When her husband dies Lu Si-yan's mother is encouraged to sell her young daughter into domestic service. Lu Si-yan is just eleven when sold by her uncle. Nearly two years will pass before she can get back home to her mother & brother. In this powerful & compelling novel Sally Grindley portrays the life of a young girl in China a young girl whose life is said to be like 'spilled water'. With a brilliant first-person narrative & a powerful description of time & place this novel is gripping heart-wrenching & utterly mesmerising. ...

Clarissa was born into wealth & privilege as a child shooting & hunting were the norm & pigeons were flown in from Cairo for supper. Her mother was an Australian heiress her father was a brilliant surgeon to the Royal family. But he was also a tyrannical & violent drunk who used to beat her & force her to eat carrots with slugs still clinging to them. Clarissa was determined & clever though & her ambition led her to a career in the law. At the age of 21 she was the youngest ever woman to be called to the Bar. Disaster struck when her adored mother died suddenly. It was to lead to a mind-numbing decade of wild over-indulgence. Rich from her inheritance in the end Clarissa partied away her entire fortune. It was a long hard road to recovery along which Clarissa finally faced her demons & turned to the one thing that had always brought her joy
- cooking. Now at last she has found success sobriety & peace. With the stark honesty & the brilliant wit we love her for Clarissa recounts the tale of a life lived to extremes. A vivid & funny story it is as moving as it is a cracking good read.
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How on earth did 'with bells on' come to express enthusiasm? What do chips on shoulders have to do with inferiority complexes? & who is the face that launched a thousand ships? Did you know that 'the rule of thumb' refers to the use of the thumb to make measurements as the first joint of the average adult thumb measures one inch? Spilling the Beans on the Cat's Pyjamas" provides us with the meanings of these well-worn & much-loved phrases by putting these linguistic quirks in context & explaining how & why they were first used. Absorbing diverting & fascinating
- as far as gift books go " Spilling the Beans" really is the bee's knees!"
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First a horse in Brisbane falls ill: fever swelling bloody froth. Then thirteen others perish. The foreman at the stables becomes ill & the trainer dies. What is going on? It takes months to establish that the cause is a virus which has travelled from a tree-dwelling bat to horse & from horse to man. The bats had lived undisturbed for centuries in Queenslands eucalyptus forests. Now the forests are being cut down & the colonies of bats are roosting elsewhere... Spillover" tells the story of such diseases. As globalization spreads & as we destroy the ancient ecosystems we encounter strange & dangerous infections that originate in animals but that can be transmitted to humans. Diseases that were contained are being set free & the results are potentially catastrophic. In a journey that takes him from southern China to the Congo from Cameroon to Kinshasa David Quammen tracks these infections to their source & asks what we can do to prevent some new pandemic spreading across the face of the earth." ...

In April 2010 the world watched in alarm as BPs Macondo well suffered a fatal explosion & a catastrophic leak. Over the next three months amid tense scenes of corporate & political finger-pointing millions of barrels of crude oil dispersed across the Gulf of Mexico in what became one of the worst oil spills in history. But there is more to BPs story than this. Tom Bergin an oil broker turned Reuters reporter watched the two-pipeline company of the early 1980s grow into a dynamic oil giant & PR machine by the turn of the twenty-first century. His unique access to key figures before during & after the spill
- including former CEO Tony Hayward
- has enabled him to piece together this compelling account of a corporation in crisis & to examine how crucial decisions made during BPs remarkable turnaround paved the way for its darkest hour.

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Stormy is an orphan & a kitchen skivvy. He tends the compost he scrubs the floors & watches feasts make their way up the mountain as he survives on bread & water. A skivvy is all that Stormy can hope to be. But Stormy has a secret. He wants to be a sky-rider to soar amongst the clouds on spitfyres: flying horses that spit fire & smoke & answer only to their riders. A chance meeting with an escaped convict turns Stormy's life upside down. Sent up to the Academy he uncovers a web of lies deceits & neglect at the centre of which lies the mysterious thirteenth horse. Can Stormy save Thirteen defeat the dark forces at work within the Academy & prove himself worthy as a sky-rider? ...

This unique board book which features two spinners inside is perfect for teaching simple concepts & first words from colours & counting to farm & jungle animals -- & even everyday household objects. Whos that animal? What colour is that flower? How many crayons are there? & whats that noise? Simply spin the wheel point & say! A brilliant interactive early learning book from the creator of DEAR ZOO. ...

True or false? In selling high-value products or services: closing" increases your chance of success; it is essential to describe the benefits of your product or service to the customer; objection handling is an important skill; & open questions are more effective than closed questions. All false says Neil Rackham. He & his team studied more than 35 000 sales calls made by 10 000 sales people in 23 countries over 12 years. Their findings revealed that many of the methods developed for selling low-value goods just don't work for major sales. Rackham went on to introduce his SPIN-selling method where SPIN describes the whole selling process
- Situation questions Problem questions Implication questions Need-payoff questions. SPIN-selling provides you with a set of simple & practical techniques which have been tried in many of today's leading companies with dramatic improvements to their sales performance."
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Spinderella the spider has a passion for football! She tries to play a match with her brothers & sisters but she doesn't know how many spiders should be on each team. Even worse she can't count the goals! Luckily Spinderella lives on the ceiling of a school dinner hall & with the help of her Hairy Godmother she finds a classroom where all her questions are answered! Just like magic Spinderella finds she can divide her brothers & sisters into two equal teams & keep score. They have a brilliant match & Spinderella scores the winning goal! ...

This is a new & completely revised book covering the latest UK & European Health & Safety directives. Spindle Moulder Handbook" deals with all aspects of this essential woodworking machine including spindle speeds cutting action theory operation safety cutter & cutter types & their preparation & performance development of cutters grinding profiling & development. A large section covers the practical aspects of operating the machine; the fences guards jigs & so on; the types of operation such as rebating grooving bevelling moulding trimming shaped work routing dovetailing finger jointing tenoning & much more. This title is well-illustrated & written by an acknowledged expert. It is essential reading for all spindle moulder users & students of machine woodworking." ...