In 1959 British agents masterminded the escape of the Dalai Lama from Tibet. Three years later Paul Chavasse is doing it all over again...A vitally important scientist holding intelligence that could shift the balance of world power is being held in China. British secret agent Paul Chavasse responsible for extracting the Dalai Lama from under Chinese noses is the perfect man to slip through the border locate the scientist & bring him back to the West. But Chavasse's nerve stamina & loyalties will all be tested as he finds the Chinese are reluctant to let their asset go without a fight... ...

It had never been the best of marriages & over recent years it had become effectively a marriage in name & outward appearance only. Yet in the autumn of 1960 Winifred & Daniel Coulson presented an acceptable facade to the outside world for Daniel had prospered sufficiently to allow them to live at Wearcill House a mansion situated in the most favoured outskirt of the Tyneside town of Fellburn. Of their children it was Donald on whom Winifred doted to the point of obsession & now he was to be married Winifreds prime concern was whether Donald was entering wedlock with an unbesmirched purity of body & spirit for amidst the strange workings of her mind much earlier conceptions of morality & the teachings of the Church held sway. There was something potentially explosive just below the surface of life at Wearcill House but when that explosion came it was in a totally unforeseeable & devastating form plunging the Coulsons into an excoriating series of crises out of which would come both good & evil as well as the true significance of The Year of the Virgins"..." ...

Get Close To The Worlds Most Amazing Animals Every week of the year something astounding happens in the animal kingdom. A million wildebeest trek 800 km across the Serengeti; killer whales surf Argentinean beaches; lizards fly like paper planes in the jungles of Borneo; 10 million puffins descend on Iceland; & the worlds biggest feeding frenzy takes place off the coast of South Africa. A Year of Watching Wildlife" shows you where when & how to take part in the natural worlds greatest happenings
- be inspired & go wild! Organized by month & week to help you plan the years wildlife adventures
Includes: essential planning tips & links to more information about each encounter Country & animal indexes allow you to search by destination or by animal"

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From the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of March & People of the Book. A young womans struggle to save her family & her soul during the extraordinary year of 1666 when plague suddenly struck a small Derbyshire village. In 1666 plague swept through London driving the King & his court to Oxford & Samuel Pepys to Greenwich in an attempt to escape contagion. The north of England remained untouched until in a small community of leadminers & hill farmers a bolt of cloth arrived from the capital. The tailor who cut the cloth had no way of knowing that the damp fabric carried with it bubonic infection. So begins the Year of Wonders in which a Pennine village of 350 souls confronts a scourge beyond remedy or understanding. Desperate the villagers turn to sorcery herb lore & murderous witch-hunting. Then led by a young & charismatic preacher they elect to isolate themselves in a fatal quarantine. The story is told through the eyes of Anna Frith who at only 18 must contend with the death of her family the disintegration of her society & the lure of a dangerous & illicit attraction. Geraldine Brookss novel explores love & learning fear & fanaticism & the struggle of 17th century science & religion to deal with a seemingly diabolical pestilence. Year of Wonders is also an eloquent memorial to the real-life Derbyshire villagers who chose to suffer alone during Englands last great plague. ...

Dartmoor can present a mask of barren wilderness to the uninitiated. But for those willing to explore the moor unfolds the secrets of its seasonal changes revealing faces of spectacular colour inspiring light & landscape distinctly marked over time by the shared presence of humans wildlife & natural elements alike. The 954 square kilometres of unyielding granite plateau are dotted with tors peat bogs & stocky trees stubbornly adhering to the scoured earth. David Entricans moody panoramic photographs capture the magic of this landscape through the seasons & through the changing English weather. ...

In the tradition of Krakatoa" " The World Without Us" & " Guns Germs & Steel" comes a sweeping history of the year that became known as 18-hundred-&-froze-to-death. 1816 was a remarkable year
- mostly for the fact that there was no summer. As a result of a volcanic eruption in Indonesia weather patterns were disrupted worldwide for months allowing for excessive rain frost & snowfall through much of the North-eastern U.S. & Europe in the summer of 1816. In the U.S. the extraordinary weather produced food shortages religious revivals & extensive migration from New England to the Midwest. In Europe the cold & wet summer led to famine food riots the transformation of stable communities into wandering beggars & one of the worst typhus epidemics in history. 1816 was the year " Frankenstein" was written. It was also the year Turner painted his fiery sunsets. All of these things are linked to global climate change
- something we are quite aware of now but that was utterly mysterious to people in the nineteenth century who concocted all sorts of reasons for such an ungenial season. Making use of a wealth of source material & employing a compelling narrative approach featuring peasants & royalty politicians writers & scientists " The Year Without Summer" examines not only the climate change engendered by this event but also its effects on politics the economy the arts & social structures."

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This fourth volume of the years best science fiction & fantasy features thirty stories by some of the genres greatest authors including Jonathan Carroll Neil Gaiman Kij Johnson Kelly Link Paul Mc Auley RJ Parker Robert Reed Rachel Swirsky Catherynne M. Valente & many others. Selecting the best fiction from Asimovs F&SF" " Strange Horizons" " Subterranean" " Tor.com" & other top venues " The Years Best Science Fiction & Fantasy" is your guide to magical realms & worlds beyond tomorrow." ...

Packed with fun quizzes & fill-in sections that will help girls document their likes & dislikes record their physical characteristics detail information about their friends families & hobbies & encourages them to confess their hopes & dreams this work also

Includes:: instructions for girls to create their own memory box & suggests items to put inside it
- including the completed Yearbook.


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Patrick O' Brian's Aubrey-Maturin tales are widely acknowledged to be the greatest series of historical novels ever written. To commemorate the 40th anniversary of their beginning with Master & Commander these evocative stories are being re-issued in paperback with smart new livery. This is the eighteenth book in the series. The Yellow Admiral -- the eighteenth novel in the sequence hailed as the greatest series of historical novels ever written -- sets the fall & rise of Jack Aubrey in brilliant counterpoint to the fall & rise of Napoleon Bonaparte. Life ashore may once again be the undoing of Jack Aubrey. Even Jack's exploits at sea turn sour in the storm waters off Brest. Worst of all in the spring of 1814 peace breaks out. But Stephen Maturin returns from a mission in France with news that the Chileans require the service of English officers. Jack is savouring this reprieve for his career when he receives an urgent despatch ordering him to Gibraltar: Napoleon has escaped from Elba. ...

SHORTLISTED FOR THE GUARDIAN FIRST BOOK AWARD 2012 NATIONAL BOOK AWARD FINALIST NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER AN AMAZON EDITORS PICK: BEST BOOKS OF 2012 AN INDEPENDENT BEST WINTER READ An unforgettable depiction of the psychological impact of war by a young Iraq veteran & poet THE YELLOW BIRDS is already being hailed as a modern classic. Everywhere John looks he sees Murph. He flinches when cars drive past. His fingers clasp around the rifle he hasnt held for months. Wide-eyed strangers praise him as a hero but he can feel himself disappearing. Back home after a year in Iraq memories swarm around him: bodies burning in the crisp morning air. Sunlight falling through branches; bullets kicking up dust; ripples on a pond wavering like plucked strings. The promise he made to a young mans mother that her son would be brought home safely. With THE YELLOW BIRDS poet & veteran Kevin Powers has composed an unforgettable account of friendship & loss. It vividly captures the desperation & brutality of war & its terrible after-effects. But it is also a story of love of great courage & of extraordinary human survival. Written with profound emotional insight especially into the effects of a hidden war on families at home THE YELLOW BIRDS is one of the most haunting true & powerful novels of our time. THE YELLOW BIRDS is the All Quiet on the Western Front of Americas Arab Wars. (Tom Wolfe author of The Bonfire of the Vanities ) Kevin Powers has conjured a poetic & devastating account of wars effect on the individual. (Damian Lewis star of Homeland & Band of Brothers ) Inexplicably beautiful. (Ann Patchett Orange Prize-winning author of Bel Canto & State of Wonder) ...