Instead, it presents young readers with a biography that covers what is known historically about Jesus and places in his life in the context of his world when Jerusalem was part of the Roman Empire. In an even-handed and easy-to-read narrative, this title—illustrated with eighty black-and-white drawings—also explains the early origins of Christianity and how it became a major religion.

    Morton's evocative account of his days in 1950s Rome—the fabled era of La Dolce Vita—remains an indispensable guide to what makes the Eternal City eternal. In his characteristic anecdotal style, Morton leads the reader on a well-informed and delightful journey around the city, from the Fontana di Trevi and the Colosseum to the Vatican Gardens loud with exquisite birdsong. He also takes time to consider such eternal topics as the idiosyncrasies of Italian drivers as well as the ominous possibilities behind an unusual absence of pigeons in the Piazza di San Pietro. As TourismWorld.com commented recently: "H.V. Morton.. . .wrote of Rome with style, involvement, and passion. His book In Search of Rome is perhaps the definitive guide book on the Eternal City."

    They have come to Australia to escape the violence in Northern Ireland, but when the past catches up with them, Tas is trapped in the middle.

    In her privileged circles the thunder of approaching revolution was easy to ignore. Then the Shah fell and in the terrifying new fundamentalist regime of Ayatollah Khomeini Sousan and her friends were branded taghouti, devil's followers. They were hunted, their children brainwashed, their property confiscated. Alone with her son after the death of her husband, Sousan became an easy target. She was flung into jail, where she witnessed terrible suffering inflicted in the name of 'immodest behaviour' and 'indecency.' Only when she caught the eye of a Mullah, who clearly expected sexual favours in return, did she escape. But real freedom still lay beyond the snow-capped Zagros mountains, in Turkey- a hazardous route for a woman and child to take. OUT OF IRAN grips and involves the reader as it recounts one woman's courageous struggle for survival in fanatical war-torn Iran.

    I’ve been lionized by the public and the press. The world is at my feet. I’ve spread my wings and here I am, soaring above everything and everyone. But in reality, the descent has already begun.” At age 20, Thomas Dekker was already earning €100,000 a year—as an amateur bike racer. The next year, he turned pro and his salary quadrupled then rose again to €900,000 as he established his position as a super-domestique among Europe’s wealthiest superteams. The sport marveled at Dekker’s rise as the young racer set his ambitions on capturing cycling’s biggest prizes for himself. Before long, though, Dekker found himself corrupted by money, dazzled by fame, and cracking under the relentless pressure to perform at a superhuman level. In his tell-all book DESCENT: My Epic Fall from Cycling Superstardom to Doping Dead End, Dekker reveals a sordid way of life full of blood bags, drugs, prostitutes, and money. DESCENT tells the story of a yearslong bender that exposes the brutal truth of his life as a professional cyclist. And Dekker is not alone; he names those who fell with him and those who aided in his downfall. In DESCENT, we take an unflinching look at the European peloton as it roars through its modern boom years—the height of the EPO era—and what we see is shocking. You won’t be able to turn away from this page-turning read about one man’s rise, fall, and redemption and what his story reveals about professional sports.

    Reflecting the flavor and wholeness of the traditional Indian way of life, where fact and fable, philosophy and the matter-of-fact blend into one, this semi-autobiographical novel can be called timeless, just as India herself seems timeless and other-worldly by virtue of her unchanging rituals.But the novel also portrays a very definite period of time, describing the full implications of the meeting of East and West on the most intimate plane through the story of Rama, an Indian, and Madeleine, a French girl, who meet at a French university shortly after World War II. Their marriage is the central theme of the book, and it is in telling the story of this marriage that Rama reveals, more deeply than most writers are able to suggest in their lifetime, the meaning of love. For these two people it becomes a question either of preserving their identities or of sacrificing an inherited background to make their marriage a success. Family ties on both sides do not help, and Rama's trip back to India for his father's illness forcibly reminds him of the underlying contrasts between India and Europe, and of a certain conflict between them and himself. While there he meets his friend Pratap's fiancée, Savithri, an event which is to bring many forgotten questions to the surface and to alter the whole perspective of his life. When Rama returns to France, he and Madeleine have to face their problems and find their own solutions.To express his fundamental and universal message, Raja Rao has created a memorable style, a compound of the unhurried breath of the Eastern sense of time with a fresh and personal imagery. Together with the compelling story he unfolds, this provides for a remarkable new literary experience.

    Here the lives of rich and poor, white and coloured are tightly interwoven. Various characters roam here, each with their own story. As Oom Kêppies says: “He’s like the sea, like a wave. You think you’ve got him, but his foam line on the sand is all that’s left.” But even before the line of foam is all that remains on the sand, the calm life cycle of the “salt of the earth” is suddenly threatened.,

    The pay was good and the work was easy - or so he thought. Then the truth was revealed: he had to sail to South America to collect one of the biggest shipments of cocaine ever bound for the UK. And to the gangsters who hired him, refusal was not an option.There followed a harrowing journey to Venezuela, where almost £50 million of coke was waiting. But someone had tipped off the authorities. Donald and his fellow crewman were arrested, convicted of drug smuggling and sentenced to six years in the notorious island prison of San Antonio.He soon discovered why Venezuela’s prisons are the most violent in the world, a nightmare gulag where hundreds are killed and thousands maimed every year in riots, vendettas and petty disputes. Thrown into a filthy, over-crowded dormitory known as Pavilion 4, and surrounded by armed gangs, crack addicts, death and disease, he faced a daily fight to survive. Ferocious guards beat prisoners indiscriminately and many cut themselves in “blood strikes” to protest against the scarce food, undrinkable water and lack of medical care. Finally a war broke out between two prison compounds, involving guns, machetes and even grenades.Through it all, and despite witnessing the brutal killing of his friend and mentor, MacNeil clung to the belief that one-day he would be home. Journey To Hell is a harrowing but compelling account of man’s extraordinary will to survive in a world gone mad.

    Graham Lord was born and educated in Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), raised in Mozambique, took an honours degree in History at Cambridge, and spent twenty-three years as Literary Editor of the Sunday Express in London, where he wrote a weekly column about books and met almost every major English language author of the 1960s to the 1990s.After leaving the Sunday Express in 1992 to become a full-time author he wrote regularly for The Daily Telegraph, The Times and the Daily Mail, and from 1994 to 1996 he edited the short story magazine Raconteur.Printed book size: 482 pages

    Some of his tales will seem far fetched, unless you're a cop and then you know that anything can happen - and just when you think you've seen it all, someone will surprise you.

    I was also so chronically unfit that I couldn’t manage more than one flight of stairs without getting seriously out of breath. I was eating my way to a whole host of health problems and my knees were knackered. Now nearly four years on, I am over 80lbs lighter and a whole heck of a lot fitter. I’m now training to be a Personal Trainer so that I can help other people like me. This is why I have written this book. Along the way I learned a lot, and came up with some ideas of my own about how and why people lose weight….or don’t. This is my story.

    Adapted from Mark Kurlansky’s adult work Birdseye: The Adventures of a Curious Man.  Adventurer and inventor Clarence Birdseye had a fascination with food preservation that led him to develop and patent the Birdseye freezing process and start the company that still bears his name today. His limitless curiosity spurred his other inventions, including the electric sunlamp, an improved incandescent lightbulb, and a harpoon gun to tag finback whales. This true story of an early entrepreneur is as thrilling as the story of Steve Jobs or Mark Zuckerberg. Simultaneously available in a hardcover and trade paperback edition. Each edition includes an 8-page black-and-white photo insert.

    Clever illustrations and story lines, together with full-color reproductions of actual paintings, give children a light yet realistic overview of each artist's life and style in these fun and educational books.

    

    Driven from their home countries by famine and persecution, they arrived at Ellis Island full of fear and hope, determined to claim their share of the American Dream.Among the first to pass through Ellis Island was young Israel Baline, a Russian Jew who at the age of just five had seen his homeland overrun by anti-Semitic violence. Forced to flee their village deep within the Russian Empire, the Baline family used their meagre life savings to cross Europe and buy a one-way steerage-class ticket to America. They landed at Ellis Island in 1893, only to find that the streets of New York were not quite paved with gold; the riches they had risked everything for would not be easily won.Israel Baline may have traded a rural slum for an urban one, but he was an American now. He would not stay impoverished for long. Blessed with talent, spurred by the will to succeed, Israel Baline would grow up to become—under another name—his adopted country’s most famous songwriter.