With passion and precision, Michael Thelwell recounts Rhygin’s journey from a morally coherent rural universe to the teeming, predatory slums of Kingston, his rebellion against the poverty and corruption of postcolonial Jamaica, his blazing, simultaneous rise to the top of the charts and the Most Wanted list.

    He in turn beguiles her with stories of his nonexistent wife and children thereby weaning her from her self-absorption, but creating for himself a dreamlife with Lady Franklin at the heart of it. Half-hoping to make his dream come true, Leadbitter takes a bold step which costs him her company and brings the story to a dramatically unexpected end. "The Hireling" was made into a 1973 film starring Sarah Miles and Robert Shaw.

    He's got six guys to find with only their names to go on and no more help than the phone book and an A-Z. Stuart is determined to walk each of the capital's roads, streets and alleyways. But what will he do when there's nothing left of his A-Z but blacked out pages? Judy is set on creating her own unique map of each of the metropolis' boroughs…an A-Z of sex in the city.

    Mack's investigation of the various groups and strands of the early Christian community, out of which were generated the texts of Christianity's first anthology of religious literature, makes sense of a topic that has been confusing.

    The end of the sixteenth century was marked by the Inquisition and Counter-Reformation, a background of ideological war against which, despite all odds, brilliant feats of art and science were achieved. No artist captured the dark, violent spirit of the time better than Caravaggio, variously known as Marisi, Moriggia, Merigi, and sometimes, simply M. As art critic Robert Hughes has said, "There was art before him and art after him, and they were not the same." Robb's masterful biography "re-creates the mirror Cravaggio held up to nature," as Hilary Spurling wrote in The New York Times Book Review, "with singular delicacy as well as passion and panache."

    Semi-autobiographical novel from the Rudimentary Peni leading light plunging into the worlds of madness, suicide and anarchist punk. And it's a good read.

    Vincent and his generation are contrasted with an older generation of retired teachers and petty crooks, and both generations come under the bemused gaze of the waiter Alfred, whose infallible method of predicting the future mocks prevailing scientific models. Similarly, Queneau's literary universe operates under its own laws, joining rigorous artistry with a warm evocation of the last days of a bygone era.

    In a rich weave of images and text, each chapter offers an intimate look at the artist's expression in a different medium. This volume includes beautiful photographs of Micheangelo's works but here also are never before seen details of his sculpture and architecture that invite us to linger. The black-and-white photographs printed in lush doutones that add depth, show in the marks of the chisel, the hand of Michangelo at work - the rough but deliberate strokes of a man struggling to express himself in an unyielding and unforgiving medium.

    Gloria's image seems distilled from memory and fantasy and the fragments of whatever Jimmy can buy from the other whores: their sex, their stories--all the unavailing dreams of love and salvation among the drinkers and addicts who haunt San Francisco's Tenderloin District.

    "Unfailingly incisive, thought-provoking, humane."--The Economist.

    By the end of the 1930s they had lost not only a generation of sons in the First World War, but also much of their prosperity, prestige, and political significance.Deftly orchestrating an enormous array of documents and letters, facts, and statistics, David Cannadine shows how this shift came about--and how it was reinforced in the aftermath of the Second World War. Astonishingly learned, lucidly written, and sparkling with wit, The Decline and Fall of the British Aristocracy is a landmark study that dramatically changes our understanding of British social history.

    Poland. Our narrator has no intention of being a hero. He plans to survive this war, whatever it takes.Meticulously he recounts his experiences: the slow unravelling of national events as well as uncomfortable personal encounters on the street, in the café, at the office, in his love affairs. He is intimate but reserved; conversational but careful; reflective but determined. As he becomes increasingly and chillingly alienated from other people, the reader is drawn into complicit acquiescence. We are forced to consider what it means to be heroic and how we ourselves would behave in the same circumstances.Written in 1961, this is the masterpiece of one of the great Polish writers of the 20th century.

    A young widow, she lives in a village, where the crops grow tall and the people are ruled over by a Chief on a white horse. She married for love, but now her husband is dead, leaving her with nothing but a market stall and a young son to feed.When the Chief knocks on Ese's door demanding that she marry again, as the laws of the land dictate she must, Ese is a fool once more. There is a high price for breaking the law, and an even greater cost for breaking the heart of a Chief. Ese will face the wrath of gods and men in the fight to preserve her heart, to keep her son and to right centuries of wrongs. She will change the lives of many on the road to freedom, and she will face the greatest pain a mother ever can.'Wake Me When I'm Gone' is a story of curses broken, and lives remade, of great tragedy and incredible rebirth. In this, his second novel, Nigerian writer Odafe Atogun unfolds a world rich with tradition and folklore, a world filled with incredible people of remarkable strength, a world that is changing fast.

    At its head lies Red Fort, once the home of the gem-encrusted Peacock Throne, symbol of the Mughal Empire's dazzling might, and of its downfall.

    His partner, an unproductive writer named Byron Burns, is happy to join him for the long ride down. Their distant salvation is an unwritten manuscript sure to redeem their standing and pride - though both know it's just a thin reason to get up and go to the bar.When their latest female companion dies in their fleabag hotel room, the duo find themselves putting up her young but futureless daughter, Hanna. Despite their own dishonorable intentions and aging desires, the pair cannot abide her lack of ambition and low expectations for herself. Together, they dust off their teachers' instincts and conspire to use every means necessary - legal, illegal, fair, and unfair - to get Hanna into college.