Is geography really destiny?Our maps may no longer be stalked by dragons and monsters, but our perceptions of the world are still shaped by geographic myths. Myths like Europe being the centre of the world. Or that border walls are the solution to migration. Or that Russia is predestined to threaten its neighbours.In his punchy and authoritative new book, Paul Richardson challenges recent popular accounts of geographical determinism and shows that how we see the world represented often isn't how it really is - that the map is not the territory.Along the way we visit some remarkable places: Iceland's Thingvellir National Park, where you can swim between two continents; Bir Tawil in North Africa, one of the world's only territories not claimed by any country; and we follow the first train that ran across Eurasia between Yiwu in east China and Barking in east London.Written with verve and full of quotable facts, Myths of Geography is a book that will turn your world upside down.
After much searching, the happily married young couple, Amber and Stevie think they have found the perfect spot in Grimaldi Square. Despite the rundown pub across the way, the overgrown garden and a decidedly nosy neighbour, number 4 is the house of their dreams. Stevie, a woman who has never left anything to chance, has planned everything so nothing can spoil their happiness. But ... upstairs in their new home, seated on an old red sofa is the woman they bought the place from - eighty-year-old foul-mouthed, straight-talking, wise-cracking Dorothy - who has decided that she's not going anywhere. It turns out that Dorothy will be only the first in a line of life-changing surprises. Friends of Dorothy is a touching, funny novel about a family that is not biological, but logical; a story close to Sandi Toksvig's heart.
'Immensely readable. A celebration of what was - and can be - built, with all the hurdles and ecstasies' Rosie Garland, author of The Night Brother and The Palace of CuriositiesA highly readable cultural history of queer women's lives in the second half of the twentieth century, told through six iconic spacesFor as long as queer women have existed, they've created gathering grounds where they can be themselves. From the intimate darkness of the lesbian bar to the sweaty camaraderie of the sports pitch, these spaces aren't a luxury - they're a necessity for queer women defining their identities.Blending memoir, archival research and interviews, journalist June Thomas invites readers into six iconic lesbian spaces over the course of the last sixty years, including the rural commune, the sex toy boutique, the holiday destination and the feminist bookstore. She also illuminates what is gained and lost in the shift from the exclusive, tight-knit women's spaces of the '70s toward today's more inclusive yet more diffuse LGBTQ+ communities.At once a love letter, a time capsule and a bridge between generations of queer women, A Place of Our Own brings the history - and timeless present - of the lesbian community to vivid life.
An inspiring and beautifully written collection of ancient stories retold to celebrate older women. From early childhood, we learn about the world and its possibilities through myths and fairy tales. The heroines, though, tend to be young, golden-haired princesses, and the evil-doers often older women: either wicked witches or unforgiving matriarchs. But from midlife onwards, women today are searching for positive versions of themselves, and this dazzling array of not-to-be-messed-with older characters provides them. They outwit monsters, test and mentor younger heroines, embody the cycles and seasons of the earth, weave the world into being - and almost always have the last laugh. Many years of research have gone into this new gathering of ungainly giantesses, sequin-strewn fairy godmothers, misunderstood witches, fierce grandmothers, hairy-chinned hags and craggy crones. These wise women manifest their wisdom in different ways, and so offer us inspiration for how we too can walk boldly and live authentically in the second half of life.
Shauna and Erin are celebrating their joint bachelorette party, living their best lives, drinking and dancing with a group of their girlfriends. One of the girls won't make it to the end of the night because on this - the best night of their lives - a killer lies in wait...Lt. Eve Dallas is on the case
In this highly anticipated follow-up to the 100,000 copy bestseller 'The Science of Storytelling', acclaimed story guru Will Storr shows you how to engage and influence your audience to create irresistible pitches, build rock solid brand loyalty, motivate teams and lead with charisma and authenticity. Using the latest findings from social psychology, evolutionary psychology, organisational psychology and neuroscience, it argues that we won't unlock the true power of story if we treat it merely as something we read on a page, see on a screen or listen to a charismatic figure deliver in a speech. Storr shows how successful stories shape identities, which changes beliefs, drives action and achieves extraordinary results. With examples ranging from Aztec rituals to Apple's legendary advertising successes (and long-forgotten fails) A STORY IS A DEAL lays out a revolutionary new method for creating the most persuasive messaging: by harnessing the power of our storytelling brains.
This addictive thriller from No. 1 New York Times bestselling author Vi Keeland follows a New York psychiatrist's dark descent into a dangerous obsession.After experiencing a terrible loss, New York City psychiatrist Meredith McCall feels painfully adrift. When she crosses paths with a man with whom she has a tragic connection, she follows him, sparking an unhealthy obsession with Gabriel Wright. How is he doing so well while her life is in shambles? But when Gabriel walks into her office as a patient, seemingly unaware of who she is, she knows it crosses all ethical and moral bounds to treat him. Yet, Meredith can't bring herself to turn him away and becomes further entangled. With her life and career continuing to unravel, it appears that things could not get any worse . . . until they do.
Paris in the Belle Époque is remembered as a golden age of cultural flourishing and political progress. The time between the revolutionary 1870s and the outbreak of war in 1914 saw the modern French capital take shape: by day Parisians could admire the rising Eiffel Tower and Sacré-Coeur Basilica, while at night they roamed the Bohemian world of the Moulin Rouge.But as Mike Rapport reveals in this authoritative and beautifully written new history beneath its elegant veneer Paris was at war with itself. The Belle Époque was also an era of social and religious unrest, women's emancipation and violent clashes over what it meant to be French.Paris pulsated with the pleasures and anxieties of modernity: blazing electric lights illuminating the night, the first cars speeding down the boulevards, as well as the first Métro trains and plane flights. At the same time reactionary forces reasserted themselves-mostly dramatically in the infamous Dreyfus affair.Told through the eyes of the greatest personalities of the age-novelist Émile Zola, feminist activist Marguerite Durand, Vietnamese diplomat Nguy?n Tr?ng H?p and socialist politician Jean Jaurès-the book weaves together stories of splendour and suffering, delight and agony, offering a brilliant account of the shadows cast across the City of Light.
In 1978, when Alex Duff first went to watch Brentford, players would go on midweek pub crawls near the Griffin Park stadium. Sometimes, in no fit state to go home, they would crash out in a terraced home where one of them lived opposite the stadium gates. The next morning, they clambered into a white van which one of them would drive to training, stopping on the way for a bacon sandwich and cup of tea at a greasy spoon café. Brentford had once played in the top-flight but now, idling in the third division, were a second home for players and supporters, but there was neither the ambition nor money to revive their best days. They bumbled along until in 2005, fed up with trying to make a profit from a club with an ageing stadium in an unfashionable west London suburb, owner Ron Noades agreed to hand over the business to supporters on the condition they take over responsibility for their £5.5 million overdraft. One of the fans, an Oxford University physics graduate called Matthew Benham, was making millions of pounds from professional gambling and threw in a £500,000 lifeline to help keep the club afloat. Initially, as a sort of academic challenge, he began figuring out if he could employ the mathematics which he used in beating the bookmakers to improve the club''s performance on the pitch. Smart Money is the story of how a scientist with an inquiring mind was set loose in a backwater of professional football, and how he turned a modest, little-known team into a competitor in one of the world''s most-watched sports leagues.
In this dead city, the vultures are circling...Berlin 1944. The beginning of the end for Nazi Germany. And the beginning of a dark journey for Garda detective Stefan Gillespie as he makes his way through war-ravaged Europe to the German capital. He carries secret instructions for the Irish ambassador, who is clinging on in the growing chaos - even though it's time to get out. Bombs fall and bodies fill the streets. People starve. The true horrors of Nazi terror are everywhere now... and the Russians are coming. As Stefan searches for an Irishman trapped in Berlin who has betrayed his country and his friends, who cares if people are murdered along the way? And Stefan has to ask himself if saving one life matters in this devastation. And if it does, is it worth him risking his own?QUOTES TO COME
'Neil Stewart is the kind of writer who appears once in a generation, gifts fully-formed' Paul Murray, author of The Bee StingTest Kitchen is set during a single evening's service at the Michelin-starred restaurant everyone's talking about, Midgard.As Midgard's newest waitress, Australian-born Marley is glad to have found a kind of family among the 'brigade' there. Like any family, however, it is dysfunctional, possibly even lethal . . .A violent event - an event she is struggling to piece together - has befallen Marley. She can't move. She can't speak. All she can do is observe the restaurant tonight, seeing but unseen. As she strains to recall what has happened to her, she can only witness the chaos that is about to unfurl here, a place ordinarily so precisely curated by Joanna, Midgard's famously enigmatic head chef . . .Tense and moreish, Test Kitchen offers a deliciously dark insight into the goings-on behind the scenes in the kitchen, as well as eavesdropping in on the dramas of the diners who are lucky - or unlucky - enough to have booked a table at Midgard on what will prove to be its final night. Test Kitchen is a gripping, funny and often macabre story about the culture of food, of dining and eating, about feeding and nourishing, about mothers, mortality and magic.
It's time to rage, drink and fight like a barbarian! Red Sonja, the iconic She-Devil with a Sword, will meet a new generation of readers in this action-packed epic fantasy by legendary comic book writer Gail Simone, making her novel-writing debut. Hot-headed, charismatic and always unapologetically herself, Red Sonja, the ferocious She-Devil and barbarian of Hyrkania has never concerned herself with the consequences of her actions. She's pursued all her desires, from treasure, to drink, to the companionship of bedfellows. She's fought those who deserve it (and sometimes those who didn't). And she's never looked back. But when rumours start bubbling up from her homeland - rumours of unknown horrors emerging from the ground and pulling their unsuspecting victims to their deaths - she realises she may have to return to the country that abandoned her. Sonja must finally do the only thing that ever scared her: confront her past.
Welcome to Florence, 1517, a world of intrigue, opulence, secrets, and murder. The Medici family rules the city from their seat of wealth, but the people of Florence remember the few decades they spent as a Republic, free from the Medicis and their puppet Pope, Leo X.Sharp-witted seventeen-year-old con-woman Rosa Cellini has plans for the Pope and the Medicis - and, more specifically, the mountain of indulgence money they've been extorting from the people of Tuscany. To pull off the Renaissance's greatest robbery, she'll recruit a team of capable misfits: Sarra the tinkerer, Khalid the fighter, and Giacomo, the irrepressible master of disguise. To top it all off, and to smooth their entrance into the fortress-like Palazzo Medici, Rosa even enlists the reluctant help of famed artist and local misanthrope, Michelangelo.Old secrets resurface and tensions in the gang flare as the authorities draw closer and the Medicis' noose pulls tighter around Tuscany itself. What began as a robbery becomes a bid to save Florence from certain destruction - if Rosa and company don't destroy each other first.Get ready for an absolute swashbuckling riot, beginning with a 'mud' pie to the Pope's face, and ending with a climatic heist that would give Danny Ocean a run for his money. Bursting with snark, innuendo and action, Medici Heist is your next un-put-downable obsession.
A collection of brand-new short stories written by major international writers and inspired by Kafka - to commemorate one hundred years since his deathFranz Kafka is widely regarded as one of the greatest and most enigmatic geniuses of twentieth-century literature. Few writers have inspired as much interpretation, adaptation and imitation as he has - from films to novels to memes - and very few artists in any field have created work that captures so resonantly the fraught peculiarity of our existence.What happens when Kafka's idiosyncratic imagination meets some of the greatest literary minds writing in English across the globe today? From a future society who ask their AI servants to construct a giant tower to reach God; to a flat hunt that descends into a comically absurd bureaucratic nightmare; to a population experiencing a wave of anxiety attacks, these specially commissioned stories speak powerfully to the strangeness of being alive today.
One ship. Seven strangers. And all hell's about to break loose.Firefly meets The Breakfast Club in this high-concept sci-fi romance from No. 1 New York Times bestselling author Tracy Wolff and bestselling author Nina Croft, perfect for fans of Star Wars and Guardians of the Galaxy.Readers are blown away by STAR BRINGER!'Everything you could possibly want in a story: Action, Romance, Political intrigue, Amazing sci-fi elements, Forced proximity, Found family, Enemies to lovers, Grumpy/sunshine, and so much more' 'I love everything about this book. The made-up places, animals and society. The characters and all their quirks. The plot. It is everything' 'The twists and turns that this amazing book will give you is indescribable' ...........................How much space does one princess need?The sun is dying . . . and it's happening way too damn fast.With the clock ticking, the Nine Planets' only hope of survival rests on a fancy space station and the alien artefact it's carrying. Which is why it really sucks when some jackass doesn't want the universe saved and blows that station up - while you're still on it.So if your only choices are flaming death or stealing a flying hunk of space junk - you pick that busted-ass spaceship. Even if it leaves seven strangers with deadly secrets trapped together: a princess, a prisoner, a con artist, a warrior, a priestess, a mercenary, and an asshole in charge of us all.Now every faction in the galaxy is hunting this ship - from the Sisterhood to the Corporation, and the rebellion's joining in on the fun, too. We just need to stop drinking, fighting, and screwing long enough to evade them all and save the freaking universe . . . somehow.Because apparently the only thing standing between a dying sun and ultimate salvation is seven unlikely misfits . . . ahem, heroes............................'Readers will gobble this up' Publishers Weekly
Marigold is entering another season without any intentions of accepting a proposal. When her eccentric grandmother Althea visits and finally provides an explanation for Marigold's strange magical abilities, they return to the Lake Isle of Innisfree where she begins training as a Honey Witch - an apothecary and alchemist who uses her magical connection with the bees to create enchanted honey for her spells. While this lovely power leaves her especially adept at helping others find love, it also comes with an ancient curse that none have been able to break: no one can fall in love with the Honey Witch. When Lottie Burke, a notorious grumpy sceptic who doesn't believe in magic, accompanies her best friend to the cottage for a love spell, Marigold can't resist the challenge to prove to her that magic is real. She invites Lottie and her best friend, August Owens, to stay with her for the summer to prove her abilities, but Marigold begins to care for Lottie in a way she never expected. She longs to break the curse and escape her lonely fate, but when darker magic awakens and threatens to destroy her home, she must fight for much more than her freedom-at the risk of losing her magic and her heart.
It's 1996, and alt-rocker Emma Cantor is on tour, with her sights trained on a record deal. Emma's got no lack of inspiration for her confessional songs, chief among them her mother Judie, a 1960s folk legend who is bitterly disappointed by Emma's choice to skip college. Emma is baffled by Judie's coldness. Judie herself was only eighteen when she ran away to New York to pursue music, ahead of forming the influential folk duo the Singer Sisters with her sister Sylvia. But Judie has a long-kept secret about why she abandoned her music career at the peak of her success, which is about to unravel.This is an epic family saga that follows mother Judie and daughter Emma as they navigate the ups and downs of music stardom - asking what women artists must sacrifice for success.
Dr Jessica Taylor grew up on a council estate where brutality and coercion were normalised, and where substance abuse was a day-to-day occurrence. Now one of the UK's most spirited advocates for women's rights, and a leading chartered psychologist helping women and girls subjected to violence and trauma, Jessica shares her own personal journey for the very first time.Told through a series of absorbing vignettes spanning from her childhood days to gaining her PhD in forensic psychology, Underclass is a memoir about extraordinary strength, the complexities of belonging, and finding your power even when it feels as though the world is against you. Do you bend to fit in, or do you accept that you will always stand out? Do you run away from your roots, or love them for making you who you are? Do you fade into mediocrity, or do you change the world?Taylor recounts with dark humour and unflinching detail the various lives she's lived, covering the violence suffered at the hands of her abusers, the realities of becoming a mother in her teenage years, coming to terms with her sexuality, putting herself through university, and overcoming underhand discrimination at work. She poignantly delves into both the classist and misogynistic double standards that she has faced throughout her life, whether she was waking up on a roundabout by the estate or chairing a parliamentary conference. You can take the girl out of the council estate, but you can't take the council estate out of the girl. Especially when it made her who she is today.The result is deeply moving, searingly honest, horribly funny and, above all, unforgettable; a memoir that stays with you long after you've turned the last page.
In The Doors Unhinged, New York Times bestselling author and legendary Doors drummer John Densmore offers a powerful exploration of the 'greed gene' - that part of the human psyche that propels us toward the accumulation of more and more wealth, even at the expense of our principles, friendships and the well-being of society. This is the gripping account of the legal battle to control The Doors's artistic destiny. In it, Densmore looks at the conflict between his bandmates and him as they fought over the right to use The Doors's name, revealing the ways in which this struggle mirrored and reflected a much larger societal issue: that no amount of money seems to be enough for even the wealthiest people.The Doors continue to attract new generations of fans, with more than one hundred million albums sold worldwide and counting, and nearly twenty million followers on the band's social media accounts. As such, Densmore occupies a rarefied space in popular culture. He is beloved by artists across the decades for his fierce, uncompromising dedication to art. His writing consistently earns accolades and has appeared in a range of publications such as the Los Angeles Times and Rolling Stone. As his friend and American novelist Tom Robbins recently advised him, 'If you keep writing like this, I'll have to get a drum set.'
Thea Fox is just twelve years old when her parents are brutally slain. With Thea's help the police put their murderer - a psychotic serial killer called Ray Riggs - behind bars for life and Thea and her family try to move. But Ray isn't willing to let Thea go quite so easily...
'One of those rare novels which a reader doesn't merely read but lives through with the characters . . . Claire Messud is a magnificent storyteller' Yiyun LiJune 1940. As Paris falls to the Germans, Gaston Cassar - honorable servant of France, devoted husband and father, currently posted as naval attache in Salonica - bids farewell to his beloved wife, aunt and children, placing his faith in God that they will be reunited after the war. But escaping the violence of that cataclysm is not the same as emerging unscathed. The family will never again be whole.A work of breathtaking historical sweep and vivid psychological intimacy, This Strange Eventful History charts the Cassars' unfolding story as its members move between Salonica and Algeria, the US, Cuba, Canada, Argentina, Australia and France - their itinerary shaped as much by a search for an elusive wholeness, as by the imperatives of politics, faith, family, industry and desire.
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