Buckingham Palace is one of the most familiar buildings in the world, but who knows the real tales hidden behind its ceremonial gates? Who was the witch that once lived in the royal courtyard? How could courtesans once have plied their trade in front of the present royal windows? How dare a prime minister call the palace a monstrous insult to the nation? This text presents a detailed exploration of the ordinary & sometimes extraordinary people who owned or lived on the land now occupied by the Palace, & of the royal occupants who later inhabited it. The book reveals how Buckingham Palace came to be the place it is today, from the time when it probably formed the escape route from a Roman battle nearly 2000 years ago, to the establishment of the first gentleman`s house there in the 17th century, & on into a chequered royal history, which

Includes:: an ambitious Saxon queen & James I`s plan to found an English silk industry in the Palace gardens.

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The young narrator of The Strange Library finds himself wondering how taxes were collected in the Ottoman Empire. He pops into the local library to see if it has a book on the subject. This is his first mistake. Led to a special `reading room` in a maze under the library by a strange old man, he finds himself imprisoned with only a sheep man, who makes excellent donuts, & a girl, who can talk with her hands, for company. His mother will be worrying why he hasn`t returned in time for dinner & the old man seems to have an appetite for eating small boy`s brains. How will he escape? This hardback book contains beautiful illustrations that assist with the story & will delight Murakami fans. ...

*THE NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER* Could you leave behind all that you know & live in solitude for three decades? This is the extraordinary story of the last true hermit
- Christopher Knight. ` This was a breath-taking book to read & many weeks later I am still thinking about the implications for our society &
- by extension
- for my own life` Sebastian Junger, bestselling author of The Perfect Storm `A wry meditation on one man`s attempt to escape life`s distractions & look inwards, to find meaning not by doing, but by being` Martin Sixsmith, bestselling author of Philomena & Ayesha`s Gift ` Not all heroes wear capes. My latest one is a man called Christopher Knight
- a silent idol for anyone who has felt the urge to just sack it all off & live the life of a hermit` Lucy Mangan, Stylist ` An extraordinary story about solitude, community, identity & freedom` Guardian `A meditation on solitude, wildness & survival. It is also, unexpectedly, a tribute to the joys of reading` The Wall Street Journal In 1986, twenty-year-old Christopher Knight left his home in Massachusetts, drove to Maine, & disappeared into the woods. He would not speak to another human being until three decades later when he was arrested for stealing food. Christopher survived by his wits & courage, developing ingenious ways to store food & water in order to avoid freezing to death in his tent during the harsh Maine winters. He broke into nearby cottages for food, clothes, reading material & other provisions, taking only what he needed. In the process, he unwittingly terrified a community unable to solve the mysterious burglaries. Myths abounded amongst the locals eager to find this legendary hermit. Based on extensive interviews with Knight himself, this is a vividly detailed account of his secluded life & the challenges he faced returning to the world. The Stranger in the Woods is a riveting story of survival that asks fundamental questions about solitude & what makes for a good life. Above all, this is a deeply moving portrait of a man determined to live life his own way.



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In the late summer of 1913, George Sawle brings the charming, aristocratic young poet Cecil Valance to his family`s modest home. The shared intimacies of this weekend link the Sawle & Valance families irrevocably, becoming legendary events in a larger story, told & interpreted in different ways over the coming century. Throughout this richly comic history of sexual mores & literary reputation we follow the two families, in a series of widely spaced episodes, through startling changes in fortune & circumstance. An impeccably nuanced exploration of changing taste, class & social etiquette, The Strange`s Child, written in deliciously witty & observant prose, is an enthralling novel from one of the finest writers in the English language. ` With The Stranger`s Child, an already remarkable talent unfurls into something spectacular` Sunday Times `A remarkable, unmissable achievement.. . One leaves the novel with a sense of the truly extraordinary` Independent ` Elegant, seductive & extremely enjoyable to read.. . The Stranger`s Child will no doubt be one of the best novels published this year` Guardian ...

In the late summer of 1913, George Sawle brings his Cambridge friend Cecil Valance, a charismatic young poet, to visit his family home. The weekend will be one of excitements & confusions for everyone, but it is on George`s sixteen-year-old sister Daphne that it will have the most lasting impact. As the decades pass, Daphne & those around her endure startling changes in fortune & circumstance &, as reputations rise & fall, the events of that long-ago summer become part of a legendary story. Longlisted for the Man Booker Prize, The Stranger`s Child is Hollinghurst`s masterly exploration of English culture, taste & attitudes. Epic in sweep, it intimately portrays a luminous but changing world & the ways memory
- & myth
- can be built & broken. It is a powerful & utterly absorbing modern classic.

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This book is a pure celebration of the art of the stencil. It is a book of stencils that can be used & treasured or just simply be an inspiration to others to create. The 20 stencils featured, printed on perforated card stock so that they can be torn out & used, have been created by an impressive list of international street artists, from the masters to the new kids on the block. Each artist has created an in-situ photograph to accompany their stencil, showing how they would use it, along with other imagery. There is also a short biography for each artist. The book opens with an interview with the founder of stencil art, the Paris-based artist Blek Le Rat, who has also created a stencil for the book. A collectors item in its own right, the book is a must for artists, illustrators & anyone who loves street art. ...

This double-sided foldout book takes you on a fascinating journey deep underground. One side of the foldout shows the ground beneath the city, whilst the reverse side shows the ground beneath the countryside. The underground scenes include tunnels & pipes, creatures` burrows, layers of rock & the planet`s molten core, & run seamlessly into the next. Mixing urban & rural settings, covering subjects such as geology, archaeology & natural history, The Street Beneath My Feetoffers children the opportunity to explore their world through a detailed learning experience. & its fold-out, `laperello` style, which extends to 2.5 metres in length, is ideal for spreading out on the floor to pore over for hours. ...

This unique, stunningly illustrated journal is ideal to be used as a travelling notebook or sketchpad. Food lovers & travel enthusiasts will love exploring street food from all around the world through Sophia Augusta`s vibrant illustrations. There is something for everyone, from the instantly recognisable (Italian ice cream, American hot dogs & Belgian waffles) to more unusual delicacies such as starfish on sticks from China & `red red` stew from Ghana. It contains 128 blank pages & 26 colourful illustrations to inspire your notes & sketches. ...

A beautifully illustrated art history & cultural biography, The Street of Wonderful Possibilities focuses on one of the most influential artistic quarters in the late nineteenth & early twentieth centuries
- London`s Tite Street, where a staggering amount of talent thrived, including James Abbott Mc Neill Whistler, Oscar Wilde & John Singer Sargent. For Wilde, the street was full of `wonderful possibilities`, while for Whistler it was `the birthplace of art`, where a new brand of aestheticism was nurtured in his controversial White House. Modern masterpieces in art & literature flowed from the studios & houses of Tite Street, but this bohemian enclave had a dark side as well. Here Whistler was bankrupted, Frank Miles was sent to an asylum, Wilde was imprisoned, & Peter Warlock was gassed to death. Throughout its turbulent existence, Tite Street mirrored the world around it. From the Aesthetic movement & its challenge to Victorian values, through the Edwardian struggle for women`s suffrage, to the bombs of the Blitz in the 1940s, it remained home to innumerable artists & writers, socialites & suffragettes, musicians & madmen. The Street of Wonderful Possibilities reveals this complex history, tying together private & professional lives to form a colourful tapestry of art & intrigue, illuminating their relationships to each other, to Tite Street & to a rapidly modernising London at the fin de siecle.
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An elegant, powerful novel, set in Victorian Engl&, a time not so different from our own! perfect for fans of THE INTERPRETATION OF MURDER & THE SHADOW OF THE WIND Ambitious young journalist Thomas Kitson arrives at the battlefields of the Crimea as the London Courier`s man on the ground. It is a dangerous place, full of the worst horrors of war but Kitson is determined to make his mark. Under the tutelage of his hard-bitten Irish boss Cracknell, & assisted by artist Robert Styles, he sets about exposing the incompetence of the army generals. Two years later, as Sebastopol burns, Thomas returns to England under mysterious circumstances. Desperate to forget the atrocities of the Crimea, he takes a job as a `street philosopher`, a society writer reporting on the gossip of the day. But on the eve of the great Art Treasures Exhibition, as Manchester prepares to welcome Queen Victoria, Thomas`s past returns to haunt him in the most horrifying way! ...