Parade's End is the great British war novel & Ford Madox Ford's major achievement as a novelist. Originally published as four linked novels between 1924 & 1928, it follows the story of Christopher Tietjens, as his life is shattered by his wife's infidelities & overturned by the mud, blood & destruction of the First World War. Tietjens, with his old-fashioned Tory values, is already out of step with the corrupt political culture of Edwardian England: his experiences at the Front & his developing relationship with the suffragette Valentine Wannop force him into a radical reconfiguring of his values as he participates in the post-war period of national re-construction. Parade's End is both a subtly perceptive psychological novel & a richly descriptive chronicle of 'the public events of a decade'. Through Tietjens, his beautiful (and unforgettably cruel) wife, Sylvia, & the principled Valentine, Ford draws us into the world of the English upper class as it goes through a period of crisis & transformation. ...

Booker Prize-winner Julian Barnes introduces Ford Madox Ford`s masterpiece ” Parade`s End”
- now a major new BBC/HBO TV adaptation
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The Great War changes everything. In this epic tale, spanning over a decade, war turns the world of privileged, English aristocrat Christopher Tietjens upside down. It forces him to question everything he holds dear
- social order, morality, marriage & loyalty. & it rocks the very foundations of English society. This is a powerful story about love, betrayal & disillusionment in a time of horror & confusion by one of Britain`s finest novelists. Ford Madox Ford`s monumental novel came to our screens in August 2012 as a major BBC adaptation, with a screenplay by the legendary playwright Tom Stoppard & a stellar cast that included Benedict Cumberbatch. This edition of the novel

Includes:: all four parts, originally published separately between 1924 & 1928.


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Almost forty & with nothing to show for it, Hannah Luckraft is starting to notice that her lifestyle is not entirely sustainable: her subconscious is turning against her, her soul is a little unwell. Her family is wounded, her friends are odd, her body is not as reliable as it once was & her drinking is frankly out of h&. Robert, a dissolute dentist, appears to offer a love she can underst&, but he may only be one more symptom of the problem she must cure. From the north-east of Scotland to Dublin, from London to Montreal, to Budapest & onwards, Hannah travels in search of the ultimate altered state: the one where she can be happy
- her paradise. Paradise is a compelling examination of failure that is also a comic triumph, a novel of dark extremes that is full of the most ravishing lyrical beauty.
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Beatrice Kizza, a woman in flight from a homeland that condemned her for daring to love, flees to London. There, she shields her sorrow from the indifference of her adopted city, & navigates a night-time world of shift-work & bedsits. Howard Pink is a self-made millionaire who has risen from Petticoat Lane to the mansions of Kensington on a tide of determination & bluster. Yet self-doubt still snaps at his heels & his life is shadowed by the terrible loss that has shaken him to his foundations. Carol Hetherington, recently widowed, is living the quiet life in Wandsworth with her cat & The Jeremy Kyle Show for company. As she tries to come to terms with the absence her husband has left on the other side of the bed, she frets over her daughter`s prospects & wonders if she`ll ever be happy again. Esme Reade is a young journalist learning to muck-rake & doorstep in pursuit of the elusive scoop, even as she longs to find some greater meaning & leave her imprint on the world. Four strangers, each inhabitants of the same city, where the gulf between those who have too much & those who will never have enough is impossibly vast. But when the glass that separates Howard`s & Beatrice`s worlds is shattered by an inexcusable act, they discover that the capital has connected them in ways they could never have imagined. ...

This timely portrait of Lebanon exposes the fault lines that underlie the current crisis in the Middle East, & charts the country`s attempts to rebuild a fragile peace after its long civil war & recent conflict with Israel. Part reportage, part travel narrative, ” Paradise Divided” chronicles the delicate web of relationships that make up contemporary Lebanese society. Drawing on interviews with community leaders & relationships with ordinary people, it reveals a richly-textured social & religious fabric in which Sunni & Shia Muslims, Druze & Christians of all kinds, from Maronite Catholics to evangelical Protestants, strive to maintain a delicate balance. It offers an insight into how Lebanon`s religious communities, their identities formed by history, landscape & their relationships with one another, came to be what they are today
- & how their different perspectives can lead to potentially destructive tensions. What emerges is a quintessentially Middle Eastern form of coexistence, poised between tolerance & sectarianism
- a theme powerfully developed through the author`s privileged access to the normally secretive Druze. The reader follows the country`s changing fortunes after the assassination of former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, the subsequent pro-democracy movement & withdrawal of Syrian forces from Lebanese soil. The final chapters examine the aftermath of Israel`s military campaign & the emergence of the new battle dividing Lebanese society as opposing camps struggle to have their vision for Lebanon made reality. ” Paradise Divided” opens a window onto a country little-visited by Westerners for decades, & one very different from the war-torn images of the Middle East that dominate our television screens. Offering a unique view of the struggle between sectarianism & tolerance, & the relationship between the Arab world & the West, it is a book which sheds light on some of the central issues of our time.

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A journey through some of the world`s most stunning gardens from Spain & Morocco to Turkey & India. An exploration of the beauty ...

This is the story of Lizzie Vogel, a 15 year old girl who finds herself working in an old people`s home in Leicestershire in the 1970s. The place is in chaos & it`s not really a suitable job for a schoolgirl: she`d only gone for the job because she wanted a new phase & it seemed too exhausting to commit to being a full-time girlfriend or a punk. Lizzie has some knowledge of old people (they`re not suited to granary bread, & you mustn`t compare them to toddlers) but she doesn`t know there`s a right way to get someone out of the bath, or what to do when someone dies. When a rival old people`s home with better parking & daily chairobics threatens to take all their patients, Paradise Lodge`s cast of staff & helpers, from the assertively shy Nurse who only communicates through little grunts to the son of the Chinese takeaway manager who`s renowned for his erotic handholding techniques, have to come together to save the home before it`s too late. From the bestselling author of Love, Nina comes a story of being very young, & very old, & the laughter, & the tears, in between. ...

This is the story of Lizzie Vogel, a 15 year old girl who finds herself working in an old people`s home in Leicestershire in the 1970s. The place is in chaos & it`s not really a suitable job for a schoolgirl: she`d only gone for the job because she wanted a new phase & it seemed too exhausting to commit to being a full-time girlfriend or a punk. Lizzie has some knowledge of old people (they`re not suited to granary bread, & you mustn`t compare them to toddlers) but she doesn`t know there`s a right way to get someone out of the bath, or what to do when someone dies. When a rival old people`s home with better parking & daily chairobics threatens to take all their patients, Paradise Lodge`s cast of staff & helpers, from the assertively shy Nurse who only communicates through little grunts to the son of the Chinese takeaway manager who`s renowned for his erotic handholding techniques, have to come together to save the home before it`s too late. From the bestselling author of Love, Nina comes a story of being very young, & very old, & the laughter, & the tears, in between. ...

In 1976 & 1978, aerial photographer Georg Gerster had the rare opportunity to record the landscape of Iran on over 100 flights & 300 flying hours. This unique photographic project resulted in a near complete documentation of the major archaeological sites & important landscapes in the region. The book

Includes:: spectacular images of ancient citadels, desert ruins & rice fields spreading like a vast patchwork in a river delta, along with many unexpected sights, such as the bird`s eye view of a crowded ski resort in the Elburz mountains, within easy reach of Tehran. Persia`s densely packed cities like Bushehr on the Persian Gulf, are elegantly captured by Gerster & look so very different from Western European or North American cities of the same period. Persia`s complex, interlocking flat-roofed buildings are both timeless & timely, with architecture that has stood unchaged for thousands of years, along with brightly-coloured 1970s cars parked in the colonnaded courtyards. Even the Persian landscape contains surprises: on closer inspection, the elaborate patterns made in fields with tractors & ploughs turn out to have more to do with politics than agriculture or land art
- a law at the time allowed people to claim unused land by planting crops on it, & this type of `agridoodle` was apparently enough to support such a claim. Persia is the anchient name of the region we now know as Iran. We still reference the country`s long & rich cultural heritage when we speak of Persian carpets & Persian miniatures, of Persian language, history & literature. In her introduction to this book, Iranian-born writer Maryam Sachs lists some words borrowed from Persian by English speakers, which include azure, bazaar, gazelle, magic, musk, tapestry, scarlet, narcissus & paradise. These words offer insight into the country`s landscape, inhabitants & traditions
- influences that have indirectly shaped its landscape. This book vividly brings to life a place, time & culture that few people outside Iran are able to witness.



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