Category Archives: Travel Guides
Zeal of Zebras
An embarrassment of pandas, a galaxy of starfish, a shiver of sharks…these are all collective nouns – terms used to describe a group. Woop Studios has illustrated these quirky phrases, creating a series of truly stunning art that has been collected here for the first time. The colourful introduction to animals and the alphabet is
The Ice Lands
The Ice Lands by Steinar Bragi is set against Iceland`s volcanic hinterlands, where four thirty-somethings from Reykjavik – the reckless hedonist Egill; the recovering alcoholic Hrafin; and their partners Anna, a tenacious journalist and Vigdis, a psychiatrist facing her own inner demons – embark on an ambitious camping trip, their jeep packed with supplies.Victims of
Queen of the Desert: The Extraordinary Life of Gertrude Bell
Archaeologist, spy, Arabist, linguist, author, poet, photographer, mountaineer and nation builder, Gertrude Bell was born in 1868 into a world of privilege and plenty, but she turned her back on all that for her passion for the Arab peoples, becoming the architect of the independent kingdom of Iraq and seeing its first king Faisal safely
Our Souls at Night
`Absolutely beautiful` The Times `Luminous` Ursula K Le Guin, Guardian `I loved Our Souls at Night` David Nicholls This is a love story. A story about growing old with grace. Addie Moore and Louis Waters have been neighbours for years. Now they both live alone, their houses empty of family, their quiet nights solitary. Then
What Would Alice Do?: Advice for the Modern Woman
In What Would Alice Do?, a handy, pocket-sized volume, are the pithiest quotations from the White Rabbit, the Mad Hatter, the Queen of Hearts and, of course, the irrepressible Alice, every one of them pertinent today…and guaranteed to put a Cheshire grin on your face! What Would Alice Do? offers advice for any unreasonable, demanding
Gingerbread
Perdita Lee and her mother Harriet may appear your average schoolgirl and working mother but they are anything but. For one thing, their home is a gold-painted seventh-floor flat with some surprisingly verbal vegetation. And then there`s the gingerbread. As we follow the Lees through encounters with jealousy, ambition, family grudges, work and wealth, gingerbread
I Heard the Owl Call My Name
With an introduction by author Cynan JonesAmid the grandeur of British Columbia stands the village of Kingcome, a place of salmon runs and ancient totems. Yet in this Eden of such natural beauty and richness, the old culture is under attack – slowly being replaced by prefab houses and alcoholism. Into this world, where an
Quartet in Autumn
With an introduction by Alexander McCall SmithOne did not drink sherry before the evening, just as one did not read a novel in the morning.In 1970s London Edwin, Norman, Letty and Marcia work in the same office and suffer the same problem – loneliness. Lovingly and with delightful humour, Pym conducts us through their day-to-day
For Those Who Know the Ending
A multi-layered and unnerving portrait of gangland Glasgow, For Those Who Know the Ending is the gripping new novel from the award-winning author Malcolm Mackay.He has to clear thoughts of Joanne and thoughts of the past out of his mind. He has to think about himself, his situation. Think about the next hour …In that
An Italian Holiday
Sunshine, warmth, lemon blossom . . .Springtime in glorious Southern Italy can go to your head. Especially if you are escaping an overbearing husband, the embarrassingly public loss of your company, an interfering mother who still tries to run your life or the pain of a husband`s affair with a girl young enough to be
The Brewer of Preston
From Andrea Camilleri, the bestselling author of the Inspector Montalbano mysteries, comes The Brewer of Preston, a hilarious standalone comedy. 1870s Sicily. Much to the displeasure of Vigata`s stubborn populace, the town has just been unified under the Kingdom of Italy. They`re now in the hands of a new government they don`t understand, and they
A Little Lumpen Novelita
`Now I am a mother and a married woman, but not long ago I led a life of crime`: so Bianca begins her tale of growing up the hard way in Rome in A Little Lumpen Novelita. Orphaned overnight as a teenager – `our parents died in a car crash on their first vacation without
Brian Blessed Absolute Pandemonium: My Larger than Life Story
There is no one quite like Brian Blessed. He`s an actor, film star, trained undertaker, unlikely diplomat, secret romantic, martial artist and mountaineer. He`s also a brilliant storyteller who will – and you must brace yourself – simply leap out of the pages at you. In Absolute Pandemonium and you`ll be taken on a riotous
Milk of Paradise: A History of Opium
“Lucy Inglis has done a wonderful job bringing together a wide range of sources to tell the history of the most exciting and dangerous plants in the world. Telling the story of opium tells us much about our faults and foibles as humans – our willingness to experiment; our ability to become addicts; our pursuit
A Little Life
A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara is an immensely powerful and heartbreaking novel of brotherly love and the limits of human endurance. When four graduates from a small Massachusetts college move to New York to make their way, they`re broke, adrift, and buoyed only by their friendship and ambition. There is kind, handsome Willem, an
A Manual for Cleaning Women: Selected Stories
The New York Times bestseller `This selection of 43 stories should by all rights see Lucia Berlin as lauded as Jean Rhys or Raymond Carver` Independent The stories in A Manual for Cleaning Women make for one of the most remarkable unsung collections in twentieth-century American fiction. With extraordinary honesty and magnetism, Lucia Berlin invites
A Year in the Life of the Yorkshire Shepherdess
From bestselling author Amanda Owen come more tales of life at Ravenseat, the remote Yorkshire hill farm she shares with husband Clive, eight children and 1,000 sheep. In A Year in the Life of the Yorkshire Shepherdess she describes the age-old cycles of a farming year and the constant challenges the family faces, from being
An Atlas of Countries That Don`t Exist: A Compendium of Fifty Unrecognized and Largely Unnoticed States
Shortlisted for a 2016 Edward Standford Travel Writing Award.Acclaimed travel writer and Oxford geography don Nick Middleton takes us on a magical tour of countries that, lacking diplomatic recognition or UN membership, inhabit a world of shifting borders, visionary leaders and forgotten peoples. Most of us think we know what a country is, but in
The History of Us
Liverpool 1985 Kathleen, Adam and Jocelyn are three teenage friends who bond over an unconventional nativity play. They all have ambitions, they all have dreams. Adam wants to be a writer, Jocelyn wants to sing and Kathleen – well, she wants to be an embalmer. London 2015 Kathleen is a borderline alcoholic, Adam is holding
The Pyramid of Mud
The Pyramid of Mud is the twenty-second Montalbano mystery from Italy`s finest crime writer, Andrea Camilleri.It`s been raining for days in Vigata, and the persistent downpours have led to violent floods overtaking the Inspector`s beloved hometown, sweeping across the land and leaving only a sea of mud behind. It is on one of these endless
