Everyone knows `tis the season to be jolly; when you can roast chestnuts on an open fire, treetops glisten & sleigh bells ring alongside the sound of small children`s laughter. However, if you don`t think Christmas is the most wonderful time of the year then reach for ” Keep Calm at Christmas” & let its soothing advice reassure you that Christmas comes but once a year. ” Keep Calm at Christmas” follows ” Keep Calm for Ladies” & ” Keep Calm for Chaps” & offers many merry pearls of wisdom to help you get through the festive season; on everything from relatives to office parties, & gluttony to New Year resolutions. This is an insightful pocket gift for Christmas. ” What I don`t like about office Christmas parties is looking for a job the next day”. (Phyllis Diller). ” About all you can do is dream of a white Christmas, for it seems like it always leaves most of us in the red”. (Anon). ” Once again, we come to the Holiday Season, a deeply religious time that each of us observes, in his own way, by going to the mall of his choice”. (Anon). ” Next to a circus there ain`t nothing that packs up & tears out faster than the Christmas spirit”. (Kin Hubbard). ” New Year`s Day...now is the accepted time to make your regular annual good resolutions. Next week you can begin paving hell with them as usual”. (Mark Twain). ...

Enlivened with vivid autobiographical detail, George Orwell`s Keep the Aspidistra Flying is a tragically witty account of the struggle to escape from a materialistic existence from the author of 1984, with an introduction by Peter Davison in Penguin Modern Classics. Gordon Comstock loathes dull, middle-class respectability & worship of money. He gives up a `good job` in advertising to work part-time in a bookshop, giving him more time to write. But he slides instead into a self-induced poverty that destroys his creativity & his spirit. Only Rosemary, ever-faithful Rosemary, has the strength to challenge his commitment to his chosen way of life. Through the character of Gordon Comstock, Orwell reveals his own disaffection with the society he once himself renounced. If you enjoyed Keep the Aspidistra Flying you might like Orwell`s Burmese Days, also available in Penguin Modern Classics. ”A completely harrowing & stark account of poverty...written in clear & violent language.” (Cyril Connolly). ...

From first arrival in Lebanon as a fresh faced graduate to the heat of the first Gulf War conflict as managed from Saudi Arabia, Sir Alan Munro`s account of life representing Her Majesty`s government in embassy posting across the world will enchant & engage. This book is intended to convey something of the flavour
- & the frivolities
- of escapades & encounters which Sir Alan & his wife experienced in the course of thirty-five years in diplomacy in the Middle East, Africa & South America, & at home too. The narrative is set against a half-century of post-imperial adjustment in Britain`s foreign policy, in which withdrawal from a global role is offset by an overriding concern, shared with western partners, to counter the extension
- political & economic as well as military
- of Soviet Marxist influence across a fractious post-colonial world. It is no purpose of mine to denigrate or burlesque any individuals who appear in its pages. This account brings out the human side, as well as the value, of a profession in which `life`s rich tapestry` plays an uncommonly prominent part.



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Whitechapel, 1888: London is bowed under Jack the Ripper`sreign of terror. London 2015: actress Julianne Bell is abducted in a case similar to the terrible Tower Hamlets murders of some ten years earlier, & harking back to the Ripper killings of a century before. Falkenberg, Sweden, 2015: a woman`s body is found mutilated in a forest, her wounds identical to those of the Tower Hamlets victims. With the man arrested for the Tower Hamlets crimes already locked up, do the new killings mean he has a dangerous accomplice, or is a copy-cat serial killer on the loose? Profiler Emily Roy & true-crime writer Alexis Castells again find themselves drawn into an intriguing case, with personal links that turn their world upside down. Following the highly acclaimed Block 46 & guaranteed to disturb & enthral, Keeper is a breathless thriller from the new queen of French Noir. ...

` Flaubert believed that it was impossible to explain one art form in terms of another, & that great paintings required no words of explanation. Braque thought the ideal state would be reached when we said nothing at all in front of a painting. But we are very far from reaching that state. We remain incorrigibly verbal creatures who love to explain things, to form opinions, to argue... It is a rare picture which stuns, or argues, us into silence. & if one does, it is only a short time before we want to explain & understand the very silence into which we have been plunged.` Julian Barnes began writing about art with a chapter on Gericault`s The Raft of the Medusa in his 1989 novel A History of the World in 101/2 Chapters. Since then he has written a series of remarkable essays, chiefly about French artists, which trace the story of how art made its way from Romanticism to Realism & into Modernism. Fully illustrated in colour throughout, Keeping an Eye Open contains Barnes` essays on Gericault, Delacroix, Courbet, Manet, Fantin-Latour, Cezanne, Degas, Redon, Bonnard, Vuillard, Vallotton, Braque, Magritte, Oldenburg, Howard Hodgkin & Lucian Freud. ...

From the jungles of South America to the deserts of Arizona, one thing remains consistent: bees are disappearing. A world without bees would be much less colourful, with fewer flowers. But that`s not all-bees are responsible for up to one-third of our food supply, & the consequences of not taking action to protect them are frightening. While the media focuses on colony-collapse disorder & the threats to honey bees specifically, the real danger is much greater: all bees are at risk, whether it be from loss of habitat, pesticide use or disease, among other factors. & because of the integral role these insects play in the ecology of our planet, we may be at risk as well. In Keeping the Bees, Laurence Packer, a melittologist whose life revolves around bees, debunks many myths about these creatures & takes us behind the scenes with scientists around the world who are working to save these fascinating creatures before it`s too late. ...

When India became independent in 1947, the general view, which has prevailed until now, is that Britain had been steadily working for an amicable transfer of power for decades. In this book Walter Reid argues that nothing could be further from the truth. With reference to a vast amount of documentary material, from private letters to public records & state papers, he shows how Britain held back political progress in India for as long as possible
- a policy which led to unimaginable chaos & suffering when independence was granted, & which created a legacy of hatred & distrust that continues to this day.
...

In 1996, in the middle of watching an ill-tempered football match between England & Germany, Philip Oltermann`s parents tell him that they are going to leave their home city Hamburg behind & move to London. A number of worrying questions arise. How would English schoolboys take to a lanky 16-year-old German? How did they think & do things differently? What was the secret of the famed British humour? & were there values that English & German people shared? In search of answers, Oltermann interweaves memoir & history, taking ten key Anglo-German encounters from the last 200 years as his starting point. These include: an encounter between Joe Strummer & the Baader Meinhof gang, Helmut Kohl trying to explain the virtues of German cuisine to a sceptical Margaret Thatcher & philosophers Theodor Adorno & A. J. Ayer clashing over jazz. What emerges is nothing less than an alternative national story for the two countries: not one marked by military conflict & diplomatic hostility, but one shaped by dialogue, interaction & genuine fondness. ...

In 1996, in the middle of watching an ill-tempered football match between England & Germany, Philip Oltermann`s parents tell him that they are going to leave their home city Hamburg behind & move to London. A number of worrying questions arise. How would English schoolboys take to a lanky 16-year-old German? How did they think & do things differently? What was the secret of the famed British humour? & were there values that English & German people shared? In search of answers, Oltermann interweaves memoir & history, taking ten key Anglo-German encounters from the last 200 years as his starting point. These include: an encounter between Joe Strummer & the Baader Meinhof gang, Helmut Kohl trying to explain the virtues of German cuisine to a sceptical Margaret Thatcher & philosophers Theodor Adorno & A. J. Ayer clashing over jazz. What emerges is nothing less than an alternative national story for the two countries: not one marked by military conflict & diplomatic hostility, but one shaped by dialogue, interaction & genuine fondness. ...

Kefalonia at 1:65, 000 with Ithaca at 1:25, 000 on a contoured, GPS compatible double-sided map from a wide coverage of the Greek islands by Anavasi, printed on light, waterproof & tear-resistant plastic paper. On one side are both islands presented at 1:65, 000, with an enlargement of Ithaca to 1:25, 000 shown on the reverse. Contours at 20m intervals are enhanced by relief shading & spot heights, with graphics indicating different types of vegetation: forests, shrubbery, olive groves & vineyards. Road network indicates dirt roads in poor condition or difficult roads, & shows locations of petrol stations & driving distances on main routes. Also marked are country trails ranging from narrow earth roads to faintly defined paths. Symbols mark various places of interest. The maps have a UTM grid for GPS use & latitude/longitude margin ticks. All place names are in both Greek & Latin alphabet, as are the indexes for each isl&. Map legends include English. (Kefallonia, Kefallinia, Cephalonia, Cefalonia, Ithaka, Ithaki) ...