Do lobsters feel pain? Did Franz Kafka have a sick sense of humour? What is John Updike's deal anyway? & who won the Adult Video News' Female Performer of the Year Award the same year Gwyneth Paltrow won her Oscar? David Foster Wallace answers these questions & more in his new book of hilarious non-fiction. For this collection David Foster Wallace immerses himself in the three-ring circus that is the presidential race in order to document one of the most vicious campaigns in recent history. Later he strolls from booth to booth at a lobster festival in Maine & risks life & limb to get to the bottom of the lobster question. Then he wheedles his way into an L.A. radio studio armed with tubs of chicken to get the behind-the-scenes view of a conservative talkshow featuring a host with an unnatural penchant for clothing that only looks good on the radio. In what is sure to be a much-talked-about exploration of distinctly modern subjects one of the sharpest minds of our time delves into some of life's most delicious topics. ...

Winner of the Blue Peter Book Award 2012 Fourteen-year-old Mariel returns to England for her grandmother's funeral. It is the first time she has been back since she emigrated with her mother as a baby & it is the beginning of the uncovering of some really extraordinary truths about the Considine family. Why did Mariel's mum argue with Grandma all those years ago? Why does Amelia wear so much perfume? Why is there a very large cat flap in Louvre House? Why does Gerald seem scared of his brother's appetite? Did Grandma Considine really break her neck falling down the stairs? & most importantly what is the dark secret that lies at the heart of the family? ...

The Consolations of Philosophy" is Alain de Botton's internationally bestselling guide to life. It is the inspiration for the TV series " Philsophy: A Guide to Happiness. Alain de Botton bestselling author of " How Proust Can Change Your Life" has set six of the finest minds in the history of philosophy to work on the problems of everyday life. Here then are Socrates Epicurus Seneca Montaigne Schopenhauer & Nietsche on some of the things that bother us all: lack of money the pain of love inadequacy anxiety; the fear of failure & the pressure to conform. " Singlehandedly de Botton has taken philosophy back to its simplest & most important purpose: helping us live our lives". (" Independent"). " No doubt about it philosophy is the new rock & roll & Alain de Botton is its Colonel Tom Parker.. .A pleasure to read. & good writing like good philosophy is always a consolation". (John Banville " Irish Times"). " Few discussions on the great philosophers can have been so entertaining.. .an ingenious imaginative book". (Humphrey Carpenter " Sunday Times"). " Witty thoughtful entertaining.. .a stylish book which manages to make philosophy both enjoyable & relevant". (Anthony Clare " Literary Review"). " Gentle helpful & humane.. . De Botton's instinct is surely right: if we are to bring philosophy to life we should look again at those thinkers who have sought to be not clever or paradoxical but simply wise". (Roger Scruton " Mail on Sunday"). Alain de Botton was born in 1969 & is the author of non-fiction essays on themes ranging from love & travel to architecture & philosophy. His bestselling books include " Essays in Love"; " The Romantic Movement"; " Kiss & Tell"; " Status Anxiety"; " How Proust Can Change Your Life"; " The Pleasures & Sorrows of Work"; " The Art of Travel"; & " The Architecture of Happiness & Religion for Atheists". He lives in London & founded The School of Life & Living Architecture." ...

In Consolations of the Forest" Sylvain Tesson explains how he found a radical solution to his need for freedom one as ancient as the experiences of the hermits of old Russia: he decided to lock himself alone in a cabin in the middle taiga on the shores of Baikal for six months. From February to July 2010 he lived in silence solitude & cold. His cabin built by Soviet geologists in the Brezhnev years is a cube of logs three meters by three meters heated by a cast iron skillet six-day walk from the nearest village & hundreds of miles of track. To live isolated from the world while retaining one's sanity requires a routine Tesson discovered. In the morning he would read write smoke or draw & then devoted hours to cutting the wood shoveling snow & fishing. Emotionally these months proved a challenge & the loneliness was crippling. Tesson found in paper a valuable confidant the notebook a polite companion. Noting carefully almost daily his impressions of the silence his struggles to survive in a hostile nature his despair his doubts but also its moments of ecstasy inner peace & harmony with nature Sylvain Tesson shares with us an extraordinary experience. Writer journalist & traveler Sylvain Tesson was born in 1972. After a world tour by bicycle he developed a passion for Central Asia & has travelled tirelessly since 1997. He came to prominence in 2004 with a remarkable travelogue Axis of Wolf (Robert Laffont). Editions Gallimard have already published his "A Life of a Mouthful" (2009) & with Thomas Goisque & Bertrand de Miollis " High Voltage" (2009). In 2009 he won the Prix Goncourt for "A Life of a Mouthful" & in 2011 won the Prix Medicis for non-fiction for " Consolations of the Forest: Alone in Siberia"." ...

The Consolidated B-24 Liberator was the Second World War's most numerous Allied heavy bomber &
- at over 18 000 made
- the

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THE ROMAN EMPIRE IS DEAD. LONG LIVE THE CHURCH OF ROME! 609 AD. Rome is torn apart by war plague & internal power struggles between the Emperor the aristocracy & the Church. Into this morass stumbles the young & handsome Briton Aelric. His father was murdered his inheritance stolen. Forcibly separated from the woman he loves he is determined to win back all that he has lost. Through his naivety & ambition he unwittingly becomes involved in a heretical plot that will lead to fraud high treason & murder. Introducing the most compelling anti-hero since Flashman CONSPIRACIES OF ROME takes you back to one of the darkest & least known periods of history. ...

Jack Norton is a Ghost Walker a genetically enhanced sniper with a merciless sense of justice a phantom welcomed by the anonymity of the night. But a mission to rescue his brother in the jungle has left him vulnerable to rebel forces. His only salvation is his power of telepathy. Then he meets Briony an unusual beauty on a mission of her own. But they share more than the sweltering heat.. . Briony shares the Ghost Walker powers. Yet she's different. She doesn't know what she is or what she's capable of. But her enemies do. & Jack & Briony's flight will take them into frightening conspiracy of mind & body
- across the globe & into the heart of darkness where the shocking truth is something neither of them could have foreseen
- or can escape...

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Eve Dallas must stray into the bowels of New York City when she is called to a street sleeper's homicide. All expectations go out the window when she discovers a laser-perfect hole where his heart used to be
- the work of a highly skilled surgeon. Research reveals that similar deaths have been occurring across America & Europe but all her efforts to work out why are confused by the fact that the organs are always faulty. As she digs further & the medical community shuts against her Eve's problems become much worse as an internal investigation leaves her suspended from action & fighting to retain her fragile sense of identity. Eve & those loyal to her must go to even greater lengths as they get closer to the mastermind killer & the stakes are raised.
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Corduroy Mansions Pimlico is an oasis of old-fashioned civilisation its inhabitants considerate & peace-loving. But beneath the polite exterior seismic change is stirring. Barbara Ragg makes an eye-popping discovery about her stolid Scottish suitor's past while Oedipus Snark
- newly appointed & tirelessly self-interested Government Minister
- has a close encounter in Switzerland that leaves him a new man all together. Then plucky canine Freddie de la Hay goes missing & his owner widower William French is so shaken by an unexpected declaration of love that he seriously considers making a disappearance himself. Goodhearted well-intentioned but often to be found barking up the wrong tree the residents of Corduroy Mansions remain a thoroughly entertaining example to us all.

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Tracing family histories is a popular pursuit & everyone loves the idea of discovering where they really come from. But when Bobbie Neate began to investigate her own family's past she made some shocking discoveries which would cause shockwaves within her own family as well as on a much wider national scale. The result of Bobbie's quest is an enthralling journey not only into her own past but also into the history of this country & its leaders. It was after the death of her beloved mother that Bobbie started to question strange events from her childhood. From hazy recollections grew firm lines of enquiry & eventually she was able to match her memories with actual historical data. Her discoveries were mind-blowing. Her stepfather
- & indeed the man she had referred to as 'father' for most of her life
- had kept a huge secret & had lied about who he really was. In this intriguing biographical detective story the author reveals that Louis T Stanley well known in Formula One racing circles had hidden his true backgroud from his wife & from the public. He was not the man he pretended to be but was the illegitimate son of an elderly serving Prime Minister HH Asquith & the young Venetia Stanley an aristocrat's daughter. One hundred years after these events took place the truth behind one of the biggest cover-ups in British political history can be revealed. As well as serving as an important historical document which will challenge commonly-held opinions of modern British history. Conspiracy of Secrets is equally a revealing personal memoir which uncovers what kind of a man Louis T Stanley really was. His stifling influence over the author & her family is explored as are the extraordinary lengths he went to in order to cover up his past & his true identity. This wonderfully researched book is a gripping story of forbidden love betrayal & identity.

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