In ancient times, it was known as one of the Pillars of Hercules, and a glance at its formidable mass suggests that it may well have been created by the gods. Sought after by every nation with territorial ambitions in Europe, Asia, and Africa, Gibraltar was possessed by the Arabs, the Spanish, and ultimately the British, who captured it in the early 1700s and held onto it in a siege of more than three years late in the eighteenth century. The fact that that was one of more than a dozen sieges exemplifies Gibraltar’s quintessential value as a prize and the desperation of governments to fly their flag above its forbidding ramparts. Bradford uses his matchless skill and knowledge to take the reader through the history of this great and unique fortress. From its geological creation to its two-thousand-year influence on politics and war, he crafts the compelling tale of how these few square miles played a major part in history. Ernle Bradford's books have been widely praised. 'A gripping story' - The Economist. Ernle Bradford (1922-1986) was an historian who wrote books on naval battles and historical figures. Among his subjects were Lord Nelson, the Mary Rose, Christopher Columbus, Julius Caesar and Hannibal. He also documented his own voyages on the Mediterranean Sea.

    From Pulpville Press.

    Set in the aftermath of WW2, this gripping saga is richly evocative of the period and shows the true grit of our heroine Ruby.

    But then an unexpected pregnancy puts everything at risk, and Dorothy is left alone – with Robbie nowhere to be seen.Heartbroken, Dorothy picks up the pieces of her life as a working girl in Battersea helping to support her mother and father. But before long, things start to become difficult. Her father’s health is worsening, money is tight and worst of all, Robbie hasn’t come back for her.Can Dorothy find a way back to happiness in the face of real adversity? Will she have the courage to make it on her own – or is someone else waiting in the wings to save her?Gritty and moving, this is the perfect read for fans of Dilly Court and Maggie Hope.

    When his on-again, off-again, love is kidnapped, Jesse risks his life to discover the startling truth behind her disappearance. Battling the chaos of guns and violence, Jesse finds new strength and purpose.

    Henry's tyrannical, brick laying father, Nick, though weak and alcoholic, can still strike fear into the hearts of his sons. His mother, though ill and devout to her Catholicism, still has the power to comfort and confuse her children. This is typical of Fante's novels, it's autobiographical, and brimming with love, death, violence and religion. Writing with great passion Fante powerfully hits home the damage family can wreck upon us all.

    Six-year-old Birdie Adams wants to run away and join the circus but guesses she’ll have to go to the first grade and hang around with her new baby brother instead. Maybe her big sister needs a little help, too. The circus will have to wait.Twelve-year-old Melanie Adams wants her friend to stop bugging her to get her first kiss. Melanie’s already had her first kiss, but won’t spoil the special secret by talking about it. Norah Adams is a good mother and wife who wants to keep her family safe and happy, but tucking the order form for dogtags in her daughters’ lunch boxes is a big change from the everyday bologna sandwiches.Lola Carter wants the life her sister, Norah, has. Instead she has a factory job, an alcohol and prescription drug addiction, and an abusive boyfriend. Even if President Kennedy prevents World War III, these women’s lives will be changed forever.

    A memorable cast of characters, ready for battle, duelling, or love in this last completed historical novel of the Nobel Prize winner.

    Barker's stories often use wordplay and humor to stretch the boundaries of metaphor and reality as the outrageously original plots unfold. Through her confident and clever style, these short stories sling Barker to the forefront of fiction writing, as she is reminiscent of Martin Amis, Julian Barnes, and Margaret Atwood.The collection begins with a smart tale of a teenage girl whose obsession with the size of her nose dangerously compromises her relationships with her friends and her family. "Inside Information" is a pun of a title, describing how the protagonist's unborn fetus is the only one able to reform his mother's compulsive shoplifting by pulling the ultimate prank. "G-String" and "Symbiosis: Class Cestoda" detail women who gain self-esteem, albeit through quirky methods, despite the cowardly men who try to suppress them. The title story, "Three Button Trick," is about a man who deliberately buttons his duffel coat incorrectly to attract sympathetic females. Carrie falls for this trick, and it takes twenty-one years, a curious friend, and an eighty-three-year-old widower for her to realize her mistake. Wesley is the protagonist of a three-part collection, "Blisters," "Braces," and "Mr. Lippy" who, traumatized by two unfortunate incidents as a young boy, is an eccentric obsessed with freedom and the sea.Barker skillfully intertwines humor with despair to stimulate any reader's interest; she taps into the psyches of her characters to create an authentic, original, and highly enjoyable read. The Three Button Trick and Other Stories is a resonant, audacious volume from a writer of immense talent and originality.

    Her father has gone to bring home a son missing because of the war. Loyal servants give her support and comfort and are at her side when she learns of her father’s death. She promises to fulfill her father’s dream but someone doesn’t want her to, the one person she should be able to trust. He sets out to defeat her until another man, a Northern stranger, comes to her aid.

    Bedazzled by tales of gold and movie stardom, she tricks them into buying tickets for America. Yet no sooner do they land on the squalid Lower East Side of Manhattan, than Malka is crippled and abandoned in the street.Taken in by a tough-loving Italian ices peddler, she manages to survive through cunning and inventiveness. As she learns the secrets of his trade, she begins to shape her own destiny. She falls in love with a gorgeous, illiterate radical named Albert, and they set off across America in an ice cream truck. Slowly, she transforms herself into Lillian Dunkle, "The Ice Cream Queen" -- doyenne of an empire of ice cream franchises and a celebrated television personality.Lillian's rise to fame and fortune spans seventy years and is inextricably linked to the course of American history itself, from Prohibition to the disco days of Studio 54. Yet Lillian Dunkle is nothing like the whimsical motherly persona she crafts for herself in the media. Conniving, profane, and irreverent, she is a supremely complex woman who prefers a good stiff drink to an ice cream cone. And when her past begins to catch up with her, everything she has spent her life building is at stake.

    In Blacker Than a Thousand Midnights, she fulfills the promise of the earlier book, and reintroduces readers to the inhabitants of fictional Rio Seco, California. This is the story of Darnell Tucker, and black firefighter and workingman trying to work the toughest turf of all: the straight and narrow. As his friends disappear around him - victims of the streets, of police dogs, of drugs, of an addiction to cheap thrills and guns - Darnell struggles to establish his own business, facing a thousand midnights before he's home free, with a job that supports his young family. Yet even as he gains a tentative sense of self, Darnell Tucker is drawn to the destructive beauty of fires, and to the wilder, untamed forces beyond the structure of domesticity. This search for balance in a dangerous world propels the quiet heroism of a beautifully evoked and very moving story.

    Exclusive to Kindle: a free sample of The Hangman's Daughter

    Here the father—a former high school teacher—is demeaned by the only job he can get: gravedigger and cemetery caretaker. When local prejudice and the family's own emotional frailty give rise to an unthinkable tragedy, the gravedigger's daughter, Rebecca heads out into America. Embarking upon an extraordinary odyssey of erotic risk and ingenious self-invention, she seeks renewal, redemption, and peace—on the road to a bittersweet and distinctly “American” triumph.

    But when the 'unsinkable' Titanic hits an iceberg one cold dark night, May's dreams are instantly shattered. Jumping from the sinking ship at the last minute, May loses sight of Joe and Ellen. Distraught, she is pulled into a lifeboat. Minutes later, the real-life Captain Smith swims to the lifeboat and hands May a baby swaddled in blankets. Beside herself, and in virtual darkness, May believes the baby to be Ellen. This rescue is witnessed by fellow survivor, Celeste Parkes, married to an American industrialist who is on her way back to Ohio after her mother's funeral. In horror, they both watch the death throes of the mighty ship; May traumatised, knowing her husband has drowned, Celeste wishing her bully of a husband had been on board and out of her life. As the dawn comes up, and the two women are rescued by the Carpathia, a friendship is formed, one which is destined to transcend the Atlantic and social differences between them and last a lifetime. Then May makes a shocking discovery and a split-second decision which will change the lives of so many.