For 125 years the British & Irish Lions have stood out as a unique emblem in world sport. They represent the best of the best from England Ireland Scotland & Wales coming together every four years under a united badge to take on the rugby greats of the southern hemisphere. Lions tours are steeped in history & tradition yet maintain a vibrant standing in the modern era. The Lions badge is a symbol of the ethics values & the romance at the heart of Test match rugby union & represents the pinnacle for every international player in Britain & Irel&. As the Lions party departs the shores of Britain & Ireland a great red wave of support follows them as thousands of fans make a rugby pilgrimage to see their heroes do battle with the superpowers of the world game
- & with the weight of history itself. Behind the Lions sees four esteemed rugby writers from each of the Home Nations delve to the very heart of what it means to be a Lion interviewing a vast array of former tourists to uncover the passion pride & honour experienced when wearing the famous red jersey. It is a tale of heart-break & ecstasy humour & poignancy that is at once inspirational moving & utterly compelling. & it is the only story worth hearing: the players own. This is the history of the British & Irish Lions
- in their own words.

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Facts testimonies police records & previously unpublished state documents are brought together in this enlightening new study into the truth about Hitlers early & private life
- exposing a lineage that he was determined to keep secret. In this book Behind the Mask of Hitler" the author strives to find a path through the conspiracies & speculation underpinning the few existing accounts of Hitlers life before his rise to power. It provides a detailed insight into his fascination for the occult his family life the milieu that he grew up in the people who influenced him & those who undoubtedly helped forge his ideologies & his cultural pessimism that resulted in occult-nationalism."
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Eva Cassidys story if one of the most compelling & poignant in recent music history. In this thoughtful & probing biography Johan Bakker re-evaluates her brief performing career & the game that only came after her death at the age of 33. Before BBC Radio 2 & TV made her famous first in the UK & then Europe Eva Cassidy had been mainly a local performer in & around Washington D.C. Performing in Iceland was the closest she ever got to Europe yet a handful of recordings spanning pop jazz blues folk & country would maker her a posthumous star there & eventually in her home country too. Her posthumously released recordings including three UK number ones have sold more than ten million copies. Johann Bakker has interviewed Evas friends colleagues & family in Washington D.C. & Maryland tracing her short life her idealism & her disillusionment with the business side of her trade. Through it all her shimmering spirit shines making this biography both a searching analysis & a warm commemoration of a uniquely talented young woman. ...

SO WHAT DO YOU SAY TO THE WAGER MISS PRENTESS? A DIAMOND WORTH THOUSANDS AGAINST A NIGHT WITH ME? No London beauty has managed to tame the incorrigible Jasper Coale though many have lost their reputations trying. In sedate Bath on a family errand the Viscount expects to find little in terms of entertainment
- certainly no female company to tempt him... Miss Susannah Prentesss discreet card parties in Royal Crescent offer a welcome distraction. & the glint in Susannahs hazel eyes tells Jasper hes met his match at last. But is she game enough to accept the most outrageous wager of all? The Notorious Coale Brothers They are the talk of the Ton!
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Established by the film industry in 1912 as the nation's only official & independent classifier of the moving image the British Board of Film Classification (originally the British Board of Film Censors) has long been a source of fascination
- & sometimes a bone of contention
- for filmgoers film-makers & industry figures. This new book published in the BBFC's centenary year traces the fascinating history of film classification censorship & controversy in Britain & marks an unparalleled collaboration between the BBFC & leading film critics historians & cultural commentators. These writers given unprecedented access to the BBFC's archives chart the organisation's history alongside the cultural social & political forces that have helped shape it. Together they explore shifting public attitudes towards cinema's portrayal of sex & drugs horror & violence; the different perspectives of the BBFC's successive leaders; the impact of controversial decisions & the ever-changing nature of moving image distribution & exhibition. The book also features unique case studies written by BBFC staff focusing on significant films that have provoked debate & controversy both within the BBFC & more widely
- Battleship Potemkin The Snake Pit A Clockwork Orange Indiana Jones & the Temple of Doom & many more. Behind the Scenes at the BBFC: Film Classification from the Silver Screen to the Digital Age gives an entertaining & invaluable insight into changing attitudes to what counts as offensive shocking or harmful over the last century & shows how the work of the BBFC shapes what we see on screen.


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Ruby Lennox was conceived grudgingly by Bunty & born while her father George was in the Dog & Hare in Doncaster telling a woman in an emerald dress & a D-cup that he wasn't married. Bunty had never wanted to marry George but here she was stuck in a flat above the pet shop in an ancient street beneath York Minster with sensible & sardonic Patrica aged five greedy cross-patch Gillian who refused to be ignored & Ruby... Ruby tells the story of The Family from the day at the end of the nineteenth century when a travelling French photographer catches frail beautiful Alice & her children like flowers in amber to the startling witty & memorable events of Ruby's own life. ...

Having learned Mandarin & travelling alone by foot bicycle & train Colin Thubron set off on a 10 000 mile journey from Beijing to the borders of Burma. He travelled through the wind-swept wastes of the Gobi desert & finished at the far end of the Great Wall. What Thubron reveals is an astonishing diversity a land whose still unmeasured resources strain to meet an awesome demand & an ancient people still reeling from the devastation of the Cultural Revolution. ...

Aged 16 White was the youngest snooker player to win the English Amateur Championship. By 1984 he was a professional success & married but not settled. He has survived a life of gambling women & marathon binges with showbiz friends to tell in candid detail the story of his own life. ...

When Gregory Matthews patriarch of the Poplars is found dead one morning imperious Aunt Harriet blames it on the roast duck he ate for supper after all she had warned him about his blood pressure. But a post-mortem determines that the cause of death is much more sinister. Murder by poison. Suspicion falls immediately amongst his bitter quarrelsome family. Each has a motive; each opportunity. It falls to Superintendent Hannasyde to sift through all the secrets & lies & discover just who killed Gregory Matthews before the killer strikes again... ...

The brilliant new novel by the internationally bestselling author of the Sister Fidelma mystery series. AD 664: Sister Fidelma finds herself in the seaport of Genua en route from Rome back to her native Cashel. Her old teacher Brother Ruadan lies dying in the abbey of Bobium
- an isolated abbey in a disturbed country where even the Christians are in bloody conflict with one another & the worship of the pagan gods often prevails. Fidelma is determined to see Brother Ruadan before he dies. But from the moment she enters the beautiful valley of the Trebbia there is danger on every side. Her dying teachers last words send her off on her most dangerous adventure where murder follows murder & a vicious civil war threatens before an extraordinary conspiracy is revealed. & from the start Fidelma is on her own...
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