Aaron Dignan is the founder of The Ready--a global organizational transformation and coaching practice--that helps companies large and small adopt new forms of self-organization and dynamic teaming. Clients include Johnson &amp; Johnson, Microsoft, Lloyds Bank, Citibank, Boeing, Mailchimp, Airbnb, Dropbox, and charity: water. 
 
He is also the founder of Murmur--a SaaS startup that helps teams scale culture through the magic of working agreements. The Murmur platform will allow every team on the planet to define and share their ways of working. 
 
Dignan is the author of Brave New Work (2019) and Game Frame (2011), co-host of the Brave New Work podcast, and a friend to misfit toys.

Aaron Dignan

Aaron Edwards is a senior lecturer in defence and international affairs at the Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst, specialising in terrorism and counter-insurgency. He is the author and editor of several books, including Defending the Realm: The Politics of Britain’s Small Wars Since 1945, and has lectured all over the world on aspects of national and international security. He is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society.

Aaron Edwards

Aaron Robertson is a writer, an editor, and a translator of Italian literature. His translation of Igiaba Scego’s Beyond Babylon was short-listed for the 2020 PEN Translation Prize and the National Translation Award, and in 2021 he received a National Endowment for the Arts grant. His work has appeared in the New York Times, The Nation, Foreign Policy, n+1, The Point, and Literary Hub, among other publications. He lives in Brooklyn, New York.

Aaron Robertson

Aaron Shapiro

Aaron T Beck

Aaron Vallance

Aaron Young was born in Portsmouth, Hampshire, and read Politics and Communications at The University of Liverpool. He is a BAFTA-nominated director, producer and executive producer with over 20 years of experience across projects for the BBC, PBS, Channel 4, Channel 5, UKTV, UK Film Council and Arts Council England. A long-time collaborator of acclaimed historian, James Holland, he is the producer and director of the BAFTA-shortlisted BBC titles ‘Battle of Britain: The Real Story’ and, ‘Dam Busters: The Race to Smash the German Dams’, as well as ‘The Battle for Malta’, ‘Normandy ’44: The Battle Beyond D-Day’, the RTS-nominated ‘Imphal &amp; Kohima: Britain’s Greatest Battle.’, and the 3-part series, 'Normandy '44: D-Day and the Battle for France. His most recent credits include 'Hidden Histories of WWII', 'Lost Temples of Cambodia', the RTS-winning ‘Lost Home Movies of Nazi Germany’, and ‘Prue Leith: Journey with My Daughter’. Aaron was named in the inaugural list of BAFTA ‘Brits to Watch.’ He is the co-owner of award-winning film and television production company, Bright Button Productions, and lives with his wife and children in Poundbury, Dorset.

Aaron Young

Aatish Taseer

Abbe Prevost

Abbey Bryant is an NYC-based award-winning illustrator. With her BFA in Children's Book Illustration, her notable illustrated books include Nautilus award winner Hazel Mist, Hypnotist as well as an Enchanted Fairy House Kit with Scholastic's Klutz! 
 
As a queer illustrator, LGBTQ+ themes and stories hold a spot near to her heart. Most days she can be found around the city drawing New Yorkers or sketching trees at the park.

Abbey Bryant

Abbey Clancy is a model, television presenter and the host of chart-topping podcast The Therapy Crouch. She was the runner-up of Britain's Next Top Model in 2006, winner of Strictly Come Dancing in 2013 and went on to present Britain's Next Top Model. Later this year she will host Celebrity Homes on ITV.

Abbey Clancy

Abbie Greaves studied at Cambridge University before working in a literary agency for a number of years. She was inspired to write her first novel, The Silent Treatment, after reading a newspaper article about a boy in Japan who had never seen his parents speak to one another before. 
 
Abbie lives in Brighton with her boyfriend.

Abbie Greaves

Abbie Ross is a British author and psychotherapist. Her first book, Hippy Dinners, a funny and poignant memoir of her bohemian childhood in 1970s North Wales, has been optioned by Baby Cow, who are developing it into an 8-part television series. 
Before turning to writing, Abbie had a successful career as a producer at Aardman Animations, the acclaimed studios behind Wallace &amp; Gromit and the film Chicken Run. 
Today, she divides her time between her thriving psychotherapy practice in Bristol, and her writing, and finds that the two careers complement each other perfectly.

Abbie Ross

Abbie Spallen

Abbie Taylor lives in Dublin. She works as a doctor and has two daughters.

Abbie Taylor

Abby L Yates co-founded the Ghostbusters with Erin Gilbert. Ghosts from Our Past was her first book, now finally back in print.

Abby L Yates

Abby Lee

Abby Rawlinson is an integrative therapist with a private practice based in east London, UK. Her work mixes traditional psychotherapeutic theories with cutting-edge, evidence-based techniques into a style that feels relatable, down-to-earth, and compassionate. Abby regularly contributes to articles, including but not limited to Stylist, Elle, BBC, Harpers Bazaar, Sheerluxe, Women's Health, and Psychologies. She can be found on Instagram @therapywithabby or online at therapywithabby.co.uk

Abby Rawlinson

Abby Wambach is a two-time Olympic gold medallist, FIFA World Cup champion, six-time winner of the U.S. Soccer Athlete of the Year award and one of Time’s Most Influential People. She is a founder of Treat Media, an award-winning media company that makes art for humans who want to stay human. Abby is the author of the #1 New York Times bestseller Wolfpack and the New York Times bestseller Forward. Named one of the ‘50 Most Powerful People in Podcasting,’ she is co-host of the chart-topping podcast We Can Do Hard Things, which has received over a half billion plays. Abby is an executive producer of the Sundance award-winning film Come See Me in the Good Light, part owner of the NWSL’s Angel City Football Club and sits on multiple boards. Her most recent book, We Can Do Hard Things: Answers to Life’s 20 Questions, created with Glennon Doyle, Amanda Doyle and Treat Media, is being hailed as ‘the guidebook for being alive.’

Abby Wambach

Abel &amp; Cole’s story starts in 1988 with Keith Abel flogging potatoes door-to-door. ‘Of course potatoes are organic,’ he thought, ‘they’re vegetables’. However, he quickly discovered how unnecessarily complicated our food system had become and, consequently, realised the huge benefits of going organic and never looked back. In fact, Abel &amp; Cole still get veg from the farm where Keith's first organic spuds came from. 
To this day, their priorities remain the same. Now, selling 100% organic produce, Abel &amp; Cole believe that organic farming (a holistic system that encourages biodiversity) is the very best way to go. It protects our countryside and the critters that inhabit it, insists on the very best animal welfare, supports your local community and, frankly, tastes heaps better. Abel &amp; Cole think so anyway.

Abel & Cole Limited

Abhijit Banerjee, winner of the 2019 Nobel Prize in Economics, is the Ford Foundation International Professor of Economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and a co-founder and co-director of the Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL). In 2011, he was named one of Foreign Policy magazine’s top 100 global thinkers. Banerjee served on the U.N. Secretary-General’s High-level Panel of Eminent Persons on the Post-2015 Development Agenda.

Abhijit V. Banerjee

Abhishek Mukherjee, 30, is a Delhi-based journalist. He holds a bachelor's degree in English literature from Delhi University, a post-graduate diploma in journalism from the Indian Institute of Mass Communication, New Delhi and an MBA from the Indian Institute of Management, Raipur. He also likes dogs.

Abhishek Mukherjee

Abi Elphinstone grew up in Scotland where she spent most of her childhood running wild across the moors, hiding in tree houses and building dens in the woods. After being coaxed out of her tree house, she studied English at Bristol University and then worked as an English teacher in Africa, Berkshire and London. She is the bestselling and multi-award shortlisted author of RUMBLESTAR (first in The Unmapped Chronicles), SKY SONG &amp; THE DREAMSNATCHER TRILOGY, published by S&amp;S. When she's not writing, Abi volunteers for Beanstalk, speaks in schools and travels the world looking for her next story.

Abi Elphinstone

Abi Falase is a Black British writer and director, reimagining fundamental societal concepts in inventive new worlds. Abi has written and directed a number of plays, including The Village and Rush with the Almedia Theatre, as well as Rift for Immediate Theatre and was shortlisted for the BBC Scriptworks ‘A Thousand Stories’ scriptwriting competition in 2021.

Abi Falase

Abi Titmuss

Abie Longstaff is the eldest of six children and grew up in Australia, Hong Kong and France. She knows all about squabbling, chaos and bossing younger sisters around. So she logically began her career as a barrister. She started writing when her children were born. Her favourite childhood books were Hating Alison Ashley, A Little Princess, Maura's Angel and The Black Stallion and she sneakily reads them again sometimes. Abie lives in Hove with her family.

Abie Longstaff

Abigail Ahern

Abigail Balfe is a queer, auDHD author-illustrator and Emmy award-winning creative based in Brighton. Before writing books full-time, Abigail led digital campaigns for pop stars such as One Direction and Little Mix, and for TV broadcasters including Channel 4 and Netflix. She also performed stand-up comedy and won several small trophies for her onstage humour, which featured life-size illustrations, ridiculous songs, and rambling stories about her family. In 2023, Abigail was named one of the Top 50 Influential Neurodivergent Women in the UK.

Abigail Balfe

Abigail Docherty

Abigail Foster is a Chartered Accountant and founder of Elent Finance, a financial education company designed to demystify the world of finance and empower you to achieve financial wellbeing. 
 
Abigail has worked with leading financial institutions across the UK, including HMRC, the Bank of England and Downing Street, and global companies such as Google and Goldman Sachs. She hosts a weekly money segment on LBC radio and has also appeared as a finance expert on ITV, Channel 5 and Sky News.

Abigail Foster

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Johnny Herbert

Johnny Herbert was one of the most brilliant natural talents to emerge in motor racing, but for all his bravery and prowess, he's lucky to be alive. After becoming British Junior Karting Champion (losing part of a finger in the process), then the Formula 3 title for Eddie Jordan in 1987, he was all set for a glittering debut season in Formula 1 when he was caught in a mass pile-up at Brands Hatch. That horrific crash threatened to end his career, but Herbert made a miraculous recovery, was a hugely popular winner of the British Grand Prix in 1995, and enjoyed 25 years of competitive motorsport, becoming the only British driver to win the 24 hours of Le Mans followed by a Grand Prix. And all that despite driving every pace in extreme pain; in fact, as the first and only disabled driver in F1 history. 
 
While chronicling an extraordinary life behind the wheel with cheer and his trademark cheeky humour, What Doesn't Kill You... contains a wealth of stories from the hard end of Formula 1: on Johnny's team-mate Michael Schumacher, legends like Ayrton Senna and Alain Prost, his fellow British adversaries Damon Hill, Martin Brundle and Nigel Mansell, and of course all those gruesome accidents. With an encyclopaedic knowledge and love of the sport, Johnny Herbert's autobiography, much like the man himself, delivers brilliance from the back of the grid.

What Doesn't Kill You...

My Life in Motor Racing

Frances Mayes

Discover the New York Times bestseller that inspired the film. The perfect read for anyone seeking an escape to the Italian countryside. 
 
When Frances Mayes – poet, gourmet cook and travel writer – buys an abandoned villa in Tuscany, she has no idea of the scale of the project she is embarking on. 
 
In this enchanting memoir she takes the reader on a journey to restore a crumbling villa and build a new life in the Italian countryside, navigating hilarious cultural misunderstandings, legal frustrations and the challenges of renovating a house that seems determined to remain a ruin. 
 
Filled with evocative landscapes, delicious recipes and colourful characters, Under the Tuscan Sun is a book to savour. It’s a love letter to Tuscany, good food, and the joys of starting over. 
 
"What makes it special is the sustained note of joy in it; joy in the beauty of the Tuscan countryside, the sights and sounds of daily life, the physical labour involved in the restoration of this 200-year-old villa and the five acres of land that go with it" SUNDAY TIMES

Under The Tuscan Sun

Anniversary Edition

James Redfield

Michael Murphy

Sylvia Timbers

From James Redfield, the author of the phenomenal international bestseller, The Celestine Prophecy, and Michael Murphy, the author of the bestselling Golf in the Kingdom, with documentary filmmaker Sylvia Timbers, comes the story of the past, present and future of human potential - and a journey that can take contemporary seekers to the next level of spiritual evolution. 
 
Written with the insight of the The Celestine Prophecy and representing a unique pairing of global visionaries, God and the Evolving Universe is a book that deepens our knowledge of personal growth and shows how each of us can begin to integrate our extraordinary experiences into a heightened synchronistic flow - allowing us to participate consciously in an unfolding evolutionary adventure. 
 
With exercises that readers can use to develop the abilities they are reading about, God and the Evolving Universe heightens readers' awareness of their place in personal/planetary evolution and sets the stage for actualizing the next level of human potential.

God And The Evolving Universe

Jean Sasson

After the recent success of Princess, More Tears to Cry the Princess Al-Saud and Jean Sasson are collaborating on this new book to bring readers up to date not only with the Princess and her family but the stories and experiences of characters who formed the focus of the last book: Dr Meena - the woman who helps abused women to heal and fight for their rights, and Fatima, the mother of twin daughters who, once abused and abandoned by her family, now works for the Princess in one of the royal palaces. 
 
Here too, are the stories of other Muslim women - women who are struggling with human rights abuses from across the region - from Pakistan, Syria and Northern Lebanon - and the many innocent victims who suffer the consequences of ISIS's march across the Middle East. 
 
This new book will attract both Jean Sasson's many loyal readers and new audiences eager to learn more about not only how the Saudi Royal family live, but how with courage and determination the Princess continues the fight for equal rights for women in the Middle East.

Princess: Secrets to Share

Dave Bassett

Wally Downes

'If we can sell Newcastle Brown to Japan, and if Wimbledon can make it to the First Division, there is surely no achievement beyond our reach.' Margaret Thatcher 
 
The Crazy Gang is the story of a football miracle. Promoted to the Football League in 1977, Wimbledon FC was a small team from south London that against the odds went all the way to the top of the First Division, then to win the FA Cup, in only just over a decade. With no money, scant resources and a blend of youth players and offcuts from other clubs, they were christened 'Rag-Arse Rovers'. They played hard on the pitch and partied hard off it. 
 
Dave 'Harry' Bassett was the manager who drilled a fierce fighting spirit into his players, an unbreakable team ethos, but he was also an underrated master tactician and pioneer of innovative training methods. Wally Downes was the midfield fulcrum of the Dons, but also the ringleader for the various acts of debauchery and general silliness that earned the club their reputation. 
 
In The Crazy Gang, Harry and Wally are joined by a host of former Wimbledon players and staff, both famous names like Vinnie Jones, Lawrie Sanchez and Dave Beasant, but also unsung heroes in the club's history, to tell it as it really was. This is real football, the way fans remember it, and a world away from multimillionaire Premier League primadonnas.

The Crazy Gang

Stephen Hawking

“It is said that fact is sometimes stranger than fiction, and nowhere is that more true than in the case of black holes. Black holes are stranger than anything dreamed up by science fiction writers.” 
 
In 2016 Professor Stephen Hawking delivered the BBC Reith Lectures on a subject that fascinated him for decades – black holes. 
 
In these flagship lectures the legendary physicist argued that if we could only understand black holes and how they challenge the very nature of space and time, we could unlock the secrets of the universe.

Black Holes: The Reith Lectures

Andy Bull

WINNER OF THE TIMES BIOGRAPHY OF THE YEAR AT THE BRITISH SPORTS BOOK AWARDS 
 
In the 1930s, as the world hurtled towards terrible global conflict, speed was all the rage. It was described by Aldous Huxley as 'the one genuinely modern pleasure', and one of the fastest and most thrilling ways to attain it was through the new sport of bobsledding. Exotic, exciting and above all dangerous, it was by far the most popular event at the Lake Placid Winter Olympics. It required an abundance of skill and bravery. And the four men who triumphed at those Games lived the most extraordinary lives. 
 
Billy Fiske was an infamous daredevil, blessed with a natural talent for driving. He would later become the first American airman to die in the war - flying for the RAF. Clifford Gray was a notorious playboy and a player on both Broadway and Hollywood. Or was he? His identity was a mystery for decades. Jay O'Brien was a gambler and a rogue who, according to one ex-wife, forced women to marry him at gunpoint. And Eddie Eagan, a heavyweight boxer and brilliant lawyer, remains the only man to win gold at both the Summer and Winter Olympics. 
 
This is their story, of loose living, risk-taking and hell-raising in an age of decadence, and of their race against the odds to become the fastest men on ice. We will never see their like again. Especially after the world did descend into that second, terrible global conflict.

Speed Kings

Oliver Graham Jones

One puff adder, one antelope, one crocodile – 
 
This was the list of sick animals presented to Oliver Graham-Jones on his first day as a new vet at London Zoo in 1951. And his time at the zoo didn’t get any less strange or entertaining… 
 
There’s the time he anaesthetized, and was then chased by, a gorilla; had to capture an angry polar bear in thick fog; performed a colostomy on a python; and fitted a raven in the Tower of London with a wooden leg. And if an animal escaped (more frequently than you might think) or required urgent medical attention, he was always on hand, ready for any eventuality. With his self-deprecating humour, Oliver frequently described himself as quaking with fear, but he was also skilful, brave and, most of all, incredibly caring and kind to his animal patients.

Zoo Tails

When Jean Sasson’s book Princess: Life Behind the Veil in Saudi Arabia was published, it became an immediate international bestseller. It sold to 43 countries and spent 13 weeks on The New York Times bestseller list. Now, in this long-awaited, compelling new book, Sasson and the Princess ‘Sultana’ return to tell the world what it means to be a Saudi woman today. 
 
Through advances in education and with access to work, Saudi women are breaking through the barriers; they are becoming doctors, social workers, business owners and are even managing to push at the boundaries of public life. Major steps forward have, undoubtedly, been made. 
 
But this is not the whole story. Sadly, despite changes in the law, all too often legal loopholes leave women exposed to terrible suppression, abuse and crimes of psychological and physical violence. 
For many, the struggle for basic human rights continues. 
 
This fascinating insight will include personal stories of triumph and heartbreak, as told to Princess 'Sultana', her eldest daughter, and author Jean Sasson. Each of these stories will offer the reader a glimpse into different aspects of Saudi society, including the lives of the Princess, her daughter and other members of the Al-Saud Royal family.

Princess More Tears to Cry

Huntly Gordon

In the centenary year of the Great War, names such as Ypres, the Marne, the Somme, Passchendaele are heavy with meaning as settings for the near-destruction of a generation of men. It is this aura of tragedy that makes Huntly Gordon’s memoir, drawn from his letters written from the Front, such a potent one. 
He was sensitive, intelligent, unpretentious and, as his account reveals, capable of detached and trenchant judgement. As the summer of 1914 drew to a close, it was difficult for a16 year-old schoolboy to realize that the world for which he had been prepared at Clifton College was itself preparing for war. By 1916, he was commissioned in the Royal Field Artillery. By June 1917, he was at the Ypres Salient getting his ‘baptism’ at Hell Fire Corner in an intensive artillery duel that formed the prologue to Passchendaele itself. Early in 1918, his battery would fight a series of rearguard actions near Baupaume that would help turn the tide of the massive German Spring offensive. 
Huntly Gordon has given us an enduring and classic memoir: a poignant and extraordinarily human account of history as it happened.

The Unreturning Army

Ellis Bacon

In 1868, the first ever documented bicycle race was held in a Paris park, and to the locals' chagrin, was won by a Briton. Yet while cycling culture became ingrained in continental European culture, riders this side of the Channel were engaged in constant battles with the authorities to pursue their sport - road racing was in fact banned as early as 1890. Its rise in popularity over the past 150 years, and the many triumphs of British cyclists in that time, have therefore been phenomenal. 
 
Never before has the full story of the sport been documented in one book, and in Great British Cycling, Ellis Bacon guides you through the development of our bike racing world, from weekend outings to British riders being able to compete in, then finish and win stages of the Tour de France. It takes you from cycling clubs and iconic frame-builders to a post-war explosion in cycling participation inspired by the likes of Brian Robinson, Tommy Simpson, Barry Hoban and Beryl Burton, from huge crowds witnessing the Tour of Britain and other races up and down the land to the modern era of glorious success by the likes of Mark Cavendish, Bradley Wiggins and Chris Froome. 
 
As the Tour de France returns to these shores for the fourth time, with Great Britain now firmly established at the top of the world of cycling, this is the ideal time for fans of the sport, both new and old, to explore its wonderful history.

Great British Cycling

The History of British Bike Racing

Dave Roberts

All Dave Roberts ever wanted to do (apart from collect football programmes) was to work in advertising. More specifically, to work for the world's best advertising agency, Saatchi and Saatchi. There was just one problem. Even when he managed to persuade someone to employ him, Dave's copywriting assignments were mainly for second hand car dealers and double glazing companies. And Leeds, Manchester and, bizarrely, New Zealand were a long way from Charlotte Street and Madison Avenue. This was the world of the Sad Men. 
 
In his sparkling new memoir, Dave tells the story of a life shaped by his love of adverts, from seeing the PG Tips chimps at the age of three to writing infamous ads such as the Westpac Rap and having David Jason plug a family restaurant. Bursting with brilliant ideas - and some pretty daft ones - it is the cautionary tale of a quest for advertising glory... and not quite ever getting there.

Sad Men

Pang-Mei Natasha Chang

After long afternoons spent with her great-aunt Yu-i, Pang-Mei, a first-generation Chinese-American, paints this unforgettable saga of a woman, born in Shanghai at the turn of the century to a well-to-do family, who continually defied the expectations of her class and culture. 
 
'In China, a woman is nothing,' began Yu-i over tea and dumplings. 'This is the first lesson I want to give so that you will understand.' Growing up in the perilous years between the fall of the last Emperor and the Communist Revolution, Yu-i led a life marked by a series of rebellions that changed the course of her life, including the first and most lasting: her refusal to have her feet bound. And as Yu-i confides her innermost dreams and demons to her great-niece in this dual memoir, the deeply textured portrait of a woman's life in China is blended with the very Western story of a young woman's search for identity and belonging.

Bound Feet And Western Dress

Alice Steinbach

A few years ago, Alice Steinbach, a Pulitzer prize winning journalist decided to take a break from her life. She took a leave from her job, friends and family to go on a European journey of self-discovery, and her first book, WITHOUT RESERVATIONS, was the exquisite result of that trip. 
But once Steinbach had opened the door to a new way of living, she found herself unwilling to return to her old routine. She left her job and went travelling again, only this time her objective was not so much one of self-discovery as it was a reaching out. She wanted to learn, by taking lessons and courses, but also by connecting to and learning from the people she would encounter along the way. 
Choosing exactly where to go and what to study turned out to be harder than she'd anticipated, but Steinbach found herself repeatedly drawn to the interests and fantasies of her youth. And so her lifelong fascination with writing, animals, gardening, and food led her to study dog training in Scotland, writing in Prague, gardening in Provence, calligraphy and flower arranging in Kyoto, music in Cuba, cooking in Paris and Jane Austen in Exeter. 
Her weeks and months spent with fellow students of all ages are, as she'd hoped, every bit as educational as her courses. And studying side by side with people preparing for careers in these various fields gives Steinbach a second chance at some roads not taken - a chance to reconnect with her past, when so many options were still open to her. In pursuing interests she's never had time to fully explore, she finds that her sense of curiosity is as strong as it ever was, and, as she discovers during the course of this wonderful trip, we are never too old to learn.

Educating Alice

Allan Mallinson

‘No part of the Great War compares in interest with its opening’, wrote Churchill. ‘The measured, silent drawing together of gigantic forces, the uncertainty of their movements and positions, the number of unknown and unknowable facts made the first collision a drama never surpassed…in fact the War was decided in the first twenty days of fighting, and all that happened afterwards consisted in battles which, however formidable and devastating, were but desperate and vain appeals against the decision of fate.’ 
 
On of Britain's foremost military historians and defence experts tackles the origins - and the opening first few weeks of fighting - of what would become known as 'the war to end all wars'. Intensely researched and convincingly argued, Allan Mallinson explores and explains the grand strategic shift that occurred in the century before the war, the British Army’s regeneration after its drubbings in its fight against the Boer in South Africa, its almost calamitous experience of the first twenty days’ fighting in Flanders to the point at which the British Expeditionary Force - the 'Old Contemptibles' - took up the spade in the middle of September 1914: for it was then that the war changed from one of rapid and brutal movement into the more familiar vision of trench warfare on Western Front. In this vivid, compelling new history, Malliinson brings his experience as a professional soldier to bear on the circumstances, events, actions and individuals and speculates – tantalizingly – on what might have been...

1914: Fight the Good Fight

Britain, the Army and the Coming of the First World War

Frank Gardner

On the June 6, 2004, while on assignment in Riyadh, BBC security correspondent Frank Gardner and cameraman Simon Cumbers were ambushed by Islamist gunmen. Simon was killed outright. Frank was hit in the shoulder and leg. As he lay in the dust, a figure stood over him and pumped four more bullets into his body at point-blank range... 
 
Against all the odds, Frank Gardner survived. 
 
Today, although partly paralysed, Frank continues to travel the world, reporting and making documentaries for the BBC. This acclaimed memoir was brought up to date with a new chapter that recounted his return to Saudi Arabia for the first time since he was shot and the story he tells continues to move and inspire, and remains an affirmation of his deep understanding of - and affection for - the Islamic world in these uncertain times. 
___ 
 
 
'Gardner tells his remarkable tale well and bravely, with an astonishing lack of anger and enduring love and respect for the Islamic world' SUNDAY TIMES 
 
'Brave, unsentimental and genuinely inspiring' EVENING STANDARD 
'What makes Gardner's moving, often humorous, deeply personal story so important is the fact that he has woven into it a brilliantly dispassionate, clear-eyed account of the Islamic world' SCOTSMAN 
'A witty, self-deprecating, inspiring testament' DAILY TELEGRAPH

Blood and Sand

The BBC security correspondent’s own extraordinary and inspiring story

Nathaniel Philbrick

What lights the spark that ignites a revolution? 
 
What was it that, in 1775, provoked a group of merchants, farmers, artisans and mariners in the American colonies to unite and take up arms against the British government in pursuit of liberty? 
 
Nathaniel Philbrick, the acclaimed historian and bestselling author of In the Heart of the Sea and The Last Stand, shines new and brilliant light on the momentous beginnings of the American Revolution, and those individuals – familiar and unknown, and from both sides – who played such a vital part in the early days of the conflict that would culminate in the defining Battle of Bunker Hill. 
 
Written with passion and insight, even-handedness and the eloquence of a born storyteller, Bunker Hill brings to life the robust, chaotic and blisteringly real origins of America.

Bunker Hill

A City, a Siege, a Revolution

Winston S. Churchill

Winston Churchill understood and wielded the power of words throughout his six decades in the public eye. His wartime writings and speeches revealed both his vision for the future and his own personal feelings, fascinating generation after generation with their powerful style and thoughtful reflection. In this book Churchill’s official biographer, Martin Gilbert, has skilfully selected 200 extracts from his entire oeuvre of books, articles and speeches that reflect his life story, career and philosophy. From intimate memories of his childhood to his contributions to half a century of debates on war and social policy, we see how Churchill used words for different purposes: to argue for moral causes; to advocate action in the national and international spheres, and to tell of his own struggles, setbacks and achievements. Martin Gilbert’s informed choice of extracts and his illuminating explanations linking them together create a compelling biography of Churchill as recounted in the great man’s own inimitable words.

Churchill: The Power of Words

Guy Walters

In early 1942 the Germans opened a top-security prisoner-of-war camp in occupied Poland for captured Allied airmen. Called Stalag Luft III, the camp soon came to contain some of the most inventive escapers ever known. They were led by Squadron Leader Roger Bushell, code-named 'Big X', who masterminded an attempt to smuggle hundreds of POWs down a tunnel built right under the noses of their guards. 
 
The escape would come to be immortalised in the famous film The Great Escape, in which the ingenuity and bravery of the men was rightly celebrated. The plan involved multiple tunnels, hundreds of forged documents, as well as specially made German uniforms and civilian clothing. In this book Guy Walters takes a fresh look at this remarkable event and asks the question, what was the true story, not the movie version? He also examines what the escape really achieved, and the nature of the man who led it. 
 
The Real Great Escape is the first account to draw on a newly-released cache of documents from Roger Bushell’s family, including letters from Bushell, that reveals much about this remarkable man, his life and experiences during the war, and the planning of the escape attempt that was to make him famous. The result is a compelling and authoritative re-evaluation of the most iconic escape story of the Second World War.

The Real Great Escape

Christopher Fowler

It’s the late 1970s and 20-something Christopher Fowler is a film freak, obsessively watching lousy films in run-down fleapit cinemas. He longs to be a famous screenwriter and put his dreams on the big screen. And so he heads for Wardour Street, Britain’s equivalent of Hollywood. 
But he’s made a spectacular mistake, arriving just as the nation’s filmmakers are falling to their knees, brought low by the arrival of video and the destruction of the old movie palaces. The only films being made are smutty low budget farces and TV spinoffs and instead of being asked to write another 
'Bullitt’, he's churning out short films advertising boilers and nylon sheets. Somehow, against the odds, he finds success – although in a very different guise to the one he expected. 
 
From the sticky Axminster of the local cinema to the red carpet at Cannes, Film Freak is a grimly hilarious and acutely observed trawl through the arse-end of the British film industry that turns into an ultimately affecting search for friendship and happiness.

Film Freak

Linda Geddes

From the presenter of the brilliant BBC podcast ‘Parentland’, and drawing on the most up-to-date scientific research, here are the answers to everything you’ve ever wondered about having a baby – from the first pregnancy symptoms to birth and the baby’s first twelve months. 
‘What a BRILLIANT book! The antidote to anecdote, a great survey of current evidence. Just what the midwife ordered!’ – Professor Alice Roberts 
‘Answers the questions that tantalise every mother’ – Daily Mail

Bumpology

The myth-busting pregnancy book for curious parents-to-be

Brooke Alpert

Patricia Farris

Sugar is the new controlled substance. More addictive than cocaine, the deadly white stuff has become the focus of health professionals worldwide who are highlighting the dangers of over-indulgence. And whilst we all know that a diet high in sugar can cause obesity, heart disease, cancer and diabetes, it is now also linked to a wide range of other serious health conditions, such as poor brain development in children, cataracts – even Alzheimer’s. Quite simply, our excess intake of sugar, from the spoonfuls we tip into our tea to the high levels of fructose hidden in packaged foods, is making us fat and sick, and is prematurely ageing our skin. 
 
In Sugar Detox nutritionist Brooke Alpert and dermatologist Dr Patricia Farris provide a revolutionary plan which will limit excess blood sugar, slim your waistline and increase your energy levels. It will help you to recapture youthful skin and good health. The secret? 
* A three-day detox sugar fix to rid your system of sugar and a three-day skin fix to pamper you on your journey to looking and feeling great 
* A four-week eating plan, delicious recipes and menus to help you to lose – and keep off – unwanted pounds now and in the future 
* A four-week skincare regime to fight the ageing process and keep your skin looking as youthful as ever. 
This is an easy-to-follow plan for looking and feeling your best – and most importantly, it will break your sugar addiction once and for all.

The Sugar Detox

Lose Weight, Feel Great and Look Years Younger

Nick Robinson

The relationship between politicians and broadcasters has always been fraught with tension. Today, every word and act of those who wield power is instantly broadcast and dissected on 24-hour rolling news channels, blogs and Twitter. But in the past, broadcasters were banned by law from debating anything newsworthy and Parliament imprisoned those who dared to report what MPs had said. Since that censorship ended, the two sides have clashed repeatedly. 
 
Live From Downing Street takes us on an absorbing journey through the history of this power struggle, dwelling in fascinating detail on the charismatic key players from radio and television – the Dimblebys, Day, Frost, Walden, Paxman, Humphrys – and those who fought back – Churchill, Wilson, Thatcher and Blair. As the BBC’s Political Editor, Nick Robinson is uniquely placed to add his own perceptive insights into the controversial issue of impartial reporting, providing a colourful and gripping account of the hard-fought battles for the right to tell the public about the decisions taken on their behalf.

Live From Downing Street

Richard Phillips

8th April 2009 was just an ordinary day for 53 -year-old Richard Phillips, captain of the United States-registered cargo vessel, the Maersk Alabama, as it headed towards the port of Mombasa. Ordinary that is until, two hundred or so miles off the east coast of Africa, armed Somali pirates attacked and boarded the freighter. It was the first time an American cargo ship had been hijacked in over 200 years. 
 
What the pirates didn’t expect was that the crew would fight back, nor did they expect Captain Phillips to offer himself as a hostage in exchange for the safety of his crew - a courageous gesture that resulted in his being held captive on a tiny life-boat off the anarchic, gun-plagued coast of Somalia. And so began a tense five-day stand-off, which ended in a daring high-seas rescue by U.S. Navy SEALs. 
 
In A Captain's Duty, Richard Phillips tells his own extraordinary story - that of an ordinary man who did what he saw as his duty and in so doing became a hero. It is a thrilling true tale of adventure and courage in the face of deprivation, death threats and mock executions and also a compulsively readable first-hand account of the terrors of high-seas hostage-taking.

A Captain's Duty

The true story that inspired the major film, Captain Phillips

Eleni Gage

Eleni Gage, a young journalist living in New York, leaves her Manhattan flat to return to the remote but beautiful Greek village of Lia in northern Greece and rebuild her ruined ancestral home. But this is not just another tale of quaint rustic DIY - the house was the scene of imprisonment and torture, and its ruins are stalked by the ghosts of the Greek Civil War. 
The story is played out in the stunning mountainous landscape of Epiros, one of the least-visited regions of Europe. As Eleni becomes part of the village, her neighbours and the house come vividly to life while her own disasters, triumphs and self-discoveries are alternately poignant and hilarious. The cast of characters includes Eleni's formidable yet miniscule aunts - the thitsas, who fear that she will be eaten by wolves; her immigrant Albanian builders; and the residents of modern-day Lia, whose feelings about the rebuilding of a house where such terrible events took place are ambivalent at best. 
 
Informed by her knowledge of Greece's folklore, literature, language and history, Eleni's story is unfailingly witty and wise. But beneath it all lie the indelible stains of a real-life Greek tragedy.

North Of Ithaka

Dave Simpson

When the Leeds United players celebrated winning the championship in April 1992, they had no idea how momentous the occasion was. Manchester United, losers at Liverpool that Sunday afternoon, had now gone 25 years without winning the league. Howard Wilkinson's side, promoted just two seasons ago, could bring back the glory days to Leeds. But Wilkinson would prove to be the last English manager to win the league. In 1992, football changed beyond all recognition. 
 
The Last Champions explores the roots of that success and the amazing cast of characters who came together to fashion the triumph. As in his acclaimed book The Fallen, Dave Simpson's quest to catch up with the protagonists of the era, from the visionary Sergeant Wilko, top scorer Lee Chapman and unsung heroes like Mike Whitlow and Carl Shutt (not forgetting Eric Cantona), sees him unearth some extraordinary untold stories. 
 
And he finds that The Last Champions were also the last ordinary people to win the league, before the Premier League saw skyrocketing wages, billionaire foreign owners and the dictates of television taking the game away from the fans. It is the brilliantly told story of the end of an era.

The Last Champions

Leeds United and the Year that Football Changed Forever

The author who unforgettably captured the experience of starting a new life in Tuscany returns to immerse herself - and her readers - in the sights, aromas and treasures of twelve new special places. 
 
A YEAR IN THE WORLD is vintage Frances Mayes - a celebration of the allure of travel, of serendipitous pleasures found in unlikely places, of memory woven into the present, and of a joyous sense of quest. An ideal travel companion, Frances Mayes brings to the page the curiosity of an intrepid explorer, remarkable insights into the wonder of the everyday, and a compelling narrative style that entertains as it informs. 
 
With her beloved Tuscany as a home base, Mayes travels to Spain and Portugal, France, the British Isles, and the Mediterranean world of Turkey, Greece, the south of Italy, and North Africa. In Andalucía, she relishes the intersection of cultures. She cooks in Portugal, gathers ideas in the gardens of England and Scotland, takes a literary pilgrimage to Burgundy and explores the Moroccan city of Fez. 
 
Weaving together personal perceptions and informed commentary on art, architecture, history, landscape, and the social and culinary traditions of each area, Mayes brings the immediacy of life in her temporary homes to the reader. An illuminating and passionate book that will be savored by all who loved UNDER THE TUSCAN SUN, A YEAR IN THE WORLD is travel writing at its absolute best.

A Year In The World

Ken McGoogan

In 1757, when twelve-year-old Samuel Hearne joined the Royal Navy as an apprentice to the famous fighting captain Samuel Hood, he was embarking on a life of high adventure. This young sailor would become the first European to reach the Arctic coast of North America, the author of a classic work of exploration literature, and the man who inspired one of the greatest poems in the English language. Yet, for over two centuries, Hearne's place in history has been a subject of dispute. In ANCIENT MARINER, Ken McGoogan paints a vivid portrait of life in the eighteenth century, from London through to the farthest reaches of North America. After serving as a midshipman during the Seven Years War, Hearne joined the Hudson's Bay Company and was posted to the Arctic coast. From there he embarked on an overland quest for a fabled copper mine - also hoping to discover the Northwest Passage. In his epic account, A JOURNEY TO THE NORTHERN OCEAN, Hearne described this trek, marked by hardship, near-starvation and culture shock. Joining forces with the legendary Dene leader Matonabbee, and closely observing the people, wildlife and terrain as he went, Hearne travelled more than 3,500 miles, mostly on foot. His journey culminated in the infamous massacre at 'Bloody Falls' at the mouth of the Coppermine River - an event, McGoogan suggests, that changed him for ever. 
In a fascinating piece of literary detective work, McGoogan also determines that, having returned to London to live out his final days, Hearne met Samuel Taylor Coleridge and inspired the poet to write his classic poem, THE RIME OF THE ANCIENT MARINER.

Ancient Mariner

Steve James

In 1999, England slumped to a new low in their tumultuous cricket history. Defeat at home by a mediocre New Zealand team saw them fall to the bottom of the world Test rankings, below even Zimbabwe. Yet only just over a decade later, England reached the top. It was a remarkable and profound transformation, brought about largely by two men with an insatiable desire to succeed, Duncan Fletcher and Andy Flower. 
 
In The Plan, Steve James tells the story of the renaissance of English cricket from a unique perspective. As the former batting partner of ECB managing director Hugh Morris, a player under Fletcher at Glamorgan and Flower's closest confidant in the press corps, James is the perfect analyst of this period in cricket history. From crucial choices of captain to innovative coaching and a complete overhaul of training and preparation for matches, it is the tale of a refusal to be second best. 
 
And in examining Fletcher and Flower's background in Zimbabwe, where James himself played, he uncovers the continental shift behind the turnaround. It is the story of how English steel was melded with African fire to create the most potent combination in world cricket.

The Plan: How Fletcher and Flower Transformed English Cricket

Terry Darlington

At seventy-five, Terry and Monica Darlington had done everything they could think of doing, including starting a business and becoming athletes and running a literary society.Lately they had become boating adventurers and Terry a bestselling writer. But in their Midlands canal town in November, life was looking dull and short on surprises. 
Then their famous canal boat was destroyed by fire. Within a few days they had bought a new one and soon headed north in the Phyllis May 2 – to Liverpool, Lancaster, the Pennines and Wigan Pier. Terry recorded the journey, and alongside it the story of his life and his marriage and his dog Jim, with his broken ear like a flat cap, and Monica’s dog Jess, known with heartbreaking reason as the Flying Catastrophe. 
Funny, affecting and beautifully told, this is a story that brims with incident and excitement, and is full of the famous and fascinating people the Darlingtons have met - a story of an adventurous life well lived.

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