London`s Notting Hill in the 1950s was an unimaginably different place to the white stucco splendour it`s known for today. Alan Johnson`s family lived in condemned housing, declared unfit for human habitation, in a cramped flat with no central heating, no electricity & no running water. His mother, Lily, battled against poor health, poverty, domestic violence & chronic loneliness to try & ensure a better life for her children. His sister, Linda, took on an adult`s burden of responsibility & fought to keep the family together when she was still only a child. This personal story is played out against the background of a community on the verge of massive upheavals. We move from postwar austerity, through the early days of immigration & race riots, into the swinging Sixties, when Alan & his band recorded a record on Denmark Street & he became a teenage father & husb&. No matter how harsh the detail, Alan writes with a spirit of generous acceptance, humour & openness which makes his book anything but a grim catalogue of misery. In the end, This Boy is about success against all the odds, & paints a vivid portrait of a bygone era. ...

A curated collection of some of the most powerful & awe-inspiring Brutalist architecture ever built This Brutal World is a global survey of this compelling & much-admired style of architecture. It brings to light virtually unknown Brutalist architectural treasures from across the former eastern bloc & other far flung parts of the world. It

Includes:: works by some of the best contemporary architects including Zaha Hadid & David Chipperfield as well as by some of the master architects of the 20th century including Le Corbusier, Mies van der Rohe, Frank Lloyd Wright, Louis Kahn, Paul Rudolph & Marcel Breuer.

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Think your cat loves you? Think you have a special connection, just the two of you? Think again... All cat owners are convinced their cat adores them, the loving provider of daily food, affection & a warm home. But what would your cat tell you if it could speak? Would they shower you with praise for providing them a loving home? Not likely. Discover what your cat`s really thinking & what the meaning is behind those looks, twitches & `loving` gestures in this hilarious cat`s-eye view of life. ...

In a remote house on a hilltop, a lonely boy witnesses a traumatic event. He tries
- & fails
- to flee. Left alone with his

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Naomi Klein`s international bestseller This Changes Everything is a must-read on our future, one of the defining & most hopeful books of this era. Forget everything you think you know about global warming. It`s not about carbon
- it`s about capitalism. The good news is that we can seize this crisis to transform our failed economic system & build something radically better. Once a decade, Naomi Klein writes a book that redefines its era. No Logo did so for globalization. The Shock Doctrine changed the way we think about austerity. In This Changes Everything, her most provocative & optimistic book yet, Naomi Klein has upended the debate about the stormy era already upon us, exposing the myths that are clouding the climate debate. You have been told the market will save us, when in fact the addiction to profit & growth is digging us in deeper every day. You have been told it`s impossible to get off fossil fuels when in fact we know exactly how to do it
- it just requires breaking every rule in the ”free-market” playbook. You have also been told that humanity is too greedy & selfish to rise to this challenge. In fact, all around the world, the fight back is already succeeding in ways both surprising & inspiring. It`s about changing the world, before the world changes so drastically that no one is safe. Either we leap
- or we sink. This Changes Everything is a book that will redefine our era. ` The most important book I`ve read all year
- perhaps in a decade.. .crucially, she leaves the reader with a sense of optimism` Stephanie Merritt, Observer, Books of the Year `A book of such ambition & consequence it is almost unreviewable.. . The most momentous & contentious environmental book since Silent Spring` Rob Nixon, The New York Times ` Naomi is like a great doctor
- she can diagnose problems nobody else sees` Alfonso Cuaron ` Damn right, this changes everything.. .one of the greatest nonfiction works of all time.. .not just a book. It is a path of survival` D. R. Tucker, Washington Monthly




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In an unforgettable tribute to the far latitudes, Gretel Ehrlich travels across Greenl&, the largest island on earth. Greenland is the largest island on earth. All but five percent of it is covered by a vast ice sheet, an enduring remnant of the last ice age. Despite a uniquely hostile environment, it has been inhabited continuously for thousands of years. Greenlanders retain many of their traditional practices. Some still hunt on sleds made from whale & caribou with packs of dogs; others fashion harpoons from Narwhal tusks; entranced shamans make soul fights under the ice. The modern population lives on the edge of a stone- & ice-age world & has reached a unique understanding of it. Ehrlich mixes stories of European anthropologists who have recorded the ways of the Inuit, with artists who have lived briefly on Greenland`s fringe in order to try to capture its extraordinary pure light. She travels across this unearthly landscape in the company of men & women who have a deep bond with it, & with them she discovers the realm of the Great Dark, ice pavilions, polar bears & Eskimo nomads. She learns about hunting & endurance, inuit languages, legends & ghosts. Conjuring up Greenland`s cruel, beautiful landscape, she shows that it is a land endowed with magical & mysterious properties. St Brendan, the sixth century Irish monk, described one of its huge glaciers as `a floating crystal castle the colour of a silver veil, yet hard as marble & the sea around it as smooth as glass & white as milk.` It has lost none of its power to enthral. ...

” In the summer of 2009, the leader of the dreaded Tamil Tiger guerrillas was killed, bringing to a bloody end the stubborn & complicated civil war in Sri Lanka. For nearly thirty years, the war`s fingers had reached everywhere: into the bustle of Colombo, the Buddhist monasteries scattered across the isl&, the soft hills of central Sri Lanka, the curves of the eastern coast near Batticaloa & Trincomalee, & the stark, hot north. With its genius for brutality, the war left few places, & fewer people, untouched. What happens to the texture of life in a country that endures such bitter conflict? What happens to the country`s soul? Samanth Subramanian gives us an extraordinary account of the Sri Lankan war & the lives it changed. Taking us to the ghosts of summers past, & to other battles from other times, he draws out the story of Sri Lanka today
- an exhausted, disturbed society, still hot from the embers of the war. Through travels & conversations, he examines how people reconcile themselves to violence, how religion & state conspire, how the powerful become cruel, & how victory can be put to the task of reshaping memory & burying histories. This Divided Island is a harrowing & humane investigation of a country still inflamed.”
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” In the summer of 2009, the leader of the dreaded Tamil Tiger guerrillas was killed, bringing to a bloody end the stubborn & complicated civil war in Sri Lanka. For nearly thirty years, the war`s fingers had reached everywhere: into the bustle of Colombo, the Buddhist monasteries scattered across the isl&, the soft hills of central Sri Lanka, the curves of the eastern coast near Batticaloa & Trincomalee, & the stark, hot north. With its genius for brutality, the war left few places, & fewer people, untouched. What happens to the texture of life in a country that endures such bitter conflict? What happens to the country`s soul? Samanth Subramanian gives us an extraordinary account of the Sri Lankan war & the lives it changed. Taking us to the ghosts of summers past, & to other battles from other times, he draws out the story of Sri Lanka today
- an exhausted, disturbed society, still hot from the embers of the war. Through travels & conversations, he examines how people reconcile themselves to violence, how religion & state conspire, how the powerful become cruel, & how victory can be put to the task of reshaping memory & burying histories. This Divided Island is a harrowing & humane investigation of a country still inflamed.”
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Dogs know that their human is the greatest in the whole world! They`ll stop at nothing to show their owners just how much they love them. They`ll remodel the garden, lick the dishes clean & keep the bed nice & warm. They just can`t figure out why their displays of affection don`t always get the reaction they deserve... Discover a dog`s infinite love for their human in this hilarious dog`s-eye view of life. ...

This Dynamic Planet World Wall Map from the USGS, size 148.5 x 111cm (59 x 44 approx), provides on both of its sides extensive information on many of the features which have shaped & continue to change our planet. Produced by an impressive trio of organizations: the United States Geological Survey, the Smithsonian Institute & the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory, the map has on one side a physical map of the world indicating both the elevation of the land masses & the surface of the ocean floor. The map shows locations of volcanoes, impact craters & earthquake sites, plus the boundaries of the tectonic plates. Under the main world map & on the whole of the reverse side are panels with additional maps, colour illustrations or photos, tables & time lines, & extensive text providing more information on various aspects of the development of the earth crust. Current edition of this map was published in 2006. ...