Search results for ""Profile Books Ltd""
Profile Books Ltd How to Deal With Idiots: (and stop being one yourself)
Idiocy is all around us, whether it's the uncle spouting conspiracy theories, the colleagues who repeat your point but louder, or the commuters who still don't know how to use an escalator. But what is the answer to this perpetual scourge? Here, philosopher Maxime Rovere turns his attention to the murkiest of intellectual corners. With warmth, wit and wisdom, he illuminates a new understanding of idiots, one which examines our relations to others and our own ego, offers tools and strategies to dismantle the most desperate of idiotic situations, and even reveals how to stop being the idiots ourselves (because we're always someone else's idiot). Expertly translated by David Bellos, this is an erudite, enjoyable and much-needed solution to a most familiar vexation.
£9.99
Profile Books Ltd The Artist's Way Workbook: A Companion to the International Bestseller
For the millions of people who have uncovered their creative selves through The Artist's Way: a workbook and companion to the international bestseller. In this elegantly redesigned and user-friendly volume you'll find: - More than 110 Artist's Way tasks - More than 50 Artist's Way check-ins - Insights into the creative process - New ideas for Morning Pages and Artist's Dates The Artist's Way Workbook is an indispensable book for anyone following the path to creativity laid out in The Artist's Way.
£16.99
Profile Books Ltd The Warriors
It's a hot 4th of July night in New York City. In the darkness of the Bronx, thousands of boys have gathered from all across the city. Among them are the warriors of the Coney Island Dominators. Ismael Rivera, leader of the Delancey Thrones, has called an assembly of New York's disparate youth gangs. Why should they keep taking it from the Man when they could be the ones giving it to everyone else? But when the assembly descends into violence, the Dominators are suddenly a very long way home from home. The Warriors follows the Dominators as they rape and murder their way back to Coney Island through the terrifying New York night. First published in 1965, Sol Yurick's bleak and shocking novel is a brutal tale of young men left to raise themselves, and an urgent warning about the animal savagery that emerges from the torn fabric of human society.
£9.99
Profile Books Ltd The Denial of Death
'It made me rethink the roots of our deepest fears and insecurities, and why we often disappoint ourselves in how we manifest them' Bill Clinton, Guardian Winner of the Pulitzer Prize in 1974 and the culmination of a life's work, The Denial of Death is Ernest Becker's brilliant and impassioned answer to the 'why' of human existence. In bold contrast to the predominant Freudian school of thought, Becker tackles the problem of the vital lie - man's refusal to acknowledge his own mortality. The book argues that human civilisation is a defence against the knowledge that we are mortal beings. Becker states that humans live in both the physical world and a symbolic world of meaning, which is where our 'immortality project' resides. We create in order to become immortal - to become part of something we believe will last forever. In this way we hope to give our lives meaning. In The Denial of Death, Becker sheds new light on the nature of humanity and issues a call to life and its living that still resonates decades after it was written.
£10.99
Profile Books Ltd She Comes First: The Thinking Man's Guide to Pleasuring a Woman
'There are some fantastic books out there that men should read ... It really worked' Coleen Nolan, ITV's Loose Women Did you know that the clitoris has 8000 nerve endings, twice as many as the penis? Here is everything you've wondered about the female orgasm and how to make it happen. A witty, well-researched and revealing guide to giving your lover an orgasm every time. More than just foreplay, Ian Kerner argues that oral sex is the key to a great sex life for both partners. Short sections cover philosophy, technique, step-by-step instructions and detailed anatomical information, essential to both beginners and experienced lovers. 'It's time to close the sex gap and create a level playing field in the exchange of pleasure, and cunnilingus is far more than just a means for achieving this noble end; it's the cornerstone of a new sexual paradigm, one that exuberantly extols a shared experience of pleasure, intimacy, respect and contentment. It's also one of the greatest gifts of love a man can bestow upon a woman.' Ian Kerner
£9.99
Profile Books Ltd Nuking the Moon: And Other Intelligence Schemes and Military Plots Best Left on the Drawing Board
"Compulsively readable laugh out loud history." Mary Roach Bomb-carrying bats. Poisoned flower arrangements. Cigars laced with mind-altering drugs. Listening devices implanted into specially-trained cats. A torpedo-proof aircraft carrier made out of ice and sawdust. And a CIA plan to detonate a nuclear bomb on the moon ... just because. In Nuking the Moon, Vince Houghton, Historian and Curator at the International Spy Museum, collects the most inspired, implausible and downright bizarre military intelligence schemes that never quite made it off the drawing board. From the grandly ambitious to the truly devious, they illuminate a new side of warfare, revealing how a combination of desperation and innovation led not only to daring missions and brilliant technological advances, but to countless plans and experiments that failed spectacularly. Alternatively terrifying and hilarious, and combining archival research with newly-conducted interviews, these twenty-six chapters reveal not only what might have happened, but also what each one tells us about the history and people around it. If 'military intelligence' makes you think of James Bond and ingenious exploding gadgets ... get ready for the true story.
£9.99
Profile Books Ltd The King's Cathedral: The ancient heart of Christ Church, Oxford
The cathedral church of Christ in Oxford - better known as Christ Church Cathedral - was established in 1546. It forms one half of Christ Church, the unique joint foundation of cathedral and university college created by King Henry VIII. Today's cathedral occupies the site of a monastery founded in the late seventh century by Frideswide, patron saint of Oxford and its university. In the early twelfth century it was re-founded as an Augustinian priory, and 400 years later it met its nemesis in Cardinal Thomas Wolsey, whose plan for an Oxford college grander than any other caused its dissolution. But when the cardinal fell from royal favour, the priory church was saved. The King's Cathedral is the first account of the convent, priory and cathedral for nearly a century. Judith Curthoys - author of two previous volumes on Christ Church - has drawn widely on scholarly research into the cathedral's archaeology, architecture and history for her fascinating and accessible new study of this historic building.
£31.50
Profile Books Ltd Stillness is the Key: An Ancient Strategy for Modern Life
The #1 New York Times Bestseller that shows why slowing down is the key to getting ahead 'Choose the focused inner stillness that Ryan champions' - Mark Manson #1 Bestselling author The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck 'Some authors give advice. Ryan Holiday distills wisdom. This book is a must read.' Cal Newport, New York Times bestselling author, Digital Minimalism 'A life-changing idea: that in order to move forward, we must learn to be still.' - Sophia Amoruso, cofounder and CEO, Girlboss Throughout history, there has been one quality that great leaders, makers, artists and fighters have shared. The Zen Buddhists described it as inner peace, the Stoics called it ataraxia and Ryan Holiday calls it stillness: the ability to be steady, focused and calm in a constantly busy world. Drawing on a wide range of history's greatest thinkers, Holiday shows us how crucial stillness is, and how it can be cultivated in our own lives today. Just as Winston Churchill, Oprah Winfrey and baseball player Sadaharu Oh have done, we can all benefit from stillness to feed into our greater ambitions - whether building a business or simply finding happiness, peace and self-direction. Stillness is the key to the self-mastery, discipline and focus necessary to succeed in this competitive, noisy world.
£10.99
Profile Books Ltd Trust Me I'm Lying: Confessions of a Media Manipulator
Recently, fake news has become real news, making headlines as its consequences become crushingly obvious in political upsets and global turmoil. But it's not new - you've seen it all before. A malicious online rumour costs a company millions. Politically motivated 'fake news' stories are planted and disseminated to influence elections. Some product or celebrity zooms from total obscurity to viral sensation. Anonymous sources and speculation become national conversation. What you don't know is that someone is responsible for all this. Usually, someone like Ryan Holiday: a media manipulator. Holiday wrote this book to explain how media manipulators work, how to spot their fingerprints, how to fight them, and how (if you must) to emulate their tactics. Why is he giving away these secrets? Because he's tired of a world where trolls hijack debates, marketers help write the news, reckless journalists spread lies, and no one is accountable for any of it. He's pulling back the curtain because it's time everyone understands how things really work.
£10.99
Profile Books Ltd How Democracy Ends
'Scintillating ... thought-provoking ... one of the very best of the great crop of recent books on the subject.' Andrew Rawnsley, Observer Democracy has died hundreds of times, all over the world. We think we know what that looks like: chaos descends and the military arrives to restore order, until the people can be trusted to look after their own affairs again. However, there is a danger that this picture is out of date. Until very recently, most citizens of Western democracies would have imagined that the end was a long way off, and very few would have thought it might be happening before their eyes as Trump, Brexit and paranoid populism have become a reality. David Runciman, one of the UK's leading professors of politics, answers all this and more as he surveys the political landscape of the West, helping us to spot the new signs of a collapsing democracy and advising us on what could come next.
£9.99
Profile Books Ltd Murder On Christmas Eve: Classic Mysteries for the Festive Season
Christmas Eve. While the world sleeps, snow falls gently from the sky, presents lie under the tree ... and murder is afoot. In this collection of ten classic murder mysteries by the best crime writers from the 1920s to today, death and mayhem take many festive forms, from the inventive to the unexpected. From a Santa Claus with a grudge to a cat who knows who killed its owner on Christmas Eve, these are stories to enjoy - and be mystified by - in front of a roaring fire, mince pie in hand.
£8.13
Profile Books Ltd The House Divided: Sunni, Shia and the Making of the Middle East
Recommended on The Rest is Politics and Empire 'A masterly engagement with the most delicate and important of subjects - filled with gentle empathy, learning and rare balance' Rory Stewart 'Rogerson is an original - eloquent and always fascinating' William Dalrymple 'Brilliant' Anita Anand 'This is not a book to be ignored' The Times At the heart of the Middle East, with its regional conflicts and proxy wars, is a 1400-year-old schism between Sunni and Shia. To understand this divide and its modern resonances, we need to revisit its origins, which go back to the death of the Prophet Muhammad in 632, the accidental coup that set aside the claims of his son Ali, and the slaughter of Ali's own son Husayn at Kerbala. These events, known to every Muslim, have created a slender faultline in the Middle East. The House Divided follows these narratives from the first Sunni and Shia caliphates, through the medieval caliphates and empires of the Arabs, Persians and Ottomans, to the contemporary Middle East. It shows how a complex range of identities and rivalries - religious, ethnic and national - have shaped the region, jolted by the seismic shift of the Iranian Revolution of 1979. Rogerson's original approach takes the modern chessboard of nation states and looks at each through its particular history of empires and occupiers, minorities and resources, sheikhs and imams. The result is a book of wide-ranging empathy, understanding and insights.
£22.50
Profile Books Ltd The Moth - All These Wonders: 49 new true stories
From storytelling phenomenon The Moth: a collection about risk, courage, and facing the unknown, drawn from the best stories ever told on their stages. All These Wonders features The Moth's customary variety of voices. Storytellers range from Suzi Ronson (who styled David Bowie's hair into Ziggy Stardust) to author Jung Chang, by way of a hip hop 'one hit wonder', an astronomer gazing at the surface of Pluto for the first time and a young female spy-tester in World War II. They share their ventures into uncharted territory - and how their lives were changed forever by what they found there. These true stories have been carefully selected and adapted to the page by the creative minds at The Moth, and encompass the very best of the 17,000+ stories performed in live Moth shows around the world. Filled with a variety of humourous, moving, and gripping tales from all walks of life, it is timed to celebrate the Moth's 20th anniversary year.
£11.09
Profile Books Ltd War and War
Winner of the 2015 Man Booker International Prize War & War begins at a point of danger: on a dark train platform Korim is on the verge of being attacked and robbed by thuggish teenagers. From here, we are carried along by the insistent voice of this nervous clerk. Desperate, at times almost mad, but also keenly empathic, Korim has discovered in a small Hungarian town's archives an antique manuscript of startling beauty: it narrates the epic tale of brothers-in-arms struggling to return home from a disastrous war. Korim is determined to do away with himself, but before he commits suicide, he feels he must escape to New York with the precious manuscript and commit it to eternity by typing it all out onto the world wide web. Following Korim with obsessive realism through the streets of New York (from his landing in a Bowery flophouse to his move far uptown with a mad interpreter), War and War relates his encounters with a fascinating range of people in a world torn between viciousness and mysterious beauty. Following the eight chapters of War & War is a short 'prequel acting as a sequel', 'Isaiah', which brings us to a dark bar, years before in Hungary, where Korim rants against the world and threatens suicide. Written like nothing else (turning single sentences into chapters), War & War affirms W. G. Sebald's comment that Krasznahorkai's prose far surpasses all the lesser concerns of contemporary writing.
£10.99
Profile Books Ltd The Tao of Coaching: Boost Your Effectiveness at Work by Inspiring and Developing Those Around You
The essence and success of The Tao of Coaching has always been its focus on the practical tips and techniques for making work more rewarding through the habit of coaching - and this philosophy continues to underpin this brand new reissue. The book's premise is simple: that to become an effective coach, managers and leaders need master only a few techniques, even though mastery obviously requires practice. Each chapter focuses on a specific technique - or Golden Rule - of coaching to help practice make perfect. Tried and tested by generations within and beyond the workplace, this succinct and engaging book gives readers the tools to: - create more time for themselves, by delegating well - build, and enjoy working with, effective teams - achieve better results - enhance their interpersonal skills. It demonstrates that coaching is not simply a matter of helping others and improving performance, but is also a powerful force for self-development and personal fulfilment.
£9.99
Profile Books Ltd Billions to Bust and Back: How I made, lost and rebuilt a fortune, and what I learned on the way
Thor Bjorgolfsson is a self-styled adventure capitalist with an addiction to debt and an insatiable appetite for business deals who became Iceland's first billionaire. After 10 years establishing his financial empire with alco-pops and beer in the lawless 'Wild East' of newly-capitalist Russia in the 1990s, he moved on to merging, floating, spinning off and privatising businesses from Finland to Sweden, Poland, Bulgaria, Serbia, Greece and the Czech Republic. On his 40th birthday, and worth $3.5 billion, he was sitting on top of the world; only 250 people in it were richer than him. His most spectacular triumph was the takeover of Iceland's second-largest bank, Landsbanki - he had expected his investment's value to double or treble in four years, and instead it rose ten-fold. But when financial meltdown hit Iceland in October 2008, Landsbanki crashed and burned, taking Bjorgolfsson with it. Within 12 months he had lost 3.3 billion euros - 98.5% of his wealth - and was treated as a scapegoat in his native country for supposedly bringing about the disaster. Faced with appalling debts, Bjorgolfsson has made good on his promises to repay his creditors, and at the age of 47 is now a billionaire once again.
£18.00
Profile Books Ltd Criticism: Ideas in Profile
Ideas in Profile: Small Introductions to Big Topics At the heart of criticism lies one question: What do you think of it? Every time we comment on an artefact, whether a poem, a play, a painting, a novel or a piano concerto, we are acting as critics, making our own judgements and interpretations. Among the most fundamental of human intellectual activities, criticism offers a starting point for many of our journeys towards understanding. Focusing particularly on stories, plays and poems, Criticism traces the central concepts and controversies in criticism, from Plato to Derrida, and from Romanticism to the death of the author. In the process, it reflects on criticism itself, the possibilities and options that confront casual readers, as well as reviewers, members of reading groups, students and teachers of English. How far do we make conscious choices about how and what we read (or view)? What do we conventionally look for in fiction? And what might we look for if we went beyond the conventional?
£9.99
Profile Books Ltd Function of the Orgasm
Over twenty years Wilhelm Reich, a psychologist and doctor of medicine, studied the relationship between the emotional, physiological and physical functions of biological energy. He saw the orgasm as the key to the body's energy metabolism, discovering that the biological emotions governing the psychic processes are themselves the immediate expression of strictly physical energy - which he named the cosmic orgone. Initially derided, Reich's theories are now seen as crucial to our understanding of ourselves and our fellow men. In appreciating why the orgasm brings a feeling of physical and emotional well-being, we can also gain insight into the physical and emotional ills that result from a thwarting of this bioenergetic function. Many researches into psychic energy believe that the aura recorded by Kirlian photography is nothing less than the manifestation of Reich's orgone energy.
£14.99
Profile Books Ltd Growth of the Soil
This is the story of Isak, a worker of the land, with its roots in man's deepest myths about the struggle to cultivate the land and make it fertile. Sweeping and panoramic, the story moves at the pace of the passing seasons and with the growth of the crops on which the characters' lives depend. Hamsun's themes of individual freedom, and the fundamental human need to reconcile man with the natural world, speak even more resonantly than when the novel was first published.
£11.99
Profile Books Ltd The Book on the Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are
The Book On the Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are explores an unrecognised but mighty taboo - our tacit conspiracy to ignore who, or what, we really are. Alan Watts, key thinker of Western Zen Buddhism, explains how to reconsider our relationship with the world. We are in urgent need of a sense of our own existence, which is in accord with the physical facts and which overcomes our feeling of alienation from the universe. In The Book On the Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are, Alan Watts asks what causes the illusion of the self as a separate ego which confronts a universe of physical objects that are alien to it. Rather, a person's identity binds them to the physical universe, creating a relationship with their environment and other people. The separation of the self and the physical world leads to the misuse of technology and the attempt to violently subjugate man's natural environment, leading to its destruction. Watts urges against the idea that we are separate from the world. Nowhere is this idea more apparent than in the concept of cultural taboos. The biggest taboo of all is knowing who we really are behind the mask of our self as presented to the world. Through our focus on ourselves and the world as it affects us, we have developed narrowed perception. Alan Watts tells us how to open our eyes and see ourselves not as coming into the world but from it. In understanding the individual's real place in the universe, Watts presents a critique of Western culture and a healing alternative.
£9.99
Profile Books Ltd Sabre-Tooth: (Modesty Blaise)
* THE SECOND NOVEL IN THE BESTSELLING MODESTY BLAISE SERIES * 'The finest escapist thrillers ever written' THE TIMES 'Before Buffy, before Charlie's Angels, before Purdy and Emma Peel, there was Modesty Blaise' OBSERVER Karz, a modern-day Genghis Khan, is assembling an army of mercenaries in a hidden valley in the Hindu Kush Mountains. His objective: the invasion and occupation of oil-rich Kuwait. But he lacks a couple of top lieutenants, and his gaze falls on Modesty Blaise and her loyal companion Willie Garvin, even though he knows they are not for hire. Meanwhile, Sir Gerald Tarrant, who runs a secret service organisation under the British government, has noticed that many mercenaries are being recruited by some unknown employer and disappearing. This worries Sir Gerald, and he asks Modesty and Willie to investigate. When Karz kidnaps Lucille (a child dear to Modesty and Willie), and commands them to report for duty, the adventurers have no choice. They must travel to the isolated valley and find a way to prevent an invasion that will change the world.
£8.99
Profile Books Ltd I, Lucifer: (Modesty Blaise)
* THE THIRD NOVEL IN THE BESTSELLING MODESTY BLAISE SERIES * 'The finest escapist thrillers ever written' THE TIMES 'Before Buffy, before Charlie's Angels, before Purdy and Emma Peel, there was Modesty Blaise' OBSERVER Modesty Blaise and Willie Garvin are in Paris. Modesty is being wined and dined by René Vaubois, head of the French Intelligence Service, on a floating restaurant on the Seine. René asks Modesty for advice regarding a new protection racket. High-level people worldwide are receiving death threats, and those who don't pay end up dead. By what means are the victims being killed? How is the ransom money being collected without trace? Then Modesty's friend, Steve Collier, the renowned psychic researcher, is kidnapped. Modesty and her faithful lieutenant, Willie Garvin, must travel to a remote island stronghold to solve the mystery and save their friend.
£8.99
Profile Books Ltd Two-Way Mirror: The Life of Elizabeth Barrett Browning
A Washington Post 2021 Non-Fiction Book of the Year New York Times Review of Books Editors' Choice Non-Fiction Title Longlisted for the 2022 PEN / Jacqueline Bograd Weld Award for Biography 'Beautifully told. It is high time Elizabeth Barrett Browning and Aurora Leigh were once again household names.' Mail on Sunday 'How do I love thee? Let me count the ways,' Elizabeth Barrett Browning famously wrote, shortly before defying her family by running away to Italy with Robert Browning. But behind the romance of her extraordinary life stands a thoroughly modern figure, who remains an electrifying study in self-invention. Elizabeth was born in 1806, a time when women could neither attend university nor vote, and yet she achieved lasting literary fame. She remains Britain's greatest woman poet, whose work has inspired writers from Emily Dickinson to George Eliot and Virginia Woolf. This vividly written biography, the first full study for over thirty years, incorporates recent archival discoveries to reveal the woman herself: a literary giant and a high-profile activist for the abolition of slavery who believed herself to be of mixed heritage; and a writer who defied chronic illness and long-term disability to change the course of cultural history. It holds up a mirror to the woman, her art - and the art of biography itself.
£20.32
Profile Books Ltd The Forager's Calendar: A Seasonal Guide to Nature’s Wild Harvests
'He writes so engagingly that it's hard to imagine that actual foraging can be more attractive than reading his accounts of it. ...[This book] is a treasure. It is beautifully produced, designed and illustrated.' - John Carey, The Sunday Times WINNER OF THE GUILD OF FOOD WRITERS AWARD FOR FOOD BOOK OF THE YEAR 2020 WINNER OF WOODLANDS AWARDS BEST WOODLAND BOOK OF THE YEAR 2020 Look out of your window, walk down a country path or go to the beach in Great Britain, and you are sure to see many wild species that you can take home and eat. From dandelions in spring to sloe berries in autumn, via wild garlic, samphire, chanterelles and even grasshoppers, our countryside is full of edible delights in any season. John Wright is the country's foremost expert in foraging and brings decades of experience, including as forager at the River Cottage, to this seasonal guide. Month by month, he shows us what species can be found and where, how to identify them, and how to store, use and cook them. You'll learn the stories behind the Latin names, the best way to tap a Birch tree, and how to fry an ant, make rosehip syrup and cook a hop omelette. Fully illustrated throughout, with tips on kit, conservation advice and what to avoid, this is an indispensable guide for everyone interested in wild food, whether you want to explore the great outdoors, or are happiest foraging from your armchair.
£12.99
Profile Books Ltd How Bad Are Bananas?: The carbon footprint of everything - 2020 new edition
How Bad Are Bananas? was a groundbreaking book when first published in 2009, when most of us were hearing the phrase 'carbon footprint' for the first time. Mike Berners-Lee set out to inform us what was important (aviation, heating, swimming pools) and what made very little difference (bananas, naturally packaged, are good!). This new edition updates all the figures (from data centres to hosting a World Cup) and introduces many areas that have become a regular part of modern life - Twitter, the Cloud, Bitcoin, electric bikes and cars, even space tourism. Berners-Lee runs a considered eye over each area and gives us the figures to manage and reduce our own carbon footprint, as well as to lobby our companies, businesses and government. His findings, presented in clear and even entertaining prose, are often surprising. And they are essential if we are to address climate change.
£10.99
Profile Books Ltd How To Live With Each Other: An Anthropologist's Notes on Sharing a Divided World
An anthropologist looks at our modern world - and shows how we can build a better, more connected one Increasingly, we are coming to see difference, whether in the form of conflicting values or growing ethnic diversity, as an existential threat. Within much of the world, our main response has been to surround ourselves with like-minded people and double down on our own convictions, in an attempt to hold difference at bay. So, how did we get here, and what can we do about it? Here, anthropologist Farhan Samanani combines case studies from across the world with his own research to provide insights into the capacity of humankind to connect across divides. Using his anthropologist's toolkit, he explores the roots of our present tensions and casts fresh light on how we can cultivate common ground, build healthy communities and not just live but flourish together.
£15.29
Profile Books Ltd Genesis: The Story of How Everything Began
'Mind-inflating' Wired 'A grand vision of the marvels we've discovered, and the immensity of what we still don't understand' Sunday Times What if the ancient Greeks were right, and the universe really did spring into being out of chaos and the void? How could we know? And what must its first moments have been like? To answer these questions, scientists are delving into all the hidden crevices of creation. Armed with giant telescopes and powerful particle accelerators, they probe the subtle mechanisms by which our familiar world came to be, and try to foretell the manner in which it will end. The result of all this collective effort is a complex tale, stranger at times than even our most ancient creation myths. Yet its building blocks give us the power to work marvels our predecessors could scarcely comprehend. In Genesis, the CERN physicist and bestselling author Guido Tonelli does poetic justice to that great story, the accomplishment of countless minds working together across the ages.
£9.99
Profile Books Ltd A Ruined Girl: an unmissable thriller with a killer twist you won't see coming
*** WINNER OF THE BATH NOVEL AWARD *** 'A tense, unsettling and emotionally engaging whydunnit' - SOPHIE HANNAH 'Gritty, tense, and superbly plotted' - HARRIET TYCE 'A complete triumph. an intelligent and deeply satisfying thriller' - ELIZABETH HAYNES ________________________________________ TWO BOYS LOVED HER. BUT WHICH ONE KILLED HER? On a dark night two years ago, teenagers Rob and Paige broke into a house. They beat and traumatised the occupants, then left, taking only a bracelet. No one knows why, not even Luke, Rob's younger brother and Paige's confidant. Paige disappeared after that night. And having spent her life in children's homes and the foster system, no one cared enough to look for her. Now Rob is out of prison, and probation officer Wren Reynolds has been tasked with his rehabilitation. But Wren has her own reasons for taking on Rob as a client. Convinced that Rob knows what happened to Paige, and hiding a lifetime of secrets from her heavily pregnant wife, Wren's obsession with finding a missing girl may tear her family apart... This beautiful and compelling thriller is perfect for readers of Harriet Tyce, Sophie Hannah and Lisa Jewell. ________________________________________ 'Superb. A rare combination of stunning twists and exceptional prose' - DAVID JACKSON 'Immersive and compelling, authentic and raw' - S.E. LYNES 'A mesmerising tale. One of the rising stars of crime fiction' - TREVOR WOOD
£8.99
Profile Books Ltd Confronting Leviathan: A History of Ideas
'Bracingly intelligent ... a wonderful read' Guardian 'Incredibly timely ... presented [with] wonderful elegance and clarity' Irish Times Based on the History Of Ideas podcast series by Talking Politics host David Runciman, Confronting Leviathan explores some of the most important thinkers and prominent ideas lying behind modern politics - from Hobbes to Gandhi, from democracy to patriarchy, and from revolution to lock down. While explaining the most important and often-cited ideas of thinkers such as Constant, De Tocqueville, Marx and Engels, Hayek, MacKinnon and Fukuyama, David Runciman shows how crises - revolutions, wars, depressions, pandemics - generated these new ways of political thinking. This is a history of ideas to help make sense of what's happening today.
£10.99
Profile Books Ltd Drawing on the Dominant Eye: Decoding the way we perceive, create and learn
THE SEQUEL TO THE MULTI-MILLION BESTSELLER DRAWING ON THE RIGHT SIDE OF THE BRAIN From the author of the world's most popular drawing instruction manual Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain, this new book helps you discover a new way of drawing and problem solving. Betty Edwards reveals the role our dominant eye plays in how we perceive, create, and are seen by those around us. Research shows that much like being right-handed or left-handed, each of us has a dominant eye, corresponding to the dominant side of our brain - either verbal or perceptual. Once you learn the difference and try your hand at the simple drawing exercises, you'll gain fresh insights into how you perceive, think, and create. You'll learn how to not just look but truly see. Generously illustrated throughout, Drawing on the Dominant Eye offers a remarkable guided tour through art history, psychology, and the creative process; a must-read for anyone looking for a richer understanding of our art, our minds, and ourselves.
£17.09
Profile Books Ltd Sensational: A New Story of our Senses
'A future classic of popular science' Mail on Sunday Why do women have a better sense of smell than men? Has the iPhone changed how we touch? Does the Danube really look blue when you're in love? Our senses are at the heart of how we navigate the world. They help us recognise the expressions on a loved one's face, know whether fruit is ripe by its smell, or even sense a storm approaching through a sudden drop in air pressure. It's now believed that we may have as many as fifty-three senses - and we're just beginning to expand our knowledge of this incredibly extensive palette. In Sensational, Ashley Ward embarks on an expedition through the ways we experience the world, marshalling the latest advancements in science to explore the dazzling eyesight of the mantis shrimp, the rich inner lives of krill and the baffling link between canine bowel movements and geomagnetic fields. Unlocking the incredible power of our senses may hold the key to mysteries like why we kiss, how our brain dictates our taste in music and how a dairy-rich diet strained Euro-Japanese relations. Blending biology and cutting-edge neuroscience, Sensational is a mind-bending look at how our brains shape the way we interpret the world.
£18.00
Profile Books Ltd Footsloggers: An Infantry Battalion at War, 1939-45
Shortlisted for the 2023 Military History Matters Book of the Year Award The only way to truly understand what it was like to fight in the Second World War is to listen to the experiences of those men who were there. And often, there was nowhere more dangerous than on the ground. In Footsloggers, Peter Hart reconstructs one infantry battalion's war in staggering detail. Based on his interviews with members of the 16th Durham Light Infantry, Hart bears witness not only to their comradeship, suffering, dreadful losses and individual tragedies, but also their courage and self-sacrifice as they fought their way across North Africa, Italy and Greece. This is a human look at the inhuman nature of war from the author of At Close Range and Burning Steel.
£27.00
Profile Books Ltd Kit
'raw as well as wrought ... a novel of spaces and gaps ... like life poured into art' - Anthony Cummins, The Observer 'In both its open-throated exclamations and its concentrated meditations on myriad forms of pain and joy [...] Kit reaches places other books don't.' - Max Porter 'An extraordinary experience ... It is work and voices like Megan's we have to fight for.' - Maxine Peake Megan and Kit met in their early twenties. Their friendship was intense, wild and true. Years later, when Kit becomes desperately unwell, Megan tries to pull her old friend back from the precipice, navigating the difficulties of revisiting a relationship conceived in the great freedom of youth, whilst attempting to remain fully present in the messy beauty of her family life. Kit is a story of the sumptuous complication - and precariousness - of life and relationships. It describes a call to intimacy in a state of emergency. It is a story of one life disrupted as another moves toward its end. Told in a spare, winding prose-poem, with a voice reminiscent of Max Porter, Elizabeth Smart, Kae Tempest and Rebecca Watson, Kit is a splintered, powerful work of empathy, friendship and unconditional love.
£12.99
Profile Books Ltd Delicate Condition
'Shockingly real, twisty and dark' - INDEPENDENT 'Tense, thrilling and darkly comedic' - HEAT 'The feminist update to Rosemary's Baby we all needed' - ANDREA BARTZ I wanted this baby so badly. But she may be the death of me... Anna Alcott is desperate to have a family. But as she tries to balance her increasingly public life as an indie actress with a gruelling IVF regime, she starts to suspect that someone is going to great lengths to make sure that never happens. Crucial medicines are lost. Appointments are moved without her knowledge. She's sure she's being followed. And when she finally does get pregnant, someone breaks into her house and steals the ultrasound photograph of her baby. But despite everything she's gone through, not even her husband is willing to believe that someone is playing twisted games with her. Then her doctors tell her she's lost the baby. Despite her grief, Anna ignores the grave-faced men lecturing her - because she can still feel the baby moving, can see the toll it's taking on her weakened body. Isolated in a remote snowbound town, Anna is sure that whoever has been following her is closing in on her and her unborn child. And as her symptoms become more terrifying, she can't help but wonder what exactly is growing inside her... and why no-one will listen when she says that something is horribly wrong. Exploring visceral themes of loss, medical misogyny and female power, The Push meets Behind Her Eyes in this spellbindingly dark thriller. 'A timely, terrifying, heartfelt thriller' - CHRIS WHITAKER 'Perfectly terrifying and terrifyingly perfect' - JANICE HALLETT 'A thrilling, visceral read' - HEATHER DARWENT
£16.99
Profile Books Ltd Out of The Sun: Essays at the Crossroads of Race
'A remarkable set of essays unlike anything else' - Kadish Morris, Guardian As in her fiction, the essays in Out of the Sun demonstrate Esi Edugyan's commitment to seeking out the stories of Black lives that history has failed to record. Written with the death of George Floyd and the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement in the background, in five wide-ranging essays Edugyan reflects on her own identity and experiences as the daughter of Ghanaian immigrants. She delves into the history of Western Art and the truths about Black lives that it fails to reveal, and the ways contemporary Black artists are reclaiming and reimagining those lives. She explores and celebrates the legacy of Afrofuturism, the complex and problematic practice of racial passing, the place of ghosts and haunting in the imagination, and the fascinating relationship between Africa and Asia dating back to the 6th Century. With calm, piercing intelligence, and a refusal to think on anyone's terms but her own, Edugyan asks difficult questions about how we reckon with the past and imagine the future, and invites the reader to think alongside her in working out what the answers to these may be.
£16.99
Profile Books Ltd The Human Origins of Beatrice Porter and Other Essential Ghosts
'Sometimes characters are so lively and entertaining, you don't want to say goodbye to them ... A stunning feat of storytelling in itself' Suzy Feay, Financial Times Growing up in Brooklyn with their Caribbean parents, Zora and Sasha Porter's days were enchanted by stories from the islands - the mischievous spider Anansi both seductive and vengeful; the flame-breathing Rolling Calf who haunts butchers; and ocean-dwelling Mama Dglo, said to be half snake, half human. Now they are teenagers, and life at home has become unbearable. Their parents' tempestuous relationship has fallen apart, their mother Beatrice desperately ill, their father Nigel living with another woman. While an unsettled Zora escapes into her journal, dreaming of being a writer, Sasha discovers sex and chest binding, spending more time with her new girlfriend than at home. But they can't hide forever. The Anansi Stories that captivated them as children begin to creep into the present, revealing truths about the Porter family's past they must all face up to. The Human Origins of Beatrice Porter and Other Essential Ghosts is an extraordinary debut novel, a celebration of the power of stories that asks - what happens when ours are erased? Do we disappear? Or do we come back haunting? A Today Show Most Anticipated Book of 2023 An Electric Literature Recommendation for 2023 A Goodreads Buzziest Debut of 2023
£14.99
Profile Books Ltd This Book is a Plant: How to Grow, Learn and Radically Engage with the Natural World
We've become used to thinking of plants as things for us to use: as food, tools, resources, or just as an attractive background to our own lives. But it's time to change our minds. New research shows that plants can think, plan - and may even have memories. We share our planet with beings whose potential we have only glimpsed. Featuring the writing of Robin Wall Kimmerer, Susie Orbach and Merlin Sheldrake, This Book is a Plant will be your handbook to the new reality: showing you a pathway to completely reimagine your relationship with a different kind of natural world. Delve into a world of moss and fungi: Sheila Watt-Cloutier transports us to the Arctic spring, Rowan Hisayo Buchanan discovers the pleasures of painting trees, and Rebecca Tamás puts roots down through earth and soil. This Book is a Plant is made from paper: it was once part of a tree. But it's also a seed: the first shoots of a radical new way of seeing the world around you. Featuring stunning illustrations by Eduardo Navarro, and accompanying a major 2022 Wellcome Collection exhibition, Rooted Beings.
£14.99
Profile Books Ltd Immaculate Forms
''With unrivaled expertise and a wealth of classical and contemporary detail, the author weaves historical knowledge of medicine, anatomy, literature, art and religion into a narrative that surprises, informs, excites and frequently amuses'' Adrian Thatcher, author of Vile BodiesThroughout history, religious scholars, medical men and - occasionally - women themselves, have moulded thought on what ''makes'' a woman. She has been called the weaker sex, the fairer sex, the purer sex, among many other monikers. Often, she has been defined simply as ''Not A Man''. Today, we are more aware than ever of the complex relationship between our bodies and our identities. But contrary to what some may believe, what makes a woman is a question that has always been open-ended. Immaculate Forms examines all the ways in which medicine and religion have played a gatekeeping role over women''s organs. It explores how the womb was seen as both the most miraculous organ in the body and as a sewer; uncover
£22.50
Profile Books Ltd The Handover
''The Singularity'' is what Silicon Valley calls the idea that, eventually, we will be overrun by machines that are able to take decisions and act for themselves. What no one says is that it happened before. A few hundred years ago, humans started building the robots that now rule our world. They are called states and corporations: immensely powerful artificial entities, with capacities that go far beyond what any individual can do, and which, unlike us, need never die. They have made us richer, safer and healthier than would have seemed possible even a few generations ago - and they may yet destroy us. The Handover distils over three hundred years of thinking about how to live with artificial agency.
£10.99
Profile Books Ltd Intensive Care: A GP, a Community & a Pandemic
An Observer, New Statesman, Financial Times, Irish Times and Scotsman 2021 Non-Fiction Highlight 'Searing yet beautiful ... less a hot take that an astute manifesto for what matters most in life, as well as in medicine.' Rachel Clarke, author of Breathtaking: Inside the NHS in a Time of Pandemic and Your Life in My Hands 'Well written, often entertaining and occasionally deeply moving; an unmissable account of a year we will all try too hard to forget.' The Times 'Inspiring. I can't recommend it too strongly. You will learn a lot from it, and you will find much more that is encouraging.' Allan Massie, Scotsman Intensive Care is about how coronavirus emerged, spread across the world and changed all of our lives forever. But it's not, perhaps, the story you expect. Gavin Francis is a GP who works in both urban and rural communities, splitting his time between Edinburgh and the islands of Orkney. When the pandemic arrived in our society he saw how it affected every walk of life: the anxious teenager, the isolated care home resident, the struggling furloughed worker and homeless ex-prisoner, all united by their vulnerability in the face of a global disaster. And he saw how the true cost of the virus was measured not just in infections, or deaths, or ITU beds, but in the consequences of the measures taken against it. In this deeply personal account of nine months spent caring for a society in crisis, Francis will take you from rural village streets to local clinics and communal city stairways. And in telling this story, he reveals others: of loneliness and hope, illness and recovery, and of what we can achieve when we care for each other.
£16.99
Profile Books Ltd The Digital Silk Road: China's Quest to Wire the World and Win the Future
Its vast infrastructure projects now extend from the ocean floor to outer space, and from Africa's megacities into rural America. China is wiring the world, and, in doing so, rewriting the global order. As things stand, the rest of the world still has a choice. But the battle for tomorrow will require America and its allies to take daring risks in uncertain political terrain. Unchecked, China will reshape global flows of data to reflect its interests. It will develop an unrivalled understanding of market movements, the deliberations of foreign competitors, and the lives of countless individuals enmeshed in its systems. Networks create large winners, and this is one contest that democracies can't afford to lose. Taking readers on a global tour of these emerging battlefields, Jonathan Hillman reveals what China's digital footprint looks like on the ground, and explores the dangers of a world in which all routers lead to Beijing.
£20.00
Profile Books Ltd Paradise Block
**SHORTLISTED FOR THE EDGE HILL SHORT STORY PRIZE** 'Taps into a deep and compelling strangeness with vigour and humour and heart... A disturbing and moving collection' Chris Power, author of Mothers In Paradise Block, mould grows as thick as fur along the walls, alarms ring out at unexpected hours and none of the neighbours are quite what they seem. A little girl boils endless eggs in her family's burnt-out flat, an isolated old woman entices a new friend with gifts of cutlery and cufflinks, and a young bride grows frustrated with her unappreciative husband, the caretaker of creaking, dilapidated Paradise Block. With a haunting sense of place and a keen eye for the absurd, these thirteen surreal stories lure us into a topsy-turvy world where fleatraps are more important than babies and sales calls for luxury coffins provide a welcome distraction. Lonely residents live in close proximity while longing for connection.
£12.99
Profile Books Ltd Exposed
WINNER OF THE LONDON HELLENIC PRIZESHORTLISTED FOR THE ANGLO-HELLENIC RUNICMAN AWARD A SUNDAY TIMES AND SPECTATOR BOOK OF THE YEAR''A gloriously intimate tour of the body in antiquity'' Gavin Francis''A triumph ... an extraordinary book that stopped me in my tracks'' Peter FrankopanThe Greek and Roman body is often seen as flawless - cast from life in buff bronze and white marble, to sit upon a pedestal. But this, of course, is a lie.Here, classicist Caroline Vout reaches beyond texts and galleries to expose Greek and Roman bodies for what they truly were: anxious, ailing, imperfect, diverse, and responsible for a legacy as lasting as their statues. Taking us on a gruesome, thrilling journey, she taps into the questions that those in the Greek and Roman worlds asked about their bodies - where do we come from? What makes us different from gods and animals? What happens to our bodies, and the forces that govern them, when we die?You''ve seen the paintings, read the philosophers and heard
£18.99
Profile Books Ltd Robin ChichesterClark
Elected MP for Londonderry in 1955 as the second-youngest member of the House, Robin Chichester-Clark was at the forefront of Northern Irish politics for almost 20 years during one of the most turbulent periods in its history. A son and grandson of Northern Irish MPs, he held leading positions in both government and opposition, although remaining outside the UK Government when Edward Heath came to power in 1970 because of his brother's position as Prime Minister of Northern Ireland. Heath later made Robin Minister of State for Employment. Standing down from politics in 1974, he followed a dynamic career in politics with over 30 years in active philanthropy, fundraising for the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, medical research, the House of Illustration and the creative writing charity Arvon, through which he came to know such figures as Ted Hughes and Seamus Heaney.
£18.00
Profile Books Ltd Words Fail Us: In Defence of Disfluency
'TIMELY' David Mitchell 'MOVING ... REMARKABLE' SUNDAY TIMES 'ONE OF THOSE RARE BOOKS I HADN'T REASLISED I'D BEEN WAITING FOR UNTIL I READ IT.' Owen Sheers 'OPEN-MINDED, THOUGHTFUL AND WISE... A LIBERATING BOOK' Colm Toibin In an age of polished TED talks and overconfident political oratory, success seems to depend upon charismatic public speaking. But what if hyper-fluency is not only unachievable but undesirable? Jonty Claypole spent fifteen years of his life in and out of extreme speech therapy. From sessions with child psychologists to lengthy stuttering boot camps and exposure therapies, he tried everything until finally being told the words he'd always feared: 'We can't cure your stutter.' Those words started him on a journey towards not only making peace with his stammer but learning to use it to his advantage. Here, Jonty argues that our obsession with fluency could be hindering, rather than helping, our creativity, authenticity and persuasiveness. Exploring other speech conditions, such as aphasia and Tourette's, and telling the stories of the 'creatively disfluent' - from Lewis Carroll to Kendrick Lamar - Jonty explains why it's time for us to stop making sense, get tongue tied and embrace the life-changing power of inarticulacy.
£14.99
Profile Books Ltd Medici Money: Banking, metaphysics and art in fifteenth-century Florence
The Medici are famous as the rulers of Florence at the high point of the Renaissance. Their power derived from the family bank, and this book tells the fascinating, frequently bloody story of the family and the dramatic development and collapse of their bank (from Cosimo who took it over in 1419 to his grandson Lorenzo the Magnificent who presided over its precipitous decline). The Medici faced two apparently insuperable problems: how did a banker deal with the fact that the Church regarded interest as a sin and had made it illegal? How in a small republic like Florence could he avoid having his wealth taken away by taxation? But the bank became indispensable to the Church. And the family completely subverted Florence's claims to being democratic. They ran the city. Medici Money explores a crucial moment in the passage from the Middle Ages to the Modern world, a moment when our own attitudes to money and morals were being formed.To read this book is to understand how much the Renaissance has to tell us about our own world. Medici Money is one of the launch titles in a new series, Atlas Books, edited by James Atlas. Atlas Books pairs fine writers with stories of the economic forces that have shaped the world, in a new genre - the business book as literature.
£9.99
Profile Books Ltd The Art Of Seduction
Which sort of seducer could you be: *Siren? *Rake? *Cold Coquette? *Star? *Comedian? *Charismatic? or *Saint? This book will show you which. 'Charm, persuasion, the ability to create illusions: these are some of the many dazzling gifts of the Seducer, the compelling figure who is able to manipulate, mislead and give pleasure all at once. When raised to the level of art, seduction, an indirect and subtle form of power, has toppled empires, won elections and enslaved great minds. In this beautiful, sensually designed book, Greene unearths the two sides of seduction: the characters and the process. Discover who you, or your pursuer, most resembles. Learn, too, the pitfalls of the anti-Seducer. In part II, immerse yourself in the twenty-four manoeuvres and strategies of the seductive process, the ritual by which a seducer gains mastery over their target. Understand how to 'Choose the Right Victim', 'Appear to Be an Object of Desire' and 'Confuse Desire and Reality'. In addition, Greene provides instruction on how to identify victims by type. Each fascinating character and each cunning tactic demonstrates a fundamental truth about who we are, and the targets we've become - or hope to win over. The Art of Seduction is an indispensable primer on the essence of one of history's greatest weapons and the ultimate power trip.
£17.09
Profile Books Ltd A Lesson Before Dying
An Oprah Book Club selection Winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction Nominated for a Pulitzer Prize In a small Cajun community in the late 1940s, a young black man named Jefferson witnesses a liquor store shootout in which three men are killed. The only survivor, he is convicted of murder and sentenced to death. Gaines explores the deep prejudice of the American South in the tradition of Harper Lee's To Kill A Mockingbird and Toni Morrison's Beloved. A Lesson Before Dying is a richly compassionate and deeply moving novel, the story of a young black man sentenced to death for a murder he did not commit, and a teacher who hopes to ease his burden before the execution.
£9.99