From the distinguished American historian whose work has been acclaimed around the world, a major new book that penetrates one of the most bizarre & fascinating paradoxes in history: the persistent pursuit by governments of policies contrary to their own intersts. Across the march of thirty centuries, Tuchman brings to life the dramatic events which constitute folly`s hallmark in government; the fall of Troy, symbolic prototype of freely chosen disaster; the Protestant secession, provoked by six decades of spectacularly corrupt papcy; the British forfeiture of the American colonies; & America`s catastrophic thirty year involvement with vietnam. The March of Folly, a work of profound & poignant relevance today, is breathtaking in its scope, originality & vision, & represents the writing of Barbara Tuchman at it`s finest. ...

The Marche is home one of Italy's most attractive stretches of coast as well as castles further inl&. From gorgeous Adriatic beaches, to spectacular caves & dramatic gorges, The Marche is also the place for those seeking culture. Footprint Focus provides invaluable information on transport, accommodation, eating & entertainment to ensure that your trip

Includes:: the best of this celebrated region of Italy. Essentials section with useful advice on getting to & around The Marche. Comprehensive, up-to-date listings of where to eat, sleep & play.

Includes:: information on tour operators & activities, from great restaurants to Roman remains. Detailed maps for The Marche & around. Slim enough to fit in your pocket. With detailed information on all the main sights, plus many lesser-known attractions, Footprint Focus The Marche provides concise & comprehensive coverage of one of Italy's most fascinating regions. The content of the Footprintfocus The Marche guide has been extracted from Footprint's Umbria & Marche Full-Colour Guide.



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Marche guide (all text is in Italian), by the Touring Club Italiano, Italy’s leading travel publisher, exploring the history, culture, food & wine, walking opportunities, local markets & festivals of the region. The guide has been designed for independent travellers with practical information on how to prepare for the trip & make the most out of it as well as transports, cultural & musical events, eating, sleeping & leisure. A detailed introduction explores the history, culture & attractions of the region. Colour photographs & maps are included throughout the guide, illustrating some of the region’s historic sites & landmarks. The Itineraries section is divided into 9 main sections – Ancona, Urbino, Il Piceno e I monti Sibillini to name a few. It is a journey that will take you from the gentle hills rolling into the sea to the mountains of regional parks, old monastries, palazzi & medieval town in 22 itineraries exploring this region. Each section has area profiles, colour maps showing town & building plans, detailed descriptions of the history & heritage of the area, 2 or 3 suggested day-trips & details of the main attractions in the area. Individual information boxes help provide further insight into the art & architecture, food & local customs. An overview map of the region is also included in the inside-back cover. In the 90 pages attached booklet Marche Informazioni Pratiche, you will find practical information on where to stay, restaurant, museums, shopping, leisure, sport & local events.*ALL THE TEXT IS IN ITALIAN ONLY.* ...

Ten years after walking across Central Asia & through Afghanistan, Rory Stewart returns to Britain. He walks a thousand miles, crossing & recrossing the English-Scottish Border. A referendum is coming on whether Scotland will become independent country; he is a Scot living in Engl&, & the Member of Parliament for the only constituency with ` Border` in its name. He paces back & forth between his family house in Scotland & his own home in Cumbria. He discovers that, buried beneath England & Scotl&, is another country, now lost, a Middleland with its own history, its own civilisation: a vanished kingdom. Stewart sleeps on mountain ridges & in housing estates, in motels & in farmhouses. Following lines of neolithic standing stones & the wilderness created by farming subsidies; wading through floods & ruined fields, he traces Hadrian`s Wall with soldiers who have fought in Afghanistan. He interviews Buddhist & Christian monks, investigates arson attacks & heritage websites, & tries to get to grips with his tartan-clad father. His book becomes a history of the Middlel&, or ” The Marches”, what is now the frontier zone between two contemporary nations. Britain, he argues, is an island whose natural boundaries are the sea, a nation split by a colonial empire that drew a line on a map, separating tribes & families. The book is defined by a profound love of landscape, & walking, an unusual erudition, & an instinct for the most eccentric local histories. It draws on contemporary politics, & long years working in rural Asia, & on troubled borders, to illuminate the pattern of forgetting & remembrance that makes a very modern border & a very modern nationalism. ...

LONGLISTED FOR THE ORWELL PRIZE 2017` This is travel writing at its best.` Katherine Norbury, Observer An Observer Book of the Year His father Brian taught Rory Stewart how to walk, & walked with him on journeys from Iran to Malaysia. Now they have chosen to do their final walk together along `the Marches`
- the frontier that divides their two countries, Scotland & Engl&. Brian, a ninety-year-old former colonial official & intelligence officer, arrives in Newcastle from Scotland dressed in tartan & carrying a draft of his new book You Know More Chinese Than You Think. Rory comes from his home in the Lake District, carrying a Punjabi fighting stick which he used when walking across Afghanistan. On their six-hundred-mile, thirty-day journey
- with Rory on foot, & his father `ambushing` him by car
- the pair relive Scottish dances, reflect on Burmese honey-bears, & on the loss of human presence in the British landscape. On mountain ridges & in housing estates they uncover a forgotten country crushed between England & Scotland: the Middlel&. They cross upland valleys which once held forgotten peoples & languages
- still preserved in sixth-century lullabies & sixteenth-century ballads. The surreal tragedy of Hadrian`s Wall forces them to re-evaluate their own experiences in the Iraq & Vietnam wars. The wild places of the uplands reveal abandoned monasteries, border castles, secret military test sites & newly created wetlands. They discover unsettling modern lives, lodged in an ancient l&. Their odyssey develops into a history of nationhood, an anatomy of the landscape, a chronicle of contemporary Britain & an exuberant encounter between a father & a son. & as the journey deepens, & the end approaches, Brian & Rory fight to match, step by step, modern voices, nationalisms & contemporary settlements to the natural beauty of the Marches, & a fierce absorption in tradition in their own unconventional lives.



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LONGLISTED FOR THE 2017 BAILEYS WOMEN`S PRIZE FOR FICTION Ginger is in her forties & a recovering alcoholic when she meets & marries Paul. When it becomes clear it`s too late for her to have a baby of her own, she tries to persuade him to consider adoption, but he already has a child from a previous marriage & is ten years older than her, so doesn`t share her longing to be a parent at any cost. As a compromise, they sign up to an organisation that sends poor inner-city kids to stay with country families for a few weeks in the summer, & so one hot July day eleven year old Velveteen Vargas, a Dominican girl from one of Brooklyn`s toughest neighbourhoods, arrives in their lives, & Ginger is instantly besotted. Bemused by her gentle middle-aged hosts, but deeply intuitive in the way of clever children, Velvet quickly senses the longing behind Ginger`s rapturous attention. While Velvet returns her affection, she finds the intensity of it bewildering. Velvet`s own passions are more excited by the stables nearby, where she discovers she has a natural talent for riding & a deep affinity with the damaged horses cared for there. But when Ginger begins to entertain fantasies of adopting her, things start to get complicated for everyone involved. This is a heartbreakingly honest & profoundly moving portrait of the nearly unbridgeable gaps between people, & the way we long for fairytale endings despite knowing that they don`t exist. ...

The Marin is an impressive floor-standing 40cm (16”) globe, one of handcrafted warmth; its distinctive stand is handmade from wrought-iron with a rustic textured finish. The globe itself has sumptuous antique-style oceanography with raised-relief & an exquisite brass-plated meridian complete this wonderfully contemporary interpretation. ...

Geoff Hunt is known to millions of readers across the world as the artist responsible for the covers of Patrick O` Brian`s Aubrey-Maturin novels, & more recently for those of Julian Stockwin`s Thomas Kydd books. He is widely acknowledged to be one of the leading marine artists of his generation. More than a showcase of the versatility & creativity of his work, this book, written by the artist himself, also reveals its accuracy, through five key case studies that explain the initial inspirations, gathering of source material & often lengthy artistic progression that leads to the creation of a finished painting. The artist has selected over 150 paintings & sketches to illustrate his prolific career, painting techniques & influences, dividing them into sections on Nelson`s Navy, The American War of Independence, illustrating the naval writers & the Modern Maritime Scene, which

Includes:: recent commissions from the commercial sector & yachting community.

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Aimed at watchkeeping officers & those aspiring to their GMDSS certificates, thispractical & concise guide takes the reader through a typical voyage & all thecommunication routines that will be required, both for safety & commercial reasons. Crew calls are covered & examples of costings are given. Regulations, satellite & l&-based radio systems, distress, emergency & safety communications inspections are covered. ...

This is a comic masterpiece about love, art, greed & the banking crisis, from the author of Skippy Dies. What links the Investment Bank of Torabundo, www.myhotswaitress.com (yes, hots with an s, don`t ask), an art heist, a novel called For the Love of a Clown, a four-year-old boy named after TV detective Remington Steele, a lonely French banker, a tiny Pacific isl&, & a pest control business run by an ex-KGB man? You guessed it... The Mark & the Void is Paul Murray`s madcap new novel of institutional folly, following the success of his wildly original breakout hit, Skippy Dies. While marooned at his banking job in the bewilderingly damp & insular realm known as Irel&, Claude Martingale is approached by a down-on-his-luck author, Paul, looking for his next great subject. Claude finds that his life gets steadily more exciting under Paul`s fictionalizing influence; he even falls in love with a beautiful waitress. But Paul`s plan is not what it seems-and neither is Claude`s employer, the Bank of Torabundo, which inflates through dodgy takeovers & derivatives-trading until-well, you can probably guess how that shakes out. The Mark & the Void is a stirring examination of the deceptions carried out in the names of art, love & commerce
- & is also probably the funniest novel ever written about a financial crisis.
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