A captivating guide to the past, present and future of 'the amazing crystal' that plays a vital role in regulating our planet. Peter Wadhams is Professor of Ocean Physics at Cambrid
From the bestselling author of The Third Reich at War, a masterly account of Europe in the age of its global hegemony; the latest volume in the Penguin History of Europe seriesRichard J. Evans, bestse
Niccolò Machiavelli lived in times when a new princely dynasty - the superwealthy Medici - threatened the survival of freedom in his native Florence. He and his contemporaries faced a choice: should t
Solidarity and prosperity fostered by economic integration: this principle has underpinned the European project from the start, and the establishment of a common currency was supposed to be its most a
Richard Wagner's Ring of the Nibelung is one of the greatest works of art created in modern times, and has fascinated both critics and devotees for over a century and a half. The Ring of Truth is an e
In 1461 Edward Earl of March, a handsome 18-year old of massive charisma and ability, usurped the English throne from his vacant Lancastrian predecessor Henry VI. Ten years on, following outbreaks of
From the beginning of the nineteenth century to the Russian Revolution, the tsarist regime exiled more than one million prisoners and their families beyond the Ural Mountains to Siberia. This book bri
Anne Applebaum meets Paddy Leigh Fermor.Part memoir, part reflection, this book will bring to life central Europe during the last ten years of the Cold War. It begins in Trieste in 1979 where the embe
The director of the Design Museum defines the greatest artefact of all time: the city.We live in a world that is now, in the majority, urban. So how do we define the city as it evolves in the twenty-f
Parsing the complicated flood of data on debt, trade and capital flows, this book explains exactly which numbers are most telling for a nation's fortunes, and when they signal a turn for the better or
The first history for a general audience of one of Asia's most fascinating and complex countries.The Vietnamese are in the unusual situation of being both colonizers themselves and the victims of colo
Every day billions of people view billions of web pages. Most people don't know what's behind a web page. Focusing on coding and the web page: what it is, why it happened, and how to understand it, th
Bundled together in 1969 to stymie an international takeover attempt on the part of Chase Manhattan Bank of New York, Standard Chartered Bank has come to consolidate its status as one of the world's l
Edward III lived through bloody and turbulent times. His father was deposed by his mother and her lover when he was still a teenager; a third of England's population was killed by the Black Death midw
An exploration of the power dynamics that shape everyday life - from the board room to the dinner table, the playground to the bedroom. It shows us that everything we thought about power is dead wrong
Part of the Penguin Monarchs series: short, fresh, expert accounts of England's rulers in a collectible format.'After my death', George V said of his eldest son and heir, 'the boy will ruin himself in
In 1570, after numerous plots and assassination attempts against her, Elizabeth I of England was excommunicated by the Pope. It was the beginning not only of the well-known identification of England w
Between 1939 and 1945 India changed to an extraordinary extent. Millions of Indians suddenly found themselves as soldiers, fighting in Europe and North Africa but also - something simply never imagine
On 5th March 1946 a survey began that is, today, the longest-running study of human development in the world, and has grown to encompass six generations of children and over 70,000 people. This is the
The story of the Anglo-Scottish relationship by Scotland's premier historian. There can be no relationship in Europe's history more creative, significant, vexed and uneasy than that
An award-winning photojournalist returns to his home country to capture the spirit of Irish life in its centenary year. One hundred years after Ireland's 1916 Rising, the revolt tha
One of the world's most ancient cultures, India can be understood and explained in as many ways as humans can possibly devise. To make sense of this astonishing turmoil of ideas, Sunil Khilnani has cr
Part of the Penguin Monarchs series: short, fresh, expert accounts of England's rulers in a collectible format. Like his mother Queen Victoria, Edward VII defined an era. Both refle
From award-winning journalist Jack Shenker, The Egyptians is the essential book about Egypt and radical politics. In early 2011, Cairo's Tahrir Square briefly commanded the attention of the world. Hal
Richard II (1377-1399) came to the throne as a child, following the long, domineering, martial reign of his grandfather Edward III. He suffered from the disastrous combination of a most exalted sense
The first popular book on the science of the individual, in which Todd Rose draws upon the very latest findings in the fields of psychology and sociology to show how, when we focus on individual findi
Features the story of women like Ruth Sullivan, who rebelled against a medical establishment that blamed "refrigerator mothers" for causing autism, of fathers who pushed scientists to dig harder for t
From award-winning historian Serhii Plokhy, The Gates of Europe is the definitive history of Ukraine that helps us understand the country's past and the current crisis. At the western edge of the Eura
Urgent and insightful, Tim Judah's account of the human side of the conflict in Ukraine is an evocative exploration of what the second largest country in Europe feels like in wartime. Making his way f
'The Ministry of Defence does not comment upon submarine operations' is the standard response of officialdom to enquiries about the most secretive and mysterious of Britain's armed forces, the Royal N
This is the sensational second volume of Charles Moore's bestselling authorized biography of the Iron Lady. In June 1983, Margaret Thatcher won the biggest increase in a government's Parliamentary maj
SPECTATOR BOOKS OF THE YEAR 2015. Britain's empire has gone. Our manufacturing base is a shadow of its former self; the Royal Navy has been reduced to a skeleton. In military, diplomatic and economic
What does it mean to devote yourself wholly to helping others? In Strangers Drowning, Larissa MacFarquhar seeks out people living lives of extreme ethical commitment, and tells their intimate stories:
In the summer of 1914 most of Europe plunged into a war so catastrophic that it unhinged the continent's politics and beliefs in a way that took generations to recover from. The disaster terrified its
Frederick the Great, King of Prussia, dominated the 18th century in the same way that Napoleon dominated the start of the 19th - a force of nature, a caustic, ruthless, brilliant military commander, a
We live in a world made by science. How and when did this happen? This book tells the story of the extraordinary intellectual and cultural revolution that gave birth to modern science, and mounts a ma
The early 1980s in Britain were a time of hope, and of dread: of Cold War tension and imminent conflict, when crowds in the street could mean an ecstatic national celebration or an inner-city riot. Th
A lively and compelling account of how the crusades really worked, and a revolutionary attempt to rethink how we understand the Middle Ages The story of the wars and conquests initiated by the First C
Known as 'the anarchy', the reign of Stephen (1135-1141) saw England plunged into a civil war that illuminated the fatal flaw in the powerful Norman monarchy, that without clear rules ordering success
