In a year that sees a Scottish referendum on independence, Linda Colley analyses some of the forces that have unified Britain in the past.She examines the mythology of Britishness, and how far - and why - it has faded. She discusses the Acts of Union with Wales, Scotland and Ireland, and their limitations, while scrutinizing England's own fractures. And she demonstrates how the UK has been shaped by movement: of British people to other countries and continents, and of people, ideas and influences arriving from elsewhere.As acts of union and disunion again become increasingly relevant to our daily lives and politics, Colley considers how - if at all - the pieces might be put together anew, and what this might mean.Based on a 15-part BBC Radio 4 series.

    Equally important, it lays out an in-depth analysis of the possible pathways to peace. Written like a geopolitical detective story, the narrative encourages reader interaction by starting each chapter with an intriguing question that often challenges conventional wisdom. Based on interviews with more than thirty top experts, the author highlights a number of disturbing facts about China's recent military buildup and the shifting balance of power in Asia: the Chinese are deploying game-changing "carrier killer" ballistic missiles; some of America's supposed allies in Europe and Asia are selling highly lethal weapons systems to China in a perverse twist on globalization; and, on the U.S. side, debilitating cutbacks in the military budget send a message to the world that America is not serious about its "pivot to Asia." In the face of these threatening developments, the book stresses the importance of maintaining US military strength and preparedness and strengthening alliances, while warning against a complacent optimism that relies on economic engagement, negotiations, and nuclear deterrence to ensure peace.Accessible to readers from all walks of life, this multidisciplinary work blends geopolitics, economics, history, international relations, military doctrine, and political science to provide a better understanding of one of the most vexing problems facing the world.

    Drawing on unparalleled access to many of the leading figures, as well as the key civil servants and journalists of each period, he has built up a picture of the hidden nexus of influence and patronage surrounding the office.From recently declassified archival material he reconstructs, often for the first time, precise prime ministerial attitudes towards the key issues of peace and war. He concludes with a controversial assessment of the relative performance of each Prime Minister since 1945, from Clement Atlee and Winston Churchhill to Margaret Thatcher and Tony Blair, and proposes a new specification for the premiership as it enters its fourth century.'I really can't praise it too highly: a tremendous achievement ... an instant classic'  Antony Jay, author of Yes, Prime Minister'Supersedes everything else written on the subject. If I were Tony Blair, I'd keep a copy by my bedside'  Adam Sisman, Observer'A must ... far and away the best account of the office of the First Lord of the Treasury, its history, powers and practice, and an independent assessment of the occupants of Downing Street since the Second World War'  Tony Benn, Spectator'Important and extremely readable ... Hennessy's portrait of the Blair premiership is fascinating ... a major contribution to our understanding of how we are governed'  Peter Oborne, Sunday ExpressPeter Hennessy is Attlee Professor of History at Queen Mary and Westfield College, University of London. Among many other books, he is the author of The Secret State, Whitehall and Never Again: Britain 1945-1951, which in 1993 won the NCR Award for Non-Fiction and the Duff Cooper Prize.

    In order to determine her future, Fa-ling must unlock the mysteries of her past. To this end, she travels with a Canadian adoption group to the exotic southern province of Guang-Xi Zhuang.Searching for her lost heritage, Fa-ling encounters murder, kidnapping, political intrigue and organ theft. Together with Detective Wang Yong-qi and his brilliant but uncouth partner Cheng Minsheng, Fa-ling must uncover a high-stakes kidnapping plot -- before another child goes missing!Donna Carrick grew up in Canada's military, and now resides in Southern Ontario with her husband author Alex Carrick and their three children. Along with their beloved family pets, the Carricks spend most of their free time in Ontario's North Country.The First Excellence draws on their own experience in adopting a child from China.Author of The Noon God and Gold And Fishes

    Her life becomes a nightmare with a secret so awful that she prays no one will find out.

    The pattern echoes time and time again: a new significant other draws you into a new relationship that starts off loving and alluring only to develop into a hurtful or abusive cycle. People who have a healthy understanding of “true love” do not tolerate this kind of pain. He or she will move on in search of a healthier bond. It’s an unhealthy view on love that will rationalize the toxic behavior and cling to abusive relationships long after they should have ended. Like any other addiction those hooked on a toxic love and an emotionally abusive relationship; have no control over excessive urges to text, call, manipulate or beg for love, attention and affection. They want help. They want to end the pain and recover, but it’s just like trying to shake a drug habit. Ranked one of the top bestseller abusive relationship books, Addicted to Pain reveals the truths every woman needs to heal from a toxic relationship and return to a life rich with purpose and fulfillment. Relationship expert Rainie Howard writes this all-in-one spiritual guide to provide daily insight on toxic love addiction and a healing plan to help you recover from the overwhelming effects of an abusive relationship. Learn how to get over a guy and heal from all abuse including: • The verbally abusive relationship • Emotionally abusive relationship • Spiritual and physical abusive relationship Rainie has authored several books on relationships and is sought after as a conference speaker. If you’ve been seeking books for women and break up books to help you gain restoration from a separation, abusive relationship or divorce this is the book for you!

    They give a rare perspective on the greatest geopolitical drama of the last half century.In the early days of the People's Republic, diplomats were highly-disciplined, committed communists who feared revealing any weakness to the threatening capitalist world. Remarkably, the model that revolutionary leader Zhou Enlai established continues to this day despite the massive changes the country has undergone in recent decades.Little is known or understood about the inner workings of the Chinese government as the country bursts onto the world stage, as the world's second largest economy and an emerging military superpower. China's Diplomats embody its battle between insecurity and self-confidence, internally and externally. To this day, Chinese diplomats work in pairs so that one can always watch the other for signs of ideological impurity. They're often dubbed China's "wolf warriors" for their combative approach to asserting Chinese interests.Drawing for the first time on the memoirs of more than a hundred retired diplomats as well as author Peter Martin's first-hand reporting as a journalist in Beijing, this groundbreaking book blends history with current events to tease out enduring lessons about the kind of power China is set to become. It is required reading for anyone who wants to understand China's quest for global power, as seen from the inside.

    Of how she then took the biggest gamble of her career to strengthen her position – and promptly blew it. It is also a tale of treachery where – in the hour of her greatest weakness – one by one, May’s colleagues began to plot against her.Inside this book you will find all the strategy, comedy, tragedy and farce of modern politics – where principle, passion and vaulting ambition collide in the corridors of power. It chronicles a civil war at the heart of the Conservative Party and a Labour Party back from the dead, led by Jeremy Corbyn, who defied the experts and the critics on his own side to mount an unlikely tilt at the top job.With access to all the key players, Tim Shipman has written a political history that reads like a thriller, exploring how and why the EU referendum result pitched Britain into a year of political mayhem.

    Eliza is angry. Very angry, and very, very hot.Late for work and dodging traffic, Eliza's still reeling from the latest row with her husband Paddy. Twenty-something years ago their eyes met over the class divide in oh-so-cool Britpop London, but these days their eyes only meet to bicker over the three-seat sofa.Paddy seems content filling his downtime with canal boats and cricket, but Eliza craves the freedom and excitement of her youth. Being fifty feels far too close to pensionable, their three teenage children are growing up fast, and even the dog has upped and died. Something is going to have to change—menopause be damned!Woman of a Certain Rage is a smart and funny novel for all the women who won't be told it's too late to shake things up, and Eliza is a heroine many will recognise. She may sweat a lot and need a wee all the time, but she has something to prove.

    

    Nearly 60 years later, the rebuke rings true again. Britain's postwar search for its place in the world has vexed prime ministers and government since the nation's great victory in 1945: the cost of winning the war was giving up the empire. After the humiliation of Anthony Eden's Suez expedition, Britain seemed for a time to have found an answer. Clinging to its self-image as a great island nation, it would serve as America's best friend while acknowledging its geography by signing up to membership of the European Union. Never a comfortable balancing act, for 40 years it appeared to work. In 2016 David Cameron called the Brexit referendum and blew it up. Author Philip Stephens paints a fascinating portrait of a nation struggling to reconcile its waning power with past glory. Drawing on decades of personal contact and interviews with senior politicians and diplomats in Britain, the United States and across the capitals of Europe, Britain Alone is a vivid account of a proud nation struggling to admit it is no longer a great power. It is a guide to how we arrived at the state we are in.

    An enormous population migration from rural to urban areas and from the interior to the coast that is becoming one of the most massive movements of people in human history, and its significant impact on the environment The unprecedented integration into the international economic system as China has joined virtually every major multilateral regime The reactions of the top and the bottom of the political system to these recent developments and the continuing struggles between the government's large bureaucratic structures and sporadic popular political movements.

    Destiny had other plans for her: summoned to Russia, then considered by most Europeans to be a vast, primitive wasteland, devoid of culture or sophistication, she became the Grand Duchess Ekaterina, wife of the future emperor Peter III. What followed her short, unhappy marriage was a legendary rise to supreme power. At the age of 33, the Grand Duchess Catherine became the Empress Catherine II, ruler in her own right of the largest empire on earth. In this book, you will learn how, during Catherine’s lonely years as a neglected wife in the court of the Empress Elisabeth, she bided her time and amassed the necessary political and military support to overthrow the heir to the Romanov dynasty and seize his throne. You will also learn why, over the course of her 34-year reign, which saw rebellions, foreign wars, popular uprisings, and a string of jealous lovers vying for her favor, she came to be remembered by history under the name conferred upon her by her own people: Catherine the Great.

    In exposing this shadowy and complex system that dominates our lives, Owen Jones sets out on a journey into the heart of our Establishment, from the lobbies of Westminster to the newsrooms, boardrooms and trading rooms of Fleet Street and the City. Exposing the revolving doors that link these worlds, and the vested interests that bind them together, Jones shows how, in claiming to work on our behalf, the people at the top are doing precisely the opposite. In fact, they represent the biggest threat to our democracy today - and it is time they were challenged.Owen Jones may have the face of a baby and the voice of George Formby but he is our generation's Orwell and we must cherish him (Russell Brand)This is the most important book on the real politics of the UK in my lifetime, and the only one you will ever need to read. You will be enlightened and angry (Irvine Welsh)Owen Jones displays a powerful combination of cool analysis and fiery anger in this dissection of the profoundly and sickeningly corrupt state that is present-day Britain. He is a fine writer, and this is a truly necessary book (Philip Pullman)

    Marita Lorenz is one of them.Born in Germany at the outbreak of WWII, Marita was incarcerated in a Nazi concentration camp as a child. In 1959, she travelled to Cuba where she met and fell in love with Fidel Castro. Yet upon fleeing to America, she was recruited by the CIA to assassinate the Fidel. Torn by love and loyalty, she couldn’t bring herself to slip him the lethal pills.Her life would take many more twists and turns—including having a child with ex-dictator of Venezuela, Marcos Pérez Jiménez; testifying about the John F. Kennedy assassination; and becoming a party girl with close ties the New York mafia (and then a police informant).Caught up in Cold War intrigue, espionage, and conspiracy—this is Marita’s incredible autobiography of a young woman who became a spy for the CIA.