' There is no doubt a greater awareness now of the significance of twin loss than there was ten years ago I think that this is largely due to a big increase in articles radio & television programmes as well as the spread of the Network The well-known researcher Nancy Segal in the USA has through her many books added knowledge to our understanding of twin relationships as well as twin loss She believes the loss to be highly significant & queries whether for some lone twins it is greater even than that of the loss of a spouse (Segal 2000) Others have written autobiographical material about their loss (Jones 1987; Farmer 1988) In spite of this there is still ignorance At a recent book launch for the publication of a book about the loss of a twin through drug taking (Burton-Phillips 2007) someone in the field of education said to a few of us from the Network that she did not see how a twin who lost their twin at birth could possibly be affected She asked ' How would the surviving twin know?'I asked her to imagine how she might feel if told during her childhood that she had been born a twin but due to her taking all the food' during the pregnancy her twin had not survived I suggested that perhaps worse she might have had her parents make it clear that they wished her twin had been the one to live Less dramatically she was asked how she might feel missing someone all her life who 'should have been there' to share it This question was put by a lone twin who added that she had also had surviving twins born to the family to watch growing up as a pair while she was without her twin sister The educationist was honest & said she had never thought of those things before & then freely admitted our comments made her think again'
- Joan Woodward Author
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A sci-fi thriller with a killer twist from the beloved author of The Next Together series Romy Silvers is the only surviving crew-member of a spaceship travelling to a new planet on a mission to establish a second home for humanity Alone in space she is the loneliest girl in the universe until she hears about a new ship which has launched from Earth
- with a single passenger on board A boy called J Their only communication is via email
- & due to the distance between them their messages take months to transmit & yet Romy finds herself falling in love Can you fall in love with someone you've never met never even spoken to
- someone who is light years away? But what does Romy really know about J? & what do the mysterious messages which have started arriving from Earth really mean? Sometimes there's something worse than being alone


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From the author of Saturday Night & Sunday Morning' comes these stories of hardship & hope in post-war Britain The title story in this classic collection tells of Smith a defiant young rebel inhabiting the no-man's land of institutionalised Borstal As his steady jog-trot rhythm transports him over an unrelenting frost-bitten earth he wonders why for whom & for what he is running A groundbreaking work The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner' captured the grim isolation of the working class in the English Midlands when it was first published in 1960s But Sillitoe's depiction of petty crime & deep-seated anger in industrial & desperate cities remains as potent today as it was almost half a century ago ...

SHORTLISTED FOR THE 2016 GORDON BURN PRIZECHOSEN AS 'BOOK OF THE YEAR' BYObserver Guardian Telegraph Irish Times New Statesman Times Literary Supplement Herald When Olivia Laing moved to New York City in her mid-thirties she found herself inhabiting loneliness on a daily basis Increasingly fascinated by this most shameful of experiences she began to explore the lonely city by way of art Moving fluidly between the works & lives of some of the city's most compelling artists Laing conducts an electric dazzling investigation into what it means to be alone illuminating not only the causes of loneliness but also how it might be resisted & redeemed ...

David Riesman's The Lonely Crowd explores the links between social character-the ways in which members of a society are similar to one another-and social structures He argues that as the United States became predominantly consumer-driven rather than production-driven-particularly after World War II-American social character changed 94 pages Homer Jarrod ...

Please note this is a region 2 DVD & will require a region 2 (Europe) or region Free DVD Player in order to play Meet Larry Hubbard Lonely guy The one & only Steve Martin stars along with Charles Grodin & Tony Award winner Judith Ivey in a funny & poignant romance inspired by Bruce Jay Friedman&s tongue-in-cheek survival manual The Lonely Guy follows the progress of Larry (Steve Martin) & his buddy Warren (Charles Grodin) as they attempt to eke out a successful social life in the Big Apple They&re losers until one day Larry writes a book that turns loneliness into the ultimate love potion & life is never the same! The film features performances by Steve Lawrence & Robyn Douglass with special cameos by Merv Griffin & Dr Joyce Brothers Actors Steve Martin Charles Grodin Judith Ivey Steve Lawrence Robyn Douglass Merv Griffin Dr Joyce Brothers Candi Brough Randi Brough Julie Payne Rance Howard Loni Anderson & Andy Garcia Director Arthur Hiller Certificate 15 years & over Year 1984 Screen Widescreen 1851 Anamorphic Languages English
- Dolby Digital (20) Mono Additional Languages French ; German ; Italian ; Spanish ; Russian Subtitles English for the hard of hearing ; French ; German ; Italian ; Spanish Czech ; Danish ; Dutch ; Finnish ; Hungarian ; Norwegian ; Polish Duration 1 hour & 26 minutes (approx) Region Region 2
- Will only play on European Region 2 or multi-region DVD players

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' Joyful funny & vividly alive' Emily St John Mandel' The Lonely Hearts Hotel sucked me right in & only got better & better I began underlining truths I had hungered for' Miranda July' Makes me think of comets & live wires raises goosebumps' Helen Oyeyemi'A fairytale laced with gunpowder' Kelly Link The Lonely Hearts Hotel is a love story with a difference Set throughout the roaring twenties it is a wicked fairytale of circus tricks & child prodigies radical chorus girls drug-addicted musicians & brooding clowns set in an underworld whose economy hinges on the price of a kiss It is the tale of two dreamers abandoned in an orphanage where they were fated to meet Here in the face of cold hunger & unpredictable beatings Rose & Pierrot create a world of their own shielding the spark of their curiosity from those whose jealousy will eventually tear them apart When they meet again each will have changed having struggled through the Depression through what they have done to fill the absence of the other But their childhood vision remains
- a dream to storm the world a spectacle an extravaganza that will lift them out of the gutter & onto a glittering stage Heather O' Neill's pyrotechnical imagination & language are like no other In this she has crafted a dazzling circus of a novel that takes us from the underbellies of war-time Montreal & Prohibition New York to a theatre of magic where anything is possible
- where an orphan girl can rule the world & a ruined innocence can be redeemed

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A charming & uplifting story perfect for fans of A Man Called Ove or Jonas Jonasson ' If you're a bit of a weirdo you will love Biddy Weir'
- Ian Sansom bestselling author of The Norfolk Mystery Biddy Weir is a quirky girl Abandoned by her mother as a baby & with a father who's not quite equipped for the challenges of modern parenting Biddy lives in her own little world happy to pass her time painting by the sea & watching the birds go by That is until she meets Alison Flemming Because there are a few things about Biddy that aren't normal you see & Alison isn't afraid to point them out to the world All of a sudden Biddy's quiet life is thrown into turmoil If only there was someone to convince her that actually everyone's a little bit weird A story of abuse & survival of falling down & of starting again & of one woman's battle to learn to love herself for who she is The Lonely Life of Biddy Weir is Lesley Allen's startlingly honest debut novel PRAISE FOR THE LONELY LIFE OF BIDDY WEIR"A wonderful debut poignant powerful & moving with ripples of dark humour" Colin Bateman"I'm a little bit in love with Biddy Weir In her Lesley Allen has created a character who is the embodiment of all our adolescent insecurities" Bernie Mc Gill author of The Butterfly Cabinet" In Biddy Weir Lesley Allen has created one of those characters that gets under your skin & won't leave A must-read for anyone who has ever wondered about life & where we fit in" Doreen Finn author of My Buried Life" One of my favourite reads this year raw real & authentic You will be enthralled" Bibliomaniac" Truly uplifting I can not believe this is Lesley Allen's debut novel" Steph & Chris's Book Review
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Both devastating & funny The Lonely Londoners is an unforgettable account of immigrant experience
- & one of the great twentieth-century
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Collection of riveting tales of the sea including the story that launched his writing career the account of the epic battle to sink the German battle ship Bismarck & two new stories collected here for the first time THE MASTER STORYTELLER IN HIS ELEMENT Alistair Mac Lean has an unmistakable & unrivalled skill in writing about the sea & its power & about the men & women who sail it & who fight & die in it His distinctive voice was evident from his very first prize-winning story The Dileas' & has been heard time & again in his international career as the author of such bestsellers as HMS Ulysses & San Andreas The Lonely Sea starts where Mac Lean's career started with The Dileas' & collects together his stories of the sea Here is a treasury of vintage Mac Lean compelling & brilliant where the master storyteller is in his element This reissue

Includes:: two new stories The Good Samaritan' & The Black Storm' which bear all the classic hallmarks of Mac Lean's finest writing & are published here for the very first time

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