What these ruthless Italians want they get! & now they want...MISTRESSES When Angelo Riccardi set out to get revenge he had financial devastation in mind. But innocent & pretty Gwenna Hamilton added another delicious dimension. She had no chance when the Italian tycoon swooped like an urban predator & offered her the devils bargain: pay for her fathers freedom with her body. Harriets decided to forget London an unexpected legacy in Ireland calls! Her new neighbour is ruthless businessman Rafael Cavaliere; Rafael is always on hand he oozes sex & charm. Even knowing she might be just another notch on Rafaels bedpost Harriet lets him sweep her up in a heady affair. ...

This is the tragic tale of the rise & fall of Camelot
- but seen through the eyes of Camelots women: the devout Gwenhwyfar Arthurs
...

Amy has always loved cats & is thrilled when she spots a tiny little black kitten in her garden. Although she has no collar she looks too well cared for to be a stray. Misty starts to spend more & more time with Amy but just as she starts to think of the kitten as hers the real owners show up. ...

The Misunderstanding" is Irene Nemirovskys first novel written when she was just twenty-one & published in a literary journal two years later. An intense story of self-destructive & blighted love it is also a tragic satire of French society after the Great War. Yves Harteloup scarred by the war is a disappointed young man old money fallen on hard times who returns for the summer to the rich comfortable Atlantic resort of Hendaye where he spent blissful childhood holidays. He becomes infatuated by a beautiful bored young woman Denise whose rich husband is often away on business. Intoxicated by summer nights & Yves intensity Denise falls passionately in love before the idyll has to end & Yves must return to his mundane office job. In the mournful Paris autumn their love founders on mutual misunderstanding in the apparently unbridgeable gap between a life of idle wealth & the demands of making a living between a womans needs & a mans way of loving. As Denise is driven mad with desire & jealous suspicion Yves too sure of her tortures himself & her with his emotional ambivalence. Taking her sophisticated mothers advice Denise takes action.. .which she may regret forever. With a sharp satirical eye & a characteristic perception for the fault lines in human relationships Irene Nemirovskys first novel shows sure signs of the brilliant novelist she was to become." ...

Prior to the financial crisis of 2007-2008 economists thought that no such crisis could or would ever happen again in the United States that financial events of such magnitude were a thing of the distant past. In fact observers of that distant past--the period from the half century prior to the Civil War up to the passage of deposit insurance during the Great Depression which was marked by repeated financial crises--note that while legislation immediately after crises reacted to their effects economists & policymakers continually failed to grasp the true lessons to be learned. Gary Gorton considered by many to be the authority on the financial crisis of our time holds that economists fundamentally misunderstand financial crises--what they are why they occur & why there were none in the U.S. between 1934 & 2007. In Misunderstanding Financial Crises he illustrates that financial crises are inherent to the production of bank debt which is used to conduct transactions & that unless the government designs intelligent regulation crises will continue. Economists he writes looked from a certain point of view & missed everything that was important: the evolution of capital markets & the banking system the existence of new financial instruments & the size of certain money markets like the sale & repurchase market. Delving into how such a massive intellectual failure could have happened Gorton offers a back-to-basics elucidation of financial crises & shows how they are not rare idiosyncratic unfortunate events caused by a coincidence of unconnected factors. By looking back to the " from 1934 to 2007 when there were no systemic crises & to the " he brings together such issues as bank debt & liquidity credit booms & manias & moral hazard & too-big-too-fail to illustrate the costs of bank failure & the true causes of financial crises. He argues that the successful regulation that prevented crises did not adequately keep pace with innovation in the financial sector due in large part to economists misunderstandings. He then looks forward to offer both a better way for economists to conceive of markets as well as a description of the regulation necessary to address the historical threat of financial crises." ...

Carefree revelatory & intimate this selection of unpublished letters between the six legendary Mitford sisters compiled by Diana Mitfords daughter-in-law is alive with wit passion & heartbreak. The letters chronicle the social quirks & political upheavals of the twentieth century but also chart the stormy enduring relationships between the uniquely gifted
- & collectively notorious
- Mitford sisters. Theres Nancy the scalding wit & bestselling novelist; Pamela who craved a quiet country life; Diana the fascist wife of Sir Oswald Mosley; Unity whose obsession with Adolf Hitler led to personal tragedy; Jessica the runaway communist; & Deborah the socialite who became Duchess of Devonshire. Writing to one another to confide tease rage & gossip the Mitford sisters set out above all to amuse. A correspondence of this scope is rare; a collection penned by six born storytellers is irreplaceable.

...

At the age of eight Diane Lazarus first experienced the power of her amazing gift by seeing hearing & speaking to spirits. Since then Diane has learned to control her gift switching it on & off at will. Today she is rated in the top five professional psychics worldwide & was recently the winner of the TV series Psychic Challenge". Her ability to visualize past & future events means shes frequently used by police throughout the UK & her accuracy in several murder investigations have prompted senior officers to call for her psychic assistance in a number of high profile crimes. The book recounts how she first discovered her gift
- which turned out to be understandably
- a pretty terrifying experience & how she came to develop it despite the disapproval & disbelief of many of those around her. Dianes childhood was a struggle her family suffered at the hands of their violent father & although they managed to escape his grasp it took time for Diane to become confident in her gift
- a mixed blessing but one that she has managed to use to benefit so many others."


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Love is always just around the corner in a Jill Mansell novel
- with a few surprises & a lot of humour on the way to happiness.
...

Born in Ramsgate during the 1940s Brenda Bottle was the youngest of nine in a poor but close family. She left school to work as a secretary for British Rail where she met her husb&. But by the age of twenty-seven the marriage was over. Brenda left her job & with the little she had saved enrolled at Guildford Drama School. & so her life as an actress began. One of Britain's best-loved actresses Brenda Blethyn has dazzled in a vast number of roles including her performances as downtrodden Cynthia in Mike Leigh's SECRETS & LIES & as the man-eating Mari Hoff in LITTLE VOICE for which she received Oscar nominations. On stage television & film she has worked with our greatest writers & directors -- Alan Bennett Tom Stoppard Sam Mendes Peter Hall -- & actors -- including Michael Caine Jude Law Julie Walters Brad Pitt Ewan Mc Gregor & John Hurt. Brenda is one of Britain's finest character actresses famous for playing her roles with social realism & warmth wit & humour -- characters her audience empathise with. She has the same warmth & humour off screen too; a wonderfully down-to-earth person with a fascinating history. Told with sparkling wit & engaging honesty MIXED FANCIES is the compelling story of her journey from the Plains of Waterloo to the National Theatre & on to television Hollywood & stardom. ...

Glorious rejacket of the story collection set in the worlds of Chrestomanci. The stories featured in this collection are: Warlock at the Wheel Stealer of Souls Carol Oneirs Hundredth Dream The Sage of Theare Everybodys favourite nine-lifed enchanter makes a guest appearance in each tale. Plus man favourites from the Chrestomanci novels
- & a cast of thousands! With illustrations by Tim Stevens.
...