The letters of our alphabet work tirelessly to make words that in turn make stories, but what if there was a story for each of the letters instead? Turn the pages of this exquisite book to find out. Here you will discover twenty-six short stories introducing a host of new characters (plus the occasional familiar face). From Edmund the astronaut with his awkward fear of heights, via the dynamic new investigative duo of the Owl & the Octopus, through to the Zeppelin that just might get Edmund a little bit closer to where he needs to be, this book is packed with funny, thrilling, perilous & above all entertaining tales inspired by every letter in the alphabet. An adventure to follow from A to Z, or a treasure trove to dip in & out of, Once Upon an Alphabet is a work of exhilarating originality from artist Oliver Jeffers, the creator of much-loved modern classics such as Lost & Found & The Incredible Book Eating Boy. ...

This is the story of Maxine & Sheila Kohler, two sisters who grew up in the suffocating gentility of 1950s South Africa. When Maxine is just shy of her fortieth birthday her husb&, a brilliant & respected surgeon, drives their car off the road & kills her. Devastated, Sheila returns to the country of her birth, haunted by questions. How had she failed to protect her sister? Was Maxine`s death a matter of chance, or destiny? What lies in the soil of their troubled motherland that condemns its women to such violence? ...

Alan Duff`s groundbreaking first novel is one of the most talked about books ever published in New Zealand & now the basis of a major New Zealand film. This hard hitting story is a frank & uncompromising portrayal of Maoaris in New Zealand society. It is a raw & powerful story in which everyone ia a victim until the strength & vision of one woman transcends brutality & leads the way to a new life. ...

Shortlisted for the Dylan Thomas Prize 2012 In the remote Kootenay Valley in western Canada, good people sometimes do bad things. Two adolescents sabotage a rope swing; a heartbroken young man chooses not to warn his best friend about an approaching car; sons challenge their fathers. Crackling with tension & propelled by jagged, cutting dialogue, D.W. Wilson`s stories reveal to us how our best intentions can be doomed to fail or injure, how our loves can fall short or mislead us. An intoxicating cocktail of adrenaline & vulnerability, doggedness & dignity, Once You Break a Knuckle explores the courage it takes to make it through another day. ...

Topographic coverage of mainland Spain at 1:50, 000 in the MTN50 (Mapa Topográfico Nacional) series from the Centro Nacional de Información Geografica, the country’s civilian survey organization. The maps have contours at 20m intervals, enhanced by relief shading, plus colouring and/or graphics to show different types of terrain, vegetation or land use. Boundaries of national parks & other protected areas are marked. In addition to all the usual information featured on topographic mapping at this scale, detailed presentation of the road & rail networks, rural tracks & paths, etc, the maps also show campsites & mountain refuges. On more recent editions some GRs, the official long-distance hiking routes, are also marked (although not as clearly as on hiking maps from other publishers). Each map covers 29.5x 18.5 km (with adjustments in the border or coastal areas). The maps have a 1-km UTM grid, plus margin ticks for latitude & longitude at 1` intervals. Map legend is in Spanish only.HOW TO CHOOSE THE RIGHT 50K MAP: all the titles in CNIG’s 200K Provincial Road Maps series at 1:200, 000 are overprinted with the grid for the 1:50, 000 maps & can be used to see the area covered by each 50K title. TO SEE THE LIST OF TITLES IN THIS SERIES PLEASE CLICK ON THE SERIES LINK.PLEASE NOTE
- MAP TITLES: the grids shown on our website serve both the civilian & the military 1:50, 000 topographic series. Although the areas covered by maps in both series are identical (apart from some border or coastal sheets), occasionally map titles differ – only one title is shown on the grid, usually the military one. In Galicia, the Basque country & in the Catalan speaking areas the tendency now is to use local place names rather than the often better known Castilian ones. Where possible, both versions are included in our titles. Map titles listed on our website are based on information received by us at the time of publication, but sometimes maps arrive showing a completely different title! As long as the map number is as ordered, the correct map has been supplied.
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In August 1995 Alison Hargreaves became the fifth woman & the fifth Briton to climb the 28, 250-feet-high K2. The winds that she battled with on her descent were vicious, & it is likely that she was blown to her death from the summit ridge to a depression of snow more than 3000 feet below. This tribute to Hargreaves's courage is her husband's account of his trip to the base camp of K2 with his two young children, to see Mummy's last mountain & say a last goodbye. The book accompanies a BBC1 documentary. ...

1960, & Sister Conchita, the young nun with a flair for detection, has been forced to leave her beloved Malaita & assume reluctant command of a run-down mission in the lush, primitive Western District of the Solomon Islands. The group of three elderly sisters currently there are rumoured to have `gone native` & Conchita tries to grapple with these eccentric, tough-mind insurgents & the secrets they are keeping when an American tourist is murdered in their mission church but perplexingly, the colonial authorities want nothing to do with this bizarre crime. Help is at hand for Sister Conchita in the shape of her friend Sergeant Ben Kella, the local police officer but also the aofia, the traditional law-bringer of the islands. Together, the idealistic young nun & practical witch doctor set out to solve the mystery. In the process they discover links to a local independence organisation, a powerful international logging company, &, most puzzling of all, to John F. Kennedy, a former wartime US naval officer in the area but now, thousands of miles away, about to become the 35th president of the USA. Praise for ” Devil-Devil”: ” The mystery takes a back seat to [ Kent`s] knowledge of the exotic location & the combustible chemistry of his protaganists (the oddest couple since ” The African Queen”), which add immensely to his story`s charm.” (” Kirkus Review”). ...

One Breath is a gripping & powerful exploration of the strange & fascinating sport of freediving, & of the tragic, untimely death of America`s greatest freediver Competitive freediving-a sport built on diving as deep as possible on a single breath-tests the limits of human ability in the most hostile environment on earth. The unique & eclectic breed of individuals who freedive at the highest level regularly dive hundreds of feet below the ocean`s surface, reaching such depths that their organs compress, light disappears, & one mistake could kill them. Even among freedivers, few have ever gone as deep as Nicholas Mevoli. A handsome young American with an unmatched talent for the sport, Nick was among freediving`s brightest stars. He was also an extraordinary individual, one who rebelled against the vapid & commoditized society around him by relentlessly questing for something more meaningful & authentic, whatever the risks. So when Nick Mevoli arrived at Vertical Blue in 2013, the world`s premier freediving competition, he was widely expected to challenge records & continue his meteoric rise to stardom. Instead, before the end of that fateful competition Nick Mevoli had died, a victim of the sport that had made him a star, & the very future of free diving was called into question. With unparalleled access & masterfully crafted prose, One Breath tells his unforgettable story, & of the sport which shaped & ultimately destroyed him. ...

Tang Shuxiu & her husband are on an 800-mile train journey from Beijing to Shifang, where they believe their only child has perished in a recent earthquake. Three days after the event, Tang is too dehydrated to cry. Liu Ting becomes a national hero when he brings his mother to college, a celebration of filial piety in a nation that now legally compels adult children to visit their elderly parents. Tian Qingeng & his parents are deeply in debt. They have bought an apartment they hope will improve his eligibility in a nation that has 30 million bachelors, or `bare branches`. Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Mei Fong has spent eight years documenting the effects of the one-child policy across all of Chinese society. In this critically acclaimed account, she weaves together personal stories, history & politics to produce an extraordinary, evocative investigation into how the policy has changed China & why the repercussions will be felt across the world for decades to come. ...

For over three decades, China exercised unprecedented control over the reproductive habits of its billion citizens. Now, with its economy faltering just as it seemed poised to become the largest in the world, the Chinese government has brought an end to its one-child policy. It may once have seemed a shortcut to riches, but it has had a profound effect on society in modern China. Combining personal portraits of families affected by the policy with a nuanced account of China`s descent towards economic & societal turmoil, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Mei Fong reveals the true cost of this most controversial of policies. Drawing on eight years spent documenting its repercussions, she reveals a dystopian legacy of second children refused documentation by the state, only children supporting their parents & grandparents, & villages filled with ineligible bachelors. An exceptional piece of on-the-ground journalism, One Child humanizes the policy that defined China & warns that the ill-effects of its legacy will be felt across the globe. ...