narrative Writing commentary Dealing with ethical issues Camera technique Sound Lighting Post-production, editing and grading Marketing and distribution Film festivals The history of documentary With additional interviews with industry insiders and award-winning filmmakers who contribute their tips,tricks and advice, as well as layouts for budget spreadsheets, release forms, contracts and more...

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A body burns in the desert... Does the boy who found it know more than it seems? Sal Prentiss, orphaned and burdened with a terrible secret, just wants a place to belong. Sal lives with his uncles on a desolate ranch in the hills, and finds himself at the centre of a brutal murder mystery when he discovers the body of his maths teacher, charred almost beyond recognition, half a mile from his uncles' compound. In the seven months he worked at Lovelock's middle school, the quiet and seemingly unremarkable Adam Merkel had formed a bond with Sal and was one of the few people to look out for the boy. Nora Wheaton, the school's social studies teacher, sensed a kindred spirit in Adam - another soul bound to Lovelock by guilt and duty. After his death, she delves into his past for clues to who killed him. For Sal's grief seems shaded with fear, and Nora suspects he knows more than he's telling about his teacher's death.

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A year into her dream job at a cutthroat Silicon Valley startup, Cassie is trapped in a corporate nightmare. Between the long hours, toxic bosses and unethical projects, she struggles to reconcile the glittering promise of a city where obscene wealth lives alongside abject poverty. Ivy League grads complain about the snack selection from a conference room with a view of houseless people bathing in the bay. Startup burnouts leap into the paths of commuter trains and men literally set themselves on fire in the streets. Though isolated, Cassie is never alone. From her earliest memory, the black hole has been her constant companion. It feeds on her depression and anxiety, its size changing in relation to her distress. The black hole watches, but it also waits. Its relentless pull draws Cassie ever closer as the world around her unravels. When her CEO's demands cross an illegal line and her personal life spirals towards a bleak precipice, Cassie must decide whether the tempting fruits of Silicon Valley are worth the pain, or succumb to the black hole.

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Ghosts and spectres, the eerie and the occult. Why is contemporary culture so preoccupied by the supernatural, so captivated by the revenants of an earlier age, so haunted? The concept of Hauntology has evolved since first emerging in the 1990s, and has now entered the cultural mainstream as a shorthand for our new-found obsession with the recent past. But where does this term come from and what exactly does it mean? This book seeks to answer these questions by examining the history of our fascination with the uncanny from the golden age of the Victorian ghost story to the present day. From Dickens to Derrida, MR James to Mark Fisher; from the rise of Spiritualism to the folk horror revival, Hauntology traces our continuing engagement with these esoteric ideas. Moving between the literary and the theoretical, the visual and the political, Hauntology explores our nostalgia for the cultural artefacts of a past from which we seem unable to break free.

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It began with the horse-drawn carriage and ended with the aeroplane... An era, beginning in the 1830s and ending with the death of Queen Victoria in 1901, that saw the British Empire - the largest ever seen - dominate the world. British ingenuity in the fields of technological development and the heavy industry of its Industrial Revolution led to Britain being dubbed 'the workshop of the world' while its Royal Navy policed the world's oceans helping to create what has become known as a 'Pax Britannica'. History of the Victorian Era details the sweeping social and economic changes that took place during this period but also examines the events of the time and the lives of the eminent Victorians who contributed so much to British success - men and women such as Florence Nightingale, Isambard Kingdom Brunel, Charles Dickens, Elizabeth Garrett Anderson and Charles Darwin. History of the Victorian Era is the story of the greatest period in British history, a period that still resonates in today's Britain.

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Artists and writers from the colder climes of northern Europe have long felt the lure of the South of the continent. Goethe was revitalised by his encounters with Mediterranean culture on his journey to Italy. Nietzsche took flight southwards to begin his life anew, while DH Lawrence sought the health-giving southern sun in Sicily and Sardinia. But across the centuries, other outposts of the South have provoked a similar obsession. The South Seas cast a spell over figures such as Herman Melville, Robert Louis Stevenson and Paul Gauguin. The American Deep South and the southermost reaches of Latin America have been celebrated in the works of writers as diverse as John Muir, Jack Kerouac and Jorge Luis Borges. While the Great White South of the Antarctic has provided the backdrop to the darkest imaginings of Coleridge, Poe and Lovecraft. Even London, south of the river, is a place where novelists compete today to stake out a literary territory of their own. Moving between geography and mythology, literature and history, South is the first book to look at all things Southern in one volume. It examines the idea of the South as a symbol of freedom and escape, as well as the depository for many of our deepest unconscious fears and desires. It also charts the history of the South as the chosen location for the utopian visions of the North. From the beaches of Tahiti to the streets of Buenos Aires, from Naples to New Orleans, Merlin Coverley's brilliant and wide-ranging study throws light on the ways in which the idea of the South, in all its forms, has come to exert such a powerful hold on our collective imaginations.

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