Discover an astonishing collection of extraordinary characters in this brand new compilation of women`s travel writing. Spanning three centuries, this assortment of writings reveals a rich treasure trove of anecdotes & adventures from incredible women worth celebrating & remembering. Celia Fiennes travelled the length & breadth of Engl&, riding side-saddle, at the dawn of the eighteenth century. Discover the multiple journeys around the world undertaken in the 1840s by the Austrian Ida Pfeiffer. Dora d` Istria, a mountain-climbing duchess & polymath, travelled widely through Europe but her account of ascending Mont Blanc in 1860 is perhaps the most striking. Read about Isabel Burton`s adventures as a government employee`s wife stationed all over the world. Explore the writing of Isabella Bird who travelled around the world on doctor`s orders
- until finally retraining as a doctor & missionary in her sixties for a trip to India & its surrounding countries. Find out what motivated Marie Kingsley to travel solo to the deepest parts of West Africa & how her journeys shaped not only her own way of thinking but that of Europe as whole. Learn how May Kellogg Sullivan undertook her journey to Alaska & the Yukon to seek her fortune in the gold-mining world. Astonish yourself by finding out that, on a trip to Burma, India, Ceylon & Indonesia with her husb&, Fanny Bullock Workman cycled 15, 000 miles (as a welcome break from glacier-climbing in the Himalayas). Follow investigative journalist Nellie Bly as she takes up Jules Verne`s gauntlet to travel around the world in eighty days. Or find out how Ella Sykes once rode on horseback from the Caspian Sea all the way to India.
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Wry, satirical & bawdy, Tamer`s stories are always informed by his dark view of humanity & of Syrian society in particular. Through these glimpses of corrupt, fearful lives under a violent dictatorship, it is possible to discern echoes of the storm that has brought Syria to near-disintegration. Tamer`s stories explore taboos & power relations, bringing together religion, politics & sexuality (often all at once) & implying that these forms of oppression are connected. An assault is deflected when the victim responds enthusiastically; a woman is spared stoning because the streets have no cobbles, & her neighbours cannot afford any; A comatose man awakens after years to find the regime unchanged, & tries to escape back into the coma; a newborn baby curses the hospital staff that delivers him, & when his mother tries to quiet him, retorts: ` You`re talking like our leaders!`; a man is warned by two apples not to eat them, & anxiously questions them about their political connections. Unsentimental & brilliantly compressed, these sixty-three stories are the work of a virtuoso, & translator Ibrahim Muhawi has found exactly the right deadpan style with which to express them. ...

After decades of civil war, the people of southern Sudan voted to secede from the north in an attempt to escape the seemingly endless violence. On declaring independence, South Sudan was one of the least developed places on earth, but with the ability to draw upon significant oil reserves worth $150 million a month, the foundation for a successful future was firmly in place. How, then, did the state of the new nation deteriorate even further, to the point that a new civil war broke out two years later? Today, with both Sudans still hostage to the aspirations of their military & political leaders, how can their people escape the violence that has dominated the two countries` recent history? By giving voice to those who, after the break-up of Sudan, have had to find ways to live, trade & communicate with one another, Jok Madut Jok provides a moving insight into a crisis that has only rarely made it into our headlines. Breaking Sudan is a meticulous account, analyzing why violence became so deeply entrenched in Sudanese society & exploring what can be done to find peace in two countries ravaged by war. ...

NASA`s history is a familiar story, one that typically peaks with Neil Armstrong taking his small step on the Moon in 1969. But America`s space agency wasn`t created in a vacuum. It was assembled from pre-existing parts, drawing together some of the best minds the non-Soviet world had to offer. In the 1930s, rockets were all the rage in Germany, the focus both of scientists hoping to fly into space & of the German armed forces, looking to circumvent the restrictions of the Treaty of Versailles. One of the key figures in this period was Wernher von Braun, an engineer who designed the rockets that became the devastating V-2. As the war came to its chaotic conclusion, von Braun escaped from the ruins of Nazi Germany, & was taken to America where he began developing missiles for the US Army. Meanwhile, the US Air Force was looking ahead to a time when men would fly in space, & test pilots like Neil Armstrong were flying cutting-edge, rocket-powered aircraft in the thin upper atmosphere. Breaking the Chains of Gravity tells the story of America`s nascent space program, its scientific advances, its personalities & the rivalries it caused between the various arms of the US military. At this point getting a man in space became a national imperative, leading to the creation of the National Aeronautics & Space Administration, otherwise known as NASA. ...

From its humble origins in the backstreets & rooftops of Paris`s urban jungle, to the tops of London & New York`s skyscrapers, Parkour, has become an adrenaline-fuelled implosion on the urban landscape. But more than a sport that most jaw-dropped onlookers can hardly comprehend, Parkour is an exploration of movement & a return to our body`s natural ability to run, jump, hang & move with fluidity. For the first time, Julie Angel tells the story of Parkour`s beginnings
- the diverse, intriguing & unusual characters who went to the rooftops, hung off the stairwells & drain pipes as they trained through the night, often risking their lives & created something that has become a worldwide phenomenon. Breaking the Jump tells the unknown story behind Parkour`s rise, & asks what is it that drives those who stand on the edge & think `go`.
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Bruce Pike can hear the sea at night & longs to go to the shore. When he befriends Loonie, his small town`s wild boy, that dream is realized. Together, intoxicated by the treacherous power of the waves & by the immortality of youth, the two boys defy all limits & rules. Pikelet learns what it is to be extraordinary, feels exhilaration for the very first time, &
- caught up in love & friendship & an erotic current he cannot resist
- he understands the true meaning of fear. These are experiences that will far outlast his adolescence. How, then, to mask the emptiness of leaving such intensity behind?

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` Exhilarating` Sunday Times` Rapturous` Sunday Telegraph`A remarkable tale of grace & danger` Financial Times When paramedic Bruce Pike is called out to deal with another teenage adventure gone wrong, he knows better than anyone what happened & how. Thirty years before, that dead boy could have been him. Bruce remembers what it was like to be a risk-taking kid, to feel that thrill & that fear... Breath by Tim Winton is the story of Bruce & his best friend Loonie, & the obsession that changed both of their lives. It is about the exhilaration of the sea & the waves, the treacherous addiction to risk, & the intoxicating power of forbidden love. ...

Breathe is a collection that explores the heart of Fidel Castro-era Cuba; an outsider`s look that is balanced by a weight of empathy to illuminate truths that lie couched between the island`s propaganda & the Western media`s portrayal. Characters from Europe & the USA in Swimming, Taxi & Sabbatical seem to want to hold on to the indulgences that their countries offer them, while praising Cubans for the more abstemious lives they lead & seeking to sample what the locals experience; in Siempre Luchando, I Never See Them Cry & The Party, romantic liaisons strengthen or buckle under the strain of the minute exploitations that result from the assumptions one makes about the other; the seedy sexual aggression of Luca`s Trip to Havana is undercut by the subtle yet intense lust of Breathe; while Leaving Cuba, with its closing image of Havana`s night sky, is as eloquently balanced a tale of the lives of everyday Cubans as you will read in a long while
- whichever path one takes, something is lost. As Aida Bahr, winner of Cuba`s Premio de la Critica Literaria says, ”relying more on subtleties than on drama, [ Segal] portrays the tensions & struggles, but also the joy & warmth, that fill Cubans` lives.”
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Brechin in 1901 in a fascinating series of reproductions of old Ordnance Survey plans in the Alan Godfrey Editions, ideal for anyone interested in the history of their neighbourhood or family. The map covers the centre of Brechin & the area to the south & west, stretching from Victoria Park westward & southward to Stannochy Bridge. Features include Brechin Castle, churches, Meikle Mills, CR railway terminus, Poorhouse, River South Esk, Brechin Bridge, Valley Works, Den Burn Works, East Church, etc. Extracts from a trade directory are on the reverse. About the Alan Godfrey Editions of the 25” OS Series: Selected towns in Great Britain & Ireland are covered by maps showing the extent of urban development in the last decades of the 19th & early 20th century. The plans have been taken from the Ordnance Survey mapping & reprinted at about 15 inches to one mile (1:4, 340). On the reverse most maps have historical notes & many also include extracts from contemporary directories. Most maps cover about one mile (1.6kms) north/south, one & a half miles (2.4kms) across; adjoining sheets can be combined to provide wider coverage.FOR MORE INFORMATION & A COMPLETE LIST OF ALL AVAILABLE TITLES PLEASE CLICK ON THE SERIES LINK. ...

Topographical survey of Belgium at 1:20, 000 from Nationaal Geografisch Instituut / Institut Géographique National, the country’s national survey organization. Each 20K map covers one quarter of the corresponding 1:50, 000 map (with adjustments in the border & coastal areas). The maps provide all the information expected of topographic mapping at this scale & in addition have an unusually large amount of vegetation and/or land use information (different types of woodlands, gardens, orchards, heath, etc). The maps have a 1-km UTM grid, with margin ticks for latitude & longitude at intervals of 1`. Map legend & a glossary of terms used on the maps include English. Stanfords keeps as regular stock 20K maps for the World War I battlefields around the Ypres, Messines & Passchendaele, & for the area of the Battle of Waterloo. The 1:20, 000 survey covers the whole of Belgium & maps for other regions can be supplied as special orders. To see the list of titles in this series please click on the series link.PLEASE NOTE: the Long-Distance Footpaths Map of Belgium at 1:300, 000 which shows the division of Belgium into the 50K survey sheets can also be used to see in more detail coverage by the 20K maps. ...