In those weeks following the audition Id started to think that maybe I could do well in the competition & even to see beyond bootcamp & what doing well could mean. I knew I never wanted to go back to painting whatever happened. Matts dream has come true & this is his story. Painter-decorator bricklayer milkman even Santa Matts always been in bands always putting off starting a career because he knew that what he really wanted to do was sing. Charismatic but down to earth loved by the judges the other contestants & of course the public for his cheeky smile & warm heart Matt is a true star in the making. Packed full of unseen photographs shot especially for the book backstage footage behind-the-scenes gossip & the full & remarkable story of the winner from X Factor hopeful to popstar sensation this book is a must-have for all X Factor fans. Stunningly designed this is the perfect gift for Christmas. ...

The most capped England rugby scrum-half of all time a captain of his country & a two-times British Lions tourist Matt Dawsons career story is a colourful tale spiced with controversy from club rugby at Northampton to England winning the Rugby World Cup in Australia. Now fully updated with Englands first year as World Champions. The boy from Birkenhead learnt the game the hard way working as a security guard & an advertising salesman in his formative years in the days when rugby players found relief in an active & alcoholic social life. (Dawson: The drinking started on Saturday night continued all Sunday & most nights until Thursday.) Despite the frequent visits to the operating theatre & the physios table hard graft for his club Northampton eventually heralded international recognition. Dawson talks about the influential & occasional obstructive figures in his blossoming career: the likes of John Olver Will Carling Ian Mc Geechan & more recently Wayne Shelford Kyran Bracken & Clive Woodward. In typically opinionated mode he also reflects on the successes & failures of the England team & famously the Lions in Australia in 2001. After speaking out against punishing schedules disenchanted players & lack of management support in a tour diary article Dawson was almost sent home in disgrace. He revisits that bitterly disappointing period in his life & is still not afraid to point out where everything went wrong. Following Englands Rugby World Cup 2003 success Dawson provides a first-hand account of all the dressing room drama
- including a troubled Jonny Wilkinson
- & the memorable final itself followed by the stunning reaction to this historic win back home. & in a new updated chapter for this paperback edition he reveals how the World Champions have overcome the retirement of key players reviews the 2004 Six Nations & looks at his own future in the game.

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A singer once said his pitch was right on the nose: his word enunciation letter perfect: his understanding of a song thorough. He will be missed very much not only by myself but by his fans all over the world. The singer was the legendary Frank Sinatra The man he spoke about: the irreplaceable Matt Monro. The Singers Singer: The Life & Music of Matt Monro" is the highly-anticipated story of one of Britains most iconic singers tracing Matt Monros life from his poverty stricken upbringing in post-war Britain to his day job as London bus driver to the steady rise to fame that saw the singer battling the highs & lows of the entertainment industry to become one of Britains best-loved entertainers. This is the man behind the image the man who rubbed shoulders with some of the most famous names in the business who recorded the very first James Bond theme song (" From Russia with Love") represented his country in Eurovisions Song Contest & Royal Command & recorded the international hits " Softly as I Leave You" " Born Free" " Walk Away" & " Portrait of My Love". In an intimate portrait written by the singers daughter Michele Monro & drawing on more than two hundred interviews from the most important characters in Matts life " The Singers Singer" exposes the man behind the voice telling the story of how Terry Parson overcame poverty prejudice & alcoholism to arrive at the very heart of the post-war British entertainment industry as the unforgettable Matt Monro. Including never-before-seen photography exclusive correspondence between Matt & some of the biggest names in the music business & a rich array of personal anecdotes this is the first comprehensive look at the life of the man his peers dubbed the Singers Singer the irreplaceable Matt Monro." ...

The Singers Singer" is the highly-anticipated story of one of Britains most iconic singers the man who recorded the very first James Bond theme song (" From Russia with Love") represented his country in Eurovisions Song Contest & Royal Command & recorded the international hits " Softly as I Leave You" " Born Free" " Walk Away" & " Portrait of My Love"." ...

As aspiring youth footballer before injury forced him to reconsider his career Smith left his hometown of Northampton at the age of 18 to study drama & creative writing at the University of East Anglia. An outstanding performance in the National Youth Theatre production of The Master & Margarita in 2003 brought him to the attention of an agent & earned him his first professional acting jobs & his first television appearance came in 2006 in the BBC adaptation of Phillip Pullmans The Ruby in the Smoke. His first major role followed a year later & 2007 also saw him debut in Londons West End starring in Fresh Kills which he followed with a critically acclaimed performance as Henry in That Face. But Smiths biggest break came when he was cast in Doctor Who first appearing in the show on 1 January 2010. Replacing the much-loved David Tennant was no mean feat for a relatively unknown actor like Matt Smith but he has risen to the challenge & received rave reviews from critics & viewers alike. This is the inside story of the Doctor & the rapid rise of the man behind the latest incarnation of the famous Time Lord. ...

Adam Scott listens to the reading of his father's will aware that the contents can only be meagre. The Colonel after all had nothing to leave
- except a letter he had never opened himself a letter that can only bring further disgrace to the family name. Against his mother's advice Adam opens the letter & immediately realizes his life can never be the same again. The contents leave him with no choice but to follow a course his father would have described as a matter of honour.
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A Matter of Life & Death profiles some of the worlds most eminent & pioneering pathologists. This is a hidden world yet one we will all inevitably encounter at some time in our lives for pathology lies at the cornerstone of modern medicine. It is pathologists who are responsible for recognising new diseases such as AIDS SARS or Bird Flu & for diagnosing which cancer a patient is suffering from. & it is pathologists who must explain the cause of death at the autopsy table. A Matter of Life & Death tells fascinating stories of mysterious illnesses & miraculous scientific breakthroughs. But it is also crammed full of extraordinary characters
- from the forensic anthropologist with his own Body Farm in Tennessee to the doctor who had a lung & heart transplant & ended up using her own lungs for research.
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When a bomb goes off in Londons West End Home Secretary Victoria Osborne has a desperate sense of having failed in her duty to protect the public. A young Muslim reporter Ahmed Khan also has deep-seated feelings of anger & responsibility. He persuades his editor to let him go back amongst childhood friends in Leeds to try to find any lead that might help prevent further bombs. When Ahmed meets Victorias daughter Nattie at a party he cannot get her out of his mind. They begin seeing each other. But as he investigates his hometown & finds out uncomfortable facts his involvement with Nattie has everyone alarmed. Knowing something catastrophic is being planned & fearing for Natties safety Ahmed becomes obsessively determined to thwart it whatever the cost to himself. ...

I never ask for mercy & seek no one's sympathy. I would never as was once needlessly feared in this court be a fugitive from justice in this country only a seeker of it." --Conrad Black in his statement to the court June 24 2011 In 1993 Conrad Black was the proprietor of London's " Daily Telegraph" & the head of one of the world's largest newspaper groups. He completed a memoir in 1992 "A Life in Progress " & "great prospects beckoned." In 2004 he was fired as chairman of Hollinger International after he & his associates were accused of fraud. Here for the first time Black describes his indictment four-month trial in Chicago partial conviction imprisonment & largely successful appeal. In this unflinchingly revealing & superbly written memoir Black writes without reserve about the prosecutors who mounted a campaign to destroy him & the journalists who presumed he was guilty. Fascinating people fill these pages from prime ministers & presidents to the social legal & media elite among them: Margaret Thatcher Tony Blair George W. Bush Jean Chretien Rupert Murdoch Izzy Asper Richard Perle Norman Podhoretz Eddie Greenspan Alan Dershowitz & Henry Kissinger. Woven throughout are Black's views on big themes: politics corporate governance & the U.S. justice system. He is candid about highly personal subjects including his friendships
- with those who have supported & those who have betrayed him
- his Roman Catholic faith & his marriage to Barbara Amiel. & he writes about his complex relations with Canada Great Britain & the United States & in particular the blow he has suffered at the hands of that nation. In this extraordinary book Black maintains his innocence & recounts what he describes as "the fight of & for my life." "A Matter of Principle" is a riveting memoir & a scathing account of a flawed justice system."

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What did the Romans know about their gods? Why did they perform the rituals of their religion & what motivated them to change those rituals? To these questions Clifford Ando proposes simple answers: in contrast to ancient Christians who had faith Romans had knowledge & their knowledge was empirical in orientation. In other words the Romans acquired knowledge of the gods through observation of the world & their rituals were maintained or modified in light of what they learned. After a preface & opening chapters that lay out this argument about knowledge & place it in context The Matter of the Gods" pursues a variety of themes essential to the study of religion in history." ...