The Stainmore line was the most spectacular of the trans-Pennine crossings. Memories of the magnificent viaducts at Deepdale & at Belah carrying this marvellous railway from the River Tees to the Eden Valley still remain 50 years after their destruction. The line between Barnard Castle & Tebay together with its associated branches was completed during the 1860s & remained in operation for almost a century. However from about 1960 the now familiar 'closure by stealth' tactics became painfully evident & the last passenger train ran on 20 January 1962. The transition from a fully operational route to a memory took place in an unbelievably short time. In the summer of 1961 thousands of north-eastern holidaymakers were transported by train in time-honoured fashion over the rooftop of England to Blackpool enjoying unrivalled views of Westmorland as their trains rumbled over Belah Viaduct & brushed through the woodlands at Smardale. Little did those passengers realise that less than one year later most of the track over which they were travelling would be gone & demolition would be well under way. ...

Since earliest times humanity has pondered the incomprehensible mysteries of the universe life...and the afterlife. Was there somewhere on Earth where after death mortal man could join the immortal Gods? Where was this place? By whom was it established? & does it still exist today? After years of painstaking research--combining recent archaeological discoveries with ancient texts & artifacts--noted scholar Zecharia Sitchin has identified the legendary Land of the Gods & provided astounding new revelations about the Great Pyramids the Sphinx & other mysterious monuments whose true meanings & purposes have been lost for eons. Since earliest times humanity has pondered the incomprehensible mysteries of the universe life & the afterlife. In The Stairway to Heaven the second book of Zecharia Sitchins Earth Chronicles series the author answers these fundamental questions: Was there somewhere on Earth where after death mortal man could join the immortal Gods? Where was this place? By whom was it established? & does it still exist today? The Earth Chronicles deal with the history & prehistory of Earth & humankind. Each book in the series is based upon information written on clay tablets by the ancient civilizations of the Near East. For the first time the entire Earth Chronicles series is now available in a hardcover collectors edition. ...

The overwhelming response of readers to Lorna Byrne
- regardless of religious beliefs
- is that she gives them back hope helping

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In an abandoned hotel in a California ghost town horror writer Larry & his friends make a chilling discovery. By chance they stumble across a naked woman in a coffin with a stake driven through her heart. Was she a vampire or the victim of a gruesome murder? ...

A funny super-girly story with a vampire bite to it. Sink your teeth into Olivia & Ivy's twelfth fright-time adventure. ' We're on a mission!' Ivy & Olivia are together again
- & not a moment too soon. The whole vampire community is in a flap. Can the twins discover the identity of the mystery blogger who's determined to expose Franklin Grove's biggest secret? Hold on to your fangs vamp fans. It's time to go undercover! A killer story to sink your teeth into!
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There have been many biographies of Stalin but the court that surrounded him is untravelled ground. Simon Sebag Montefiore acclaimed biographer of Catherine the Greats lover prime minister & general Potemkin has unearthed the vast underpinning that sustained Stalin. Not only ministers such as Molotov or secret service chiefs such as Beria but men & women whose loyalty he trusted only until the next purge. Spectacular...an impressive & compelling work Philip Mansel Spectator This magnificent portrait of the dictator Richard Overy Literary Review ...

There have been many biographies of Stalin but the court that surrounded him is untravelled ground. Simon Sebag-Montefiore acclaimed biographer of Catherine the Greats lover prime minister & general Potemkin has unearthed the vast underpinning that sustained Stalin. Not only ministers such as Molotov or secret service chiefs such as Beria but men & women whose loyalty he trusted only until the next purge. Here is the Stalin story from the inside full of revelations. How the death of Stalins wife was hushed up
- was it suicide? How the Soviet leaders & their families lived & partied inside the Kremlin walls. What happened on the first day of war with Germany in 1941. The fullest account of the meeting between Stalin Roosevelt & Churchill that settled the fate of the axis powers. & how the Great Terror in which 10 million died actually happened. Robert Service (St Antonys Oxford) former head of Russian history at the School of Slavonic Studies U. of London: Simon Sebag Montefiore has pulled it off. His book succeeds in giving us an intimate picture of daily life in the Kremlin under Stalin. The arrests & killings are not ignored; indeed Montefiore supplies extra chapters & verses on the process by which the Soviet dictator moved against his enemies real & potential. An abundance of the sources are wholly new. The result is a gripping account. Stalin was a vengeful conspirator & a murderous leader. But he was also normal in many ways. He was convivial solicitous & even flirtatious. When he wanted he could be quite a charmer. This duality has long been under-appreciated but it helps to explain why Stalin was admired as well as feared by his associates
- & indeed why his power endured. This is a fundamental theme & it is one of Montefiores that he handles it with excitement & cogency.

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Drawing on a wealth of unexplored material
- available for the first time since the collapse of the former Soviet Union
- Robert

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The Sayles might not have been the only Jewish atheist communist family in Liverpool but Alexei knew from an early age that they were one of the more eccentric. Born on the day egg rationing came to an end Alexei was the only child of Joe an affable trade unionist who led the family on railway expeditions across eastern Europe & Molly a hot-tempered red-head who terrified teachers & insisted Alexei see the Red Army Choir instead of the Beatles. Perceptive & hilarious this is a portrait of a family a city a country & a continent going through enormous changes. ...

Marshal Georgy Zhukov is one of military historys legendary names. He played a decisive role in the battles of Moscow Stalingrad & Kursk that brought down the Nazi regime. He was the first of the Allied generals to enter Berlin & it was he who took the German surrender. He led the huge victory parade in Red Square riding a white horse & in doing so dangerously provoking Stalins envy. His post-war career was equally eventful
- Zhukov found himself sacked & banished twice & wrongfully accused of disloyalty. However he remains one of the most decorated officers in the history of both Russia & the Soviet Union. Since his death in 1974 Zhukov has increasingly been seen as the indispensable military leader of the Second World War surpassing Eisenhower Patton Montgomery & Mac Arthur in his military brilliance & ferocity. Making use of hundreds of documents from Russian military archives as well as unpublished versions of Zhukovs memoirs Geoffrey Roberts fashions a remarkably intimate portrait of a man whose personality was as fascinating as it was contradictory. Tough decisive strong-willed & brutal as a soldier in his private life he was charming & gentle. Zhukovs relations with Stalins other generals were often prickly & fraught with rivalry but he was the only one among them to stand up to the Soviet dictator. Piercing the hyperbole of the Zhukov personality cult Roberts debunks many of the myths that have sprung up around Zhukovs life to deliver fresh insights into the marshals relations with Stalin Khrushchev & Eisenhower. A highly regarded historian of Soviet Russia Roberts has fashioned the definitive biography of this seminal 20th-century figure.
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