This is the Penguin English Library Edition" of " The War of the Worlds" by H. G. Wells. ' Death!' I shouted. ' Death is coming! Death!' In this pioneering shocking & nightmarish tale naive suburban Londoners investigate a strange cylinder from space but are instantly incinerated by an all-destroying heat-ray. Soon gigantic killing machines that chase & feed on human prey are threatening the whole of humanity. A pioneering work of alien invasion fiction " The War of the World's" journalistic style contrasts disturbingly with its horrifying visions of the human race under siege. " The Penguin English Library"
- 100 editions of the best fiction in English from the eighteenth century & the very first novels to the beginning of the First World War."
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No one would have believed in the last years of the nineteenth century that this world was being watched keenly & closely by intelligences greater than mans... So begins H. G. Wells classic novel in which Martian lifeforms take over planet Earth. As the Martians emerge they construct giant killing machines
- armed with heatrays
- that are impervious to attack. Advancing upon London they destroy everything in their path. Everything except the few humans they collect in metal traps. Victorian England is a place in which the steam engine is state-of-the-art technology & powered flight is just a dream. Mankind is helpless against the killing machines from Mars & soon the survivors are left living in a new stone age.

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Following the blockbuster film this version of the classic story is ideal for younger readers in an easy to read abridged format. Classic Starts[trademark]" is in its 5th printing
- with more than half a million copies sold! It is aimed at children aged 7 to 9 years old. Hot on the heels of the blockbuster film comes a version of H.G. Wells chilling tale of alien invasion that every child can enjoy. It begins as the sky lights up with bright cylinders from Mars that look like falling stars
- & continues as the Martians emerge from their vessels with machines of fire & deadly smoke. Wellss depiction of a city in panic
- written in 1898
- still remains shockingly contemporary."



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Richard Dawkins Christopher Hitchens & Stephen Hawking have had a major impact on the loud & popular debate between aggressive atheists & religion. The huge sales of their bestselling books show just how much interest people have in their ideas. Now the rock star of the new spirituality Deepak Chopra is entering this debate sparring with leading physicist Professor Leonard Mlodinow (the co-author with Stephen Hawking of The Grand Design). In War of the Worldviews Chopra argues that there is design in our universe & a deep intelligence behind life. Without defending organised religion he debunks randomness as an explanation for how Nature evolves & shows how consciousness comes first & matter second. On the other side Mlodinow argues the viewpoint of science specifically what modern quantum physics can tell us about our world. In his view physics genetics & cosmology will shed far more light on the big questions than rethinking ancient spiritual concepts can ever do. A major work of our time War of the Worldviews offers much food for thought for those fascinated by the two sides of this modern conundrum. ...

Robert Harvey brilliantly recreates the story of the greatest conflict that stretches from the first blaze of revolution in Paris in 1789 to final victory on the muddy fields of Waterloo. On land & at sea throughout the four corners of the continent from the frozen plains surrounding Moscow & terror on the Caribbean seas to the muddy low lands of Flanders & the becalmed waters of Trafalgar The War of Wars" tells the powerful story of the greatest conflict of the age." ...

This selection of Wilfred Owen's war poems is being published partly to provide an ideal edition of the poems for schools who essentially read the war poems & need a short thorough edition. It contains a new introduction by Jon Stallworthy which is aimed at a general audience but will be thorough & academic enough to work for schools as well. Constable have a similar edition planned but Chatto's will be out first & contains copyright material unavailable to other editions. ...

Having joined the BBC as a trainee in 1984 Jeremy Bowen first became a foreign correspondent four years later. He had witnessed violence already both at home & abroad but it wasnt until he covered his first war -- in El Salvador -- that he felt he had arrived. Armed with the fearlessness of youth he lived for the job was in love with it aware of the dangers but assuming the bullets & bombs were meant for others. In 2000 however after eleven years in some of the worlds most dangerous places the bullets came too close for comfort & a close friend was killed in Lebanon. This & then the birth of his first child began a process of reassessment that culminated in the end of the affair. Now in his extraordinarily gripping & thought-provoking new book he charts his progress from keen young novice whose first reaction to the sound of gunfire was to run towards it to the more circumspect veteran he is today. It will also discuss the changes that have taken place in the ways in which wars are reported over the course of his career from the Gulf War to Bosnia Afghanistan to Rwanda. ...

For the very first time The War That Never Was" tells the fascinating story of a secret war fought by British mercenaries in the Yemen in the early 1960s. In a covert operation organised over whisky & sodas in the clubs of Chelsea & Mayfair a group of former SAS officers
- led by the irrepressible Colonel Jim Johnson
- arranged for a squadron of British mercenaries to travel to the remote mountain regions of the Yemen to arm train & lead Yemeni tribesmen in their fight against a 60 000-strong contingent of Egyptian soldiers. It was one of the most uneven running battles ever waged; the Egyptians fielded a huge professionally-trained army. The British fought back at the head of a ragtag force of tribal warriors & ultimately won. Egypts President Nasser described the battle in the Yemen as my Vietnam. Its a fascinating forgotten & rip-roaringly entertaining pocket of British military history much in the spirit of Ben Mv Intyres bestselling " Agent Zigzag & Operation Mincemeat"."

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With two tours of Iraq under his belt Sergeant Dave Henley knows what modern war looks like. But nothing can prepare him for the posting to Forward Operating Base Senzhiri Helmand Province Afghanistan. This is a battlezone like he's never seen before. He's in charge of 1 Platoon a ragbag collection of rookies who he must make into a fighting force
- & fast. But this is a brutal unforgiving conflict which takes no prisoners. Their convoy is ambushed on the way to the FOB leaving two men grievously wounded
- before they've fired a shot. Back at home Dave's wife Jenny seven months pregnant must try to hold together the fragile lives of the families left behind who all wait for the knock on the door & the arrival of bad news...

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Again & again British politicians commentators & celebrities intone that The War on Drugs has failed. They then say that this is an argument for abandoning all attempts to reduce drug use through the criminal law. Peter Hitchens shows that in Britain there has been no serious war on drugs since 1971 when a Tory government adopted a Labour plan to implement the revolutionary Wootton report. This gave cannabis the most widely used illegal substance a special legal status as a supposedly soft drug (in fact Hitchens argues it is at least as dangerous as heroin & cocaine because of the threat it poses to mental health). It began a progressive reduction of penalties for possession & effectively disarmed the police. This process still continues behind a screen of falsely tough rhetoric from politicians. Far from there being a war on drugs there has been a covert surrender to drugs concealed behind an official obeisance to international treaty obligations. To all intents & purposes cannabis is legal in Britain & other major drugs are not far behind. In The War We Never Fought Hitchens uncovers the secret history of the governments true attitude & the increasing recruitment of the police & courts to covert decriminalisation initiatives & contrasts it with the rhetoric. Whatever & whoever is to blame for the undoubted mess of Britains drug policy it is not prohibition or a war on drugs for neither exists. ...