Search results for ""Quercus Publishing""

Natalie Barney,'the wild girl of Cincinnati', and Romaine Brooks were both rich, American and grandly lesbian. They met in Paris in 1915 and their tempestuous affair lasted more than fifty years. By the end of their lives together, Natalie and Romaine had entertained, slept with, fallen in love with, tutored or tortured a range of figures including Gertrude Stein, Colette, Edith Sitwell, Gabriele d'Annunzio and the ballerina Ida Rubinstein. But among this tumult there was an enduring and loving relationship that supported a liberating spirit of culture, style and candour. In this vivid double biography, Souhami writes with complexity and skill, drawing the reader into a different world and capturing for ever her subjects' extraordinary lives.

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The Greek Myths contains some of the most thrilling, romantic and unforgettable stories in all human history. From Achilles rampant on the fields of Troy, to the gods at sport on Mount Olympus, from Icarus flying too close to the sun, to the superhuman feats of Heracles, Theseus and the wily Odysseus, these timeless tales exert a fascination and inspiration that have endured for millennia. There are few people as steeped in the Ancient World as Robin and Kathryn Waterfield, and in their hands the heroism, humour, mystery, sensuality and brutality of the Greek Myths are brought brilliantly to life.

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'I wish it was science fiction, but I know it's not.' Jaan Tallinn, co-founder of Skype'If you read just one book that makes you confront scary high-tech realities that we'll soon have no choice but to address, make it this one.' Washington Post Corporations and government agencies around the world have for years been pouring billions into achieving AI's Holy Grail - human-level intelligence. But once AI has attained it, scientists argue, it will have survival drives much like our own. We may be forced to compete with a rival more cunning, more powerful, and more alien than we can imagine.First published ten years ago, Our Final Invention predicted much of the artificial 'intelligence explosion' that is now ripping through our culture, and was named by Elon Musk as one of five books everyone should read about the future. Now with an urgent new preface, James Barrat's landmark work explores the ethics, history and future perils of the heedless pursuit of advanced AI. Until now, human intelligence has had no rival. Can we coexist with beings whose intelligence dwarfs our own? And will they allow us to?

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From Kate Golden, author of the instant bestseller and viral phenomenon A Dawn of Onyx, comes the next seductive, sweeping, action-packed installment in her addictive Sacred Stones trilogy.A prophecy of death. A weapon of hope. A sacrifice of love.Arwen Valondale is sailing for the mysterious Kingdom of Citrine after the battle of Siren''s Bay. Reeling from shocking revelations and her newfound powers, Arwen directs all of her pain and rage toward the man who betrayed her: King Kane Ravenwood.Kane''s presence is unavoidable as he travels with Arwen and her friends to seek the Blade of the Sun, a legendary weapon inextricably tied to her fate and the future of the realm. Even an uneasy truce proves difficult as Arwen fights against her unresolved feelings for Kane, who is willing to become darkness itself to protect her.As Arwen faces creatures, foes, and magic beyond her wildest imaginings, she must discover the secrets of her past to de

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From TikTok phenomenon Whitney Hanson, a brand-new collection of poems exploring the progression of a life through the elements of musicIn this collection of all new poems, Whitney Hanson explores the progression of a life through the lens of music. We each begin with a simple note, but as life progresses, we're led to the next note, and the next - all of which combine to form the melody of a song and the cadence of a life. As life becomes more complicated and complex, we find that loss, grief, and heartache can muffle our music, making the world go silent. But as Whitney's poems show, all of these rests and pauses in the music are part of the magnificent composition of life.Broken into four sections - melody, rest, crescendo, and harmony - the poems in Harmony explore childhood, friendship, grief, acceptance, and peace. The result is a collection that emphasizes the beauty of living a life at peace with all its musical variations.

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From Tiktok phenomenon Whitney Hanson, a revised edition of her bestselling Home, now with a new introduction and more than a dozen new poems"the bees aren't going to go awaybut they are going to change with yousometimes they will be chaoticsometimes they will restsometimes they will give you sweet honeyand sometimes they will remind youof how much love can stingbut if you can find a home within yourselfand make peace with your beesyou will be alright"--from HomeResonant, raw, and vibrant, Home is a lyrical map to navigating heartbreak. Tracing the stages of healing - from the despair that comes with the end of a relationship to the eventual light and liberation that comes with time - the poems in Home provide comfort and solace, while revitalizing your soul - and helping you make peace with your bees.'I would buy it again!' 5* reader review'This book is everything I needed and more' 5* reader review'Best poet out there' 5* reader review'This book did wonders for my mental health and heartbreak' 5* reader review'Can't wait for what Whitney writes next' 5* reader review

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From the bestselling author of THE GREATCOATS: seven war mages with dark pasts must come together to fight an unknown enemy - but the stakes are higher than anyone can imagine . . . and someone's setting the seven up for a fall. Picture a wizard. Go ahead, close your eyes. There he is, see? Skinny old guy with a long straggly beard. The hat's a must, too, right? Big, floppy thing. Wouldn't want a simple steel helmet or something that might, you know, protect the part of him most needed for conjuring magical forces from being bashed in with a mace (or pretty much any household object). Yep. Behold the mighty wizard. Now open your eyes and let me show you what a real war mage looks like . . . but be warned: you're probably not going to like it, because we're violent, angry, dangerously broken people who sell our skills to the highest bidder and be damned to any moral or ethical considerations. My name is Cade Ombra, and though I currently make my living as a mercenary wonderist, I used to have a far more noble-sounding job title - until I discovered the people I worked for weren't quite as noble as I'd believed. Now I'm on the run and my only friend, a homicidal thunder mage, has invited me to join him on a suicide mission against the seven deadliest mages on the continent. Time to recruit some very bad people to help us on this job . . .

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'A great introduction to the subject and a fascinating read.'- James Friedlander-Boss, Brand Experience Manager, vvast'An accessible but comprehensive introduction to UX Design.' - Dave Watson, Norwich University of the ArtsWe all engage with digital user experience design and user interfaces every day - if you are reading this on an e-commerce platform then you are doing it right now. This is an invaluable introduction for designers and creatives on how to create successful digital environments for users.The discipline of design is increasingly carried out in the virtual sphere, with a greater emphasis on user interaction and user experience than ever before. This book takes students through the crucial stages and skills that are needed for creating successful interactive digital environments, including:- Data collection- User analysis - Testing- Creating valid content- Design for different devices and platforms- Prototyping and visualizationVisual examples range from screen shots to diagrams and physical prototypes, while case studies featuring digital agencies and creatives from around the world show how they approach each project.

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***As featured on Dr Rangan Chatterjee's FEEL BETTER, LIVE MORE podcast***"Loads of practical guidance, all the scientific studies . . . beautiful photos and illustrations" Dr Rangan Chatterjee A beautifully illustrated exploration of cold-water traditions in Scandinavia and around the world, and a factual, scientific account of why winter swimming gives such a boost to body and soul.Whether in lake, lido, river or sea, we know the benefits of swimming outdoors and in nature - environmentally friendly and accessible, it can influence our happiness, our energy and our inner tranquility, and give us that winter glow.Danish scientist Dr Susanna Søberg leads us step by step into the icy water and explains the "cold-shock response", the massive endorphin rush as our body reacts and adapts to very cold temperatures through the winter season. Not only do our circulation, heart, lungs and skin respond positively, but our immune system, metabolism and mental health too. In particular she explains how our "brown fat" is activated to benefit multiple health conditions.Winter swimming is fast becoming one of our most popular pastimes. This beautifully illustrated exploration of cold-water traditions in Scandinavia and around the world shows how it can have a significant positive impact on our physical and mental health, confidence and well-being, providing such a boost to body and soul.Praise for Winter Swimming:"Full of brilliant insights . . . an inspiring book" Stylist Christmas Gift Guide 2022"It's all the encouragement you need to dip a toe in icy waters" Woman & Home"Packed with stunning photography" Red Magazine"A perfect gift" My Weekly"A blend of how, and why, and what . . . A beautiful celebration . . . Visual inspiration for anyone hovering on the edge" Sunday Independent"Take an uplifting dip into Winter Swimming" Stylist's "Ultra List"Translated from the Danish by Elizabeth DeNoma

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France''s favourite country cop, Bruno, faces a dangerous threat to the town he polices and the people he protects. Loved by millions, the Dordogne Mysteries are the perfect mix of mystery and escapism.The event of the Périgord tourist season is the re-enactment of the liberation of the historic town of Sarlat from the English in 1370. But it all goes wrong when the man playing the part of the victorious French general collapses in a pool of blood.The question for chief of police Bruno is was this an accident - or deliberate? The stakes rise when Bruno learns that the man, Kerquelin, was running Frenchelon, the secret French electronic intelligence base nearby, after being recruited from a brilliant Silicon Valley career.As he investigates, Bruno discovers that Kerquelin''s wound was faked, that he is alive and well and secretly negotiating a massive deal to build a semi-conductor industry in France. But then a whole new and dangerous player emerges,

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"Anti-Semitism revisited in a wholly original way" Philippe Sands"Rippling with ideas on every page" Jewish Chronicle"Tackles the issue [of anti-semitism] from the perspective of a country where its manifestations have been more vicious and deadly" Financial TimesRabbi Delphine Horvilleur analyses the phenomenon of anti-semitism as it is viewed by those who endure it and who, through narration and literature, succeed in overcoming it. Jewish texts are replete with treatments of anti-semitism, of this endlessly paradoxical hatred, and of the ways in which Jews are perceived by others. But here, the focus is inverted: Anti-Semitism Revisited explores the hatred of Jews as seen through the lens of the sacred texts, rabbinical tradition and Jewish lore. Delphine Horvilleur gives a voice to those who are too often deprived of one, examining resilience in the face of adversity and the legacy of an ancient hatred that is often misunderstood. An engaging, hopeful and very original examination of anti-semitism: what it means, where it comes from, what are the ancient myths and tropes that are weaponised against Jewish people, and how do we take them apart.Translated from the French by David Bellos

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What qualities made the Duke of Wellington a strategic genius? How did Oliver Cromwell, a gentleman farmer create an army that overthrew a king and changed the course of British history? Why was Simon Bolivar able to overcome early reverses to become the greatest figure in the Latin American struggle against Spanish colonialism? The answers to these and a myriad other fascinating questions can be found in Great Commanders of the Early Modern World, a sumptuous chronological survey of the 25 greatest commanders of the early modern world. Compiled by an distinguished team of historians (including such names as Antonia Fraser, Saul David and Stephen Brumwell) working under the general editorship of Andrew Roberts, Great Commanders of the Early Modern World is an authoritative and beautifully illustrated account of the lives and careers of the 25 greatest military commanders of the period, from the Duke of Marlborough to Napoleon Bonaparte, from Robert Clive to Carl von Clausewitz, and from Frederick the Great to Shaka Zulu. Every commander is profiled in a concise and informative 3000-word article which not only brings its subject vividly to life via a lively, fact-driven narrative, but also analyses and assesses his tactical and strategic gifts. As accessible and informative as it is rigorous and scholarly, Great Commanders of the Early Modern World is the perfect introduction to its subject for the layperson - but also a stimulating and thought-provoking read for those with greater knowledge of military history. With its companion volumes, focusing on the great commanders of the ancient, medieval and modern eras, it forms an indispensable guide to the greatest generals the world has seen.

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THE INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLERThe complete history of the world, from the beginning of time to the present day, based on the beliefs and writings of the secret societies.Jonathan Black examines the end of the world and the coming of the Antichrist - or is he already here? How will he make himself known and what will become of the world when he does? - and the end of Time. Having studied theology and learnt from initiates of all the great secret societies of the world, Jonathan Black has learned that it is possible to reach an altered state of consciousness in which we can see things about the way the world works that hidden from our everyday commonsensical consciousness. This history shows that by using secret techniques, people such as Leonardo da Vinci, Isaac Newton and George Washington have worked themselves into this altered state - and been able to access supernatural levels of intelligence. This book will leave you questioning every aspect of your life and spotting hidden messages in the very fabric of society and life itself. It will open your mind to a new way of living and leave you questioning everything you have been taught - and everything you've taught your children.

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"I have never read anything that so fully and perfectly captured the personal experience and the personal aftermath of war" P. J. O'RourkeA young, devil-may-care Englishman reporting on the Soviet war makes a fateful commitment to a swashbuckling Afghan guerrilla commander. Not only will he go inside the capital secretly and live in the network of safe houses run by the resistance, he will travel around the city in a Soviet Army jeep, dressed as a Russian officer. Waiting in the mountain camp, from where Niazuldin's band of fighters lived and planned their hit-and-run attacks on Soviet troops, Ed Gorman discovers what it means to experience combat with men whose only interest is to be killed or martyred.After that summer in Kabul province the young freelancer became a staff reporter for The Times, covering conflicts in Northern Ireland, the Gulf, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and the Balkans, but Afghanistan never let him go. Death of a Translator is a searingly honest description of a mind haunted and eventually paralysed by the terror of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder."Death of a Translator is a powerful and personal read. Ed Gorman discusses his experiences in an incredibly open and moving way. His story is an example to us all" - Brigadier Ed Butler CBE, DSOWith a new preface by Ed Gorman

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'Arditti is a master storyteller who uses his theological literacy sparingly to deliver a challenging but enthralling read' GuardianAward-winning, bestselling author Michael Arditti's tenth novel, documenting the history of homophobia and religion.God's vengeance on the wicked city of Sodom is a perennial source of fascination and horror. Michael Arditti's passionate and enthralling new novel explores the enduring power of the myth in five momentous epochs.A young Judean exile transcribes the Acts of Abraham and Lot in ancient Babylon; the Guild of Salters presents a mystery play of Lot's Wife in medieval York; Botticelli paints the Destruction of Sodom for a court in Renaissance Florence; a bereaved rector searches for the Cities of the Plain in nineteenth century Palestine; a closeted gay movie star portrays Lot in a controversial biblical epic in 1980s Hollywood. With its interrelated narratives and interwoven documents, Of Men and Angels is both formally inventive and imaginatively rich. Abounding in characters as vivid as they are varied, from temple prostitutes and palace eunuchs, through fanatical friars and humanist poets, to Bedouin tribesmen, Russian exiles and, of course, angels, this is a novel of breathtaking scope, penetrating insight and profound human sympathy.

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"Intense, riotous, funny, sexy and thrilling . . . Renberg is a great writer" MATT HAIG"An exceptional novel . . . majestic page-turner" KARL OVE KNAUSGAARDPal has a shameful secret that has dragged him into huge debt, much more than he can ever hope to pay back on his modest salary as a civil servant. He's desperate that nobody finds out especially not his teenage daughters or his ex-wife. It's time to get creative. Sixteen-year-old Sandra also has a secret. She's in love with the impossibly charming delinquent Daniel William, a love so strong and pure that nothing can get in its way. Not her concerned parents, not Jesus, and certainly not some other girl. Cecilie has the biggest secret of them all, a baby growing inside her. She can only hope that her boyfriend Rudi is the child's father. But although she loves him intensely, she feels trapped in their small-time criminal existence, and dreams of an escape from it all. Over three fateful September days, these lives cross in a whirlwind of brutality, laughter, tragedy and love that will change them forever. A fast-paced, moving and darkly funny page-turner about people who are trying to fill the holes in their lives, See You Tomorrow combines horror and hope, heavy metal music and literary marvels to become a startlingly original, eerie and hilarious novel about friendship, crime, loneliness and tragic death.Translated from the Norwegian by Sean KinsellaWINNER OF AN ENGLISH PEN AWARD

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Parma. A multiple pile-up occurs on the autostrada into the city. A truck transporting cattle skids off the road. Dozens of cows and bulls go on the rampage, injured and crazed. In the chaos, the burned body of a young woman is found at the side of the road. Her death has no apparent link to the carnage. Commissario Soneri is assigned the case. It is a welcome distraction: his mercurial lover Angela has decided to pursue other options, leaving him even more morose than usual. The dead woman is identified as Nina Iliescu, a Romanian immigrant whose beauty had enchanted a string of wealthy lovers. Temptress, muse, angel - she was all things to all men. Her murder conceals a crime and a sacrilege, and even in death she has a surprise waiting for Soneri.

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The Buddha taught that to live is to experience suffering. Few family sagas, especially first ones, have captured this aspect of suffering and so many other truths in as lyric a fashion as "When Memory Dies". Through the viewpoints of three generations of a Sri Lankan family (taking the reader from 1920 through the 1980s), Sivanandan explores a culture destroyed first by colonization, then through the ethnic divisions that are released when the country achieves independence. The family, which lives at a level of poverty that makes survival a constant struggle, must also balance love for one another with a deep love of their homeland. Without bending to romanticism or proselytization, the author evokes a compelling and very human story of a lost country. It is a vision as beautifully told as it is unrelenting in its devotion to truth. In the process, the work also supplies a rich historic background to the often underreported news accounts of the massacres and upheavals in Sri Lanka.

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"I have read few autobiographies more extraordinary . . . Astonishing" OBSERVER"A classic. I preferred it to Primo Levi's If This is a Man" EDWARD WILSON"A child's clear-eyed journey to hell" ANNE SEBBAThis is a story of a young boy's journey from a sleepy provincial town in Hungary during the Second World War to the concentration camp in Bergen-Belsen. After a winter in Bergen-Belsen where his father died, he and his mother were liberated by the Americans outside a small German village, and handed over to the Red Army. They escaped from the Russians, and travelled, hiding on a goods train, through Prague to Budapest. Unlike other books dealing with this period, this is not a Holocaust story, but a child's recollection of a journey full of surprise, excitement, bereavement and terror. Yet this remains a testimony of survival, overcoming obstacles which to adults may seem insurmountable but to a child were just part of an adventure and, ultimately, recovery. After having established a career in the West, the author decided to revisit the stages on his earlier journeys, reliving the past through the perspective of the present. Along the way, ghosts from the past are finally laid to rest by the kindness of new friends.With an introduction by Lisa Appignanesi

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The players in this deadly-serious game of Monopoly will stop at nothing.In Pondange, Lorraine, the Korean Daewoo group manufactures cathode ray tubes. Working conditions are abysmal, but as it's the only source of employment in this bleak former iron and steel-manufacturing region, the workers daren't protest. Until a strike breaks out, and there's a fire at the factory. But is it an accident? The Pondange factory is at the centre of a strategic battle being played out in Paris, Brussels and Asia for the takeover of the ailing state-owed electronic giant, Thomson. Unexpectedly the Matra-Daewoo alliance wins the bid. Rival contender Alcatel believes there's foul play involved and brings in the big guns led by its head of security service. Intrepid private cop Charles Montoya is called to Lorraine to investigate, and explosive revelations follow - dirty tricks, blackmail and murder.

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A magnificent debut novel, which follows in the spirit of Conrad's Heart of Darkness, in which an alienated student named Lopez joins the Vietnam war to escape from his past and himself. Forced out of self-pity by the brutality and injustice surrounding him, Lopez begins to shed his layers of acquired culture, identifying instead with the Vietnamese and their cause. 'Stylistically sophisticated, visually and emotionally present; the pace is good and the author knows how to hold the reader's attention.' y

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"Larsson is one of the best current practitioners of Scandinavian crime fiction" Financial Times"A masterful storyteller . . . An astute social commentator" Sunday ExpressWinner of the Best Swedish Crime Novel of the Year 2021 (Swedish Crime Writers' Academy)Winner of the Storytel Award for Best Suspense Novel 2021Winner of the Adlibris Award for Best Suspense Novel 2021 Forensic pathologist Lars Pohjanen has only a few weeks to live when he asks Rebecka Martinsson to investigate a murder that has long since passed the statute of limitations. A body found in a freezer at the home of the deceased alcoholic, Henry Pekkari, has been identified as a man who disappeared without a trace in 1962: the father of Swedish Olympic boxing champion Börje Ström. Rebecka wants nothing to do with a fifty-year-old case - she has enough to worry about. But how can she ignore a dying man's wish?When the post-mortem confirms that Pekkari, too, was murdered, Rebecka has a red-hot investigation on her hands. But what does it have to do with the body kept in his freezer for decades? Meanwhile, the city of Kiruna is being torn down and moved a few kilometres east, to make way for the mine that has been devouring the city from below. With the city in flux, the tentacles of organized crime are slowly taking over . . .Fragile yet fierce Rebecka Martinsson returns in a spellbinding addition to the Arctic Murders series, now a Walter Presents drama for television.Translated from the Swedish by Frank Perry

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'Joyful, funny and vividly alive' Emily St John Mandel'The Lonely Hearts Hotel sucked me right in and only got better and better . . . I began underlining truths I had hungered for' Miranda July'Makes me think of comets and live wires . . . raises goosebumps' Helen Oyeyemi'A fairytale laced with gunpowder' Kelly Link The Lonely Hearts Hotel is a love story with a difference. Set throughout the roaring twenties, it is a wicked fairytale of circus tricks and child prodigies, radical chorus girls, drug-addicted musicians and brooding clowns, set in an underworld whose economy hinges on the price of a kiss. It is the tale of two dreamers, abandoned in an orphanage where they were fated to meet. Here, in the face of cold, hunger and unpredictable beatings, Rose and Pierrot create a world of their own, shielding the spark of their curiosity from those whose jealousy will eventually tear them apart. When they meet again, each will have changed, having struggled through the Depression, through what they have done to fill the absence of the other. But their childhood vision remains - a dream to storm the world, a spectacle, an extravaganza that will lift them out of the gutter and onto a glittering stage. Heather O'Neill's pyrotechnical imagination and language are like no other. In this she has crafted a dazzling circus of a novel that takes us from the underbellies of war-time Montreal and Prohibition New York, to a theatre of magic where anything is possible - where an orphan girl can rule the world, and a ruined innocence can be redeemed.

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1635, Aberdeen. A girl lies dead in a frozen garden. A young man goes missing after a drunken brawl. A sinister cloaked figure watches from the shadows. The missing student, son of a Highland chief, is in Alexander Seaton's class. When the young man's companion turns up bruised and bloodied, suspicion mounts that he has murdered his friend. But Alexander is convinced that there's another explanation. Drawn ever deeper into the mystery, Alexander realises that the man in the shadows is known to him and that the strange events in the town are linked to his own past.

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Elijah, seven years old, is covered in scars and has a history of disruptive behaviour. His adoptive mother Nikki believes that she and her husband Obi are strong enough to accept his difficulties - and that being white will not affect her ability to raise a black son. Elijah's birth mother Deborah loves her son like the world has never known. Elijah thinks it's his fault they can't be together. Each of them faces more challenges than they could have dreamed, but just as Elijah starts to settle in, a shocking event rocks their fragile peace and the result is devastating.

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In the final days of the Second World War, Michael Rogan, an American intelligence officer, is tortured by a group of seven senior Gestapo officers who need to discover the secrets he alone can give them. Ten years later, when he has recovered from the appalling injuries he suffered, and determined to revenge the death of his wife at the hands of the same men, he begins a quest to track down and kill each one of his tormentors. Dark, violent, and graphic, this is an addictive thriller about how far one man will go to exact his own justice. Written a year before Puzo completed The Godfather, published under a pseudonym and only very recently brought to light, Six Graves to Munich bears all the hallmarks of a master storyteller.

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J.M.W. Turner's The Fighting Temeraire Tugged to her Last Berth to be Broken Up (1838) was his masterpiece. Sam Willis tells the real-life story behind this remarkable painting. The 98-gun Temeraire warship broke through the French and Spanish line directly astern of Nelson's flagship Victory during the Battle of Trafalgar (1805), saving Nelson at a crucial moment in the battle, and, in the words of John Ruskin, fought until her sides ran 'wet with the long runlets of English blood...those pale masts that stayed themselves up against the war-ruin, shaking out their ensigns through the thunder, till sail and ensign dropped.' It is a story that unites the art of war as practised by Nelson with the art of war as depicted by Turner and, as such, it ranges across an extensive period of Britain's cultural and military history in ways that other stories do not. The result is a detailed picture of British maritime power at two of its most significant peaks in the age of sail: the climaxes of both the Seven Years' War (1756-63) and the Napoleonic Wars (1798-1815). It covers every aspect of life in the sailing navy, with particular emphasis on amphibious warfare, disease, victualling, blockade, mutiny and, of course, fleet battle, for it was at Trafalgar that the Temeraire really won her fame. An evocative and magnificent narrative history by a master historian.

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Somebody in Laos is wooing and wedding country girls - and then killing them on honeymoon and binding their bodies to trees. The horror of what this monster does to his victims appals Dr Siri and his morgue team and they vow revenge. But they're distracted by the disappearance of itinerant Crazy Rajid. Siri has been getting premonitions that he's in danger. A trail of elaborate clues and remarkable disclosures about the Indian's past lead them to Vientiane's most ancient temple - and a terrible discovery.

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The Victorians called him 'Bobby' after Sir Robert Peel, the Home Secretary who created the Metropolitan Police in 1829. The generations that followed came to regard the force in which he served as 'the best police in the world'. If twenty-first century observers sometimes take a more jaundiced view of his efforts, the blue-helmeted, unarmed policeman remains an icon of Britishness, and a symbol of the relatively peaceful nature of our social evolution. In The Great British Bobby, Clive Emsley traces the development of Britain's forces of law and order from the earliest watchmen and constables of the pre-modern period to the police service of today. He examines in detail such milestones in police history as the establishment of the Bow Street Runners in the 1740s, the Police Acts of 1839, the introduction of women police officers during the First World War, and the Macpherson Report of 1999 into the death of Stephen Lawrence. Threaded through his narrative are case-studies of real-life Bobbies, drawn from police archives, evoking the day-to-day reality of the policeman's lot over two and a half centuries: the boredom of patrolling on foot in all weathers, the threats to life and limb of policing rough areas, and the diverse historical challenges of industrial unrest, the growth of cities, the arrival of the motor car and the ethnic diversification of society. From Robert Grubb, patrolling the mean streets of Georgian London with rattle and cudgel, to Norwell Roberts, the first black officer to be appointed to the Metropolitan Police, The Great British Bobby presents a cast of mostly honest coppers performing a testing role to the best of their ability. A distinguished historian and criminologist, Clive Emsley is ideally placed to tell - candidly but affectionately - the fascinating story of Britain's police force. The Great British Bobby is nothing less than a social history of Britain over the last 250 years, viewed through the prism of one of its most remarkable and distinctive institutions.

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MI5 officer Liz Carlyle is posted to Northern Ireland. From the moment she lands in Belfast, danger follows. She soon discovers that the peace process in the province is precarious. Then a source reports strange goings-on at a house on the Irish Sea owned by the Fraternity, an organisation Liz suspects of being a front for renegade former IRA men. Its head is Seamus Piggott, an Irish-American with a gun-running past. When another informant reports a plot is being hatched against the security forces, Liz and her colleague Dave Armstrong suspect Piggott is involved, along with a former French Intelligence officer. Moving from London to Belfast to the South of France, the latest Stella Rimington Liz Carlyle novel is a propulsive thriller filled with action and nail-biting suspense.

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In celebration of the Glyndebourne Festival, Jeanette Winterson has brought together some of the best loved and most critically acclaimed authors writing today to pen stories inspired by opera. Includes an introduction by Jeanette Winterson, Alexander McCall Smith on Cosi Fan Tutte, Ali Smith on Fidelio, Andrew Motion on Peter Grimes, Andrew O'Hagan on Eugene Onegin, Anne Enright on La Boheme, Antonia Fraser on The Marriage of Figaro, Colm Toibin on Pearl Fishers, Jackie Kay on The Makropulos Affair, Joanna Trollope on L'Elisir d'Amore, Julie Myerson on Ariadne auf Naxos, Jeanette Winterson on La Fanciulla del West, Kate Atkinson on La Traviata, Kate Mosse on Pelleas et Melisande, Lynne Truss on The Turn of the Screw, Marina Warner on Dido and Aeneas, Paul Bailey on The Makropulos Affair, Posy Simmonds, 'Midsummer Night at Glyndebourne', Ruth Rendell on Theodora, Sebastian Barry on Natoma, Toby Litt on Don Giovanni.

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When Marie moves from her family's waxwork museum into the palace of Versailles, her whole life is set to change...When Marie Tussaud learns the exciting news the royal family will be visiting her famed wax museum, the Salon de Cire, she never dreams that the king's sister will request her presence at Versailles: as a royal tutor in wax sculpting. As Marie familiarizes herself with Princess Elisabeth and begins to know Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI, she witnesses the glamorous life of court, a very different world from her home on the Boulevard du Temple of Paris where bread can only be had on the black market and men sell their teeth to put food on the their tables. The year is 1788 and men like Desmoulins, Marat, and Robespierre are meeting in the salons of Paris speaking against the monarchy; there's whispered talk of revolution. Spanning five years from budding revolution to the Reign of Terror, Madame Tussaud brings us into the world of an incredible heroine whose talent for wax moulding saved her life and preserved the faces of a vanished kingdom.

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Sean Carroll explores how evolution has shaped nature's wondrous complexity and diversity, from insects to octopuses, from mice to men.We not only share nearly 99% of our genes with chimps, we also have some 35% in common with daffodils. Throughout much of the animal and even plant kingdoms, almost the same ancient genes code for almost the same proteins. And further, to everyone's astonishment, the genes involved in making the complex eyes of fruitflies are close matches to those involved in making the very different eyes of octopuses and people. So what leads to the nature's 'endless forms most beautiful'? The key to this mystery is being unravelled by 'Evo Devo' or the new science of evolutionary development biology. By looking at how a single-celled egg gives rise to a complex, multi-billion celled animal, Evo Devo is illuminating exactly how new species - butterflies and zebras, trilobites and dinosaurs, apes and humans - are made and evolved. The key, it turns out, is all about location and timing... For anyone who has ever pondered 'where did I come from', Endless Forms Most Beautiful explores our history, both the journey we have all made from egg to adult, and the long trek from the origin of life to the very recent origin of our species.

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Conventional chronologies of world history concentrate on the reigns of kings and queens, the dates of battles and treaties, the publication dates of great books, the completion of famous buildings, the deaths of iconic figures, and the years of major discoveries. But there are other more interesting stories to tell - stories which can bring the past vividly and excitingly to life. Imagine a book that tells you the date of the ancient Roman law that made it legal to break wind at banquets; the name of the defunct medieval pope whose putrefying corpse was subjected to the humiliation of a trial before a court of law; the identity of the priapic monarch who sired more bastards than any other king of England; and last but not least the date of the demise in London of the first goat to have circumnavigated the globe - twice. Imagine a book crammed with such deliciously disposable information, and you have History without the Boring Bits. By turns bizarre, surprising, trivial, and enlightening, History without the Boring Bits offers rich pickings for the browser, and entertainment and inspiration aplenty for those who have grown weary of more conventional works of history.

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Legal Highs are without doubt the biggest drug scourge to blight the world since recreational drugs first hit the streets more than 100 years ago. Their growing menace opens up a new front in the drug war, shifting the battle line from the Colombian jungles, Moroccan valleys, Afghan hills and the Winnebagos of New Mexico to especially constructed laboratories on the outskirts of Shanghai and other cities across the globe.But who are the shadowy characters behind the extravagant new drugs such as 'bath salts' and 'Miaow Miaow'? The scientists, the rogue boffins, the factory sweat-shop workers, the smugglers, the suppliers, and, ultimately, the dealers who sell tens of millions of packets of these substances every week? Why are so many people from all walks of life now consuming Legal Highs in such large quantities? This book will go inside the lives of all these people to reveal for the first time the true stories behind the emergence of the most deadly narcotics the world has ever seen.

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Catch-22 meets The Brothers Karamazov in the last great satire of the Soviet EraThe Great Patriotic War is stumbling to a close, but a new darkness has fallen over Soviet Russia. And for a disparate, disconnected clutch of wanderers - many thousands of miles apart but linked by a common goal - four parallel journeys are just beginning.Gorych and his driver, rolling through water, sand and snow on an empty petrol tank; the occupant of a black airship, looking down benevolently as he floats above his Fatherland; young Andrey, who leaves his religious community in search of a new life; and Kharitonov, who trudges from the Sea of Japan to Leningrad, carrying a fuse that, when lit, could blow all and sundry to smithereens.Written in the final years of Communism, The Bickford Fuse is a satirical epic of the Soviet soul, exploring the origins and dead-ends of the Russian mentality from the end of World War Two to the Union's collapse. Blending allegory and fable with real events, and as deliriously absurd as anything Kurkov has written, it is both an elegy for lost years and a song of hope for a future not yet set in stone.Translated from the Russian by Boris Dralyuk

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From the #1 Amazon Charts bestselling author of Beneath a Scarlet SkyAs a CIA operative, Robin Monarch was the US government's most valuable asset. Nowadays, as a rogue international thief, he answers to only himself. So when Monarch finds himself in the darkest recesses of the Amazon jungle - very much against his own wishes - he is on unfamiliar terrain in more ways than one. THE PRIZE HE MUST STEAL. Deep within the Brazilian rainforest lies a secret of incalculable value to mankind. Robin Monarch must locate and extract this enigmatic treasure: not for greed or gain, but because a life, that of the woman dearest to him, is at stake. THE PERSON HE MUST SAVE. Sister Rachel Diego del Mar, the missionary who saved Monarch's life when he was a homeless orphan, has been kidnapped by a vengeful past adversary. If Monarch does not give his enemy the Amazon's secret, they will take her life. Unaccustomed to failure, and unprepared to let his nemesis prevail, Monarch has vowed to deliver - first the coveted prize, then his full, uncompromising retribution.

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In love and war, who can you trust? 1944, Hampshire. Her face still bearing the scars from the explosion at the factory, Rita Brown is nonetheless back on her feet. She's caught the eye of local wide boy Blackie Bristow, who's sweeping her around the country in a life of shady glamour. But there's a war on, and life is not all fun and games. Some of the local men are taking advantage of the topsy-turvy world to break more than just hearts, and standing up to them comes with its own costs. Rita keeps calm and carries on with a little help from her friends at the factory. But then she discovers someone there has been leaking secrets to the Germans. With D-Day on the horizon, Rita must work out who she can rely on - and fast.

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An enthralling, eventful WW2 saga from the popular writer of the Daisy Lane novels - perfect for fans of Daisy Styles. 1943, Gosport, Hampshire. Pixie Saunders is 19 and employed in the local armaments factory. Not for the first time, her mother has run off with a dodgy-looking bloke, leaving Pixie to pay the rent and fend for herself. Pixie, along with her best friend Rita, Em, the factory overseer, and the rest of the girls are making the most of the war while trying to stay alive. The work is dangerous and the hours long, but in the evenings they take off their overalls and go to the pub or, better still, go dancing. Pixie meets American serviceman Cal and falls in love. But then Cal rejoins his ship. When Pixie falls pregnant, her life changes dramatically. Alone and unable to work, she has to rely on the kindness of friends to help her survive. Happiness seems like a thing of the past. Little does she know that there are plenty of surprises waiting for her - good ones at that. Love may be closer than she thinks.

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'Wonderfully imaginative' Bernard Cornwell, author of The Last KingdomBritish Intelligence maverick James Keane goes undercover in Napoleon's Paris for his most daring espionage mission yet. Perfect for fans of Simon Scarrow and Bernard Cornwell.It's 1812, and one man is on the top of the world. Napoleon Bonaparte has enjoyed victories all over Europe and is rebuilding the glorious city of Paris. Meanwhile, his enemies struggle to keep alive the embers of rebellion that still burn at the city's heart. To aid this noble cause, a few British intelligence officers have been smuggled in, and James Keane is one of them.Keane finds himself at once adrift in a world of gambling houses and derelict cemeteries - of ex-Jacobites, disaffected French royalists, Irishmen and Americans, all of them voicing dissension. If Keane is to succeed, a means must be discovered by which to persuade these miscreants to rise against Napoleon's rule, without alerting the endless spies and informers that surround them. Forging alliances between unlikely collaborators proves especially difficult for Keane, whose honourable nature objects so strongly to this double-dealing. But he must persevere, or else lose the golden opportunity to aid in the defeat of the tyrannical French Emperor once and for all.WHAT READERS ARE SAYING 'Enthralling' *****'Full of intrigue' *****'I can't wait for the next in the series' *****

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'Darkly mesmerising' - LocusThe first in New York Times bestselling author Anne Bishop's captivating Black Jewels trilogy. The Darkness has had a Prince for a long, long time. Now the Queen is coming. For years the realm of Terreille has been falling into corruption, as the powerful Queens who rule it turned to cruelty.But there is hope. A prophetic vision has revealed the coming of a Queen more powerful than any before. And once the foundations of her power - father, brother, lover - are in place, she will emerge from the darkness, bringing freedom. For she is the living myth, dreams made flesh. Not just any witch, but Witch.

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A deeply atmospheric literary horror novel about the nature of repressed guilt, grief and fear. Daniel once had a baby brother, but he died, a long time ago now. And he had a wife and a daughter, but that didn't work out, so now he's alone. The easy monotony of his job as a milkman in the remote northwest of England demands nothing from him other than dealing with unreasonable customer demands and the vagaries of his enigmatic boss. But things are changing. Daniel's started having nightmares, seeing things that can't possibly be there - like the naked, emaciated giant with a black bag over its head which is so real he swears he could touch it . . . if he dared. It's not just at night bad things are happening, either, or just to him. Shaken and unnerved, he opens up to a local witch. She can't t discern the origins of his haunting, but she can provide him with a protective ward - a witch-bottle - if, in return, he will deliver her products on his rounds. But not everyone's happy to find people meddling with witch-bottles. Things are about to get very unpleasant . . . Witch Bottle is literary horror at its finest, perfect for fans of Andrew Michael Hurley's The Loney and Starve Acre.

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Why is it that the more advanced our society becomes, the unhappier we are?Seeking an answer from the only honest perspective, Tobias Jones and his wife opened up their family home and ten acre woodland to those going through crises in their lives, or suffering from depression, addiction and loneliness.They will encounter extraordinary people: from 'Roadkill Kev' to 'Mary Poppins'; build a chapel, raise pigs and encounter both violent antagonism and astounding generosity. At the same time, they will open themselves, their children and their ideals up to the most demanding of judgements and transformations.Five years on, they think they are on to something. To sit down to eat together, to work on the land, to have no tolerance for drugs but a lot of tolerance for change – it takes time and many mistakes, but they have found a way to help people.This is the story of how.

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Matthew Sobol is dead, but his final creation survives. It begins with a bizarre murder, where the only possible perpetrator happens to be dead. As more killings follow, the police are completely out of their depth. It falls to the unlikely partnership of Sebeck, a computer-illiterate cop, and Ross, an enigmatic hacker, to realise the scale of the imminent danger. The Daemon is seemingly unstoppable, and murder is the least of its capabilities. As it leaves a trail of death and destruction in its wake, Sebeck and Ross must face up to a terrifying possibility. Can they convince a disbelieving world to take drastic action, and shut down the Daemon before it is too late? Explosive, action-packed, terrifyingly relevant, Daemon redefines the high-concept thriller for the information age.

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Harry Boyd, a hard-bitten refugee from failure in Toronto television, has returned to a small radio station in Yellowknife, Northern Canada. There, in the summer of 1975, he falls in love with a voice on air, though the real woman, Dido Paris, is both a surprise and even more than he imagined. Dido and Harry are part of the cast of eccentric characters who form an unlikely group at the station. Their loves and longings, their rivalries and entanglements, the stories of their pasts and what brought each of them to the North, form the centre. One summer, on a canoe trip four of them make into the Arctic wilderness, they find the balance of love shifting, much as the balance of power in the North is being changed by the proposed Mackenzie Valley gas pipeline, threatening to displace Native people from their land. Hay brings to bear her skewering intelligence into the frailties of the human heart and her ability to tell a spellbinding story written in gorgeous prose and laced with dark humour.

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Play Better Golf takes an innovative, holistic approach to improving your golf game. By focusing on all aspects the game - technical, mental, physical and competitive - as well as building on your own strengths you will improve your scores and take your game to the next level. Easy-to-follow text, step-by-step instructions supported by clear photographic swing sequences and detailed illustrations make this the most accessible and comprehensive instruction handbook available. Contents include:Learning from the great players, The mental game, Putting, Short game, Swing, Getting out of trouble, Fitness, Equipment, Practice, Course management, Great courses and how to play them, The rules. Whether you are just starting out or looking to take your game to the limit, Colin Howe and his team of experts make Play Better Golf the indispensable guide for golfers of all levels of skill.

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'Like Angela Carter, she is relentlessly inventive' Sunday Times'Full of pathos, spirit and iridescent innocence' Independent on SundayThe first novel by the author of The Lonely Hearts Hotel12-year-old Baby is used to turmoil in her life. Her mother is long dead, her father is a junkie and they shuttle between rotting apartments and decrepit downtown hotels. As her father's addiction and paranoia grow worse, she begins a journey that will lead her through chaos and hardship; but Baby's remarkable strength of spirit enables her to survive. Smart, funny and determined to lift herself off the city's dirty streets, she knows that the only person she can truly rely upon is herself.

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Dortmunder's past comes back to haunt him when he returns home after an unsuccessful burglary and finds his old cellmate sitting in his living room. He needs Dortmunder's help in retrieving $700,000 that he'd buried in a small town 30 years before. The problem is that, while he sat in jail, the State of New York flooded the area to build a reservoir; the loot is now under a few feet of dirt and many feet of water. Being a man of great determination but few ethical principles, the thief plans to blow up the dam, emptying the reservoir but also flooding the inhabited countryside to get at his stash. Dortmunder pleads with him to be allowed to retrieve the money another way. His first attempt fails. And his second. And third. Meanwhile the thief is losing patience...

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