It is 1947, & Beit Daras, a rural Palestinian village, is home to the Baraka family
- oldest daughter Nazmiyeh, brother Mamdouh,
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You are crossing the Atlantic on a liner with your boyfriend who may or may not be planning to propose. You are fleeing the past
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'1942: It was towards the middle of the year when my friends started disappearing...' On the island of Java, the stirrings of the Second World War in Europe & the angry-looking man called Hitler seem a million miles away from Norwegian-born Lise & her siblings. Then one day, her friends & neighbours start to disappear, & she begins to realise that they are not safe after all. Through ten-year-old eyes, Lise tells of her family's two-year imprisonment in POW camps & the brutal treatment received at the hands of their Japanese captors. For respite from the rat-infested floor of their shelter they adopt a blue door, which sits on concrete posts in the ground. They live on it during the day as young Lise plots ways to protect her family from disease, starvation & the desperate behaviour of fellow prisoners. This is a little girl's heartbreaking tale of survival. 'A devastating portrayal of a child's loss of innocence to humiliating cruelty' Observer ...

Sjon`s The Blue Fox takes place in the year 1883
- the stark Icelandic winter is the backdrop. We follow the priest, Baldur Skuggason,
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From John Banville, one of the world`s greatest writers, comes The Blue Guitar, a story of theft & the betrayal of friendship. Adultery is always put in terms of thieving. But we were happy together, simply happy. Oliver Orme used to be a painter, well known & well rewarded, but the muse has deserted him. He is also, as he confesses, a petty thief; he does not steal for gain, but for the thrill of it. HIs worst theft is Polly, the wife of his friend Marcus, with whom he has had an affair. When the affair is discovered, Oliver hides himself away in his childhood home. From here he tells the story of a year, from one autumn to the next. Many surprises & shocks await him, & by the end of his story, he will be forced to face himself & seek a road towards redemption. Shortlisted for the Kerry Group Irish Novel of the Year 2016 ...

Tintin has been summoned to Shanghai, but corruption, kidnap & espionage await him there. Should Tintin heed the terrible warning from the famous fakir Ramacharma? & can he find an antidote to the terrifying `poison of madness` before he is given a taste himself? ...

The mile-deep gorge made by the Blue Nile as it flows out of the highlands of North West Ethiopia into the broad plains of the Sudan is one of the greatest natural features in the world. It remained virtually unexplored until 1968. That summer an expedition supported by the Army, The Daily Telegraph & the Royal Geographical Society set out to investigate this gorge. It also aimed to navigate 500 miles of the crocodile-infested river--known in Ethiopia as the Great Abbai--200 miles of which had not been visited by Europeans, except at occasional fording places. The climax of the expedition, the penetration of the Northern gorge, was unhappily marked by the death of an expedition member by drowning, & by two attacks by bandits. In these harsh conditions a group of scientists--mainly zoologists--were able to carry out a valuable investigation of the area. In The Blue Nile Revealed Richard Snailham, one of those directly involved, tells the story of Great Abbai expedition. While covering the technical & scientific

Dimensions of the expedition, he also provides a deeply human account of this exciting adventure. First published in 1970, this book has become a classic of African exploration.

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James A. Levine's first novel, tells the haunting story of Batuk, a 15-year old girl whose family, living in the Indian countryside, is in such poverty & debt that she is sold into sexual slavery & lives in a cage on the streets of Mumbai. Batuk is just one of many girls forced into prostitution, but against the odds, she manages to put pen to paper, writing stories of her life that help her transcend & make a certain sense of her daily existence. The novel is powerfully told in Batuk's voice, through the words she writes in her journal. Searing, moving, & surprisingly hopeful, The Blue Notebook explores how people, in the most difficult of circumstances, can use stories to understand & give meaning to their lives. ...

Stunning book to accompany the BBC series of the same name. The team responsible travelled to all of the different ocean habitats in the world in order to provide the first complete & comprehensive portrait of the whole ocean system. You are led from the coastal edges to the deepest abysses & shown all of the wonders of the sea, many for the first time. Detailed text & extraordinary images combine to offer a unique insight into the world beneath the waves, affording us a glimpse of the vast treasure trove of rich & diverse life which resides there. ...

This is a new translation of Simenon`s gripping novel about lives transformed by deceit & the destructive power of lust. It was all real: himself, the room, Andree still lying on the ravaged bed. For Tony & Andree, there are no rules when they meet in the blue room at the Hotel des Voyageurs. Their adulterous affair is intoxicating, passionate
- & dangerous. Soon it turns into a nightmare from which there can be no escape. Simenon`s stylish & sensual psychological thriller weaves a story of cruelty, reckless lust & relentless guilt. ”A double crime, a dark provincial scandal, & a dreadful sort of triumph...presented with shattering power.” (San Francisco Chronicle). ” The romans durs are extraordinary: tough, bleak, offhandedly violent, suffused with guilt & bitterness, redolent of place...utterly unsentimental, frightening in the pitilessness of their gaze, yet wonderfully entertaining.” (John Banville). ” One of the greatest writers of the twentieth century... Simenon was unequaled at making us look inside, though the ability was masked by his brilliance at absorbing us obsessively in his stories.” (Guardian). ”A supreme writer...unforgettable vividness.” (Independent). Georges Simenon was born in Liege, Belgium, in 1903. Best known in Britain as the author of the Maigret books, his prolific output of over 400 novels & short stories have made him a household name in continental Europe. He died in 1989 in Lausanne, Switzerl&, where he had lived for the latter part of his life.
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