Robert Fagles` award-winning translations of Homer`s twin works ” The Iliad” & ” The Odyssey” have sold more than a million copies & become classics in their own right. With this stunning modern verse translation, Fagles introduces Virgil`s ” Aeneid” to a whole new generation of readers & completes the classic triptych at the heart of Western civilisation. ” The Aeneid” tells the story of an epic voyage in which Aeneas crosses stormy seas, becomes entangled in a tragic love affair with Dido of Cathage, descends to the world of the dead
- all the way tormented by the vengeful Juno, Queen of the Gods
- & finally reaches Italy, where he will fulfil his destiny: to found the Roman people. A stirring tale of arms & heroism, dispossession & defeat, & an unsparing portrait of a man caught between love, duty, & fate, ” The Aeneid” brings to life a whole world of human passion, nobility, & courage. Fagles` new translation retains all of the gravitas & humanity of the original as well as its powerful blend of poetry & myth. Featuring an illuminating introduction to Virgil`s world from noted scholar Bernard Knox, this new ” Aeneid” lends a vibrant, contemporary voice to the literary achievement of the ancient world.

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Three people in three countries in three different eras. Ursule in 1864 lives the life of a kitchen skivvy in Paris. Dexter in 1965 is an American GI in Vietnam. Dante in 2015 is a Catholic priest in Palermo, Sicily. For Ursule the Prussians are closing in. For Dexter it`s the Vietcong. For Dante it is the mafia. How can they escape but, more than that, how can misery become rapture? In contemporary Britain a fourth person holds all the strings in his hands as he rises silently & gracefully above the earth. In this tour de force of imagination Stuart Campbell follows the brilliant John Mc Pake & the Sea Beggars with a tale that defies time & gravity & takes the reader to a place few have ever been & fewer still come back from. ...

Intrigued by an exquisite & mysterious amulet on an antique dress from Kohistan, `land of mountains` in Pakistan, Sheila Paine began an epic quest that took her from the peaks of the Himalaya to the shores of Greece. In this, the first part of her journey, she set off alone & undaunted for the rugged Hindu Kush, her only possessions a tiny rucksack & a litre of vodka. Over the course of several months she followed endless clues
- the patterns on a woman`s dress, pendants hanging outside village houses to ward off djinns, scraps of embroidery in a bazaar
- that took her to some of the most remote & inhospitable places in the world. She travelled to Makran & in Pakistan, an area closed completely to foreigners, & to Iran, where she was constantly watched by government minders. She was smuggled into Afghanistan by a band of mujahedin, & then forged on into Iraq & Turkish Kurdistan from Iran, before one final piece of evidence led her to the small town of Razgrad in eastern Bulgaria & news of the amulet she so tirelessly sought.

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Christina Lamb’s “ Africa House” is a startling tale of Africa & the Empire, all ensconced within one man’s attempt to make an idyll for himself in the African bush. Stewart Gore-Brown build himself a feudal paradise in Northern Rhodesia; a sprawling country estate modelled on the finest homes of Engl&, complete with uniformed servants, daily muster parades & rose gardens. He wanted to share it with the love of his life, the beautiful unconventional Ethel Locke King, one of the first women to drive & fly. She, however, was nearly twenty years his senior, married & his aunt. Lorna, the only other woman he had ever cared for, had married another many years earlier. Then he met Lorna`s orphaned daughter, so like her mother that he thought he had seen a ghost. It seemed he had found companionship & maybe love
- but the Africa house was his dream & it would be a hard one to share. Assembled from the large volume of diaries & correspondance that was within the empty house, she does an extraordinary job of bringing this forgotten story to life, the text very nearly bewitching the reader as the African bush did of Gore-Brown.
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” Khadra brings us deep into the hearts & minds of people living in unspeakable mental anguish.”--” Los Angeles Times” ”A skilled storyteller working at the height of his powers.”--” Times Literary Supplement” Like all the great storytellers of history, [ Khadra] espouses the contradictions of his characters, who carry in themselves the entirety of the human condition.”--” Le Point”A new masterpiece from the author of ” The Swallows of Kabul.” Frankfurt MD Kurt Krausmann is devastated by his wife`s suicide. Unable to make sense of what happened, Kurt agrees to join his friend Hans on a humanitarian mission to the Comoros. But, sailing down the Red Sea, their boat is boarded by Somali pirates & the men are taken hostage. The arduous journey to the pirates` desert hideout is only the beginning of Kurt`s odyssey. He endures imprisonment & brutality at the hands of captors whose failings are all too human. As the situation deteriorates, it is fellow prisoner, Bruno, a long-time resident in Africa, who shows Kurt another side to the wounded yet defiant continent he loves.A giant of francophone writing, Algerian author Yasmina Khadra takes current events as a starting point to explore opposing views & myths of Africa & the West, ultimately delivering a powerful message of friendship, resilience, & redemption. Yasmina Khadra is the pen name of Mohammed Moulessehoul, a former Algerian army officer & now director of the Algerian Cultural Center in Paris. In November 2013, he announced his candidacy for the presidency of Algeria. ...

Set in post-war Germany, the international bestseller The Aftermath by Rhidian Brook is a stunning emotional thriller about ...

As seen on TV: now a major BBC4 television series. A chance encounter with a strange young woman leads Inspector Montalbano to Vigata harbour -- & into a puzzling new mystery. The crew of a mysterious yacht
- the Vanna
- due to dock in the area have discovered a corpse floating in the water, the dead man's face badly disfigured. It isn't long before Montalbano begins to become suspicious of the Vanna's inhabitants. Who is the yacht's owner, the glamorous & short-tempered Livia Giovannini? How has she accrued her riches? & why does she spend so much time at sea? Meanwhile Montalbano finds himself getting into tangles with the dreaded Commissioner, the exasperating Dr Lattes & a very beautiful young woman at the harbour, with whom he becomes dangerously besotted.. . Can the Inspector clear his head long enough to unravel this murky mystery?

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As seen on TV: now a major BBC4 television series. A chance encounter with a strange young woman leads Inspector Montalbano to Vigata harbour -- & into a puzzling new mystery. The crew of a mysterious yacht
- the Vanna
- due to dock in the area have discovered a corpse floating in the water, the dead man's face badly disfigured. It isn't long before Montalbano begins to become suspicious of the Vanna's inhabitants. Who is the yacht's owner, the glamorous & short-tempered Livia Giovannini? How has she accrued her riches? & why does she spend so much time at sea? Meanwhile Montalbano finds himself getting into tangles with the dreaded Commissioner, the exasperating Dr Lattes & a very beautiful young woman at the harbour, with whom he becomes dangerously besotted.. . Can the Inspector clear his head long enough to unravel this murky mystery?

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`I am an Empress.. .and am sometimes called Empress of India. Why have I never officially assumed this title? I feel I ought to do so & wish to have preliminary enquiries made.` Five years after discussing the matter with her private secretary, in 1877 Queen Victoria became Empress of India. This symbolic event was followed by the transformation of Britain into the seat of self-consciously imperial power. Britain`s industrial & imperial might financed an architectural golden age, which saw the Dickensian rookeries replaced with model housing; civic life enhanced through new town halls, bath houses & libraries; God glorified in new churches & cathedrals; Mammon pursued in banks, exchanges & commercial buildings; & the Empire celebrated in numerous sculptural projects around the globe. Through stunning images this book reveals the national confidence & prosperity that led to a new-found grandeur & scale in the architecture commissioned. The Age of Empire is a lavishly illustrated celebration of the architectural legacy of the British Empire & its ability to create buildings that remain as awe-inspiring as when they were first built. ...

The story of thirteen modern Empires, a story full of suspense, cruelty, conflict, heroism, great explorations & extraordinary feats of endurance, is here told with a rich profusion of illustrations drawn from a wide range of vivid, colourful, authentic sources. Now that the age of empires is fully over, it is possible for the first time to draw up a balance sheet of praise & blame. ...