After a separation of many years, Emily ` Fido` Faithfull bumps into her old friend Helen Codrington on the streets of Victorian London. Much has changed: Helen is more & more unhappy in her marriage to the older Vice-Admiral Codrington, while Fido has become a successful woman of business & a pioneer in the British Women`s Movement. But, for all her independence of mind, Fido is too trusting of her once-dear companion & finds herself drawn into aiding Helen`s obsessive affair with a young army officer. Then, when the Vice-Admiral seizes the children & sues for divorce, the women`s friendship unravels amid accusations of adultery & counter-accusations of cruelty & attempted rape, as well as a mysterious `sealed letter` that could destroy more than one life.. . ...

A Zoe Ball ITV Book Club Pick` Sally Magnusson has taken an amazing true event & created a brilliant first novel. It`s an epic journey in every sense: although it`s historical, it`s incredibly relevant to our world today. We had to pick it` Zoe Ball Book Club`A remarkable feat of imagination.. . I enjoyed & admired it in equal measure` Sarah Perry, author of The Essex Serpent `A powerful tale of Barbary pirates.. . richly imagined & energetically told.` Sunday Times
- 100 Best Books to Read This Summer` Engrossing` Sunday Express ` Fascinating.. . a really, really good read` BBC R2 Book Club` The best sort of historical novel` Scotsman `A lyrical tale` Stylist ` Compelling stuff` Good Housekeeping` An extraordinarily immersive read.. . examining themes of motherhood, identity, exile & freedom` Guardian 1627. In a notorious historical event, pirates raided the coast of Iceland & abducted 400 people into slavery in Algiers. Among them a pastor, his wife, & their children. In her acclaimed debut novel Sally Magnusson imagines what history does not record: the experience of Asta, the pastor`s wife, as she faces her losses with the one thing left to her
- the stories from home
- & forges an ambiguous bond with the man who bought her. Uplifting, moving, & witty, The Sealwoman`s Gift speaks across centuries & oceans about loss, love, resilience & redemption. Chosen for the BBC Radio 2 Book Club (a really really good book) & the ITV Zoe Ball Book Club (the quality of the writing is amazing).` Icelandic history has been brought to extraordinary life... An accomplished & intelligent novel` Yrsa Sigurðardóttir, author of Why Did You Lie?` Vivid & compelling` Adam Nichols, co-translator of The Travels of Reverend Ólafur Egilsson


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School`s out, & Bobby Parrish is spending the summer on his dad`s boat. Job number one is to deal with the seals infesting the peninsula. The money`s good
- but Bobby knows, deep down, that he hasn`t got it in him. Will Bobby’s dad let him be different?A story of the split-second choices that can change lives forever. Eoin Colfer`s trademark humour & lightness of touch & Victor Ambrus`s classic artwork evoke a strong sense of place, character & vitality.
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Maria Duenas`s million copy best-selling tale of adventure, tragedy, love & war, ” The Seamstress”, a Richard & Judy 2012 book club pick. Spain, 1936 & the brink of civil war. Young, poor Sira Quiroga is swept up in a whirlwind romance with her wily love Ramiro. Fleeing Madrid together for Morocco, her love blinds her to his real failings. Soon abandoned, left penniless & in debt to the authorities, she has to rely on the one skill she still possesses: sewing. Taken under the wing of the bullish but caring housekeeper Candelaria, Sira is able to sew for the glamorous foreign English & German women in Tetouan. Privy to their unbridled gossip, Sira becomes invaluable to the British secret service, a position that is filled with untold risk. A story of danger, espionage, romance & war, ” The Seamstress” is a WWII tale like no other. ...

It was Czechoslovakia, 1942. Jan's father has been summarily executed by the Nazis. His mother & his older sister Maria have disappeared, & his younger sister Lena has been removed to a remote farm in the German countryside. With Europe in the throes of war, the ten-year-old boy embarks on a personal journey to reunite the family he has been violently torn from. The experiences he goes through & the horror he faces during this desperate quest will change his life for ever. ...

The Search for Ancient Egypt is Jean Vercoutter & Ruth Sharman`s riveting compilation of the major discoveries of ancient Egypt, including the stories of Howard Carter & Lord Carnarvon, Belzoni & Champollion. They write of the `pharaoh`s curse`, the Patagonian Samson, the unlocking of the ever-secretive hieroglyphs & a remarkable rescue of Egypt`s monuments from ravaging flood waters. Buried treasure, looting, intrigue & dedicated scholarship; `wonderful things` gleaming in the darkness; the cache of royal mummies; &, most wonderful of all, the tomb of Tutankhamun. Add this to your cart today! ...

The idea of a hidden refuge, a paradise far from the stresses of modern life, has universal appeal. In 1932 the writer James Hilton coined the word ” Shangri-La” to describe such a place, when he gave that name to a hidden valley in the Himalayas in his popular romance, Lost Horizon. Charles Allen, oral & military historian, acclaimed traveller, & author of several best-selling books on colonial themes, explores here the myth behind the story, tracking down the sources that Hilton drew upon in writing his novel, & then setting out to discover what lies behind the legend that inspired him. In the course of this lively & amusing account of his four journeys into Tibet, Allen also provides a controversial new reading of the country`s early history, dismissing notions of Tibet as a Buddhist paradise & seeking to restore the mysterious pre-Buddhist religion of Bon to its rightful place in Tibetan culture. In his travels to Tibet, Allen located the ”lost” kingdom of Shang-shung &, in doing so, the original Shangri-La itself: in an astounding gorge beyond the Himalayas, full of extraordinary ruins. ...

George Orwell, a man fond of a pint, used to write about his fantasy pub, The Moon Under Water, in his Evening Standard columns
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Inspired by George Orwell, Paul Moody & Robin Turner take a nostalgic road trip around Britain in search of the perfect pub. `A deeply satisfying travelogue` Stuart Maconie In 1946, George Orwell, a man fond of a pint, wrote about his favourite pub, The Moon Under Water, in his EVENING STANDARD column. But it didn`t actually exist. It was Orwell`s vision of a perfect pub. Today, Wetherspoons have fourteen Moon Under Waters, & the nation is awash with identikit, high-street lounge bars competing for a dwindling clientele. Paul Moody & Robin Turner`s road trip around Britain, therefore, is not just a search for the perfect pub. It is a deeper investigation into what has happened to British pub culture, once the toast of the world. In fact, it is a search for a kind of life-force kindled by the British public, something the powers-that-be are forever trying to extinguish. Along the way, such luminaries as Pete Brown (`the King of Beer`), Tim Martin (Wetherspoon`s boss), Iain Sinclair, James Dean Bradfield & Paul Kingsnorth are consulted
- along with a host of micro-brewers, landlords, politicians, bloggers & barroom philosophers. What emerges is a picture of the country as seen through a pint glass, a vision that goes to the heart of what it means to be British.
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In 1990 an expedition of Cambridge scientists arrived at the Plains of Nechisar, tucked between the hills of the Great Rift Valley in the Gamo Gofa province in the country of Ethiopia. On that expedition, 315 species of birds were seen; 61 species of mammal & 69 species of butterfly were identified; 20 species of dragonflies & damselflies; 17 reptile species were recorded; three frog species were filed; plants were listed. & the wing of a road-killed bird was packed into a brown paper bag. It was to become the most famous wing in the world. At British Natural History Museum in Tring, the wing set the world of science aflutter. It seemed that the wing was unique, but they questioned, can you name a species for the first time based only on the description of a wing, based on just one wing? After much to & fro, confirmation was unanimous, & the new species was announced, Nechisar Nightjar, Caprimulgus solala, (solus: only & ala: wing). And birdwatchers like Vernon began to dream. Twenty-two years later an expedition of four led by Ian Sinclair set off to try to find this rarest bird in the world. Vernon R.L. Head captivates & enchants as he tells of the adventures of Ian, Dennis, Gerry & himself as they navigate the wilderness of the plains, searching by spotlight for the elusive Nechisar Nightjar. But this book is more than a boy`s own adventure in search of the rarest bird in the world. It is a meditation on nature, on ways of seeing, on the naming of things & why we feel so compelled to label. It is a story of friendships & camaraderie. But most of all it embraces & enfolds one into the curious & eye-opening world of the birdwatcher. For birdwatchers, twitchers, bird lovers, & about-to-become birdwatchers everywhere. ...