From the origins of urbanization in Mesopotamia to the global metropolises of today great cities have marked the development of human civilization The Great Cities in History tells their stories from Uruk & Memphis to Tokyo & Sao Paulo A galaxy of distinguished contributors evoke the character of each place
- its people its art & architecture its government
- & explain the reasons for its success Richly illustrated with photographs paintings maps & plans this volume is nothing less than a portrait of world civilization

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To rebuild the Eternal City the Roman Emperor summoned the most talented builders of antiquity Each of them is trying to draft the best city — but talent is not enough Only those who know how to please the Emperor cleverly exert their influence & invest at the right time will succeed in City of Rome In more detail the game lasts fourteen rounds & in each round players draft one of the building cards in play & add it to their hand The drafting order depends on how closely you stand to the emperor At the start of a round you reveal a new "action strip" that has three bricks & two cogs in some order then players take turns placing their figure on one of these five spaces; the closer you are to the emperor the earlier you draft but the fewer resources (bricks & cogs) you receive (With only two players in the game each player places two figures on the action strip & takes two complete turns each round) After drafting you can take one build action & one produce action To build you must pay the cost in bricks — paying two coins for each missing brick — then place the card you&re building adjacent to another card of yours already in play You start with two building cards in play so you&ll have at most sixteen cards at game&s end These cards must fit in a 4x 4 square so plan carefully since you&ll want to place some buildings next to other ones to earn the most points & to get the most out of a produce action Some buildings give you a special action or influence tokens when you build them To produce you must have two cogs — paying one coin for each missing cog — then use the production action of each building in your city once Every few rounds an influence card is revealed & whoever has the most influence tokens at the end of that round collects the card then discards their tokens At the end of fourteen rounds players score points for their residential buildings temples aqueducts coins & influence cards & tokens whoever has the most points wins! Players 2-4 Playing time 60 mins Ages 10 ...

What happens when a cheeky young zoo keeper goes against his wise old mum's advice & gives his charges coffee? Absolute complete & utter chaos that's what! This is a cautionary tale about Percy keeper at the World's Smallest Zoo & the disastrous consequences he faces after substituting his animals' normal food with caffeine ...

As the sun sits high in the sky over Cornwall & the sea breeze brings a welcome relief to the residents of the seaside village of Trevay a stranger arrives in need of a safe haven The fact that the stranger is a Hollywood heartthrob makes villagers Penny & Dorrie even more keen to help They both know what it's like to feel that you need a break from life & they bring the village together to keep their stranger's secret It's not long before he's helping some of the villagers find the answers to their own problems In return they find a place for him in their hearts Pendruggan A Cornish village with secrets at its heart This delightful Quick Read from Sunday Times bestselling novelist Fern Britton is full of her usual warmth & wit It is the perfect way to treat yourself to a gorgeous escape to Cornwall ...

Although later made an icon of rugged individualism the American cowboy was a grossly exploited & underpaid seasonal worker who waged a series of militant strikes in the generally isolated & neglected corners of the Old West Mark Lause examines those neglected labour conflicts couching them in the context of the bitter & violent range wars that broke out periodically across the region & locating both among the political insurgencies endemic to the American West in the so-called Gilded Age ...

Please note this is a region 2 DVD & will require a region 2 (Europe) or region Free DVD Player in order to play A controversial figure challenging the social mores of the time Professor Melvin Tolson (Washington) used unconventional & ferocious teaching methods to shape a debate team at Wiley College a small African American university in Texas during the 1930s Fighting against all odds & paving their way to success the team reaches a pivotal moment when they are faced with one of their greatest challenges yet going up against Harvard University&s critically acclaimed national championship debate team Actors Denzel Washington Nate Parker Jurnee Smollett Denzel Whitaker & Jermaine Williams Director Denzel Washington Certificate 12 years & over Year 2007 Languages English Duration 2 hours & 8 minutes (approx) ...

Please note this is a region 2 DVD & will require a region 2 (Europe) or region Free DVD Player in order to play A skilfully constructed melodrama with a genuinely thrilling denouement The Great Defender tells the story of an artist wrongly accused of murdering his model & of the efforts of an eminent KC to clear him Featuring a characteristically powerful performance from Matheson Lang the classical actor who became one of Britains most successful screen stars during the twenties this superb feature is presented here in a br&-new digital transfer from original film elements Sir Douglas Rolls is a highly respected defence lawyer of many years experience Now in rapidly failing health he is advised to retreat from the courtroom & pursue more pleasurable activities But it is just at this point in his life that his great lost love a woman his own strong sense of duty led him to give up twenty years ago & whom he still loves deeply walks into his chambers to ask that he defend her adulterous husband now to stand trial for murder Reluctantly agreeing to take on the case Sir Douglas soon finds there is more to the story than meets the eye ...

The decline of the West is something that has long been prophesied Symptoms of decline are all around us today slowing growth crushing debts ageing populations But what exactly is amiss with Western civilization? The answer Niall Ferguson argues is that the institutions that were once the four pillars of Western society
- representative government the free market the rule of law & civil society
- are degenerating The Great Degeneration is a powerful indictment of an era of negligence & complacency To stop us frittering away the institutional inheritance of centuries Ferguson warns will take heroic leadership & radical reform 'A refreshing perspective on the economic decline of advanced countries & the origins of the crisis' Samuel Brittan Financial Times ' He writes with splendid panache & a seemingly effortless debonair wit' The Times ' One of the most incisive writers of history politics & economics today' Sunday Telegraph ' Niall Ferguson has transformed the intellectual landscape' Economist

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The New Deal shaped our nation's politics for decades & was seen by many as tantamount to the American Way itself Now in this superb ...

Are we deranged? The acclaimed Indian novelist Amitav Ghosh argues that future generations may well think so How else to explain our imaginative failure in the face of global warming? In his first major book of nonfiction since In an Antique Land Ghosh examines our inability--at the level of literature history & politics--to grasp the scale & violence of climate change The extreme nature of today's climate events Ghosh asserts make them peculiarly resistant to contemporary modes of thinking & imagining This is particularly true of serious literary fiction hundred-year storms & freakish tornadoes simply feel too improbable for the novel; they are automatically consigned to other genres In the writing of history too the climate crisis has sometimes led to gross simplifications; Ghosh shows that the history of the carbon economy is a tangled global story with many contradictory & counterintuitive elements Ghosh ends by suggesting that politics much like literature has become a matter of personal moral reckoning rather than an arena of collective action But to limit fiction & politics to individual moral adventure comes at a great cost The climate crisis asks us to imagine other forms of human existence--a task to which fiction Ghosh argues is the best suited of all cultural forms His book serves as a great writer's summons to confront the most urgent task of our time ...