Category Archives: Travel Guides
The Trial
The terrifying tale of Joseph K, a respectable functionary in a bank, who is suddenly arrested and must defend his innocence against a charge about which he can get no information. A nightmare vision of the excesses of modern bureaucracy wedded to the mad agendas of twentieth-century totalitarian regimes.
The Villain: The Life of Don Whillans
Don Whillans has an iconic significance for generations of climbers. His epoch-making first ascent of Annapurna`s South Face, achieved with Dougal Haston in 1970, remains one of the most impressive climbs ever made – but behind this and all his other formidable achievements lies a tough, recalcitrant reality: the character of the man himself. Whillans
Death in Venice
TRANSLATED AND INTRODUCED BY DAVID LUKE. Death in Venice is a story of obsession. Gustave von Aschenbach is a successful but ageing writer who travels to Venice for a holiday. One day, at dinner, Aschenbach notices an exceptionally beautiful young boy who is staying with his family in the same hotel. Soon his days begin
To Kill A Mocking Bird
`Shoot all the Bluejays you want, if you can hit `em, but remember it`s a sin to kill a Mockingbird.` Lawyer Atticus Finch gives this advice to his children as he defends the real mockingbird of Harper Lee`s classic novel – a black man charged with the rape of a white girl. Through the young
Lost in Translation
In 1959 13-year-old Eva Hoffman left her home in Cracow, Poland for a new life in America. This memoir evokes with deep feeling the sense of uprootendess and exile created by this disruption, something which has been the experience of tens of thousands of people this century. Her autobiography is profoundly personal but also tells
Shalimar the Clown
The place is Los Angeles, 1991. Maximilian Ophuls is knifed to death on the doorstep of his illegitimate daughter India, slaughtered by his Kashmiri driver, a mysterious figure who calls himself Shalimar, the Clown. The dead man is a World War II Resistance hero, a man of formidable intellectual ability and much erotic appeal, a
Walk With A White Bushman
Explorer, novelist, writer and film-maker, Sir Laurens van der Post was one of the most influential figures of our era. Here, in conversation with Jean-Marc Pottiez, he records his ideas and insights into a wide range of issues and personalities, forged by a lifetime of vast experiences and challenges.
The Enchantress of Florence
*LONGLISTED FOR THE MAN BOOKER PRIZE 2008*From one of the world’s most famous living authors, Salman Rushdie, comes The Enchantress of Florence, a tale of historical intrigue, love and power. Longlisted for the 2008 Man Booker Prize, ‘The Enchantress of Florence” may repeat the success of Midnight’s Children, Rushdie’s 1981 novel, recently voted the greatest
Venture To the Interior
Summoned to Whitehall in 1949, Laurens van der Post was told that in old British Central Africa there were two large tracts of country that London didn`t really know anything about, and could he go in there on foot and take a look, please? Venture to the Interior is the account of that journey, a
The Beckoning Silence
Since the epic tale of his survival in the Andes, recounted in Touching the Void, Simpson has lived a life full of adventure but haunted by death. Insisting that he played a simple game on a dangerous stage because it seemed the best way of living, Simpson analyses his fascination with the mountains. Simultaneously enticed
T2 Trainspotting
Ten years on from Trainspotting, Simon `Sick Boy` Williamson is back in Edinburgh after a long spell in London. Having failed spectacularly as a hustler, pimp, husband, father and businessman, Sick Boy taps into an opportunity, which to him represents one last throw of the dice. However, to realise his dream of directing and producing
A House in Corfu
A House in Corfu is the story of one of the most beautiful places on earth, still astonishingly unspoilt, on the west coast of Corfu. In the early 1960s, Emma Tennant`s parents, on a cruise, spotted a magical bay and decided to build a house there. This book is the story of that house, Rovinia,
Thames: Sacred River
Thames: Sacred River, by the bestselling author of London: The Biography, is about the river from source to sea. It covers history from prehistoric times to present; the flora and fauna of the river; paintings and photographs inspired by the Thames; its geology, smells and colour; its literature, laws and landscapes; its magic and myths;
Venice – Pure City
A title created in the light of Peter Ackroyd’s own television series, Venice – Pure City presents the mystery and beauty of this jewel in the lagoon of Italy’s north. The city is dealt with in true Ackroydian style – at once romantic and factual, conjuring up the atmosphere of the canals, bridges and squares,
London – The Biography
Much of Peter Ackroyd`s work has been concerned with the life and past of London but here, as a culmination, is his definitive account of the city. For him it is a living organism, with its own laws of growth and change, so London is a biography rather than a history. It differs from other
A Season with Verona
After twenty years in Italy, Parks decides to explore the country in a different way: he follows for a whole year Hellas Verona, the Verona football club. The result is a highly personal account of one man`s relationship with a country, its people and its national sport.
Charlotte Gray
In 1942, Charlotte Gray, a young scottish woman, goes to Occupied France on a dual mission – officially, to run an apparently simple errand for a British special operations group and unofficially, to search for her lover, an English airman who has gone missing in action. In the small town of Lavaurette, Sebastian Faulks presents
Don Fernando
Considered by Graham Greene to be Maugham`s best work, “Don Fernando” is a paean to a golden age of enormous creative energy. It discusses the writings of St. Teresa and the paintings of El Greco, and comments with sagacity and wit on such illustrious figures as Cervantes, Velazquez and the creator of Don Juan. This
Lustrum
Rome, 63 BC. In a city on the brink of acquiring a vast empire, seven men are struggling for power. Cicero is consul, Caesar his ruthless young rival, Pompey the republic`s greatest general, Crassus its richest man, Cato a political fanatic, Catilina a psychopath, Clodius an ambitious playboy. The stories of these real historical figures
On A Chinese Screen
Maugham spent the winter months of 1919-20 travelling 1500 miles up the Yangtze river. Always more interested in people than places he gave full rein to a sensitive and philosophical nature: ON A CHINESE SCREEN is the refined accumulation of the countless scraps of paper on which he had taken notes. A series of acute
