'A web of laws had been spun to keep us apart'. So writes rising young Ray, public relations man for the Organisation, who is falling in love against all the taboos
- with Victor, the country's most popular deejay, on Radio Bantu. The setting is Johannesburg in the Sixties, where such a high profile 'dirty case' can only play into the hands of the powers that be. First published pseudonymously in 1972, Michael Power's frank, masterly exposure of the police-state brutality of that period may now appear without restriction both at home & abroad.
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M.M. Kaye, author of ” The Far Pavilions”, sweeps her readers back to the vast, glittering, sunbaked continent of India. ” Shadow of the Moon” is the story of Winter de Ballesteros, a beautiful English heiress who has come to India to be married. It is also the tale of Captain Alex Randall, her escort & protector, who knows that Winter`s husband to be has become a debauched wreck of a man. When India bursts into flaming hatreds & bitter bloodshed during the dark days of the Mutiny, Alex & Winter are thrown unwillingly together in the brutal & urgent struggle for survival. ...

One humid summer night in Gibraltar, lawyer Spike Sanguinetti arrives home to find an old friend, Solomon Hassan, waiting on his doorstep. Solomon is on the run, accused of a brutal murder in Tangiers. He has managed to skip across the Straits but the Moroccan authorities want him back. Spike travels to Tangiers to try to delay Solomon`s extradition, & there meets a beautiful Bedouin girl. Zahra is investigating the disappearance of her father, a trail which leads mysteriously back to Solomon. Questioning how well he really knows his friend, Spike finds himself drawn into a dangerous game of secrets, corruption & murderous lies. ...

The Shadow of the Silk Road records a journey by Colin Thubron along the greatest land route on Earth. Out of the heart of China into the mountains of Central Asia (Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan & Uzbekistan), across northern Afghanistan & the plains of Iran & into Kurdish Turkey, Colin Thubron travels from the Tomb of the Yellow Emperor (the Mythic progenitor of the Chinese people) to the ancient Mediterranean port of Antioch, going by local bus, truck, car, donkey-cart, horse or camel. He covers 7, 000 miles in eight months
- in perhaps the most difficult & ambitious journey he has undertaken in 40 years of travel. The Silk Road is a huge network of arteries splitting & converging across the breath of Asia. To travel it is to trace the passage not only of trade & armies, but of ideas, religions & inventions. But alongside this rich & astonishing past, Shadow of the Silk Road is also about today: a continent in upheaval. One of the trademarks of Thubron`s travel writing is the beauty of his prose; another is his gift for talking to people & getting them to talk to him. The themes in Shadow of the Silk Road include different Islams (oppressed in China; fervent in Afghanistan & Iran; cautiously monitored in Uzbekistan); changes (how China was transformed since the Cultural Revolution); contrasts (no cities could be more different than ancient Samarkand & modern Teheran); false nationalisms & the world`s discontented margins, where the true boundaries are not political borders but the frontiers of tribe, ethnicity, language & religion.
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In the early hours of 15 April 1912, after the majestic liner Titanic had split apart & the 1, 500 men, women & children struggled to stay alive in the freezing Atlantic, the sea was alive with the sound of screaming. Then, as the ship sank to the ocean floor & the passengers slowly died from hypothermia, a deathly silence settled over the sea. Yet the echoes of that night reverberated through the lives of each of the 705 survivors. Shadow of the Titanictells the extraordinary stories of some of those who survived. Although we think we know the story of the Titanic
- the famously unsinkable ship that hit an iceberg on its maiden voyage from Britain to America in April 1912
- little has been written about what happened to the survivors after the tragedy. How did the loss of the ship shape the lives of the people who survived? How did those who were saved feel about those who perished? & how did they remember that terrible night, in effect a disaster that has been likened to the destruction of a small town? Timed to coincide with the 100thanniversary of the sinking, Shadow of the Titanicsheds new light on this enduringly fascinating story, by showing how the disaster continued to shape the lives of a cross-section of passengers who escaped the sinking ship.

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Hasan Ali Toptas exquisitely weaves an enigmatic, mystical tale of memory & identity, displacement & belonging `I`m a barber, ` he said. `I come from afar. Across lands already forgotten...` In an Anatolian village forgotten both by God & the government, the muhtar has been elected leader for the sixteenth successive year. When he staggers to bed that night, drunk on raki & his own well-deserved success, the village is prosperous. But when he is woken by his wife the next evening he discovers that Nuri, the barber, has disappeared without a trace in the dead of night, & the community begins to fracture. In a nameless town far, far away, Nuri walks into a barbershop as if from a dream, not knowing how he has arrived. Try as he might, he cannot grasp the strands of his memory. The facts of his past life shift & evade him, & as other customers come & go, they too struggle to recall how they got there... Blurring the lines of reality to terrific effect, Shadowless is both a compelling mystery & an enduring evocation of displacement from one of the finest, most exciting voices in Turkish literature today. ...

`A knotty, postmodern tale. The quicksilver narrative slips between dream, memory & reality.. . A beguiling enigma` Financial Times In an Anatolian village forgotten both by God & the government, the muhtar has been elected leader for the sixteenth successive year. When he staggers to bed that night, drunk on raki & his own well-deserved success, the village is prosperous. But when he is woken by his wife the next evening he discovers that Nuri, the barber, has disappeared without a trace in the dead of night, & the community begins to fracture. In a nameless town far, far away, Nuri walks into a barbershop as if from a dream, not knowing how he has arrived. Try as he might, he cannot grasp the strands of his memory. The facts of his past life shift & evade him, & as other customers come & go, they too struggle to recall how they got there... Blurring the lines of reality to terrific effect, Shadowless is both a compelling mystery & an enduring evocation of displacement from one of the finest, most exciting voices in Turkish literature today. ...

Once a fabled pirate garrison, the Balearic island of Ibiza has been colonised & continually fought over since the era of the Phoenicians. During the twentieth century it gained its reputation as a countercultural hotbed after it became a melting pot for bohemians & dropouts who had come there in search of adventure. Soon, Ibiza was a crossroads for experimental musicians, writers & artists, `hippie trail travellers, enthusiastic trepanation pioneers, infamous art world conmen, & Osho sannyasins with pockets full of MDMA &, eventually, the epicentre for electronic music that it is today. After the establishment of the famous hippie markets & the trance parties that took place in forests or on deserted beaches, a number of now legendary nightclubs, including Ku, Pacha, & Amnesia started to emerge, although they had started out as simple, rural locations for islanders, fringe figures, & jetsetters to congregate together on open air terraces to listen to blues, rock n roll, & jazz. These days, pioneering electronic music DJs from around the world make the island their home from home over the summer season, attracting an equally international party community. Eco tourists & nature lovers seeking the particular pleasures of Ibiza also flock in annually, as does a crucial contingent of island faithfuls who return year after year to this tiny but charismatic & insubordinate Mediterranean hub to live an Ibiza `experience that goes way beyond the parties. With a foreword by Richie Hawtin, the world s leading electronic artist & DJ, Shadows Across The Moon explores the social & cultural history of Ibiza & its nocturnal playgrounds, from the advent of the earliest settlers through the huge influence of the Moors on Ibiza s music & traditions, the early days of the Ibiza Town jazz scene, the Goa-influenced outdoor trance party culture, the early hippie clubs, the golden years of the 1980s & the second Summer of Love, to the huge & exciting impact the techno scene made on the island s nightlife with the advent of Sven Vath s audacious Cocoon. Along the way the book draws back the curtain to reveal clubland s sometimes shadowy mafia connections, crooked politics, backstabbing, outmanoeuvring skulduggery, specious drug busts, assassinations, & suicides as well as tales of quixotic originality & futuristic vision, outrageous pansexual parties, widely talented impresarios, & the open air gatherings that make the island so special, including the famous sunset bars & chill-out culture. Drawing on interviews with everyone from Carl Cox & Dubfire to Terry Gilliam & Johnny Golden, Shadows Across The Moon is the first & only book to cover the whole fascinating & unique history of dance & counterculture in Ibiza, & vividly describes the artists, sunset drummers, shamans, DJs, outlaws, psychedelic evangelists, politicians & hippie organisers who gradually shaped the island s party landscape into the hugely influential nexus it is today. ...

Lola Jost is busy fending off boredom with a jigsaw puzzle when she hears the news. Arnaud Mars
- a disgraced police divisionnaire
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When Maximilian Potter went to Burgundy to report for Vanity Fair on a crime that could have destroyed the Domaine de la Romanee Conti-the tiny, storied vineyard that produces the most expensive, exquisite wines in the world-he soon found a story that was much larger, & more thrilling, than he had originally imagined. In January 2010, Aubert de Villaine, the famed proprietor of the DRC, received an anonymous note threatening the destruction of his priceless vines by poison-a crime that in the world of high-end wine is akin to murder-unless he paid a one million euro ransom. Villaine believed it to be a sick joke, but that proved a fatal miscalculation; the crime was committed & shocked this fabled region of France. The sinister story that Potter uncovered would lead to a sting operation by top Paris detectives, the primary suspect`s suicide, & a dramatic trial. This botanical crime threatened to destroy the fiercely traditional culture surrounding the world`s greatest wine. Like Midnight in the Garden of Good & Evil, SHADOW IN THE VINEYARD takes us deep into a captivating world full of fascinating characters, small town French politics, an unforgettable narrative, & a local culture defined by the twinned veins of excess & vitality & the deep reverent attention to the land that run through it. ...