' Winning X Factor was amazing. I didn't even think I'd get through the first audition so I just couldn't believe it when I kept getting further & further. I really didn't expect to win.I just feel so incredibly lucky. Sometimes I still can't believe it's all happening to me.' Leona's life is a real-life fairytale. Three years ago she was an ordinary girl with an incredible voice working as a daydreaming waitress & wondering if she would ever have a chance to sing. She then made the life-changing decision to audition for The X Factor & the show completely transformed her life. Leona has since become one of the biggest stars in the world with record-breaking hits countless awards under her belt & adored by her millions of fans. Now she will tell her story for the first time & share what it's really like to go from a normal girl to a global superstar. From growing up in Hackney discovering her remarkable talent the gruelling X Factor auditions working with Simon Cowell & coping with international success; Leona is a home-grown sensation & has an amazing story to share. Packed with exclusive behind-the-scenes photographs of the stunning star this book gives you a personal insight into life behind the headlines & reveals exactly what it feels like when all your dreams come true. ...

The Magical Animal Fairies look after seven young Magical Animals & train them to use their powers for the good of Fairyland & the human world. But all of the animals have been stolen by naughty Jack Frost! Can Rachel & Kirsty help Leona to find her Magical Unicorn before she's lost forever in the human world? ...

Leonard Cohen: A Remarkable Life tells the story of the life loves & work of Leonard Cohen the poet songwriter & singer born with the gift of a golden voice. As the man himself once dryly put it. Anthony Reynolds fascinating & detailed biography draws on scores of new interviews conducted with Cohens band members past & present his business associates editors friends fans producers colleagues enemies & peers. As well as their revealing accounts the author has gained access to hours of previously unpublished interviews with Cohen as well as video archive recordings from several decades. The book also

Includes:: an authoritative summary of every Cohen album with insights & recollections supplied from the musicians who appeared on the recordings. Gradually despite Cohens own good-natured evasiveness over the past 40 years a surprisingly frank portrait begins to emerge of the legendary figure who commands unparalleled loyalty from his fans & followers young & old. From the distant days of his penniless beginnings as a much-praised poet in Montreal through the travels affairs & religious crisis to his latest tours Cohens extraordinary life & body of work is examined as never before. The book

Includes:: many previously unpublished photographs.



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Walking into a video store or browsing on Netflix can be an overwhelming experience. How do you choose what to watch? Respected film historian Leonard Maltin is here to help recommending the best movies for a first date a cozy night in with your spouse or just a rainy day. Whether its a Scorsese drama or a Judd Apatow comedy all of your favorite movies are here. Listed alphabetically each movie entry
Includes:: date of release; running time; director & cast; MPAA rating; color or black & white; capsule review & Maltins own four-star-to-BOMB rating; & symbols for DVD video widescreen or Blu-Ray format Maltin also

Includes:: an index of actors & his personal recommendations for movie lovers & sources for buying & renting DVDs.


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This fascinating exploration of Leonardo da Vincis life & work identifies what it was that made him so unique & explains the phenomenon of the worlds most celebrated artistic genius who 500 years on still grips & inspires us. Martin Kemp offers us exceptional insights into what it was that made this Renaissance man so special & the real meaning behind such masterpieces as the Mona Lisa & the Last Supper. Tracing Leonardos career in all its variety we learn of his unfulfilled dreams relationships with powerful patrons & the truth about his views on God humans & nature. The famous notebooks are the key to understanding the secret of Leonardos success & genius as they clearly reveal the workings of his mind & display the true innovative & investigative nature of his creative vision. Over 20 000 pages of drawings & notes detail his incredible discoveries & inventions
- from the workings of the human eye to designs for flying machines & giant crossbows. Bringing the story up to the present day Martin Kemp considers what he means to us today investigates the Leonardo industry & speculates about what he would be doing if he were alive today. This updated edition of Martin Kemps best-seller is the first book on Leonardo to include two newly discovered works the most important such discoveries in over a hundred years.
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Milan 1496 & forty-four-year-old Leonardo da Vinci has a reputation for taking on commissions & failing to complete them. He is in a state of professional uncertainty & financial difficulty. For eighteen months he has been painting murals in both the Sforza Castle in Milan & the refectory of the convent of Santa Maria delle Grazie. The latter project will become the Last Supper a complex mural that took a full three years to complete on a surface fifteen feet high by twenty feet wide. Not only had he never attempted a painting of such size but he had no experience whatsoever in painting in the physically demanding medium of fresco. For more than five centuries the Last Supper has been an artistic religious & cultural icon. The art historian Kenneth Clark has called it the keystone of European art & for a century after its creation it was regarded as nothing less than a miraculous image. Even today according to Clark we regard the painting as more a work of nature than a work of man. & yet there is a very human story behind this artistic miracle which was created against the backdrop of momentous events both in Milan & in the life of Leonardo himself. In Leonardo & the Last Supper Ross King tells the complete story of this creation of this mural: the adversities suffered by the artist during its execution; the experimental techniques he employed; the models for Christ & the Apostles that he used; & the numerous personalities involved
- everyone from the Leonardos young assistants to Ludovico Sforza the Duke of Milan who commissioned the work. Ross Kings new book is both a record of Leonardo da Vincis last five years in Milan & a biography of one of the most famous works of art ever painted.
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Leonardo Da Vinci is considered to be one of the greatest painters of all time & perhaps the most diversely talented person ever to have lived responsible for the Mona Lisa The Last Supper The Madonna of the Carnation & Vitruvian Man. Leonardo was an Italian Renaissance polymath: painter sculptor architect musician scientist mathematician engineer inventor anatomist geologist cartographer botanist & writer & this captivating book provides the reader with a unique insight into the life & work of one of history's most intriguing figures. All of Leonardo Da Vinci's work is presented in this compact volume
- from his paintings & frescos to detailed reproductions of his remarkable encrypted notebooks. As well as featuring each individual artwork sections of each are shown in isolation to reveal incredible details
- for example the different levels of perspective between the background sections of the Mona Lisa & the disembodied hand in The Last Supper. 640 pages of colour artworks & photographs of Da Vinci's original notebooks accompanied by fascinating biographical & historical details are here.

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Da Vinci in detail: Leonardos life & work
- the definitive edition. All pictures all drawings! Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519) possessed
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Leonardo is the greatest most multi-faceted & most mysterious of all Renaissance artists but extraordinarily considering his enormous reputation this is the first full-length biography in English for several decades. Prize-winning author Charles Nicholl has immersed himself for five years in all the manuscripts paintings & artefacts to produce an intimate portrait of Leonardo. He uses these contemporary materials
- his notebooks & sketchbooks eye witnesses & early biographies etc
- as a way into the mental tone & physical texture of his life & has made myriad small discoveries about him & his work & his circle of associates. Among much else the book identifies what Nicholl argues is an unknown portrait of the artist hanging in a church near Lodi in northern Italy. It also contains new material on his eccentric assistant Tomasso Masini on his homosexual affairs in Florence & on his curious relationship with a female model and/or prostitute from Cremona. A masterpiece of modern biography.

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Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519) possessed one of the greatest minds of all time; his importance & influence are inestimable. This XXL-format comprehensive survey is the most complete book ever made on the subject of this Italian painter sculptor architect engineer scientist & all-around genius. With huge full-bleed details of Leonardos masterworks this highly original publication allows the reader to inspect the subtlest facets of his brushstrokes. Part I explores Leonardos life & work in ten chapters drawing upon his letters contracts diary entries & writings. All of his paintings are presented & interpreted in depth with The Annunciation & The Last Supper featured on fold-out pages. Part II comprises a catalogue raisonne of Leonardos paintings which covers all of his surviving & lost painted works &

Includes:: texts describing their states of preservation. Each & every painting that can be justifiably attributed to Leonardo is included here; thanks to new findings & scientific research this is the first time his definitive painting oeuvre is being published. Part III contains an extensive catalogue of his drawings (numbering in the thousands they cannot all be reproduced in one book); 663 are presented arranged by category (architecture technical anatomical figures proportion cartography etc). Over half of the drawings included were provided by Windsor Castle marking the first time that the Castle has allowed a publisher to reproduce so many of their drawings. This sumptuous Taschen offering is the most thorough & beautifully produced Leonardo book ever published.

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