Accompanying the BBC TV series of the same name Neil Olivers popular account of Britains prehistoric & Roman past strikes a personal note interweaving Olivers own voyage of discovery with a chronological survey. Featuring snippets of interviews with the archaeologists involved the book describes visits to Britains most important prehistoric sites & the results of the latest research building up a picture of the daily lives of Britains inhabitants over a vast period. ...

The extraordinary history of Ancient Egyptian civilization
- from its earliest origins to the creation of its greatest monument
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Bath is one of the most popular & significant tourist destinations in Britain. No fewer than four million visitors each year visit the much-renovated Roman Baths marvel at the sites of this World Heritage city or simply meander through its now carefully conserved eighteenth-century streets. For a few hours before they are whisked away to Stratford-upon-Avon Edinburgh or London they absorb the carefully presented image of Bath as ancient spa elegant Georgian city & haunt of the likes of Richard ' Beau' Nash or Jane Austen. Bath has always tried to present itself in a favourable light. The true picture of Bath throughout its long & varied history is of course much fuller more interesting & varied than the facade presented to casual visitors. From its earliest known history as spa during the Roman period Bath transformed itself into Saxon monastic town & subsequently Norman cathedral city. It developed into a regional market &
- perhaps surprisingly
- a centre of the woollen trade during the Middle Ages before becoming probably the most important health resort of the sixteenth & seventeenth centuries. Thereafter rapid expansion in the Georgian period created an enduring architectural legacy which made Bath the country's foremost fashionable resort attracting increasing numbers of visitors. From the later 1700s the city experienced some years of relative decline from which it re-emerged this time as a favoured place of genteel residence in the nineteenth & twentieth centuries. This theme of constant re-invention now sees Bath attempt to become a 'festival city' in the market for cultural tourism while the long-anticipated opening of a new thermal spa should bring a new lease of life to the hot springs which of course represent Bath's very oldest attraction & in many ways its very raison d'etre. This book goes beyond the narrow popular image of Bath to explore 2000 years of extraordinary change variety & interest focusing wherever possible on the lives of ordinary residents & seeking to explain as well as to chronicle Bath's truly unique historical legacy.

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Birmingham was a village worth only one pound in the Domesday Survey yet it rose to become the second city of the British Empire with a population that passed a million. Its growth began when Peter de Birmingham obtained a market charter in 1154 for his little settlement by an insignificant river with all roads leading to its all-important market-place the great triangular Bull Ring with the parish church of St Martins in the middle. In the succeeding centuries Birmingham has been a product of market forces as a market of agriculture trade & metal work. By the 18th century Birmingham overtook Coventry as the biggest town in Warwickshire & by 1800 it was the toy shop of Europe having cornered the markets for gun-making jewellery buttons & buckles with a bewildering variety of specialist craftsmen & traders. The factory system had already begun & men like James Watt Matthew Boulton Joseph Priestley & William Murdock made Birmingham the powerhouse of the Industrial Revolution selling their wares in vast quantities to the entire world. The middle of the 19th century saw Birmingham pioneering political reform education & municipal government. In this first single-volume history of the city for half a century Dr Upton looks at why Birmingham grew & what it has become. It has always been a place in which to experiment from the steam engine to the factory in a garden; from the Bull Ring to Spaghetti Junction. To some the story of Birmingham is one of great industries: Boulton & Watt Dunlop Cadburys G.K.N. Lloyds Bank & Austin Rover. But there are many lesser known tales: of the Bull Ring Riots the Onion Fair the first floodlit football matches & the tripe sellers. It is a story of communities too. The Quakers settles in the 17th century the Irish & Italians in the 19th & more recently people from the Caribbean the Indian subcontinent China & Vietnam have all made Birmingham their home. As Birmingham makes it marks on the map of Europe again one thing is certain...the story of the city that brought us Joseph & Neville Chamberlain Thomas the Tank Engine Fu Manchu & Mendelssohns Elijah can hardly be dull. Chris Uptons lively account ensures that Birminghams fascinating story loses nothing in telling. ...

History clings tight but it also kicks loose writes Simon Schama at the outset of this the first book in his three-volume journey into Britains past. Disruption as much as persistence is its proper subject. So although the great theme of British history seen from the twentieth century is endurance its counter-point seen from the twenty-first must be alteration. Change
- sometimes gentle & subtle sometimes shocking & violent
- is the dynamic of Schamas unapologetically personal & grippingly written history especially the changes that wash over custom & habit transforming our loyalties. At the heart of this history lie questions of compelling importance for Britains future as well as its past: what makes or breaks a nation? To whom do we give our allegiance & why? & where do the boundaries of our community lie
- in our hearth & home our village or city tribe or faith? What is Britain
- one country or many? Has British history unfolded at the edge of the world or right at the heart of it? Schama delivers these themes in a form that is at once traditional & excitingly fresh. The great & the wicked are here
- Becket & Thomas Cromwell Robert the Bruce & Anne Boleyn
- but so are countless more ordinary lives: an Irish monk waiting for the plague to kill him in his cell at Kilkenny; & a small boy running through the streets of London to catch a glimpse of Elizabeth I. They are all caught on the rich & teeming canvas on which Schama paints his brilliant portrait of the life of the British people: for in the end history especially British history with its succession of thrilling illuminations should be as all her most accomplished narrators have promised not just instruction but pleasure.





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In this fascinating & informative new book Professor David Wilson tells the stories of Britains serial killers from Jack the Ripper to the extraordinary Suffolk Murders case. David Wilson has worked as a Prison Governor & as a profiler & has been described as the UKs leading expert on serial killers. His work has led him to meet several of the UKs deadliest killers & build up fascinating insights into what makes a serial killer
- & who they are most likely to target. A vivid narrative history & a timely call for prison & social reform Professor Wilsons new book is a powerful & gripping investigation of Britains serial murderers.
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John O' Farrell author of The Man Who Forgot His Wife An Utterly Impartial History of Britain & Things Can Only Get Better turns his comedic genius to the problem of capitalism encapsulated in a Tube train full of passengers stuck underground
- part of a series of twelve books tied to the twelve lines of the London Underground as Tfl celebrates 150 years of the Tube with Penguin. It is also available in a boxset. Authors include the masterly John Lanchester the children of Kids Company comic John O' Farrell & social geographer Danny Dorling. Ranging from the polemical to the fantastical the personal to the societal they offer something for every taste. All experience the city as a cultural phenomenon & notice its nature & its people. Read individually they're delightful small reads pulled together they offer a particular portrait of a global city". (Evening Standard). " Exquisitely diverse". (The Times). " Eclectic & broad-minded.. .beautifully designed". (Tom Cox Observer). "A fascinating collection with a wide range of styles & themes. The design qualities are excellent as you might expect from Penguin with a consistent look & feel while allowing distinctive covers for each book. This is a very pleasing set of books". (A Common Reader blog). " The contrasts & transitions between books are as stirring as the books themselves.. .A multidimensional literary jigsaw". (Londonist). "A series of short sharp city-based vignettes
- some personal some political & some pictorial.. .each inimitable author finds that our city is complicated but ultimately connected full of wit & just the right amount of grit". (Fabric Magazine). "A collection of beautiful books". (Grazia). [ Praise for John O' Farrell]: " Comic genius". (Mirror). "A consistently humorous writer". (Mail on Sunday). John O' Farrell is the bestselling author of four novels including The Man Who Forgot His Wife. He has also written comic non-fiction such as An Utterly Impartial History of Britain the political memoir Things Can Only Get Better & three collections of his popular Guardian column."

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The epic plains & arid deserts of Central Asia have witnessed some of the greatest migrations as well as many of the most transformative developments in the history of civilization. Christoph Baumer's ambitious four-volume treatment of the region charts the 3000-year drama of Scythians & Sarmatians; Soviets & transcontinental Silk Roads; trade routes & the transmission of ideas across the steppes; & the breathless & brutal conquests of Alexander the Great & Chinghiz Khan. Masterfully interweaving the stories of individuals & peoples the author's engaging prose is richly augmented throughout by colour photographs taken on his own travels. For all the complexity of the history Dr Baumer a noted authority on Central Asia never loses sight of the sweeping grandeur of its overall setting. Volume 1 focuses on the geography of the area now occupied by present-day Kazakhstan Uzbekistan Turkmenistan Kyrgyzstan Tajikistan northern Afghanistan western & central Mongolia & parts of southern Russia & northern China. Discussing the changing climates of the Palaeolithic Mesolithic Neolithic & Bronze Ages the author explores subjects as diverse as glacial retreat; the invention of the wheel; the legendary Cimmerians & Amazons; Hellenism & Zoroastrianism; & the Oxus Treasure. Future volumes will explore the later historical periods of the region. ...

Diarmaid Mac Cullochs epic acclaimed history A History of Christianity: The First Three Thousand Years" follows the story of Christianity around the globe from ancient Palestine to contemporary China. How did an obscure personality cult come to be the worlds biggest religion with a third of humanity its followers? This book now the most comprehensive & up to date single volume work in English describes not only the main facts ideas & personalities of Christian history its organization & spirituality but how it has changed politics sex & human society. Taking in wars empires reformers apostles sects churches & crusaders Diarmaid Mac Culloch shows how Christianity has brought humanity to the most terrible acts of cruelty
- & inspired its most sublime accomplishments. "A stunning tour de force". (Simon Sebag Montefiore " Sunday Telegraph" Books of the Year). "A landmark in its field astonishing in its range compulsively readable full of insight... It will have few if any rivals in the English language". (Rowan Williams Archbishop of Canterbury " Guardian"). "A prodigious thrilling masterclass of a history book". (John Cornwell " Financial Times"). " Essential reading for those enthralled by Christianity & for those enraged by it". (Melvyn Bragg " Observer" Books of the Year). " Magnificent.. .a sumptuous portrait alive with detail & generous in judgement". (Richard Holloway " The Times"). Diarmaid Mac Culloch is Professor of the History of the Church at Oxford University. His " Thomas Cranmer" won the Whitbread Biography Prize the James Tait Black Prize & the Duff Cooper Prize. He is the author most recently of " Reformation: Europes House Divided 1490-1700" which won the Wolfson Prize for History & the British Academy Prize."
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Cosmetics have been used to increase attraction since Ancient times whilst Compacts have been a symbol of love for generations but especially since the 1920s. In this fascinating book vintage accessories expert Madeleine Marsh discusses just what makes compacts so desirable & reveals their hidden secrets from cameras to cigarettes. Madeleine shows what to buy & where what to spot when buying & how to make the most of your compacts vintage cosmetics or beauty accessories. ...