Search results for ""penguin books""

From the prize-winning author of Supper Club comes a wickedly funny and slyly poignant new satire on modern life - for fans of My Year of Rest and Relaxation, Convenience Store Woman, and J. G. Ballard''s High Rise''Far from normal'' The Times''This book is a serious vibe'' Cosmopolitan''Lara Williams is the queen of smart modern satire. I could read her all day'' Emma Jane Unsworth Meet Ingrid. She works on a gargantuan luxury cruise liner, where she spends her days reorganizing the merchandise and waiting for long-term guests to drop dead in the changing rooms. On her days off, she disembarks from the ship and gets blind drunk on whatever the local alcohol is. It''s not a bad life. And it distracts her from thinking about the other life she left behind five years ago. Until one day she is selected for the employee mentorship scheme - an initiative run by the ship''s mysterious captain and self-anointed

Read more less

With a new introduction by Polly Samson, Sunday Times bestselling author of A THEATRE FOR DREAMERS 'Gorgeous... the written equivalent of lying in the sun eating figs' India Knight, Sunday Times'That summer we bought big straw hats. Maria's had cherries around the rim, Infanta's had forget-me-nots, and mine had poppies as red as fire. . .'Three Summers is a warm and tender tale of three sisters growing up in the countryside near Athens before the Second World War. Living in a ramshackle old house with their divorced mother are flirtatious, hot-headed Maria, beautiful but distant Infanta, and dreamy and rebellious Katerina, through whose eyes the story is mostly observed. Over three summers, the girls share and keep secrets, fall in and out of love, try to understand the strange ways of adults and decide what kind of adults they hope to become.'The sun has disappeared from books these days... You are one of those who pass it on' Albert Camus to Margarita Liberaki 'The literary equivalent of a sun-soaked holiday in Greece' Culture Whisper'A leisurely, large-hearted coming-of-age novel, earthy and innocent, nostalgic and beautifully rendered' Kirkus'A dreamy, cinematic tapestry of Greek village life' NPR

Read more less

'It was the discovery of the essays celebrating his childhood and youth that altered my perception of Camus, from a thinker to a writer whose intellectual lucidity was a product of the wealth - the sensual immediacy and clarity - that had been heaped on his senses' Geoff Dyer Albert Camus was born in a 'world of poverty and sunshine' in Algeria, which would infuse all of his work. This new collection brings together three volumes of Camus' most intimate autobiographical writings for the first time. The Wrong Side and the Right Side, his first book, describes his family and his early years in a working-class neighbourhood. Nuptials rejoices in the sensuality of sun, landscape and sea, while Summer ranges over the cities of Algiers and Oran, nature and identity. Lyrical and emotional, these pieces enrich our understanding of Camus and his love of life.

Read more less

THE NO.1 SUNDAY TIMES BUSINESS BESTSELLER 2020'The Squiggly Career is about navigating work in a way that suits you, it's a timely and brilliant handbook for now' Stylist 'A brilliant guide. Read it and get the tools you need to thrive in your career now and in the future' Marie Forleo, author of Everything is Figureoutable 'Logical, practical and based on tried and tested models' Financial Times's Book of the Month Career ladders and jobs for life are a thing of the past Today, we're living in a world of squiggly careers, where moving frequently and fluidly between roles, industries, locations, and even careers, is becoming the new normal. Squiggly careers can feel stressful and overwhelming, but if you know how to make the most of them, they can be full of opportunity, freedom and purpose. And to make the most of our increasingly squiggly careers we need to answer some important questions: What am I good at? What do I stand for? What motivates and drives me? Where do I want to go in the future? In The Squiggly Career, you'll learn how to: - Play to your super strengths - Discover your values - Overcome your confidence gremlins - Build better support networks - Explore your future possibilities Packed with insights about the changing shape of work and inspiration from highly successful people, this book will fuel your growth and help you be happier, and ultimately more successful in your career.If you enjoyed reading this, check out You Coach You, Helen and Sarah's practical guide to getting unstuck, increasing self-awareness and solving knotty career conundrums.

Read more less

The perfect book for anyone who has ever dreamed of living in Paris Profiles of twenty real-life women of Paris - artists, activists, booksellers, and filmmakers, aged fourteen to seventy, living in tiny attic studios, grand apartments, or houseboats - are accompanied by more than 100 full-colour photographs by French it-girl and fashion designer Jeanne Damas, as well as tips on secret Parisian hideaways and the French art de vivre: from the five types of red wine to order depending on the occasion, and the coolest bars to drink them in, to the best red lipsticks, and places to be kissed. In Paris dispels the myth that there is only one type of Parisian woman, and offers a rare glimpse of the city that real Parisiennes live in - taking us into their homes, their careers, their style - and what being Parisian means to them. Witty, elegant, and modern, In Paris reveals the secret to living like a Parisian, wherever and whoever you are.'A love letter to Paris . . . sprinkled with quirky, authoritative guidelines on Paris living' Wall Street Journal 'I loved it - so French and so cool' Alexandra Fullerton, author of How to Dress and Fashion Director-at-large at Glamour 'Shining a spotlight on the lives and style of twenty true Parisians, this elegant coffee-table book - encompassing 100 rich and vibrant photographs - is an inclusive look at style. spanning a diverse pool of women' Because Magazine

Read more less

FIRST COMES LOVE, THEN COMES MARRIAGE, THEN COMES MURDER...THE SUNDAY TIMES TOP 10 BESTSELLING THRILLER YOU WON'T BE ABLE TO PUT DOWN_________________ What if your life was built on a lie?When lawyer Lily marries Ed, she's determined to make a fresh start. To leave the secrets of the past behind.But when she takes on her first criminal case, she starts to find herself strangely drawn to her client. A man who's accused of murder. A man she will soon be willing to risk everything for.But is he really innocent?And who is she to judge?_________________'JANE CORRY IS THE NEW QUEEN OF THE PSYCHOLOGICAL THRILLER' KATE FURNIVALL'You will be hooked after the first page' CLOSER 'A roller-coaster of dramatic twists . . . chilling and suspenseful' ELIZABETH HAYNES'Twisty, feverish and utterly gripping' EVA DOLAN________________Praise for Jane Corry:'A fearsomely good thriller' NICCI FRENCH'I raced through this' TERESA DRISCOLL'Compulsive, edgy and with some fabulous twists that I didn't see coming!' B A PARIS'So many brilliant twists' CLAIRE DOUGLAS'Tense, taut and twisty' RED'Beautifully written' PETER JAMES'A morally complex, twisty tale' KATE HAMER'Psychological thriller writing at its very best' SD SYKES'Few writers can match Jane Corry' CARA HUNTER

Read more less

In The Automatic Customer, John Warrillow provides the essential blueprint for turning your customers into subscribersThe lifeblood of your business is repeat customers. But customers can be fickle, markets shift and competitors are ruthless. So how do you ensure a steady flow of business? The secret - no matter what industry you're in - is finding and keeping automatic customers.These days virtually anything you need can come through a subscription. Far beyond Spotify and Netflix, companies in nearly any industry, from home contractors to florists, can build subscriptions into their business.Subscription is the key to increasing cash flow, igniting growth and boosting the value of your company. Whether you want to transform your entire business into a recurring revenue engine or just pick up an extra 5 per cent of sales growth, The Automatic Customer will be your secret weapon.'Read, apply and watch your bank deposits grow every month' Chris Guillebeau, bestselling author of The $100 Startup'If you have a business, or are thinking about starting one, this book will be the best investment you've ever made' Bo Burlingham, editor-at-large of Inc. and author of Small Giants and Finish BigJohn Warrillow, the author of Built to Sell, is the founder of The Value Builder System™ where advisors help company owners increase the value of their business. Previously, he founded Warrillow & Co., a subscription-based research business dedicated to helping Fortune 500 companies market to small business owners. A sought-after speaker and popular Inc.com columnist, he lives in Toronto.

Read more less

An astonishing record of the knowledge of a civilization, The Ultimate Ambition in the Arts of Erudition catalogues everything known to exist from the perspective of a 14th-century Egyptian scholar and litterateur. More than 9,000 pages and 30 volumes--here abridged to one volume, and translated into English for the first time--it contains entries on everything from medieval moon-worshiping cults, sexual aphrodisiacs, and the substance of clouds, to how to get the smell of alcohol off one's breath, the deliciousness of cheese made from buffalo milk, and the nesting habits of flamingos.Similar works by Western authors, including Pliny's Natural History, have been available in English for centuries. This ground-breaking translation of a remarkable Arabic text--expertly abridged and annotated--offers a look at the world through the highly literary and impressively knowledgeable societies of the classical Islamic world. Meticulously arranged and delightfully eclectic, it is a compendium to be treasured--a true monument of erudition.

Read more less

''The question Eilenberger sets out to answer in this ambitious, enthralling book: what use is philosophy in the middle of a war?'' The Sunday TimesThe year is 1933. Hannah Arendt escapes Berlin, seeking refuge among the stateless gathering in Paris. Simone de Beauvoir reimagines the dance between consciousness and the world outside in a Rouen café. Ayn Rand labours in Hollywood exile on the novel she believes destined to reignite the flame of liberty in her adoptive nation. Simone Weil, disenchanted with the revolution''s course in Russia, devotes her entire being to the plight of the oppressed. Over the next decade, one of the darkest in Europe''s history, these four philosophers will conceive in parallel ideas that would circle the globe in the second half of the century, reshaping it. The Visionaries follows in its protagonists'' footsteps from Leningrad to New York, Spain at civil war to France under occupation, as each is uprooted by totali

Read more less

The acclaimed Couture Classics with cover designs by Ruben Toledo have become collector's items in the worlds of literature, fashion, design, and popular culture. Now, Toledo's signature style graces the covers of three new Deluxe Editions of gothic literature greats - Jane Eyre, Dracula, and The Picture of Dorian Gray-capturing the haunting beauty, sensual horror, and decadence of these iconic tales. Perfect additions to the first set of Couture Classics: Wuthering Heights, Pride and Prejudice, and The Scarlet Letter.

Read more less

'The whizz-kid making maths supercool. . . A brilliant book that takes everything we know (and fear) about maths out of the equation - starting with numbers' The Times'A cheerful, chatty, and charming trip through the world of mathematics. . . Everyone should read this delightful book' Ian Stewart, author of Do Dice Play God?The only numbers in this book are the page numbers.The three main branches of abstract math - topology, analysis, and algebra - turn out to be surprisingly easy to grasp. Or at least, they are when our guide is a math prodigy. With forthright wit and warm charm, Milo Beckman upends the conventional approach to mathematics, inviting us to think creatively about shape and dimension, the infinite and the infinitesimal, symmetries, proofs, and all how all these concepts fit together. Why is there a million dollar prize for counting shapes? Is anything bigger than infinity? And how is the 'truth' of mathematics actually decided?A vivid and wholly original guide to the math that makes the world tick and the planets revolve, Math Without Numbers makes human and understandable the elevated and hypothetical, allowing us to clearly see abstract math for what it is: bizarre, beautiful, and head-scratchingly wonderful.

Read more less

'Kimmerer blends, with deep attentiveness and musicality, science and personal insights to tell the overlooked story of the planet's oldest plants' Guardian'Bewitching ... a masterwork ... a glittering read in its entirety' Maria Popova, BrainpickingsLiving at the limits of our ordinary perception, mosses are a common but largely unnoticed element of the natural world. Gathering Moss is a beautifully written mix of science and personal reflection that invites readers to explore and learn from the elegantly simple lives of mosses. In these interwoven essays, Robin Wall Kimmerer leads general readers and scientists alike to an understanding of how mosses live and how their lives are intertwined with the lives of countless other beings. Kimmerer explains the biology of mosses clearly and artfully, while at the same time reflecting on what these fascinating organisms have to teach us. Drawing on her experiences as a scientist, a mother, and a Native American, Kimmerer explains the stories of mosses in scientific terms as well as within the framework of indigenous ways of knowing. In her book, the natural history and cultural relationships of mosses become a powerful metaphor for ways of living in the world.

Read more less

The instant Sunday Times bestseller -- a beautiful story of rebellion and science'A triumph. . . We are left in a world that is not disenchanted by science, but even more magical' Financial TimesIn June 1925, twenty-three-year-old Werner Heisenberg, suffering from hay fever, had retreated to the treeless, wind-battered island of Helgoland in the North Sea in order to think. Walking all night, by dawn he had wrestled with an idea that would transform the whole of science and our very conception of the world.In Helgoland Carlo Rovelli tells the story of the birth of quantum physics and its bright young founders who were to become some of the most famous Nobel winners in science. It is a celebration of youthful rebellion and intellectual revolution. An invitation to a magical place.Here Rovelli illuminates competing interpretations of this science and offers his own original view, describing the world we touch as a fabric woven by relations. Where we, as every other thing around us, exist in our interactions with one another, in a never-ending game of mirrors.A dazzling work from a celebrated scientist and master storyteller, Helgoland transports us to dizzying heights, reminding us of the many pleasures of the life of the mind.Translated by Erica Segre and Simon CarnellChosen as a Book of the Year by The Times, Financial Times, Sunday Times, Guardian and ProspectShortlisted for the Nayef Al-Rodhan Prize

Read more less

'Superb, beautifully written, touching and occasionally very funny' Andrew RobertsDavid Gilmour's superb biography of Rudyard Kipling is the first to show how the life and work of the great writer mirrored the trajectory of the British Empire, from its zenith to its final decades. His famous poem 'Recessional' celebrated Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee in 1897, but his last poems warned of the dangers of Nazism, and in those intervening years Kipling, himself an icon of the Empire, was transformed from an apostle of success to a prophet of national decline. As Gilmour makes clear, Kipling's mysterious stories and poetry deeply influenced the way his readers saw both themselves and the British Empire, and they continue to challenge us today.'A fine, fair and generous work ... Gilmour's celebrated life of Curzon demonstrated his mastery of imperial nuance and esoteric character, and he brings to this book just the right combination of empathy, distaste andfastidious detachment ... there is never a flaccid line, and never a hasty judgement' Jan Morris, New Statesman'Every now and again a book comes along that sheds new light on a life we thought we knew. David Gilmour's beautifully-written biography of Rudyard Kipling is just such a work ... This is literary biography at its very finest' George Rosie, Sunday Herald'An enthralling biography of a mind ... essential reading for anyone who cares about how a writer finds, and passionately lives, his subject' Ruth Padel, Daily Telegraph'The best Kipling biography yet written ... Gilmour's account of this driven man shines with intelligence' J. B. Pick, Scotsman

Read more less

From the acclaimed Wolfson Prize-winning author, a dazzling history of the world's emperors For millennia much of the world was ruled by emperors: a handful of individuals claimed no limit to the lands they could rule over and no limit to their authority. They operated beyond normal human constraint and indeed often claimed a superhuman or divine authority. In practice they ran the gamut from being some of the most remarkable men who ever lived, to being some of the worst and least remarkable. Dominic Lieven's marvellous new book, In the Shadow of the Gods, is the first to grapple seriously with this extraordinary phenomenon. Across the world peoples, willingly or unwillingly, fell into orbit around figures who reshaped or destroyed entire societies, imposed religions and invaded rivals. Lieven describes the anatomy of imperial monarchy and the principles by which it functioned. He compares the great emperors of antiquity, the caliphs and the warrior-emperors of the steppe before he turns to the Habsburg, Russian, Ottoman, Mughal and Chinese emperors, packing the book with extraordinary stories, astute observations and a sense of both delight and horror at these individuals' antics. The entire breadth of extreme human behaviour is here - from warlords to patrons of the arts, from political genius to feeble incapacity and pathological violence. As one of the great experts both on empires and on Russian history, Lieven is brilliantly qualified to write a book that brings to life a system of rule that dominated most of human history, as well as some of history's grandest and most dismaying figures.

Read more less

Where do our ideas about politics come from? What can we learn from the Greeks and Romans?How should we exercise power?Melissa Lane teaches politics at Princeton University, and previously taught political thought at the University of Cambridge, where she was a Fellow of King's College. She has received a Guggenheim Fellowship in the field of classics, and the historian Richard Tuck called her book Eco-Republic 'a virtuoso performance by one of our best scholars of ancient philosophy.'

Read more less

Kipling's best-loved work, now in a gorgeous new clothbound edition designed by the award-winning Coralie Bickford-Smith. These delectable and collectable editions are bound in high-quality, tactile cloth with foil stamped into the design.The story of Mowgli, the man-cub who is brought up by wolves in the jungles of Central India, is one of the greatest literary myths ever created. As he embarks on a series of thrilling escapades, Mowgli encounters such unforgettable creatures as the bear Baloo, the graceful black panther Bagheera and Shere Khan, the tiger with the blazing eyes. Other animal stories in The Jungle Books range from the dramatic battle between good and evil in 'Rikki-tikki-tavi' to the macabre comedy 'The Undertakers'. With The Jungle Books Rudyard Kipling drew on ancient beast fables, Buddhist philosophy and memories of his Anglo-Indian childhood to create a rich, symbolic portrait of man and nature, and an eternal classic of childhood.Rudyard Kipling was born in Bombay in 1865. In 1882 Kipling started work as a journalist in India, and while there produced a body of work, stories, sketches and poems - notably Plain Tales from the Hills(1888) - which made him an instant literary celebrity when he returned to England in 1889. His most famous works include The Jungle Book (1894), Kim (1901) and the Just So Stories (1902). Kipling refused to accept the role of Poet Laureate and other civil honours, but he was the first English writer to be awarded the Nobel Prize, in 1907. He died in 1936. Jan Montefiore has taught at the University of Kent since 1978, where she is now Professor of 20th Century English Literature. She is the author of Men and Women Writers of the 1930s (1996); Arguments of Heart and Mind:Selected Essays 1977-2000 (2002); Feminism and Poetry (3rd edition, 2004); and Rudyard Kipling (2007). Kaori Nagai is a Research Associate at the University of Kent and author of Empire of Analogies (2006). She has also introduced Kobo Abe's Face of Another and Kipling's Plain Tales from the Hills for Penguin

Read more less

'The father of contemporary European detective fiction' Ann Cleeves Cars drove past along with the trucks and trams, but by now Maigret had realised that they were not important. Whatever roared by like this along the road was not part of the landscape. ... What really counted was the lock, the hooting of the tugs, the stone crusher, the barges and the cranes, the two pilots' bars and especially the tall house where he could make out Ducrau's red chair framed by a window.Penguin is publishing the entire series of Maigret novels in new translations. This novel has been published in a previous translation as The Lock at Charenton.'Compelling, remorseless, brilliant' John Gray'One of the greatest writers of the twentieth century . . . Simenon was unequalled at making us look inside, though the ability was masked by his brilliance at absorbing us obsessively in his stories' Guardian 'A supreme writer . . . unforgettable vividness' Independent

Read more less

Goliarda Sapienza's The Art of Joy was written over a nine year span, from 1967 to 1976. At the time of her death in 1996, Sapienza had published nothing in a decade, having been unable to find a publisher for what was to become her most celebrated work, due to its perceived immorality. One publisher's rejection letter exclaimed: 'It's a pile of iniquity.' The manuscript lay for decades in a chest finally being proclaimed a "forgotten masterpiece" when it was eventually published in 2005. This epic Sicilian novel, which begins in the year 1900 and follows its main character, Modesta, through nearly the entire span of the 20th century, is at once a coming-of-age novel, a tale of sexual adventure and discovery, a fictional autobiography, and a sketch of Italy's moral, political and social past. Born in a small Sicilian village and orphaned at age nine, Modesta spends her childhood in a convent raised by nuns.Through sheer cunning, she manages to escape, and eventually becomes a princess. Sensual, proud, and determined, Modesta wants to discover the infinite richness of life and sets about destroying all social barriers that impede her quest for the fulfilment of her desires. She seduces both men and women, and even murder becomes acceptable as a means of removing an obstacle to happiness and self-discovery.Goliarda Sapienza (1924-1996) was born in Catania, Sicily in 1924, in an anarchist socialist family. At sixteen, she entered the Academy of Dramatic Arts in Rome and worked under the direction of Luchino Visconti, Alessandro Blasetti and Francesco Maselli. She is the author of several novels published during her lifetime: Lettera Aperta (1967), Il Filo Di Mezzogiorno (1969), Università di Rebibbia (1983), Le Certezze Del Dubbio (1987). L'Arte Della Gioia is considered her masterpiece.Anne Milano Appel, Ph.D., a former library director and language teacher, has been translating professionally for nearly twenty years, and is a member of ALTA, ATA, NCTA and PEN. Her translation of Giovanni Arpino's Scent of a Woman (Penguin, 2011) was named the winner of The John Florio Prize for Italian Translation (2013).

Read more less

Proud to be a Mammal (1942-97) is Czeslaw Milosz's moving and diverse collection of essays. Among them, he covers his passion for poetry, his love of the Polish language that was so nearly wiped out by the violence of the twentieth century, and his happy childhood. Milosz also includes a letter to his friend in which he voices his concern about the growing indifference to murder and the true value of freedom of thought, as well as a verbal map of Wilno, with each street revealing both a rich local history and intricate, poignant personal memories.

Read more less

An indispensable companion for readers, writers, and even casual users of the language, the Penguin Modern Classics edition of Kingsley Amis's The King's English features a new introduction by Martin Amis.The King's English is Kingsley Amis's authoritative and witty guide to the use and abuse of the English language. A scourge of illiteracy and a thorn in the side of pretension, Amis provides indispensable advice about the linguistic blunders that lie in wait for us, from danglers and four-letter words to jargon and even Welsh rarebit. If you have ever wondered whether it's acceptable to start a sentence with 'and', to boldly split an infinitive, or to cross your sevens in the French style, Amis has the answer - or a trenchant opinion. By turns reflective, acerbic and provocative, The King's English is for anyone who cares about how the English language is used.Kingsley Amis (1922-1995), born in London, wrote poetry, criticism, and short stories, but is best remembered as the novelist whose works offered a comic deconstruction of post-war Britain. Amis explored his disillusionment with British society in novels such as Lucky Jim (1954) and That Uncertain Feeling (1955); his other works include The Green Man (1970) Stanley and the Women (1984), and The Old Devils (1986) which won the Booker Prize.If you enjoyed The King's English you might like Amis's Lucky Jim, also available in Penguin Modern Classics.'A terrific book ... learned, robust, aggressive, extremely funny'Sebastian Faulks

Read more less

An intoxicating yet sensitive novel about the sexual experiences of ten couples from Tarbox, New England. Well-to-do, sociable, articulate but dangerously unfulfilled; they play word games in the evening and adultery all year round.

Read more less

Rusty Sabich is a prosecuting lawyer in Chicago who enters a nightmare world when Carolyn, a beautiful attorney with whom he has been having an affair, is found raped and strangled. He stands accused of the crime.This 'insider' book by a Chicago lawyer was one of the great novels of the 1980s, selling more than nine million copies, and was made into a famous film starring Harrison Ford. It's a supremely suspenseful and compelling courtroom drama about ambition, weakness, hypocrisy and American justice.

Read more less

THE SUNDAY TIMES AND ECONOMIST BOOKS OF THE YEAR 2016'A definitive study of the amorphous state that lasted a thousand years ... The Holy Roman Empire deserves to be hailed as a magnum opus' Tom Holland, Daily Telegraph'Engrossing ... staggering ... a book that is relevant to our own times' The Times'Masterly ... If, like most people, you know little more about the Holy Roman Empire other than Voltaire's bon mot - "neither holy, nor Roman, nor an empire" - then this is the book for you' Daniel Johnson, Sunday Times'A history that helps us understand Europe's problems today ... interesting and provocative, makes the complex understandable' Christopher Kissane, GuardianA great, sprawling, ancient and unique entity, the Holy Roman Empire, from its founding by Charlemagne to its destruction by Napoleon a millennium later, formed the heart of Europe. It was a great engine for inventions and ideas, it was the origin of many modern European states, from Germany to the Czech Republic, its relations with Italy, France and Poland dictated the course of countless wars - indeed European history as a whole makes no sense without it.In this strikingly ambitious book, Peter H. Wilson explains how the Empire worked. It is not a chronological history, but an attempt to convey to readers why it was so important and how it changed over its existence. The result is a tour de force - a book that raises countless questions about the nature of political and military power, about diplomacy and the nature of European civilization and about the legacy of the Empire, which has continued to haunt its offspring, from Imperial and Nazi Germany to the European Union.

Read more less

This penetrating, timely portrait of Robert Mugabe is the psychobiography of a man whose once brilliant career has ruined Zimbabwe and cast shame on the African continent. Heidi Holland's tireless investigation begins with her having dinner with Mugabe, the freedom fighter, and ends in a searching interview with Zimbabwe's president more than 30 years later. The author charts Mugabe's gradual self-destruction, and uncovers some of the most respectable international players in the Zimbabwe tragedy. Probing the mystery of Africa's loyalty to one of its worst dictators, Holland explores the contradictions that cloud the life of the man who had embodied a continent's promise.

Read more less

When the three witches - now old, remarried and widowed - decide to go back to Eastwick to spend a summer together, many things have changed. Darryl Van Horne is gone. Their husbands and lovers have gone. The lithe and supple bodies with which they wrecked marriages and wreaked havoc many years before have gone - and have been replaced with the quiet aches and encumbrances of age. But a chemistry still crackles between the three and magic still lingers in the Eastwick air, and soon it becomes clear that there are those around them who remember them, and wish them ill. The Widows of Eastwick takes the mischief and enchantment of The Witches of Eastwick and reshapes it in a new emotional landscape, resulting in a sensitive study of the passing of youth and a darkly funny novel that shines with luminous sexual reminiscences and satirical observations about modern America.

Read more less

A HILARIOUS SATIRE THAT SHOWS OFFICE DYNAMICS AT THEIR MOST PETTY AND PROFOUND FROM THE BOOKER PRIZE-SHORTLISTED AUTHOR, JOSHUA FERRISThey spend their days - and too many of their nights - at work. Away from friends and family, they share a stretch of stained carpet with a group of strangers they call colleagues.There's Chris, clinging to his ergonomic chair; Lynn, the boss, whose breast cancer everyone pretends not to talk about; Carl, secretly taking someone else's medication; Marcia, whose hair is stuck in the eighties; and Benny, who's just - well, just Benny. Amidst the boredom, redundancies, water cooler moments, meetings, flirtations and pure rage, life is happening, to their great surprise, all around them.Then We Came to the End is about sitting all morning next to someone you cross the road to avoid at lunch. It's the story of your life and mine.*Joshua Ferris' mind-blowing new book, A Calling for Charlie Barnes, is available to pre-order now.*'Very funny, intense and exhilarating . . . For the first time in fiction, it has truly captured the way we work' The Times'As dazzling as Franzen's The Corrections and as confident as Tartt's The Secret History . . . Exceptional, very funny' Daily Telegraph'Slick, sophisticated and very funny, Ferris's cracking debut has modern Everyman fighting for his identity in an increasingly impersonal world' Daily Mail

Read more less

'One of the radical heroes of our age. A towering intellect' GuardianHegemony or Survival is Noam Chomsky's essential polemic on American foreign policy.Noam Chomsky, the world's foremost intellectual activist, presents an irrefutable analysis of America's pursuit of total domination and the catastrophic consequences that are sure to follow.From the funding of repressive regimes to the current 'war on terror', from the toppling of governments opposing its beliefs to the invasion of Iraq, America pursues its global strategy no matter what the cost. With the rigour and insight that have made him our most important unraveller of accredited lies, Noam Chomsky reveals the truth and the true motives behind America's quest for dominance - and seeks also to show how the world may yet step back from the brink.'A devastating history of American foreign policy since 1945 as well as a dissection of the current "war on terror"' Tim Adams, Observer'Anybody who thinks about American foreign policy has to read and contemplate Hegemony or Survival' Independent'One of the finest minds of the twentieth century' The New Yorker

Read more less

One night in the reform club, Phileas Fogg bets his companions that he can travel across the globe in just eighty days. Breaking the well-established routine of his daily life, he immediately sets off for Dover with his astonished valet Passepartout. Passing through exotic lands and dangerous locations, they seize whatever transportation is at hand - whether train or elephant - overcoming set-backs and always racing against the clock.

Read more less

The word 'kama' means the desire for sensual pleasure in Sanskrit, and was considered an essential part of the well-rounded education of a young, urbane gentleman. Treating pleasure as an art, Kama Sutra is a handbook covering every aspect of love and relationships. Its seven sections are devoted to the social life, courtship and marriage, extra-marital relations, the conduct of courtesans and prescriptions for enhancing attractiveness, as well as systematic, detailed instruction on sex. This modern translation of Kama Sutra takes it away from the well-worn image of an erotic, Oriental curiosity. This clear, accurate translation conveys all the original flavour and feel of this elegant, intimate and hugely enjoyable work; a masterpiece of pithy description and a wry account of human desires and foibles.

Read more less

'That sense of the meaninglessness of existence that runs through much of twentieth-century writing - from Conrad and Kafka, to Beckett and beyond - starts in Dostoyevsky's work' Malcolm BradburyAlienated from society and paralysed by a sense of his own insignificance, the anonymous narrator of Dostoyevsky's Notes from Underground tells the story of his tortured life. With bitter irony, he describes his refusal to become a worker in the 'anthill' and his gradual withdrawal from society. The seemingly ordinary world of St Petersburg takes on a nightmarish quality in The Double when a government clerk encounters a man who looks exactly like him - his double perhaps, or possibly the darker side of his own personality. Like Notes from Underground, this is a masterly tragi-comic study of human consciousness.Translated by Ronald Wilks with an Introduction by Robert Louis Jackson

Read more less

'The most magnificent novel ever written' Sigmund FreudThe murder of brutal landowner Fyodor Karamazov changes the lives of his sons irrevocably: Mitya, the sensualist, whose bitter rivalry with his father immediately places him under suspicion for parricide; Ivan, the intellectual, driven to breakdown; the spiritual Alyosha, who tries to heal the family's rifts; and the shadowy figure of their bastard half-brother, Smerdyakov. Dostoyevsky's dark masterwork evokes a world where the lines between innocence and corruption, good and evil, blur, and everyone's faith in humanity is tested.Translated with an Introduction and notes by DAVID McDUFF

Read more less

Taking the form of a dialogue between Socrates, Gorgias, Polus and Callicles, GORGIAS debates perennial questions about the nature of government and those who aspire to public office. Are high moral standards essential or should we give our preference to the pragmatist who gets things done or negotiates successfully? Should individuals be motivated by a desire for personal power and prestige, or genuine concern for the moral betterment of the citizens? These questions go to the heart of Athenian democratic principles and are more relevant than ever in today's political climate.

Read more less

No philosopher has held a higher opinion of art than Hegel, yet nor was any so profoundly pessimistic about its prospects - despite living in the German golden age of Goethe, Mozart and Schiller. For if the artists of classical Greece could find the perfect fusion of content and form, modernity faced complicating - and ultimately disabling - questions. Christianity, with its code of unworldliness, had compromised the immediacy of man's relationship with reality, and ironic detachment had alienated him from his deepest feelings. Hegel's Introductory Lectures on Aesthetics were delivered in Berlin in the 1820s and stand today as a passionately argued work that challenged the ability of art to respond to the modern world.

Read more less

This dictionary of numbers, arranged in order of magnitude, exposes the fascinating facts about certain numbers and number sequences. The aim of the book is to entertain and enthral the reader, which it certainly does.

Read more less

From the MAN BOOKER PRIZE- and WOMEN'S PRIZE-SHORTLISTED author of Swing Time, White Teeth and On Beauty'A pleasure from the first page to the last' Evening Standard'A glorious concoction by our most beguiling and original prose-wizard' Independent on Sunday 'Full of humour, the search for love and the fear of death... A touching, thoughtful, deeply felt rite-of-passage novel' Sunday Telegraph The Autograph Man follows one Alex-Li Tandem: a twenty-something Chinese-Jewish autograph dealer turned on by sex, drugs and organised religion. From London to New York, love to death, fathers to sons, Alex tries to discover how a piece of paper can bring him closer to his heart's desire. Exposing our misconceptions about our idols - about ourselves - Zadie Smith delivers a brilliant, unforgettable tale about who we are and what we really want to be.

Read more less

Tadeusz Borowski’s concentration camp stories were based on his own experiences surviving Auschwitz and Dachau. In spare, brutal prose he describes a world where where the will to survive overrides compassion and prisoners eat, work and sleep a few yards from where others are murdered; where the difference between human beings is reduced to a second bowl of soup, an extra blanket or the luxury of a pair of shoes with thick soles; and where the line between normality and abnormality vanishes. Published in Poland after the Second World War, these stories constitute a masterwork of world literature.

Read more less

A book explaining the history of economics; including the powerful and vested interests which moulded the theories to their financial advantage; as a means of understanding modern economics.

Read more less

This book studies the evolution of the family from the sixteenth to the eighteenth century and how the process radically influenced child-rearing, education, contraception, sexual behaviour and marriage.

Read more less

As mentioned in The Times Travel Book Club 2020Award winning writer Paul Theroux embarks on a journey that, though closer to home than most of his expeditions, uncovers some surprising truths about Britain and the British people in the '80s in The Kingdom by the Sea: A Journey Around the Coast of Great Britain. Paul Theroux's round-Britain travelogue is funny, perceptive and 'best avoided by patriots with high blood pressure...'After eleven years living as an American in London, Paul Theroux set out to travel clockwise round the coast and find out what Britain and the British are really like. It was 1982, the summer of the Falklands War, the ideal time, he found, to surprise the British into talking about themselves. The result makes superbly vivid and engaging reading.'A sharp and funny descriptive writer. One of his golden talents, perhaps because he is American and therefore classless in British eyes, is the ability to chat up and get on with all sorts and conditions of British. . . Theroux is a good companion' The Times'Filled with history, insights, landscape, epiphanies, meditations, celebrations and laments' The New York Times'Few of us have seen the entirety of the coast and I for one am grateful to Mr Theroux for making my journey unnecessary. He describes it all brilliantly and honestly' Anthony Burgess, ObserverAmerican travel writer Paul Theroux is known for the rich descriptions of people and places that is often streaked with his distinctive sense of irony; his other non-fiction titles, Riding the Iron Rooster, The Happy Isles of Oceania, Sunrise with Seamonsters, The Tao of Travel, Ghost Train to the Eastern Star, The Old Patagonian Express, The Great Railway Bazaar, Dark Star Safari, Fresh-air Fiend, Sir Vidia's Shadow, The Pillars of Hercules, and his novels and collections of short stories, including the James Tait Black Memorial Prize winner The Mosquito Coast are available from Penguin.

Read more less

THE NO. 1 BESTSELLER''Well worth a read if you want the inside track on life on the lower rungs of the tennis circuit. Warts and all.'' Judy Murray''As elegant and powerful as a Federer backhand ... It's Kitchen Confidential for tennis.'' Ed Caesar''A really wonderful read ... Conor Niland has delivered an all-timer for tennis and sports journalism'' Ashlee Vance''Conor Niland may only have managed a career-high ranking of 129 only? that is some achievement in itself! but The Racket, his account of how he managed this, is up there with the best half-dozen books on tennis ever written.'' Geoff DyerGenuinely such a brilliant book, a brilliant read' Ciarán Murphy, Second Captains PodcastOne of the best Irish sports books of the last decade' Kieran Shannon, Irish Examiner''If it''s not a contender for Sports Book

Read more less

The new collection from ''one of America''s most legendary living poets'' (Ocean Vuong), written in the drive to fall in love with the world again not as it was, but as it iswhen the hammerapproached we thought is that thing coming this wayBreathing, moving, living on the page, CAConrad's exhilarating work is centred on the (Soma)tic ritual, their celebrated practice which draws on nature, crystals, meditation and interactions with strangers to create an extreme present' of unfettered creativity from which poems can emerge.Listen to the Golden Boomerang Return gathers the results of a single new ritual, focused on fellow animals who have found ways to thrive in the Anthropocene, and spanning environments from Seattle a city built in the midst of an abundant nontropical rainforest to the Mojave Desert. The poet receives gifts from a crow; associates different parts of their body with nine different species encountered in the dese

Read more less

But she isn't here, no one is here. And I have a terror of being alone, in this building, in London, in the world.Neffy is a young woman running away from grief and guilt, and the one big mistake that has derailed her career. When a debilitating new virus sweeps across the globe, volunteering in a vaccine trial offers her a way to make up for her past. But then, the virus mutates, and the future she had dreamed for herself is gone.As the London streets outside the medical unit fall silent, and food begins to run out, Neffy must decide where safety lies. Might she find solace by revisiting her own heady memories of the past? Can she trust the strangers trapped inside with her - despite her growing suspicions? Or is her best chance of a future to be found in the terrifyingly unknown world outside?Haunting and compelling, The Memory of Animals is a novel about freedom and captivity, survival and sacrifice, and what we cling to when everything else has been taken away, from the Costa Award

Read more less

In her juicy debut novel, international recording artist Pia Mia gives an intimate, insider peek at love, the ups and downs of fame in the music industry and living life in the Hollywood spotlight----Sand in my toes, wind in my hair, and my friends by my side. . . What more could I ask for? Princess came to LA to make something of herself, to share her music and find real loveShe''s got an amazing squad of friends and a certain blue-eyed man who she can''t get out of her head. With a new single just released, everyone wants a piece of her: party invitations, paparazzi and custom couture dresses abound. She''s living her California dream. But Hollywood isn''t exactly what she thought it would be. Behind closed doors, there''s lies and loneliness disguised by smiles and laughter. It''s hard to know who to trust, or what''s fake and what''s real. Princess just wants success on her own terms but needs to make sure

Read more less

A chilling slasher from a razor-sharp new horror voice, perfect for fans of Grady Hendrix and the Scream franchiseA creepy, twisty, compulsively readable haunted house of a book built from horror movies and our obsessive response to them. Be sure to make the popcorn and dim the lights' Paul Tremblay, author of A Head Full of Ghosts ---- Journalist Laura Warren arrives in L.A. to report on a remake of a ''90s horror flick. A cursed one, which she happened to star in as a child. When eight of the cast and crew died in ways that eerily mirrored the movie''s on-screen deaths, a traumatised Laura left and changed her entire identity. But just as she reaches the set, a man falls from a building right in front of her. It''s happening again. This time, Laura is determined to end the curse once and for all. If it doesn''t come for her first . . .

Read more less