* A classic account of contemporary Africa - Eritrea & Ethiopia have not been out of the news since Band Aid in 1985 and Ciao Asmara is set to become an African travel classic.Asmara is the capita
Behind the great polar explorers of the early twentieth century—Amundsen, Shackleton, Scott in the South, and Peary in the North—looms the spirit of Fridtjof Nansen, the mentor of them all. He was the
Celebrated bestselling author Sun-mi Hwang is back with a heartwarming new novel about renewal and friendship.This is the story of a man named Kang Dae-su. His whole life is a miracle, rising from pov
Why are we drawn to the ocean each summer? Why does being near water set our minds and bodies at ease? In Blue Mind, Wallace J. Nichols revolutionizes how we think about these questions, revealing the
A reissue of Banks's 1986 Kafkaesque modern classicThe man who wakes up in the extraordinary world of a bridge has amnesia, and his doctor doesn't seem to want to cure him. Does it matter? Exploring t
For Chris Moore, World War I has developed from a childhood fascination to a full-blown obsession, both for the actuality of the war—its archives and its archaeology—as well as its abiding influence o
The year is 1531. In a small hut on the slopes of the volcano Popocateptl, scholar and poet Alvaro de Sevilla reflects on his extraordinary life. For Alvaro was one of the small army of conquistadors
From the withdrawal from Dunkirk in 1940 to the Allied invasion of Germany four and a half years later, RAF Bomber Command was the only British force to strike directly at the enemy homeland. During r
Sean and Cory are cousins with very different attitudes about life. Sean is always studying while Cory, involved in drug dealing, has stabbed a man who was meant to take part in an armed robbery with
One day, the man in front of Luke at the post office drops down dead in line. Instinctively, Luke's hand snakes out and slips the corpse's unposted letter into his pocket. With this impulsive act, he
'Incredibly insightful, funny and poignant' Helen SedgwickI get up. I go to work. I spend the whole day waiting for the words on my screen to make sense. In the commuter broth of the carriage home, te
It is often assumed that the national identity must be a matter of values and ideas. But in Robert Winder's brilliantly-written account it is a land built on a lucky set of natural ingredients: the is
Based on ten years of surveying farming communities around the world, top New York chef Dan Barber's The Third Plate offers a radical new way of thinking about food that will heal the land and taste i
The story of Jeremy Thorpe's rapid rise and spectacular fall from grace is one of the most remarkable in British politics. When he became leader of the Liberal Party in 1967 at the age of just thirty-
A fascinating look at a world in which we have become obsessed with economic growth at theexpense of quality of life, and what we can do to changeEver get the feeling that things are falling apart? Yo
They were young when they left, and jolly. They sang as they sailed down the Clyde, westwards, towards the sun-burnished hills of the Mull of Kintyre. As the light faded across the water, one of them
The second volume of William Woodruff's memoirs starts with him having arrived in Poplar in the early 1930s. On spec, he turns up at a steel foundry and luckily gets a job. Eventually he decides to "g
Bill Drummond is known variously as wayward genius, art terrorist, a hoaxer with integrity, and the ex-pop star who broke up his band, the KLF, at the height of its success to wage an idiosyncratic w
This is the story of two remarkable men, one of whom conquered empires with apparent ease and one of whom struggled with the day-to-day problems of a small provincial town. The first was Alexander the
In the summer of 2006, Colour-Sargeant Kailash Limbu's platoon was sent to relieve and occupy a police compound in the town of Now Zad in Helmand. He was told to prepare for a forty-eight hour operati
Joe Coughlin is nineteen when he meets Emma Gould. A smalltime thief in 1920s Boston, he is told to cuff her while his accomplices raid the casino she works for. But Joe falls in love with Emma - and
Sir James Brooke's curious career began in 1841, when he was caught up in a war in Brunei. He was an opportunist who, with the Sultan's backing, made war on the Dayaks tribespeople and as a result fou
Jonathan Smith takes us a his personal journey from his first days as a pupil through to the challenges of his professional and private life on the other side of the desk. He explains what it's like t
Growing up in Zagreb in the summer of 1991, 10-year-old Ana Juric is a carefree tomboy; she runs the streets with her best friend, Luka, helps take care of her baby sister, Rahela, and idolizes her fa
Ever wondered why the floors in terraced houses are different heights? Or what?a landscape looked like before it was built on? And did you know you can date a building by its window sills? In?A Lust f
For Alex James, music had always been a door to a more exciting life—a way to travel, meet new people, and, hopefully, pick up girls. But as bass player of Blur—one of the most successful
History tells us that in 69 AD, Nero fled his palace in Rome, stabbed himself in the throat with a pen, and was trampled to death by horses in a muddy ditch. But here's another possibility: Nero did n
From his vantage point as a "Saddam favourite", Ala Bashir, Saddam's personal physician, observed and tracked political events in Baghdad. He witnessed and recorded in detail the hidden life of Saddam
Revised and updated, Robert Kee's book is an introduction to the fascinating history that has made modern Ireland, and a thought-provoking examination of how past facts have bred present myths.
It is 1947, one year before the Israeli War of Independence, and Palestine is still under the British Mandate. However, young Israelis are flocking to the leadership of Menachim Begin and his Irgun te
Aiping Mu was born to parents prominent in the Communist hierarchy?her father was Political Commissar for the Beijing region and her mother ran one of the city's universities?and in her early years li
