Everyone has wanted a piece of paradise Sri Lanka is a small island with a long, violent & enthralling history. Home to thousands of wild elephants, this is a place where natural beauty has endured, indifferent to human tragedy. Journeying through its many regions
- some haunted by war, many rarely seen by our eyes
- award-winning travel writer John Gimlette interviews ex-presidents & cricketers, tea planters & terrorists, negotiating the complex relationships of Sinhalese, Tamil & Muslim communities & the more sinister forms of tourism. Each city raises the ghosts of old colonies: Portuguese, Dutch & British armies striving to claim the most significant ports in the southern seas; each site resurrects a civilization that preceded, & sometimes, outfaced them. The political families of Colombo lead Gimlette through recent years of turmoil, survivors of the tsunami tell of their recovery &, tale by tale, scrap by scrap, the thorny truths of the civil war emerge
- a war whose wounds have yet to heal. As he walks in the steps of old conquerors, follows the secret paths of elephants & marches alongside pilgrims, Gimlette seeks the soul of a country that is struggling to free itself from trauma & embody an identity to match its vitality, its power & its people.


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Stanfords Adult Book of the Month August 2016 Sri Lanka is a small island with a long, violent & enthralling history. Home to thousands of wild elephants, this is a place where natural beauty has endured, indifferent to human tragedy. Journeying through its regions
- some haunted by war, many rarely seen by our eyes
- award-winning travel writer John Gimlette interviews ex-presidents & cricketers, tea planters & terrorists, negotiating the complex relationships of diverse communities & the more sinister forms of tourism. Each city raises the ghosts of Portuguese, Dutch or British colonies; each site resurrects a civilization that preceded, & sometimes, outfaced them. The political families of Colombo lead Gimlette through years of turmoil, survivors of the tsunami tell of their recovery & the thorny truths of the civil war emerge
- a war whose wounds have yet to heal. As he walks in the steps of old conquerors, follows the secret paths of elephants & marches alongside pilgrims, Gimlette seeks the soul of a country that is striving to free itself from trauma & embody an identity to match its vitality, its power & its people.


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Ravi is fascinated by his grandfather's stories of India & descriptions of a sun like a ferocious tiger, wind like a wild horse, & monsoon rains which cascade like waterfalls from the sky. Ravi also loves to hear the story of Divaali, where the parading elephants play a key role, & dreams of having an elephant dance to the sound of his flute. This is a beautifully written exploration of India through the conversation between a grandparent & grandchild, & also has informative endnotes on Indian culture, animals & peoples. ...

The Sheep Foldable Shopping Bag, comes as a compact & colourful pouch in the shape of a fox & unfolds into a tote bag with delicate decorative print. Very lightweight, the little sheep can fit into any handbag & be ready to use as an alternative to a plastic bag. The Sheep Foldable Shopping Bag is ideal for when you pop out to get your lunch or a few items from the shops. ...

Someone has smashed Father Giant`s favourite elephant. It wasn`t Olive & her brother Grub. Nor was it the naughty newt, the laughing lady or the yucky yak. So WHO is the culprit? A magnificently madcap mystery that will keep readers guessing until the very end. ...

For five hundred years, the Forbidden City was the seat of power of China's emperors. It is a vast & beautiful complex that housed the ruler & his thous&-person court. This rare look inside the walled city brings its colourful history to life for young readers. Twenty-four emperors made their home there, including K'ang Hsi, who road to his coronation with a procession of elephants & Empress Dowager Cixi, who felt the loss of a fingernail would symbolize the loss of power, so wore golden nail guards. These stories, coupled with new photographs, make this an unforgettable tour of a fascinating place. ...

Hercule Poirot is determined to solve an old husband & wife double murder that is still an open verdict... Hercule Poirot stood on the cliff-top. Here, many years earlier, there had been a tragic accident. This was followed by the grisly discovery of two more bodies
- a husband & wife
- shot dead. But who had killed whom? Was it a suicide pact? A crime of passion? Or cold-blooded murder? Poirot delves back into the past & discovers that `old sin leave long shadows`.

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Hercule Poirot is determined to solve an old husband & wife double murder that is still an open verdict... Hercule Poirot stood on the cliff-top. Here, many years earlier, there had been a tragic accident. This was followed by the grisly discovery of two more bodies
- a husband & wife
- shot dead. But who had killed whom? Was it a suicide pact? A crime of passion? Or cold-blooded murder? Poirot delves back into the past & discovers that `old sin leave long shadows`.

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Because elephants are pachyderms, a combination of two Greek roots meaning ”thick skin, ” one might think that nothing bothers them & that they lead quiet, safe lives. Nothing could be further from the truth: elephants have been hunted & killed for their ivory tusks since antiquity. & people often ignore the calves left behind, who must now live out their lives as traumatized & fearful orphans. Wildlife photographer Joachim Schmeisser made it his mission to document the story of these abandoned baby elephants. Through his sponsorship of elephants, he came into contact with the David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust, the world`s largest & most successful rescue & rehabilitation operation for orphaned elephants, headquartered in Nairobi. Professional veterinary technicians bottle feed the elephant calves until they are old enough to locate their own food. By living together with older elephant calves, they also learn the social rules governing elephant herds. After this phase is complete, the elephants are taken to one of the Trust`s rehabilitation stockades before they are released back into the wild. Joachim Schmeisser followed numerous elephants through the entire process & captured fascinating pictures from their arrival at the nursery all the way to their release back into the wild. Elephants in Heaven provides a visual record of how these traumatized elephants are raised in a place that is truly heavenly for them, offering a compelling behind-the-scenes look inside an elephant nursery. The touching animal portraits also convey the devastating consequences of poaching, because for Joachim Schmeisser, it`s about ”beauty, fragility, transience, mindfulness, & about dignity & the equal standing of each individual.” ...

A baby elephant is lost & alone in the forest, when a herd of buffalo comes along & takes him into their fold...so what is he now
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