‘Hiraeth - A home that never was’ by Mansi Narula Kashyap is a collection of poetry and prose about a home that the author believes does not exist in the real world but still cast a shadow or instil a sense of belongingness towards the same. Each poem will enhance the reader’s imagination, coaxing them to understand the depth of a home that never was.“For just a moment, my heart believes.The home that never was,Still makes me homesick.I do not even remember when we started building it brick by brick?The thieves have come and robbed us of all that we had,Trust, loyalty and love are now just in twisted weaves.”

    In this hilarious, irreverent and frequently controversial book she explains the real joy of hill-walking and climbing the Munros.

    It will be disruptive, noisy, and dusty, despite bringing in some new jobs. Publican Glen organizes a protest group, but when the local newspaper takes an interest in him and the story, he starts to feel nervous. When Jenny Forsyth attends a protest meeting and sees the quarry surveyor she discovers a ghost from her past that she would rather keep to herself. Clarissa Ramsay, newly widowed, is too preoccupied to care much about the new threat facing the village—she has just discovered her husband's secret life, and has resolved to make some radical changes to her own.

    As wellas focusing on key moments in the nation’s history such as the Battle of Bannockburn and the Jacobite Risings, Moffat also features other episodes in history that are perhaps less well documented. From prehistoric timber halls to inventions and literature, Moffat’s tale explores the drama of battle, change, loss and invention interspersed with the lives of ordinary Scottish folk, the men and women who defined a nation.

    Most books on world history overly emphasize the role of Western nations in the vast saga of mankind - the author of this book rectifies the gaps in books by Western historians by beginning the narration of world history with East Asia, and progresses from there through the rest of Asia to the Middle East.

    The love of her life was out of reach, so she walked away and never looked back. Now, visiting the beautiful, snowy village of Glen Avich for Christmas, Viola is shocked to find him here, staying only metres away. Can she risk heartbreak again?Inary Monteith's life is at a turning point - a surprise baby has come to upset her plans and open the door to a whole new world. But as her bump grows, fear trumps over love and Inary feels completely inadequate to her new role. As she and her cousins, Eilidh and Viola, gather for Christmas lunch, no one could expect what lies ahead, least of all the arrival of a mysterious visitor who delivers a gift for them all...

    James Robertson's breathtaking novel is a portrait of modern Scotland as seen through the eyes of natives and immigrants, journalists and politicians, drop-outs and spooks, all trying to make their way through a country in the throes of great and rapid change. It is a moving, sweeping story of family, friendship, struggle and hope - epic in every sense.The winner of the Saltire Society Scottish Book of the Year Award 2010, And the Land Lay Still is a masterful insight into Scotland's history in the twentieth century and a moving, beautifully written novel of intertwined stories.

    The heat generated was so intense that a helicopter could only circle at a perimeter of one mile. Flying at a height of 200 feet, the air crew saw that the tongues of flame extended high above the rotor blades. On the surface a converted fishing trawler inched as close as possible, but the paint on the vessel's hull blistered and burnt, and the rope handrails began to smoke. In the water surrounding the inferno, men's heads could be seen bobbing like apples as their yellow hard hats melted with the heat. At the center stood, at least for now, the Piper Alpha oil platform, 110 miles northeast of Aberdeen, once the world's single largest oil producer. On July 6, 1988, its final day, it was ablaze with 226 men onboard. Only sixty-one would survive. Fire in the Night tells, for the first time and in gripping detail, the devastating story of that summer evening. Combining interviews with survivors, witness statements, and transcripts from the official enquiry into the disaster, this is the moving and vivid tale of what happened on that fateful night inside an oil rig inferno.

    Yet World War I and the changes that follow seem to mock the emotions and experiences of her youth.

    Henryson's finest poem, and one of the rhetorical masterpieces of Scots literature, is the narrative Testament of Cresseid. Set in the aftermath of the Trojan War, the Testament completes the story of Chaucer's Troilus and Criseyde, offering a tragic account of its faithless heroine's rejection by her lover, Diomede, and of her subsequent decline into prostitution and leprosy. Written in Middle Scots, the Testament has been translated by Seamus Heaney into a confident but faithful idiom that matches the original verse form and honors the poem's unique blend of detachment and compassion.A master of high narrative, Henryson was also a comic master of the verse fable, and his burlesques of human weakness in the guise of animal wisdom are delicately pointed with irony. Seven of the Fables are here sparklingly translated by Heaney, their freshness rendered to the last claw and feather. Together, The Testament of Cresseid and Seven Fables provide a rich and wide-ranging encounter between two poets across six centuries.

    In the small hours of January 1st, 1919, the cruellest twist of fate changed at a stroke the lives of an entire community.Tormod Morrison was there that terrible night. He was on board HMY Iolaire when it smashed into rocks and sank, killing some 200 servicemen on the very last leg of their long journey home from war. For Tormod – a man unlike others, with artistry in his fingertips – the disaster would mark him indelibly.Two decades later, Alasdair and Rachel are sent to the windswept Isle of Lewis to live with Tormod in his traditional blackhouse home, a world away from the Glasgow of their earliest years. Their grandfather is kind, compassionate, but still deeply affected by the remarkable true story of the Iolaire shipwreck – by the selfless heroism and desperate tragedy he witnessed.A deeply moving novel about passion constrained, coping with loss and a changing world, As the Women Lay Dreaming explores how a single event can so dramatically impact communities, individuals and, indeed, our very souls."Gave me an insight into the Iolaire disaster which no history book could manage… a powerful book…which reveals new layers with every reading. It is history brought to life through fiction, and when it is done in a manner as moving and beautiful as this it is invaluable." Alistair Braidwood, Scots Whay Hae

    Reid's chief suspect, a ruthless financier, always seems to be one step ahead of him. After one of his men is murdered, Reid suspects he's got a traitor in own camp. When Reid's wife, Anne, becomes deeply embroiled in the investigation, things get dangerously personal. The cold Glasgow spring isn't the only thing chilling Anne's blood when she leaves California to try to save her marriage. The estate gardens she's renovating are owned by her husband's enemy, her sister-in-law is trying to get her killed, and her efforts to help Terrence plunge-and her unborn child-deeper and deeper into peril.

    I might be the only person in Scotland that’s not fussed, one way or the other. But my friend, Lily, loves the idea. That’s how I wound up on the set, cast as an extra in a low budget movie set in a castle. I’m a freshly-trained history teacher about to begin my new career. History’s my passion and soon I’ll get to teach it all day long. There are so many other, more important things I should be doing right now, rather than standing in line waiting for a costume, then waiting for hair, then waiting for makeup. When I agreed to this, to be part of the crowd scene, Lily was thrilled and promised me a special time. She delivered on that promise-rather too well. Sure, I love history, but that doesn’t mean I’m prepared to be thrust back in time, into our dark past. That’s what happens to me though. I suddenly find myself living the humble and horribly dangerous life of a Scottish lass in 1263. I was not ready for this. I’m a modern woman who likes modern things. I love the idea that there’s a doctor around the corner waiting to cure me. If I had to choose a place and time in history to stop for a while, it wouldn’t be medieval Scotland. That's the end of the Viking era. It’s a tumultuous time in history when the Vikings still own small bits of Scotland, and are determined to hold on, no matter the cost. The Scots are equally as stubborn. Nevertheless, this is where I end up, forced to deal with lawlessness, disease, lack of education, and an entirely foreign sort of man. In these wayward times, men are not like they are in my own century. Here, they’re wilder and a whole lot more frightening. I need to find my way home before something really bad happens to me. I’m not blending in well in the past. Laird Bern is curious and itching to know more. He plans to keep me indefinitely, I think. But that’s not happening because I’m determined to get home again, back to my own time, to the place I belong. Someone else has noticed me too—Storr, the Viking leader. It’s bad enough to be caught between warring Vikings and Scotsmen, but somehow I also find myself trapped in a tug of love. Do I want an ambitious Viking leader or a rugged, Scottish laird, one that is hellbent on getting his own way? What I want is to go home.

    This is the perfect book to curl up with as the frosty winter draws in and each night gets darker than the last, written by one of our greatest living crime writers.

    Now she is being targeted once more, but this time her tormentor’s identity is shrouded in doubt.When her life starts to disintegrate, she flees home to the wilds of north-east Scotland, and to the one man she knows can help her – Hector Forbes, the dubiously charismatic Laird of Pitfourie, with whom she has been hopelessly in love ever since those hellish days in the school playground, when he was her protector, her rescuer, her eleven-year-old hero.But is Hector really someone she can trust?And can anyone protect her from the terrible secret she’s keeping? Meet the engaging cast of the Pitfourie series in this ‘gripping and emotional’ read. What readers are saying about The Sweetest Poison: ‘Memorable, haunting, and I’m so glad it’s part one of a series' - Autonoe, Australian Top 500 Reviewer‘This novel is gorgeously written, with characters who jump off the page - especially Helen, the flawed but very relatable main character’ - Lucy Lawrie, author of Tiny Acts of Love and The Last Day I Saw Her'An intriguing read from beginning to end... I'm really glad that this is the beginning of a series; it's got that certain something that has you needing to read more.' - Archaeolibrarian’This is gripping stuff and I thoroughly enjoyed it!... I would definitely read this author's work again; she knows how to keep you guessing and make you invested in her characters' fate’ - Avid Reader‘I couldn't stop thinking about the characters long after I'd finished the book. Highly recommended. I can't wait for the next one!’ - Wilson‘I was gripped from the first page, had to read this in one hit. The plot was abs fantastic, loads of twists and turns that keep you guessing throughout the book. Highly recommend anyone to read this book.’ - Terry‘Well written with great characters and a lovely description of the Scottish setting’ - Paul Richards‘Read this in 2 days. Unputdownable!’ - Amazon customer‘I really enjoyed this new work, easy to get into and difficult to put down’ - J Foster‘An innocent childhood in rural NE Scotland turns unexpectedly sinister in this compelling thriller. We watch as the fallout of events tracks into Helen's adult life. The psychological insights and the minutiae of her daily life are fascinating. The feel of rural Aberdeenshire is wonderfully portrayed and highly evocative... The characters of Pitfourie are set to carry on in the next novel, and those in The Sweetest Poison have certainly lived on in my imagination.’ - Roslyn