Over seventy merchant ships sailed in the Task force sent by Britain to recapture the Falkland islands in 1982. Some were Royal Fleet Auxiliary vessels but the majority were STUFT-ships taken up from trade-and the officers & crew of these merchant vessels all volunteers suddenly found themselves thrust into a war zone in the South Atlantic. Remarkably little has been written about the part played by the Merchant navy summarised by the official history of the campaign as an impenetrable mystery girt about by seasickness This book lifts the curtain on that mystery to reveal something of the experiences of the merchant seamen & women who made possible the retaking of the Falkland islands. John Johnson-Allen maritime historian & former merchant naval officer combines personal accounts documents & comment to bring to life the events of the Falklands War as seen from the merchant ships that played such a vital role in that conflict. ...

A man is shot at in a juvenile reform home
- but someone else dies... Miss Marple senses danger when she visits a friend living
...

A facsimile first edition hardback of the Miss Marple books published to mark the 75th anniversary of her first appearance & to celebrate her new-found success on television. When The Murder at the Vicarage was published in October 1930 little did the literary world realise that Agatha Christie already famous for her early Poirot titles was introducing a character who would become the best-loved female sleuth of all time. The 14 Marple books would appear at intervals over the next 49 years with Miss Marples Final Cases published in 1979 three years after Agathas death. To mark the 75th anniversary of Miss Marples first appearance & to celebrate her renewed fortunes as a primetime television star this collection of facsimile first editions will be the perfect way to enjoy these books in their original form -- 12 novels & two short story collections. Reproducing the original typesetting & formats from the first editions from the Christie familys own archive copies these books sport the original covers which have been painstakingly restored from the best available copies reflecting five decades of iconic cover design. ...

Do your relationships tend to follow the same destructive pattern? Do you feel trapped by your familys expectations of you? Does your life seem overwhelmingly governed by jealousy or competitiveness or lack of confidence? In this ground-breaking book clinical psychologist Oliver James shows that it is the way we were cared for in the first six years of life that has a crucial effect on who we are & how we behave. Nurture in effect shapes our very nature. James combines the latest scientific research with fascinating interviews to show that understanding your past is the first step to controlling your present. ...

The sixtieth birthday party of Silas Kane was marred by argument & dissension amongst his family. & then the morning after the celebrations Kane is found dead at the foot of a cliff. The theory that Silas accidentally lost his way in the fog is confirmed when the coroner returns a verdict of death by misadventure. But then Kanes nephew & heir is murdered & threats are made on the next in line to the fortune throwing a new & sinister light on Silas Kanes death. All clues point to an elderly lady of eighty as the killer. But as the redoubtable Superintendent Hannasyde delves further into the case he discovers that nothing is quite as it seems... ...

What turns an ordinary man into an extraordinary one? The answer lies in the stories of six teenage volunteers for Second World War aircrew who exchanged school uniform for Air Force Blue & took a giant step into the unknown. Based on original research from flying log books diaries & family archives this collection of true tales describes the mens training for those coveted Wings; the nervous excitement of that first sortie over enemy territory; & flying into the hell of an enemy flak barrage & fighters. From the skies over Europe to jungles & deserts all endured hardship adventure & danger. They experienced action under enemy fire wounds burns & crash-landings escape & evasion in occupied territory & the privations of life as a POW. Seventy years on & these brushes with death are by any measure hair-raising encounters that turned adolescents into men
- some of whom survived the war while others paid the ultimate price.
...

The sinister & fast moving events in Montenegro the Balkan wars the apparent encirclement of Germany & Austria-Hungary by Britain France & Russia & finally the assassination of the Archduke Franz Ferdinand all lead inexorably to the youth of Hungary marching gaily off not only to their death on the field of battle but to the dismemberment of their once great country. ...

Balint Abady is forced to part the beautiful & unhappily married Adrienne Uzdy. Laszlo Gyeroffy is rapidly heading for self-destruction through drink & his own feckleness. The politicians quarrelling among themselves & stubbornly ignoring their countrymens real needs are still pursuing their vendetta with Habsburg rule from Vienna. Meanwhile they fail to notice how the Great Powers
- through such events as Austrias annexation of Bosnia-Herzegovina in 1908
- are moving ever closer to the conflagration of 1914-1918 that will destroy their world forever.

...

While an undergraduate Carl Chinn recalls a lecturer postulating that working-class women were downtrodden & brow-beaten by their men: I remember thinking Theyre not in my family".. .I lacked the confidence to disagree & to tell him that I knew many working-class women who were at least the equals of their men & who could fight physically. Indeed the first fight I had seen was when I was ten. My Nan had taken me & my brother down the Villa. An away fan had pinched Our Kids scarf & Our Nan just four foot eleven tall turned round & laid the chap out with one punch. A tough woman whose fore-finger had been torn off by a machine at work Our Nan was the daughter mother & grandmother of strong working-class women. Often strong physically women of the urban poor worked from when they were toddlers until they died. They worked inside & outside the house cooking washing cleaning & planning how to get by; they worked as domestics in the houses of a middle class often arrogant & condescending in their attitudes towards them; they worked in factories shops mills & workshops; they worked in their neighbourhoods in providing vital services for their neighbours. Often earning her own income & receiving the earnings of her children it was the mother who was in charge of the daily battle against hunger & hardships. Such supreme dedication & true grit earned these women the central role in the family & fostered the devotion of their children who recognised a mothers command of the household finances her ability to maintain a familys self-sufficiency through careful housekeeping & creative cooking & her valiant efforts to stay clean & respectable. Married daughters chose to live close to their mothers forming extended families in settled neighbourhoods & furthering cementing strong kinship ties. Older married women who were grannies & aunts held sway over large familial networks & from this position of importance many of them achieved status in their neighbourhoods as layers-out unofficial midwives wise women custodians of the moral code & guardians of the group consciousness. The women of the urban poor worked all their lives for their families & neighbours: they deserve our respect & admiration." ...

Carr
- ex-CIA
- is the reluctant leader of an elite crew planning a robbery of such extraordinary proportions that it will leave

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