. . This is Francis Rossi as you have never seen him before. Status Quo have sold over 100 million records worldwide, including 65 hit singles and 32 hit albums. The legendary band's career has mirrored the evolution of rock music. From the struggles of the flower-power '60s, the highs of the denim-clad '70s, the coke- and tequila-induced blur of the '80s, to fighting for musical integrity in the '90s and '00s and a fresh lease of life from new band members in recent years, Rossi has been there for the entirety of Quo's turbulent history.In I Talk Too Much, Rossi will reveal the truth behind one of the biggest rock bands of all time, as well as the personal highs and lows of a career spanning over 50 years. He lifts the lid on the man behind the music - from humble beginnings in Forest Hill and being labelled a has-been by the press in his twenties to opening Live Aid in 1985 - and why he's still going strong at seventy. Along the way he has fathered eight children with three mothers and beaten both alcoholism and cocaine addiction. Rossi comes clean about the time he almost left the band, what he really thinks about the music industry today and the complexities of his fifty-year friendship with Rick Parfitt.Painfully honest, riotously funny and frequently outrageous, I Talk Too Much covers the glory years, the dark days and the real stories behind the creation of some of the greatest rock music of all time.

    The next, I was marching in lockstep through the dark, snow-strewn streets of Sweden. Clad in an ill-fitting cheap blue suit—a Book of Mormon in my pocket—I was tasked with nothing less than saving the country of "godless fornicators from certain moral destruction." You've seen us. We are impossible to miss. We are iconic, and now even celebrated in a nine times over, Tony Awarding winning Broadway musical, The Book of Mormon. Most are boys, some girls. We always travel in pairs. Impeccably groomed, always smiling and polite, you can’t mistake us for anyone else. And, if you haven't met us already, we will soon be coming to knock on a door near you. I know. I was one of them. This is my story. Although raised in the LDS faith, nothing could have prepared me for what I experienced. My world was turned upside down. Nothing was as I expected: the country, the work, my fellow missionaries, and most of all, the Church. Had I not gone through the experience myself, I honestly would not believe a word of what follows. And yet, it’s true. Every last bit.

    Her father, an ardent moonshiner when he wasn't in prison, and her mother, often showing mental illness from an earlier brain injury, raised their four children in some of the grimmest circumstances that you will ever read about. Messer eventually escaped her extreme living conditions by going to live with a family as their mother's helper outside of Washington, DC. She then moved to New York City to join her oldest sister who had fled an abusive arranged marriage when she was fifteen and left behind a young son. These two teenage girls, uneducated but determined, found freedom from their Appalachian abuse yet encountered a culture and some inhabitants who provided scars even so. Messer's memoir is told through the eyes and with the words of a barely educated child and young woman yet their meaning and her descriptions are clear as a mountain stream. Messer changed the names of many people and places she wrote about to protect her still living family members and herself as well. In the final chapter, Messer shares one legacy from her father....he even taught the infamous "Popcorn" Sutton of Maggie Valley how to be a moonshiner when Popcorn was a teenager. The moonshiner's daughter did survive and ultimately thrive. This is her story. You won't be able to put it down.

    Upon his father's sudden death in Dublin, Sheridan finds out about his father's almost fifty-year relationship with Doris, an Englishwoman who was both less and far more than a mistress. Sheridan elegantly describes his search for the truth in the face of resistance from his mother, who falls fatally ill. He eventually meets Doris and learns that she never married, living only for her brief meetings with Sheridan's father. This beautifully written portrait of a marriage forces us, like Sheridan himself, to face truths of the heart that refuse to conform to the easy verities of convention.

    A gritty London tale, perfect for fans of Katie Flynn, Nadine Dorries and Maureen Lee.1950s Battersea is no place for a shamed woman…FracturedAlison is the ugly duckling of her family and has always been treated with disdain by her mother. After years of being bullied, she is drawn to the one man who shows her affection. But when he brutally rapes her, leaving her pregnant, she is cast out.ForgottenShunned by her family, Alison must start to make her own way and plan a life for herself and her unborn child – and for the first time she is master of her own destiny.Forgiven?But when the baby arrives, Alison feels no love for her new son. Terrified that history will repeat itself, can she find a way to love her child? And will she ever find the forgiveness she craves from her family?

    Nestled in the Appalachian mountains, Owsley County is one of the poorest counties in both Kentucky and the country. Buildings are crumbling and fields sit vacant, as tobacco farming and coal mining decline. But strong women are finding creative ways to subsist in their hollers in the hills. Cassie Chambers grew up in these hollers and, through the women who raised her, she traces her own path out of and back into the Kentucky mountains. Chambers’s Granny was a child bride who rose before dawn every morning to raise seven children. Despite her poverty, she wouldn’t hesitate to give the last bite of pie or vegetables from her garden to a struggling neighbor. Her two daughters took very different paths: strong-willed Ruth—the hardest-working tobacco farmer in the county—stayed on the family farm, while spirited Wilma—the sixth child—became the first in the family to graduate from high school, then moved an hour away for college. Married at nineteen and pregnant with Cassie a few months later, Wilma beat the odds to finish school. She raised her daughter to think she could move mountains, like the ones that kept her safe but also isolated her from the larger world. Cassie would spend much of her childhood with Granny and Ruth in the hills of Owsley County, both while Wilma was in college and after. With her “hill women” values guiding her, Cassie went on to graduate from Harvard Law. But while the Ivy League gave her knowledge and opportunities, its privileged world felt far from her reality, and she moved back home to help her fellow rural Kentucky women by providing free legal services. Appalachian women face issues that are all too common: domestic violence, the opioid crisis, a world that seems more divided by the day. But they are also community leaders, keeping their towns together in the face of a system that continually fails them. With nuance and heart, Chambers uses these women’s stories paired with her own journey to break down the myth of the hillbilly and illuminate a region whose poor communities, especially women, can lead it into the future.

    River People is a novel of inspiration, love, loss, and renewal.

    starving. It is a story of courage, determination, perseverance and the power of the human spirit. Irene spent 8 years of her life in orphanages, but this did not destroy her dreams and desire to live live a full and rich life.

     He has played in World Cups and FA Cup finals; shared a dressing room with football greats like Roy Keane, Alan Shearer and Robbie Keane and worked under celebrated managers like Kenny Dalglish, Bobby Robson and Martin O’Neill. But Shay has had to show courage and strength of mind to get where he wanted in life. At four years old, he cruelly lost his mother to cancer at the age of just 41. Mum Agnes’s dying wish was that Dad Seamus would keep the family together. Seamus kept his word and the Given clan watched with pride as Shay forged a record-breaking career in the sport he loved. From Donegal to Saipan, Glasgow to Wembley and Tyneside to Paris, it’s been some journey. Shay has seen it all. Glorious highs and desperate lows. Dressing room wind-ups and team-bonding punch-ups. Brutal injuries and crippling self-doubt. Along the way, he has made so many friends. When one of his closest pals, Gary Speed, died suddenly in 2011, he was devastated. He played on, doing the only thing he knew to get him through the pain – pulling on a shirt and a pair of gloves. Shay loves football – for him, nothing can beat the buzz of a Saturday afternoon or the thrill of a big match night under lights. But he has never lost touch with the fans who make the game what it is. Entertaining, opinionated and inspirational, his long-awaited autobiography ANY GIVEN SATURDAY features a stellar cast of famous football names from the past 25 years. It tugs at the heart strings, bubbles with banter and lets slip secrets behind the big stories. This is a rare journey behind the scenes as told by one of our own.

    She has just lost her mother Tess and brother Mikey, her marriage to Joe is coming apart at the seams and her thirty-year friendship with Karen is on the rocks.While clearing out her childhood home, Carmel discovers that her mother gave birth to a baby in an Irish Mother and Baby home when she was sixteen, a place notorious for its mass burial of babies and illegal adoptions.Carmel goes on a quest for the truth about her troubled mother’s past. Her roller-coaster journey takes her from her comfortable Manchester home to the west of Ireland and to London's theatre land. It’s a journey that leads her to ask: Can we ever escape our own family history or is our destiny in our DNA?

    Her image was broadcast all over the world, as half of the infamous Peru Two, after she was caught and imprisoned for attempting to smuggle 11kg of cocaine from Peru to Madrid. This is her story of her time in a Peruvian prison - recounting tales of vicious guards, psychotic inmates and horrendous prison conditions - and the struggles she faced as she attempted to rebuild her life among such scandal and notoriety.

    With its history and Christmas charm, London feels like the perfect getaway.But can they truly leave their realities behind?In their luxurious quarters, the girls meet Holly who is ideal at showing Maggie and Zoe the sumptuous sights and sounds of London in their most glittering light. But behind her bright façade, Holly is hiding a secret: suffering from unrequited love, she’s looking for a Christmas miracle. Desperate to see an unattainable love story for Holly come together, will our LA starlets succeed in providing a Hollywood ending before the dawn of Christmas Day?Packed to the brim with festive cheer, this is the only story you’ll need this Christmas…

    Thinking he might be out of his depth he is happy to enlist the aid of his friend, Kris Gage. But when Dee reads the deceased's last entry in his diary, 'time to take care of K. Gage', he becomes torn between investigation and friendship.As an urban planner, Gage understands real estate and the bureaucracy of planning. Following the money, he soon finds himself in the middle of corrupt developers who seek to take all the charm out of the area. Over two hundred years after the War of 1812, is Niagara-on-the-Lake, once again, on-the-Take?The Concrete Vineyard is an intriguing and unique whodunit. Packing an intellectual punch, this smart murder/mystery will have you guessing and gripped! If you like great characters, clever plots and intelligent storytelling, then you'll love this creative and thought-provoking novel.

    

    Returning to this Dartmoor village where he grew up, Gabriel attempts to come to terms with what he lost as a boy so long ago. Slowly the mysteries hidden in this small community on the edge of the moors begin to unravel. But one of Gabriel's memories remains sharper than all the others: that of his boyhood friend Michael, the tenderness of their first summers and the violent betrayal that destroyed it. And, intruding on his self-enforced isolation, the beautiful Mrs Sarobi, meddling Doris Ludgate, and the frightful specter of Jim of Blackaton will become bound in with Gabriel's search for acceptance and the possibility of love. In her striking, lyrical prose, Karin Altenberg imagines what it is to be incomplete. Set in this haunted landscape, a mesmerizing tale is told of the ways in which something once broken in two may, finally, be made whole.