Margaret was born into the Scottish aristocracy, into a now almost vanished world of privilege. Royalty often came to stay and her house was run in the style of Downton Abbey. In the Second World War years she ‘lodged' at Buckingham Palace while she worked for MI5. She was a bridesmaid at the wedding of her cousin, Princess Elizabeth to Prince Philip. Three years later the King and Queen attended her own wedding; Princess Margaret was a bridesmaid. In 1990 she was appointed as a Lady-in-Waiting to the Queen Mother, acting also as her companion, which she describes in touching detail. In the early months of 2002, she spent as much time as possible with her ailing aunt, and was at her bedside when she died at Easter that year. The next morning she went to Queen Elizabeth's bedroom to pray, and in farewell dropped her a final curtsey.This is an enthralling account of a special life, and a unique insight into the intimate moments of the British Royal family. The Queen Mother regarded Margaret Rhodes as her “third daughter”, and she has been extremely close to her cousins the Queen and Princess Margaret throughout their lives. The book is full of charming anecdotes, fascinating characters, and personal photographs and is an unparalleled insight into the private life of the British monarchy.

    At the center of a triangle of Anglo Saxons, Vikings, and Normans all jostling for control of England, Emma was a political pawn who became an unscrupulous manipulator. Regarded by her contemporaries as a generous Christian patron, an admired regent, and a Machiavellian mother, Emma was, above all, a survivor: hers was a life marked by dramatic reversals of fortune, all of which she overcame.

    A Gambling Man is a portrait of Charles II, exploring his elusive nature through the lens of these ten vital years - and a portrait of a vibrant, violent, pulsing world, in which the risks the king took forged the fate of the nation, on the brink of the modern world.

    Based on previously unseen sources in Russia, Spain, the US and the UK, this book reveals the numerous plots to save them that were launched by their royal relatives, other governments and Russian monarchists, and examines the reasons for their failure.

    The reason he gave when addressing his subjects was that he could not fulfill his duties without the woman he loved—the notorious American divorcee Wallis Simpson—by his side. His actions scandalized the establishment, who were desperate to avoid an international embarrassment at a time when war seemed imminent. That the King was rumored to have Nazi sympathies only strengthened their determination that he should be forced off the throne, by any means necessary.Alexander Larman’s The Crown in Crisis will treat readers to a new, thrilling view of this legendary story. Informed by revelatory archival material never-before-seen, as well as by interviews with many of Edward’s and Wallis’s close friends, Larman creates an hour-by-hour, day-by-day suspenseful narrative that brings readers up to the point where the microphone is turned on and the king speaks to his subjects. As well as focusing on King Edward and Mrs. Simpson, Larman looks closely at the roles played by those that stood against him: Prime minister Stanley Baldwin, his private secretary Alec Hardinge, and the Archbishop of Canterbury Cosmo Lang. Larman also takes the full measure of those who supported him: the great politician Winston Churchill, Machiavellian newspaper owner Lord Beaverbrook, and the brilliant lawyer Walter Monckton.For the first time in a book about the abdication, readers will read an in-depth account of the assassination attempt on Edward’s life and its consequences, a first-person chronicle of Wallis Simpson’s scandalous divorce proceedings, information from the Royal Archives about the government’s worries about Edward’s relationship with Nazi high-command Ribbentrop and a boots-on-the-ground view of how the British people saw Edward as they watched the drama unfold. You won’t be able to put down The Crown in Crisis, a full panorama of the people and the times surrounding Edward and the woman he loved.

    Yet just a hundred years ago is was the ancestral pile of the Fitzwilliams - an aristocratic clan whose home and life were fuelled by coal mining. Black Diamonds tells of the Fitzwilliams' spectacular decline: of inheritance fights; rumours of a changeling and of lunacy; philandering earls; illicit love; war heroism; a tragic connection to the Kennedys; violent death; mining poverty and squalor; and a class war that literally ripped apart the local landscape. The demise of Wentworth and the Fitzwilliams is a riveting account of aristocratic decline and fall, set in the grandest house in England.

    He tutored The Ultimate Warrior and strangled Bret Hart with a dead chicken. This is the true story of pro wrestling's overlooked legend. GRAPPLER chronicles the rags to almost-riches journey of Lynn "The Grappler" Denton. A star of pro wrestling's territorial era, Denton worked alongside the biggest names of the 1980s. Readers will learn about his adventures with ring icons such as Roddy Piper, Ric Flair and Harley Race. In addition, GRAPPLER features previously untold stories involving Bill Goldberg, Junkyard Dog, Ted Dibiase, Rick Rude, Curt Hennig and countless others. Denton also gives wrestling fans a behind-the-scenes look at several legendary promotions, including Mid-South, World Class, Memphis and Portland Wrestling. The book chronicles the territories' "glory days," and offers a ringside seat for their demise. From Denton's humble beginnings in a Texas dance hall, to the bright lights of the "Monday Night Wars," this is the story of one man chasing his dream through 35 years of wrestling history. With a foreword from WWE legend "Rowdy" Roddy Piper, GRAPPLER is a must have for any fan who wants to learn about the unsung heroes of professional wrestling. This humorous and heartfelt autobiography is proof that not every legend wears a Hall of Fame ring.

    He is this century's most ardent advocate of First Amendment rights, a man whose landmark Supreme Court cases are studied by every law student in America. He is the founder and publisher of Hustler magazine, a journal often described as tasteless, crude, scatological, and gynecologically explicit - to which he would reply, "Good!" For Flynt, tastelessness is "a necessary tool in challenging preconceived notions in a world where people are afraid to discuss their attitudes, prejudices, and misconceptions." Born in the hills of Kentucky, in the poorest county in America, Flynt became a teenage runaway, an underage recruit in both the army and the navy, a bootlegger, a scam artist, a bar owner, the proprietor of a string of go-go clubs, an evangelical Christian, an atheist, and eventually a millionaire pornographer and publisher. A prodigious sexual athlete, Flynt was shot down in his prime by an assailant's bullet and paralyzed from the waist down. Wheelchair bound and racked by years of searing pain, he became a pain-medicine junkie and habitue of America's courtrooms. Persecuted by the self-righteous Charles Keating, prosecuted by ambitious district attorneys, sued by moral crusaders like Jerry Falwell, and hounded by the government, Flynt forged a blazing trail through the American legal system. Remarkably, Larry Flynt has never told his story before. This highly personal and reflective account will surprise everyone, offend a few, and entertain many.

    A picture is also given of political conditions in Russia during the reign of the last Romanovs. The story is illustrated with the magnificent coronation costumes and regalia designed by Faberge, personal objects relating to the family lives of Nicholas and Alexandra, and icons and religious objects demonstrating the role of Church and State during this period.

    The acclaimed biographer details the life, reign, and impact of King Charles II of England, revealing him to have been far more serious, sensible, and competent than has been thought.

    The problems of being a princess in today's monarchy are vividly implicit in every page... I found the book eminently readable in an easy style that lends itself to wit and irony..."Elizabeth Longford, The Tablet"A balanced and on the whole generous interpretation of this most elusive of royal characters. Aronson expounds convincingly the almost intolerable pressures to which a woman of intelligence and character must find herself subjected when entrapped in the mesh of royal responsibilities."PHILIP ZIEGLER, Daily Telegraph 'Books of the Year' "Theo Aronson is a practised royal biographer who writes with fluidity... It is good to find royal gossip in which no one is absurdly inflated and no one viciously demeaned."Times Literary Supplement"Aronson's strength is his style: he is an elegant writer who can handle the broad picture and the telling detail."Daily TelegraphPart imperious royal figure, part femme du monde, Princess Margaret spent the greater part of her life torn between meeting the exacting standards of the monarchy and flouting its long-established conventions. She has been described as tragic, unresolved, a royal maverick, a woman of conflict, a princess without a cause. From any viewpoint, she remains the most interesting member of the royal family.Widely praised on its publication in hardback, this is the first detailed, in-depth study of this controversial figure. A respected royal biographer. Theo Aronson is uniquely qualified to tell the Princess's story — from her private and public life. He has been helped by many who know Princess Margaret and has drawn on several new and unfamiliar sources. He has also had the incalculable advantage of several audiences with her, allowing him to incorporate many of her memories, observations and opinions in his book. This is a fresh, frank and highly entertaining account of an always colourful life.

    Simpson recounts the extraordinary love story between the popular King and the enigmatic woman that began at a party in England and culminated with the downfall of his reign nearly six years later.The King and Mrs. Simpson reads like a story and is sized like a novella, but still captues the historical detail that makes their story one of legend. The King and Mrs. Simpson offers a reader the chance to learn their story in just a few hours. A reader does not have to love or even like history to enjoy this short book about the greatest romance of the twentieth century. The King & Mrs. Simpson is a concept the author terms "beach history": creative nonfiction that reads like a story, but retains the accuracy found in traditional texts. Finally, a new way of reading and learning about history has been launched!

    He believed that to achieve his goal he must do something spectacular on the battlefield. Despite deliberately putting himself in extreme danger as a British Army officer in colonial wars in India and Sudan, and as a journalist covering a Cuban uprising against the Spanish, glory and fame had eluded him.Churchill arrived in South Africa in 1899, valet and crates of vintage wine in tow, there to cover the brutal colonial war the British were fighting with Boer rebels. But just two weeks after his arrival, the soldiers he was accompanying on an armored train were ambushed, and Churchill was taken prisoner. Remarkably, he pulled off a daring escape--but then had to traverse hundreds of miles of enemy territory, alone, with nothing but a crumpled wad of cash, four slabs of chocolate, and his wits to guide him.The story of his escape is incredible enough, but then Churchill enlisted, returned to South Africa, fought in several battles, and ultimately liberated the men with whom he had been imprisoned.Churchill would later remark that this period, "could I have seen my future, was to lay the foundations of my later life." Millard spins an epic story of bravery, savagery, and chance encounters with a cast of historical characters--including Rudyard Kipling, Lord Kitchener, and Mohandas Gandhi--with whom he would later share the world stage. But Hero of the Empire is more than an adventure story, for the lessons Churchill took from the Boer War would profoundly affect 20th century history.From the Hardcover edition.

    A charismatic leader, a warrior whose prowess in battle earned him the epithet Whiteblade, an exiled prince who returned to claim his birthright, the inspiration for Tolkien's Aragorn. Oswald of Northumbria was the first great English monarch, yet today this legendary figure is all but forgotten. In this panoramic portrait of Dark Age Britain, archaeologist and biographer Max Adams returns the king in the North to his rightful place in history.

    Paul Gallagher, the elder brother of Noel and Liam, discusses their childhood, their father, their musical beginnings and their rise to fame, as well as considering their future.