| Author: | Salman Rushdie |
On 14 February 1989, Valentine's Day, Salman Rushdie was telephoned by a BBC journalist and told that he had been 'sentenced to death' by the Ayatollah Khomeini. For the first time he heard the word fatwa. His crime? To have written a novel called The Satanic Verses, which was accused of being 'against Islam, the Prophet and ... read more
I'm half way through Joseph Anton, Salman Rushdie's account of the years he spent in hiding from the fatwa issued by the Ayatollah Khomeini following the publication of The Satanic Verses. It is an extraordinary story and this is the first time Rushdie has written about it in detail. Rather disconcertingly he has wr... read more
| Author: | B. Jack Copeland |
June 23, 2012 marks the centenary of Alan Turing's birth, and preparations are being made worldwide for the celebration of his life and work. Turing can be regarded as one of the greatest scientists of the 20th century. But who was Turing, and what did he achieve during his tragically short life of 41 years? Best known as the... read more
| Author: | Will Schwalbe |
The inspiring story of a son and his dying mother, who form a 'book club' that brings them together as her life comes to a close. For fans of Tuesdays With Morrie and The Last Lecture.
Mary Anne Schwalbe is waiting for her chemotherapy treatments when Will casually asks her what she's reading. The conversation they have... read more
| Author: | Bob Spitz |
It's rare for someone to emerge in America who can change our attitudes, our beliefs and our very culture. It's even rarer when that someone is a middle-aged, six-foot three-inch woman whose first exposure to an unsuspecting public is cooking an omelet on a hot plate on a local TV station. And yet, that's exactly what Julia C... read more
| Author: | Frank McLynn |
The age of discovery was at its peak in the eighteenth century, with heroic adventurers charting the furthest reaches of the globe. Foremost among these explorers was navigator and cartographer Captain James Cook of the British Royal Navy. Recent writers have viewed Cook largely through the lens of colonial exploitation, rega... read more
| Author: | Jeff Wells |
In this second collection by our intrepid vet, Jeff Wells has his work cut out for him when he learns that Ilamas do not take kindly to having their toenails trimmed, dog owners in the medical field can be a real pain, Scottish Highland cattle stick together and just might run a vet out of their enclosure and fixing an overly... read more
| Author: | Thomas F. Ryan |
Tom Ryan is a middle-aged, overweight, no-nonsense newspaper editor. But when Atticus M. Finch, a Miniature Schnauzer, arrives, he is forced to question everything about his life.
Wanting to raise money in memory of a friend who died of cancer, Tom decides that they will both climb 48 of New Hampshire's mountains during... read more
| Author: | Sir Richard Branson |
A thrilling and very personal history of flight by the world-famous adventurer and businessman.
As far back as stories go, pioneers have reached for the skies. In the last two hundred years, they have mastered the air and made the modern world possible. Today they are bringing outer space within our reach. They're in... read more
| Author: | Marina Chapman |
A young girl who is abducted and abandoned in the Colombian jungle. She spends five years living with a family of monkeys before being found and sold in to slavery. 'It all happened so quickly. One minute I was squatting on the bare earth, preoccupied with popping pea pods, and the next I saw a flash of black hand and white... read more
| Author: | Mary Gabriel |
Brilliantly researched and wonderfully written, LOVE AND CAPITAL is a heartbreaking and dramatic saga of the family side of the man whose works would redefine the world after his death. Drawing upon years of research, acclaimed biographer Mary Gabriel brings to light the story of Karl and Jenny Marx's marriage. We follow them... read more
| Author: | The Sun |
Prince William and Kate Middleton's fairytale romance is the greatest love story of the century, with a happy ending to come - a Royal wedding that will truly capture the hearts of the British people. Will was the boy who would one day be king; Kate was the middle class girl who had harboured a crush on him since her school ... read more
| Author: | Helen Brown |
Helen Brown wasn't a cat person, but her nine-year-old son Sam was. So when Sam heard a woman telling his mum that her cat had just had kittens, he pleaded to go and see them. Helen's heart melted as Sam held one of the kittens in his hands, with a look of total adoration. In a trice the deal was done - the kitten would be de... read more
| Author: | Patti Smith |
In this small, luminous memoir, the National Book Award-winner Patti Smith revisits the most sacred experiences of her early years, with truths so vivid they border on the surreal. The author entwines her childhood self - and its 'clear, unspeakable joy' - with memories both real and envisioned from her twenties on New York's... read more
| Author: | May Smith |
Auntie F. came in announcing dramatically that Hitler is coming tomorrow, at which my father remarked that he would, now that he's just finished papering upstairs. At the outbreak of World War Two, May Smith was twenty-four. She lived in a small village near Derby with her parents, and taught at the local elementary school. T... read more
| Author: | Wendyl Nissen |
Wendyl Nissen's year-long journey towards self-sufficiency. The book details each home discovery as it happens - both the triumphs and the disasters - while Wendyl slowly sheds her corporate life. A Home Companion is the book for any woman who finds herself yearning to get her hands covered in soil and become a green goddess.
| Author: | Michael Parkinson |
Michael Parkinson occupies a unique place in the public consciousness. Through his perceptive onscreen interviews over the past five decades, he has introduced millions of people to the personalities of major international figures in sport, showbiz, politics, the arts and journalism. In Parky's People, Parkinson sets down on ... read more
| Author: | Lani Brennan |
'How one person can endure so much and then rise and be the incredible woman that she is today is a testament to how change comes from within. Lani reminds us how the spirit can fight, no matter how broken and bruised, to make a difference in this world.' Deborah Mailman
A confronting and compelling account of a young... read more
| Author: | Sarah Gristwood |
We know how the Wars of the Roses ended - with Richard III's body under a Leicester car park - but this is a thrilling history of the extraordinary noblewomen who lived through the battles and bloodshed. The events of the Wars of the Roses are usually described in terms of the men involved: Richard Duke of York, Henry VI, Edw... read more
