Renowned social historian Julie Summers searches out the best voices from the past who convey the many problems these families faced during the early years of the conflict; where they were sent around the British Isles to live in safety; and what problems and social stigmas they overcame when dropped into parts of the country that at any other time would have seemed foreign to them.

    To save the Norse faith and himself, he embarks upon a journey, where he must confront not only his own gods but the gods of a people yet more savage."'The action sweeps across oceans and continents... As with all Watkins' work, the writing is terse and physical, the themes big and resonant.' Tatler; 'A Viking Odyssey... Thunder God vividly charts the voyages of Hakon, a fisherman's son who is struck by lightning, kidnapped by raiders, taken to Miklagard (Constantinople), where he becomes part of the Emperor's personal guard, caught up in a raid on the Welsh coast, storm-driven across the Atlantic...' The Times; 'The rich physical descriptions are matched by an equally sure understanding of the ways of religious belief... This unusual, fluent novel suggests that Watkins remains a force to be reckoned with.' Sunday Telegraph; 'A thundering good read... Watkins is a master of suspense, and his action sequences have a visceral power' Sunday Times"

    But frumpiness has its advantages when you're wielding a secret camera - and sending the damning footage straight to head office. Store manager Sandie has a lifelong love of the world of retail - the glitz, the glamour, the stockroom. Then she's fitted up by an ambitious assistant and secret shopping is the only way to keep her one passion alive. Glamorous widow Grazia can't leave behind the high life, despite her chronically low bank balance. The more she's buying - and spying - the less time she has to mourn her husband or her fair-weather friends who've dumped her. They're Charlie's Shopping Angels, controlled by a mysterious figure who sends them assignments. But when they're sent to stitch up a doomed shop owned by Will, the angels begin to feel divided loyalties.

    1 SOFTCOVER BOOK

    From the attacking flair of Real Madrid of the 50s to the defensive brilliance of the Italians in the 60s and onto the total football of the Dutch in the 70s, the European leagues have been where the game has most evolved and taken its biggest steps forward. And over the last three decades, since the rebranding of the Champions League in 1992, that pattern has continued unabated, with each major European footballing nation playing its part in how the game’s tactics have developed.From the intelligent use of space displayed by the phenomenal Ajax team of the early 90s, to the dominance of the highly strategic Italian league in the late 90s and onto the technical wizardry of Barcelona’s tiki-taka, the European game continues to reinvent the tactical dimension of the game, creating blueprints which both club and national teams around the world strive to follow.In Zonal Marking, Michael Cox brilliantly investigates and analyses the major leagues around Europe over specific time periods and demonstrates the impact each has made on how the game is now played. Highly entertaining and packed full of wonderful anecdotes, this is the first book of its kind to take an overview of modern European football, and lays bare just how much the international language of football can be shaped by a nation’s unique identity.

     The 2017 parliament began with Labour on the precipice of power, and its left-most fringe - for so long alienated within its own party - closer to government than it had ever been. It ended with them even farther away than they started. From the peak of Jeremy Corbyn's popularity and the shock hung parliament of 2017 to Labour's humbling in 2019 and the election of Keir Starmer, Left Out draws on unrivalled access throughout the party and to both leaders' inner circles to provide a blistering narrative exposé of the Labour Party during one of the most tumultuous and significant episodes in its history. It reveals a party riven by factionalism and at war over ideology, then incapacitated by crisis and indecision. From the plotting of the break-away Independent Group to the inaction and despair over accusations of anti-Semitism, from complaints of sexual harassment and bullying to foiled coups and furious disagreements over Brexit, the reader is in the room as tempers fray and tensions boil over, as sworn enemies forge unlikely alliances and lifelong friendships are tested to breaking-point. At the heart of the book is Corbyn himself, a man whose like had never been seen at the top of British politics - and is unlikely to ever be seen again. Heroised for his principles by some, derided as an idealist by others, the loyalty and hatred he inspired changed not only the party but the nation. Intimately drawn and brilliantly told, Left Out is the revelatory inside account of how Labour became the party it is today and of the greatest experiment seen in British politics for a generation.

    Choose the most significant moments from your relationship - one for each hour in the day.You'd probably pick when you first met, right? And the instant you knew for sure it was love? Maybe even the time you watched the sunrise after your first night together?But what about the car journey on the holiday where everything started to go wrong? Or your first proper fight?Or that time you lied about where you'd been?It's a once in a lifetime chance to learn the truth. But if you had to be completely honest with the one you love, would you still play?For Esme and Tom, the game is about to begin. And once they start, there's no going back . . .

    Take care. Be good." She has no knowledge of her name, her past, or even her species. It takes her a while to realize that she is human — and that the beings who threaten, befriend, and violate her are other people. Some of whom seem to know all about her.In this eerie, blackly funny, and sometimes disorienting novel, Martin Amis gives us a mystery that is as ambitious as it is intriguing, an investigation of a young woman's violent extinction that also traces her construction of a new and oddly innocent self.

    She continued to write until just a few days before her death in 1986, producing well over a million words in 45 exercise books over the course of her lifetime. For sixty years, no one had an inkling of her diaries' existence, and they have remained unpublished until now.Jean wrote about anything that amused, inspired or troubled her, laying bare every aspect of her life with aching honesty, infectious humour, indelicate gossip and heartrending hopefulness. She recorded her yearnings and her disappointments in love, from schoolgirl crushes to disastrous adult affairs. She documented the loss of a tennis match, her unpredictable driving, catty friends, devoted cats and difficult guests. With Jean we live through the tumult of the Second World War and the fears of a nation. We see Britain hurtling through a period of unbridled transformation, and we witness the shifting landscape for women in society.As Jean's words propel us back in time, A Notable Woman becomes a unique slice of living, breathing British history and a revealing private chronicle of life in the twentieth century.

    His existence was invariably short and violent, improved only faintly by the prospect of honor, wealth, and public attention. Yet men gave up their freedom to become gladiators, noblewomen gave up their positions to elope with them, and Emperors risked death to fight them. This thrilling popular history of ancient Rome's gladiators charts the evolution of the games; introduces us to the legendary fighters, trainers, and emperors who participated in the violent sport; and re-creates in gripping detail a day at the bloody games. Alan Baker reveals the techniques of the training school, then sets us ringside to witness the torturous battles between bulls, lions, jaguars, and battle-hardened human beings. With each breathtaking scene, the complex culture of world that created and adored these bloody games between man and beast comes into clear focus. A work of history that reads like fiction, The Gladiator brings to life Spartacus, Commodus, Caligula, and all of the other memorable players of the nearly thousand-year-long gladiatorial era.

    John Cooper Clarke for several decades3and a brilliant, scabrous, hilarious collection from one of our most beloved and influential writers and performers. From the "Attack of the Fifty Foot Woman" to a hymn to the seductive properties of the pie—by way of hand-grenade haikus, machine-gun ballads and a meditation on the loss of Bono’s leather pants—The Luckiest Guy Alive collects stunning set pieces, tried-and-tested audience favorites and brand new poems to show Cooper Clarke still effortlessly at the top of his game. Cooper Clarke’s status as the "Emperor of Punk Poetry" is certainly confirmed here, but so is his reputation as a brilliant versifier, a poet of vicious wit and a razor-sharp social satirist. Effortlessly immediate and contemporary, full of hard-won wisdom and expert blindsidings, it’s easy to see why the good Doctor has continued to inspire several new generations of performers from Alex Turner to Plan B: The Luckiest Guy Alive shows one of the most compelling poets of the age on truly exceptional form.

    I absolutely loved it' James O'BrienTwitter hero James Felton brings you the painfully funny history of Britain you were never taught at school, fully illustrated and chronicling 52 of the most ludicrous, weird and downright 'baddie' things we Brits* have done to the world since time immemorial - before conveniently forgetting all about them, of course. Including:- Starting wars with China when they didn't buy enough of our class A drugs- Inventing a law so we didn't have to return objects we'd blatantly stolen from other countries - Casually creating muzzles for women- And almost going to war over a crime committed by a pig52 TIMES BRITAIN WAS A BELLEND will complete your knowledge of this sceptred isle in ways you never expected. So if you've ever wondered how we put the 'Great' in 'Great Britain', wonder no more . . . *And when we say British, for the most part we unfortunately just mean the English.

    What resulted is this book: an honest, intelligent, no-holds-barred discussion of virtually every “hot button” issue on which Reform and Orthodox Jews differ, among them the existence of a Supreme Being, the origins and authenticity of the Bible and the Oral Law, the role of women, assimilation, the value of secular culture, and Israel.Sometimes they agree; more often than not they disagree—and quite sharply, too. But the important thing is that, as they keep talking to each other, they discover that they actually like each other, and, above all, they respect each other. Their journey from mutual suspicion to mutual regard is an extraordinary one; from it, both Jews and non-Jews of all backgrounds can learn a great deal about the practice of Judaism today and about the continuity of the Jewish people into the future.From the Hardcover edition.

    The case became notorious, with Sarah's face splashed across the front of every newspaper in the country.Now, seventeen years later, that man is about to be released from prison. Fearful of the media storm that is sure to follow, Sarah decides to flee to rural Wales under a new identity, telling nobody where she's gone.Settling into the small community she is now part of, Sarah soon realises that someone is watching her. Someone who seems to know everything about her

    It's a journey through the passages and tunnels of the city, the bunkers and tunnels, crypts and shadows. As well as being a contemporary tour of underground London, it's also an exploration through time: Queen Boudicca lies beneath Platform 10 at King's Cross (legend has it); Dick Turpin fled the Bow Street Runners along secret passages leading from the cellar of the Spaniards pub in North London; the remains of a pre-Christian Mithraic temple have been found near the Bank of England; on the platforms of the now defunct King William Street Underground, posters still warn that 'Careless talk costs lives'. Stephen Smith uncovers the secrets of the city by walking through sewers, tunnels under such places as Hampton Court, ghost tube stations, and long lost rivers such as the Fleet and the Tyburn. This is 'alternative' history at its best.