A very personal memoir of the author's relationship with the iconic and much loved bookshop Foyles of Charing Cross Road in London. From fond childhood memories of his eccentric and brilliant grandfather William Foyle, 'the Barnum of Bookselling' and his aunt, the beautiful, charming, witty, self centred and at times utterly ruthless Christina Foyle, to the 21st century rejuvenation of a dying family business, An Accidental Bookseller will appeal to all who have their own memories of Foyles.
Especially for this book, Andy Warhol has created prints (silkscreen over collage) of some of the most endangered animals in the world. Here they are joined with a stimulating text by Dr Kurt Benirschke affording the reader an opportunity to discover the lives and habits of these animals and what the outlook is for their survival. Extinction, the tragic and permanent loss of entire species of animals, should be a concern for everyone This concern and a strong desire to take action toward preventing the loss of more animals has brought about an unusual collaboration between art and science. The result is this beautiful volume in which artist and scientist have joined efforts to inform and inspire others to take action. It is hoped that these fascinating and striking portrayals will stimulate readers to join their own energies and talents to this important fight against the loss of more species. This book brings some of the less well known endangered animals to the reader's attention. These animals deserve just as much attention as the giant panda or the mountain gorilla about which so much has already been said. Naturally, the animals presented here are very personal choices, having been selected from a virtually endless supply of animals whose last hour is rapidly approaching.
From the USA Today bestselling author of While We Were Watching Downton Abbey... Once upon a time four aspiring authors met at their very first writers' conference. Ten years later they're still friends, survivors of the ultra-competitive New York publishing world. Mallory St. James is a workaholic whose bestsellers support a lavish lifestyle. Tanya Mason is a single mother juggling two jobs, two kids, and too many deadlines. Faye Truett is the wife of a famous televangelist and the author of inspirational romances: no one would ever guess her explosive secret. Kendall Aims's once-promising career is on the skids-and so is her marriage. Her sales are dismal, her new editor detests her work-and her husband is cheating. Barely able to think, let alone meet her final deadline, Kendall holes up in a mountain cabin to confront a blank page and a blanker future. But her friends won't let her face this trial alone. Together they collaborate on a novel using their own lives as fodder, assuming no one will ever discover the truth behind their words. No one is more surprised than they are when the book becomes a runaway bestseller. But with success comes scrutiny and scandal...as these four best friends suddenly realize how little they've truly known each other.
When a Harvard-educated aspiring actor loses all of his cash in a poker game, he finds himself stranded in Abilene, Texas. Enter Merle, a hard drinkin', tough talkin', woman lovin' wildcatter who happens to have a job opening. What ensues is a rip-roaring conflagration of unbelievably vibrant characters. In the end, good old Texan gumption wins out, but regardless, Chocolate Lizards is a helluva ride.
The untold story, based on groundbreaking original research, of the actions and inactions that created the Israeli settlements in the occupied territories After Israeli troops defeated the armies of Egypt, Syria, and Jordan in June 1967, the Jewish state seemed to have reached the pinnacle of success. But far from being a happy ending, the Six-Day War proved to be the opening act of a complex political drama, in which the central issue became: Should Jews build settlements in the territories taken in that war? The Accidental Empire is Gershom Gorenberg's masterful and gripping account of the strange birth of the settler movement, which was the child of both Labor Party socialism and religious extremism. It is a dramatic story featuring the giants of Israeli history—Moshe Dayan, Golda Meir, Levi Eshkol, Yigal Allon—as well as more contemporary figures like Ariel Sharon, Yitzhak Rabin, and Shimon Peres. Gorenberg also shows how the Johnson, Nixon, and Ford administrations turned a blind eye to what was happening in the territories, and reveals their strategic reasons for doing so. Drawing on newly opened archives and extensive interviews, Gorenberg reconstructs what the top officials knew and when they knew it, while weaving in the dramatic first-person accounts of the settlers themselves. Fast-moving and penetrating, The Accidental Empire casts the entire enterprise in a new and controversial light, calling into question much of what we think we know about this issue that continues to haunt the Middle East.
An Accidental Envoy is a memoir covering the period 1990 to 2005 during which I was involved with the Turks & Caicos Islands, initially as one of a team of consultants charged with devising a strategy to lift that small Caribbean nation, a British Dependent Territory, out of its dependency then successively as Director of Tourism, Superintendent of Banking & Offshore Finance and Government Representative in London. It was a time of great change in TCI during which it went from hopeless dependence on the UK to thriving economic independence. During that time I made many good friends and a few enemies, had much enjoyment and an acceptable level of stress. This is a personal memoir and is naturally subjective. In it I have tried to capture some of the atmosphere of what was a very exhilarating period in the history of the Turks & Caicos
On the night of November 9, 1989, massive crowds surged toward the Berlin Wall, drawn by an announcement that caught the world by surprise: East Germans could now move freely to the West. The Wall—infamous symbol of divided Cold War Europe—seemed to be falling. But the opening of the gates that night was not planned by the East German ruling regime—nor was it the result of a bargain between either Ronald Reagan or George H.W. Bush and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev. It was an accident. In The Collapse, prize-winning historian Mary Elise Sarotte reveals how a perfect storm of decisions made by daring underground revolutionaries, disgruntled Stasi officers, and dictatorial party bosses sparked an unexpected series of events culminating in the chaotic fall of the Wall. With a novelist’s eye for character and detail, she brings to vivid life a story that sweeps across Budapest, Prague, Dresden, and Leipzig and up to the armed checkpoints in Berlin. We meet the revolutionaries Roland Jahn, Aram Radomski, and Siggi Schefke, risking it all to smuggle the truth across the Iron Curtain; the hapless Politburo member Günter Schabowski, mistakenly suggesting that the Wall is open to a press conference full of foreign journalists, including NBC’s Tom Brokaw; and Stasi officer Harald Jäger, holding the fort at the crucial border crossing that night. Soon, Brokaw starts broadcasting live from Berlin’s Brandenburg Gate, where the crowds are exulting in the euphoria of newfound freedom—and the dictators are plotting to restore control. Drawing on new archival sources and dozens of interviews, The Collapse offers the definitive account of the night that brought down the Berlin Wall.
The hunting accident -- Little Italy -- A young man's trouble with the law -- Code of silence -- The truth -- Nathan Leopold -- The darkness -- Plato's cave -- The inferno -- The übermensch -- Principles of sound -- The woods of the suicides -- Final exam -- The sins of the fathers -- The glim box -- The letter -- Purgatorio -- Paradiso.
Winner of the Scottish Children's Book Award 2013 Younger Readers (8-11 years) category. I'm not mad, ok? I know this sounds off the wall, but I was just walking to the corner shop and this girl almost got hit by a car. She grabbed hold of me and told me her name's Agatha Black and she's here from the past. At first I thought she was nuts but maybe it's true. She doesn't get traffic, she's freaked out by photos and she's terrified of TV. And she knows about the past -- body snatchers, making fires, and pet monkeys. Her dad does a bit of time travel. But obviously, he's not very good at it. I mean, he got her lost. Now it's me that has to get her back ? to 1812!
