Adam Hart-Davis, one of the nations favourite TV presenters, returns to our screens with a tour through the Top Ten developments of each of the great civilisations of the past. From the Egyptians to the Romans, Babylonians to the Arabs, Adam takes us on an epic history of the world, looking at some of the great legacies left to us by ancient cultures.

What the Past Did For Us accompanies a major 9-part new format autumn show, in which Adam is the anchorman who leads us through the history of inventions while testing some of these in the studio.

The accompanying book is an entertainingly written history of ancient cultures, capturing Adams enthusiasm for the subject. Adam tells the story of the Chinese inventors who came up with the mariners compass, paper money & gunpowder right through to the Ancient Indians who, according to Einstein taught us how to count as well as giving us the 12-month calendar year & 7-day week.



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Adam Hart-Davis, one of the nations favourite TV presenters, returns to our screens with a tour through the Top Ten developments of each of the great civilisations of the past. From the Egyptians to the Romans, Babylonians to the Arabs, Adam takes us on an epic history of the world, looking at some of the great legacies left to us by ancient cultures.

What the Past Did For Us accompanies a major 9-part new format autumn show, in which Adam is the anchorman who leads us through the history of inventions while testing some of these in the studio.

The accompanying book is an entertainingly written history of ancient cultures, capturing Adams enthusiasm for the subject. Adam tells the story of the Chinese inventors who came up with the mariners compass, paper money & gunpowder right through to the Ancient Indians who, according to Einstein taught us how to count as well as giving us the 12-month calendar year & 7-day week.



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As would-be parents cycle through the adoption process, they balance anxiety & fear with the life-altering decision of adoption. The emotional toll of this dance can be completely overwhelming & can confuse parents while navigating the decisions of how to expand their families.

Drawing on extensive research & the author

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As would-be parents cycle through the adoption process, they balance anxiety & fear with the life-altering decision of adoption. The emotional toll of this dance can be completely overwhelming & can confuse parents while navigating the decisions of how to expand their families.

Drawing on extensive research & the author

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While some mothers take to breast-feeding like a duck to water, others just can't seem to get the hang of it. Clare Byam-Cook agrees that breast is best but she stresses that the most important thing is that your baby is fed
- whether by the breast or bottle
- & you, the mother, should feel comfortable with whatever you choose to do.

This comprehensive guide has been fully revised & updated to contain all the latest information on breast-feeding your baby successfully, including:
- how to prepare for breast-feeding
- what to expect in the early stages
- how to overcome common problems

And if you can't... the first rule is you shouldn't feel a failure. Clare Byam-Cook recognises there are certain circumstances where bottle feeding is an advisable alternative. Rather than making you feel guilty if you prefer, or have to, bottle feed, she is wholly supportive & sympathetic, providing you with all the practical advice & information you need.








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Candia Mc William had just joined the judging panel of the Man Booker Prize for Fiction in 2006 when she started to lose her sight. The gradual onset of blindness seemed like an assault especially tailored for someone whose life consisted of reading & writing. The necessity to look inwards that followed took her on an even more painful personal journey through a waste of snows punctuated by shards of ice as she attempted to write her life back into human shape.

At first she could only dictate, & the unfamiliar process unblocked a flow of memory & association concerning her childhood in Edinburgh, her mother's suicide, her teenage escape into another identity, finding & losing bearings in Cambridge & London, her marriages, her children &, stalking all these, her increasing alcoholism. In What To Look For In Winter, we see her rifling through her many selves for that elusive thing, a sense of self, as all the time she searches the wilder shores of medicine for a cure for her blindness.

This is a writer's book, fascinated by the process & wellsprings of writing. While love & loss are at its centre, it also celebrates friendship, reading, love of children & the consolations of landscape, particularly that of Colonsay, the Hebridean island where, after three years in the dark, & thanks to an unexpected message from a wise & sympathetic reader, she begins to face up to how, falteringly, she might come to see once



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I'm a lamb & I leap... Leaping lambs, wriggling worms, marching ants.... are just a few of the fabulous creatures eager to show off their skills! The joy of this first picture book is the artwork. Reg Cartwright's stunning, bold paintings introduce a host of wonderful creatures who tell us what they do
- very simply & in their own words.
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This powerful collection of stories, set in the mid-West among the lonely men & women who drink, fish & play cards to ease the passing of time, was the first by Raymond Carver to be published in the UK. With its spare, colloquial narration & razor-sharp sense of how people really communicate, the collection was to become one of the most influential literary works of the 1980s. ...