5ive Guys FC

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A A Gill

Andrew Swanston read law at Cambridge, but was inspired to write by his lifelong interest in early modern history. His Thomas Hill novels – The King’s Spy, The King’s Exile and The King’s Return – are set against the backdrops of the English Civil War, Cromwell’s Commonwealth and the early Restoration respectively. He is also the author of Waterloo: The Bravest Man and Beautiful Star and Other Stories. His first historical thriller set during the reign of Elizabeth I – Incendium (published in paperback as The Incendium Plot) – introduced readers to the academic, lawyer and intelligencer Dr Christopher Radcliff, whose adventures continue in Chaos. Andrew Swanston lives in Surrey.

A D Swanston

A E Langsford

A G Hopkins

A. J. BAIME is the New York Times best-selling author of The Arsenal of Democracy: FDR, Detroit, and an Epic Quest to Arm an America at War and Go Like Hell: Ford, Ferrari, and Their Battle for Speed and Glory at Le Mans. Both books are in development for major motion pictures. Baime is a longtime regular contributor to the Wall Street Journal, and his articles have also appeared in the New York Times, Popular Science, and Men’s Journal. He lives in Granite Bay, California. Visit him at facebook.com/ajbaime and trumanbook.com.

A J Baime

A J Jacobs

A J P Taylor

Anthony James Pollard is a British medieval historian, specialising in the fifteenth century and in particular the Wars of the Roses. A leading authority in the field, he is profesor emeritus of Teesside University. His books include North-Eastern England during the Wars of the Roses, Richard III and the Princes in theTower, Imagining Robin Hood: the Late Medieval Stories in Historical Context and Warwick the kingmaker: Politics, Power and Fame.

A J Pollard

A J Rochester

A K Benjamin is a clinical neuropsychologist and the author of Let Me Not Be Mad: A Story of Unravelling Minds.

A K Benjamin

A. L. Berridge read English at Oxford, and taught for ten years before moving into television, where her production credits range from period drama and thrillers to long-running soaps. She has written two previous novels, Top Ten besteller Honour and the Sword and In the Name of the King. Into the Valley of Death is her third novel.

A L Berridge

Alison Gaylin's first job was as a reporter for a celebrity tabloid, which sparked a lifelong interest in writing about people committing despicable acts. More than a decade later, she wrote and published her Edgar-nominated first novel, HIDE YOUR EYES. 
 
She's since published nine more books, including the USA Today and international bestselling Brenna Spector suspense series, which has been nominated for the Edgar, Anthony and Thriller awards and won the Shamus award. 
 
She lives in upstate New York with her husband, daughter, cat and dog.

A L Gaylin

A Maxwell-Hyslop

A McArthur

A P Wavell

A.S. Webb is the Sunday Times bestselling author of Daughter of Chaos, the first instalment of The Dark Pantheon Trilogy. She is inspired by stories rooted in history and mythology, that push the boundaries of imagination and urge us to reflect on what it means to be human.

A S Webb

A. A. Dhand is the author of six previous novels, and has been shortlisted for the CWA Steel Dagger Award. His DI Harry Virdee novels are currently being adapted for TV by the BBC. He was raised in Bradford and spent his youth observing the city from behind the counter of a small convenience store. After qualifying as a pharmacist, he worked in London and travelled extensively before returning to Bradford to start his own business and begin writing. The history, diversity and darkness of the city have inspired all his novels. For more information about A. A. Dhand and his books, follow him on X @aadhand, and on Instagram @aa_dhand.

A. A. Dhand

A. A. Gill

A. A. Milne

A. Anatoli

A. B. Poranek grew up sharing her time between Ontario, Canada and rural Poland, and eventually completed a veterinary degree at the Warsaw University of Life Sciences. A lover of mythology and history, she enjoys exploring both in her writing. Her debut novel, Where the Dark Stands Still, an instant New York Times bestseller, is an ode to Poland's folktales, while A Treachery of Swans transports readers to a world inspired by 17th century France.

A. B. Poranek

A. Bradley

Professor A. C. Grayling is Principal of the New College of the Humanities at Northeastern University, London, and a Supernumerary Fellow of St Anne's College, Oxford. He has written and edited over thirty books on philosophy, history, science and current affairs. For several years he wrote columns for the Guardian newspaper and The Times and was the chairman of the 2014 Man Booker Prize.

A. C. Grayling

A.D. Miller is the author of Snowdrops, The Earl of Petticoat Lane and The Faithful Couple. Snowdrops was a bestseller and was shortlisted for many prizes including the Man Booker and the CWA Gold Dagger. It was translated into 25 languages. As Moscow Correspondent of The Economist A.D. Miller has travelled across the former Soviet Union and covered the Orange Revolution in Ukraine; he is now the magazine’s Culture Editor based in London. 
 
admillerbooks.com

A. D. Miller

A. E. Ellis

A. Humphreys

A. Igoni Barrett was born in Port Harcourt, Nigeria, in 1979 and lives in Lagos. He is a winner of the 2005 BBC World Service short story competition, the recipient of a Chinua Achebe Center Fellowship, a Norman Mailer Center Fellowship, and a Rockefeller Foundation Bellagio Center Residency. His short story collection, Love is Power, or Something Like That, was published in 2013. In 2014 he was named on the Africa39 list of sub-Saharan African writers under 40. Blackass is his first novel.

A. Igoni Barrett

The short life of A.J.A. Symons (1900-41) was described by his biographer as an intricate and largely harmless confidence trick. His many interests included the collection of musical boxes and rare books as well as the study and practice of forgery; they left him time to edit an anthology of Edwardian verse and compose studies of H.M. Stanley and other notable figures. He is remembered for The Quest for Corvo, one of the most remarkable biographies ever written, and for co-founding the Wine and Food Society.

A. J. A. Symons

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Jeremy Atherton Lin

A Book of the Year for The New Yorker 
 
It’s 1996, and Jeremy, a young American, has met the British boy of his dreams — just as, amid a media frenzy, US Congress prepares the Defense of Marriage Act, denying same-sex couples rights including immigration. The pair snatch time in forests and deserts, London fashion shows, and East Village hotel rooms; eventually, finding no other way to stay together, they shack up illicitly among unlikely allies in San Francisco. 
 
What emerges is an unexpected romantic comedy haunted by centuries of gay ghosts. Deep House moves through the couple’s various domiciles while unlocking doors to a lineage of outsiders who came before them: hapless criminals, sexpot bartenders, friars, pirates, government workers who subvert the system and activists who go all the way to the Supreme Court to fight for their freedoms. Combining cultural history with radically intimate memoir, Deep House is at once a romp through the queer archives and the innermost tale of two boyfriends who made a home in the shadows of a turbulent civil rights battle.

Deep House

The Gayest Love Story Ever Told

Armistead Maupin

‘Logical Family is a sweet, filthy peach of a memoir from a cultural explosion of a man’ Caitlin Moran 
‘A beautiful memoir — so tender and funny and dignified and kind that it left me a little weepy’ Alan Cumming 
‘I read Logical Family as slowly as I could. It was like having the great man visit and sit smoking and gossiping from an armchair at the foot of the bed’ Patrick Gale 
__________ 
 
In this long-awaited memoir, the beloved author of the bestselling Tales of the City series chronicles his odyssey from the old South to freewheeling San Francisco, and his evolution from curious youth to ground-breaking writer and gay rights pioneer. 
 
Raised in the heart of conservative North Carolina, Armistead Maupin lost his virginity to another man ‘on the very spot where the first shots of the Civil War were fired’. Realizing that the South was too small for him, this son of a traditional lawyer packed his earthly belongings into his Opel GT and took to the road in search of adventure. It was a journey that would lead him from a homoerotic Navy initiation ceremony in the jungles of Vietnam to that strangest of strange lands: San Francisco in the early 1970s.

Logical Family

A Memoir

Andy Wilman

Top Gear turned gloomy Sunday nights into celebratory Friday nights. It made household names of presenters Clarkson, Hammond and May, their unique chemistry and buddy movie antics proving irresistible to a global audience, earning them the Guinness World Record for the world's most popular factual TV show. Then, a short while later, it was gone. How did a thoroughly sensible little consumer advice programme on cars become a global phenomenon? How did it all go wrong? And how did they rise from the ashes as The Grand Tour? One man has all the answers - co-creator, and Jeremy’s oldest friend, Andy Wilman.

Mr Wilman’s Motoring Adventure

Top Gear, Grand Tour, Clarkson and Me

Sebastian Faulks

'A wise and heartfelt piece of writing' THE TIMES 
 
'Witty' INDEPENDENT 
 
'Wry and reflective . . . a soulful look at a life in words' i PAPER 
 
‘A wonderful portrait of an age, and of a writer’ RORY STEWART, author of Politics on the Edge 
 
‘Utterly fascinating’ DAVID KYNASTON, author of A Northern Wind 
 
*** 
 
'Shot through with the kind of depth and detail that can only come from a masterful writer finally turning his pen to his own life. Fresh, wise and finely-wrought' ALICE WINN, author of In Memoriam 
 
‘As charming and funny in schoolboy episodes as he is thought-provoking in the darker environs of mental health, Sebastian Faulks is always resonant, civilised and sane’ MARK KNOPFLER In Fires Which Burned Brightly, Faulks, a reluctant memoirist, offers readers a series of detailed snapshots from a life in progress. They include a post-war rural childhood – ‘cold mutton and wet washing on a rack over the range’ – the booze-sodden heyday of Fleet Street and a career as one of the country’s most acclaimed novelists. 
 
There are not one, but two daring escapes from boarding school; the delirium of a jetlagged American book tour; the writing of Birdsong in his brother’s house in 1992; and memorable trips across the channel to France. Politics, psychiatry and frustrated ventures into the world of entertainment are analysed with patience and rueful humour. 
 
The book is driven by a desire ‘to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.’ It ends with a tribute to Faulks’s parents and a sense of how his own generation was shaped by the disruptive power of war and its aftermath.Sharply perceptive and alive with a generous wit, Fires Which Burned Brightly is a work of subtle yet profound intelligence and warmth. 
 
PRAISE FOR SEBASTIAN FAULKS 
 
'Faulks writes with great emotional authority' SUNDAY TIMES 
 
'A prodigiously talented writer' NEW YORK TIMES 
 
'Faulks is beyond doubt a master' FINANCIAL TIMES 
 
'The most impressive novelist of his generation' SUNDAY TELEGRAPH

Fires Which Burned Brightly

A Life in Progress

Oisin Murphy

Born prematurely, weighing less than a bag of sugar, Oisin Murphy’s life has always been one of struggle. From a young age he found communion with horses. Mesmerised by their power, their spirit, he discovered a gift for the saddle. 
 
Oisin quickly established himself as one of horseracing’s most prodigious talents. But reaching the pinnacle of the sport required a high-wire dance that pushed his body and mind to their breaking point. Despite a three-year streak as champion jockey, alcohol addiction lurked beneath the surface, and a string of misdemeanours saw him banned for over a year. 
 
“I dealt with success and failure the same. Drink was the rock I perished on. The day I picked up the championship trophy there was no element of joy in it for me.” 
 
Fast paced and searingly honest, Sacrifice follows Oisin’s extraordinary journey back from the brink to recover his love for the sport and reclaim his champion jockey crown in 2024. It lays bare the realities of life as a professional jockey and the personal cost of success in a sport that demands total obsession.

Sacrifice

A Year in the Life of a Champion Jockey

Ashley Walters

Chris Isaie

FROM THE STAR OF THE PHENOMENAL NETFLIX SHOW, ADOLESCENCE, COMES A POWERFUL MEMOIR, PACKED WITH INSPIRING STORIES AND HARD-EARNED WISDOM FOR LIFE'S MOST CHALLENGING MOMENTS. 
 
“I wanted to write this book for that person who feels like the world doesn’t understand what life is like for them. I want to be honest about where I have been and how I have got to where I am. Because we can’t be what we can’t see.” – Ashley Walters 
 
'An icon of British and wider Black British culture.' GQ 
 
'A raw and inspiring testament to resilience.' STEVEN BARTLETT 
 
'A deeper truth that speaks to our whole time and culture, and offers us all a way forward.' AFUA HIRSCH 
 
'An important and powerful read.' IAN WRIGHT 
 
From Adolescence and Top Boy to So Solid Crew, Ashley Walters’ explosive on-screen performances and trailblazing music has always explored the same conflicting forces that have governed his life. Born and raised in Peckham, his father in and out of prison, Ashley found the gang culture in inner city London inescapable. At 15, he was stabbed in the neck and left for dead. At 18, he had a gun held to his head as he cradled his newborn son. At 20, he was sentenced to eighteen months in prison. 
 
In this brave and inspiring book, Ashley opens up about his turbulent past. He writes candidly about his battles with identity, addiction, family and fame, and the realisation that, after years of struggle, only he could change his future. 
 
‘Always Winning’ is the framework Ashley developed to turn his life around. Revealed for the first time in this book, explored through powerful stories from his life and career, he shares the principles of this philosophy and shows how anyone can use them to overcome their own challenges, helping them to align a true sense of purpose with inner happiness and personal success and fulfilment.

Always Winning

Duncan Ferguson

They don't make footballers - and football autobiographies - like this any more. The brutally honest, riotously entertaining story of the much-loved Everton legend and iconic Premier League bad boy. 
 
Praised by Wayne Rooney and Sir Alex Ferguson as one of the greatest and most passionate players to ever play the game, Duncan Ferguson, or Big Dunc as he is known, is larger than life in every sense. Measuring a towering 6 feet 4 inches in height, from the moment the striker emerged in British football in the 1990s, he was front and back page news. On the pitch, fans loved Duncan for his roguish charm, his thrilling goals and his total commitment in every game. Fighting tooth and nail, he was a born leader and took no prisoners. Like his rival Roy Keane, he played close to the limit, and often crossed it. Such as the time he was sentenced to 3 months in Glasgow’s toughest prison for headbutting an opponent – the first and only time a footballer has ever gone to jail for a crime committed on a football pitch. 
 
In BIG DUNC: The Upfront Autobiography, Duncan reveals, for the first time, the full story: the truth about his experiences in prison, his partying with African princes and Liverpool gangsters, his fighting with burglars, his making and losing a fortune, and how he turned his life around through his beloved Everton F.C.. In the process, the book sheds light on one of football’s most charismatic but notorious and enigmatic hardmen. Duncan has also been a manager and a coach. He is a pillar of the community in Merseyside, giving back to stricken children who share a similar tough upbringing to his own. Duncan's book takes readers on a rollercoaster ride of humour, drama and redemption. Buckle up.

BIG DUNC

The Upfront Autobiography

Jeremy Clarkson

Clarkson’s farm is the gift that keeps on giving, and now our hero has decided to bring his misunderstood entrepreneurial flair to bear on a new venture: a pub. Let the doors open on The Farmer’s Dog. 
 
All British produce, Hawkstone beer on tap, a private bar for farmers and a vintage tractor hanging from the ceiling. The perfect country pub. But as the Cotwolds’ newest publican quickly discovers, there’s a lot more to landlording than pulling pints. 
 
Just as well, then, that he still has Lisa, Kaleb, Cheerful Charlie and Gerald to help him through...

Diddly Squat: The Farmer's Dog

Miriam O'Callaghan

I started writing this book as an exclusively work memoir but the work and the personal kept overlapping. I don’t know if that’s because I’m a woman or a mother or both, or none of those reasons. I just know that for my story to be authentic and truthful, I couldn’t simply focus on the work side of my life. 
Miriam O'Callaghan is one of Ireland's best-known broadcasters, covering every election, referendum, major controversy and important public event for TV, and hosting an award-winning radio show. Combining career success, high-octane glamour and being a mother-of-eight makes her a truly unique figure in Irish public life. 
In her absorbing memoir, Miriam shares touching stories from her personal life – from the life-changing impact of losing her beloved sister and father in a matter of months, and the end of her first marriage that same year, to the joys and challenges of bringing eight children into the world and juggling a frenetically busy life (‘give up on perfection’ is her wise advice!). 
Miriam includes fascinating insights into a career that has given her a ringside seat to a changing Ireland. Like attending Bobby Sands’ wake even before she was a journalist, and life coming full circle when she championed John Hume to be declared the greatest figure in Irish history. She describes extraordinary debates, important and heart-breaking conversations with people in the eye of a media storm, and how she goes after and prepares for the big interviews – as well as what happens when things go wrong. Miriam also addresses the recent RTÉ controversies that cast a shadow over its high-profile presenters, not least herself. 
Miriam is an exceptionally honest and personal memoir from one of Ireland’s most esteemed broadcasters

Miriam

Life, Work, Everything

Susan Lewis

Susan was only nine when her beloved mother died. Not long after, still a tiny child, she was sent away to school. In just one year her entire world had fallen apart. 
 
Struggling to cope so far from home, Susan pushed away the one person she loved best: her father. 
 
Years passed, and the legacy of her tragic childhood remained as poignant as ever. But slowly, Susan understood that to overcome her grief, she had to learn to love - and trust – again. 
 
And so began a journey of reconciliation that would change her world once more… 
 
Praise for Susan Lewis: 
 
‘A multi-faceted tear-jerker’ Heat 
 
‘Expertly written to brew an atmosphere of foreboding, this story is an irresistible blend of intrigue and passion, and the consequences of secrets and betrayal’ Woman 
 
‘Utterly compelling’ Sun 
 
‘Spellbinding! You just keep turning the pages, with the atmosphere growing more and more intense as the story leads to its dramatic climax’ Daily Mail 
 
‘One of the best around’ Independent on Sunday 
 
‘Sad, happy, sensual and intriguing’ Woman’s Own

One Day at a Time

Mary Ann Kenny

'A must-read: it hits you right in the heart' Katriona O'Sullivan, author of Poor 
 
'Written in beautifully honest prose, and illuminated throughout by something rare and invaluable: the notes kept by those who dealt with her…. A gripping and important book’ Horatio Clare, The Telegraph 
'Compelling' Irish Examiner 
 
‘A story of tenacity and bravery … visceral’ Irish Times 
---It could happen to anyone. 
 
One fine April day, Mary Ann Kenny’s husband died suddenly while jogging near their family home. In the months that followed, Mary Ann – who had no history of mental illness – began suffering from depression, and then from a terrifying succession of physical and psychological symptoms, including the delusion that her young children had been harmed by her medications. 
 
In this gripping memoir, Mary Ann details her descent into psychosis, her hopitalization, and her inspiring journey back to health and happiness. Drawing on her detailed medical files and on her own recollections, she has created a day-by-day account of what it is like to lose touch with reality while dealing with grief and living in the dreadful knowledge that everything you care about in life is under threat. And The Episode tells the inspiring story of how Mary Ann recovered from her illness, came to terms with her trauma, and spoke truth to the health service about the limitations of medical psychiatry. It reminds us that anyone could end up in Mary Ann’s situation, while also showing that recovery and happiness are possible even after severe mental illness. 
 
Written with the pace of a thriller and the insight of a great psychological novel, The Episode is a brilliant act of personal reclamation and an essential read for anyone who is interested in the workings of the mind. 
 
--- ‘Powerful’ Brendan O’Connor, RTÉ Radio 1 
 
'A deeply moving, often terrifying account of grief, illness, and recovery, this vivid memoir carries the reader so close to its unfolding events that it quickens the breath.' Doireann Ní Ghríofa, author of A Ghost in the Throat 
 
'Deeply insightful, clear-sighted and immersive ... it would be harrowing if not so beautifully written. I've never read anything quite like it.' Patrick Freyne, author of OK, Let's Do Your Stupid Idea 
 
'Steers an arresting course between an academic’s rigorous research and pacy, insightful readability … it’s shocking to read' Irish Times 
 
'Delivered in elegant, quietly furious prose, it deserves a wide readership' Sunday Independent 
 
‘A page-turning read … a fantastic writer.’ Irish Times Women's Podcast 
 
‘A brave, elucidatory book’ Ceci Browning, The Times

The Episode

A True Story of Loss, Madness and Healing

Steven Lovatt

A moving, powerful quest for belonging through the forsaken landscapes of Britain 
 
When Steven Lovatt’s grandmother died, he lost not only a beloved family member but also his last link to the way of life she had represented: rooted in place, socially democratic, ecologically rich. Cut loose from the past and confronted with a present missing even the birds of his childhood, Steven’s mind cracked. 
 
Drawing on field work, local library archives and oral history, as well as dreams, diaries and visions, Enchanted Ground charts a fractured course from breakdown to belonging. For if he is to survive, Steven realises he must set out, like a pilgrim, across the motorways and monoculture wastes of Britain in search of enchanted ground – and those who have begun to rebuild it.

Enchanted Ground

Growing Roots in a Broken World

Imani Perry

Many of us think we know the American South. We can rattle off a list of signifiers: the Civil War, Gone with the Wind, the Ku Klux Klan, plantations, football, Jim Crow, slavery. But the idiosyncrasies, dispositions, and habits of the region are stranger and more complex than much of the country tends to acknowledge. In South to America, Imani Perry shows that the meaning of American is inextricably linked with the South, and that our understanding of its history and culture is the key to understanding the nation as a whole. 
 
This is the story of a Black woman and native Alabaman returning to the region she has always called home and considering it with fresh eyes. Her journey is full of detours, deep dives, and surprising encounters with places and people. She renders Southerners from all walks of life with sensitivity and honesty, sharing her thoughts about a troubling history and the ritual humiliations and joys that characterise so much of Southern life. 
 
Weaving together stories of immigrant communities, contemporary artists, exploitative opportunists, enslaved peoples, unsung heroes, her own ancestors, and her lived experiences, Perry crafts a tapestry unlike any other. With uncommon insight and breathtaking clarity, South to America shows that in order to envision a more humane future for the United States, we must shift our focus below the Mason-Dixon Line.

South to America

A Journey to Understand the Soul of a Nation

Sheku Kanneh-Mason

Music is what makes us alive, mindful and connected to each other. Music is what makes us human. This is the power of music. 
 
Cellist Sheku Kanneh-Mason knows and feels the transformative power of music as much as any musician alive. From winning the prestigious BBC Young Musician Award to performing at Harry and Meghan’s wedding; from Bach’s solo suites to Bob Marley’s reggae; his ferocious passion shines through in every single performance, whether in a packed-out concert hall or on record. 
 
But how was it that someone like him – a person of colour, from a state school in Nottingham – rose to the upper echelons of the classical music world? What were the obstacles that he had to overcome, what did he learn along the way, and how could a young person follow in his footsteps today? 
 
In The Power of Music, Sheku explores the experiences and values that led him here, from a childhood of football practice and family music sessions, to his work today in the world’s finest concert halls and in the less privileged communities that surround them. As his star continues to rise, he shows us the darker side of an industry ruled by exclusivity and stubborn adherence to tradition. 
 
With its power to transform our mental and physical health, to effect social change, and to make a house a home, Sheku shows us that classical music is for everyone, not just an elite few. The Power of Music is a celebration of music of all sorts and those who make it, and a rallying call to change.

The Power of Music

How Music Connects Us All

Esther Ghey

On 11 February 2023, 16-year-old Brianna Ghey was lured to a local park where she was tragically murdered. Amidst the international outpouring of outrage, anguish and displays of support, her usually shy and private mother, Esther, came to reflect on how she could redirect her personal grief into campaigning to help others and to create a lasting legacy for her child. A clarion call for change, this is an essential and urgent read about finding threads of hope in the darkest of times and uniting to protect our young people from the threats they face in an increasingly unchecked digital world.

Under a Pink Sky

Gyles Brandreth

This is the intimate biography of our beloved Queen Elizabeth II, which tells the story of her remarkable life, reign and times, based upon unrivalled access to royal circles and from a perspective unlike any other. Gyles Brandreth writes the Queen's tale candidly with grace and sensitivity as someone close to the monarch, her husband Philip and the wider Royal family. 
 
Told with a refreshing dose of humour and moving honesty, Elizabeth is the must-have biography of the longest-serving monarch in English history, now complete with exclusive content about the 2023 coronation of King Charles III and Queen Camilla.

Elizabeth

An intimate portrait from the writer who knew her and her family for over fifty years

Rob Cowen

LONGLISTED FOR THE WAINWRIGHT PRIZE FOR NATURE WRITING 2025 
 
‘A dazzlingly inventive work of literature’ Robert Macfarlane, author of The Old Ways'A wonderful, epic braiding of history, geography and personal memoir' James Rebanks, author of English Pastoral____________________________________________________________________At the heart of this book is a highway. The A1; The Great North Road. A 400-mile multiplicity of ancient trackway, Roman road, pilgrim path, coach route and motorway that has run like a backbone through Britain for the last 2,000 years. 
 
In this genre-defying and profoundly personal book, Cowen follows this ghost road from beginning to end on a journey through history, place, people and time. Weaving his own histories and memories with the layered landscapes he moves through, this is the story of an age, of coming to terms with time past and time passing, and the roads that lead us to where we find ourselves. 
 
Written in kaleidoscopic prose, The North Road is an unforgettable exploration of Britain’s great highway. 
_________________________________________________________________________ 
 
'Stunning and utterly unique. The North Road sits in a genre of one' Benjamin Myers, author of The Gallows Pole 
 
'A dazzling, dogged, layered account of one road’s passage through place, time and an ordinary family’s history, The North Road truly is a trip' Melissa Harrison, author of All Among The Barley 
 
'Thought-provoking and beautiful' Matt Gaw, author of Under The Stars 
 
'A beautifully woven and mesmerising book' Tom Bullough, author of Sarn Helen 
 
'Sweeping, sensitive and enduring' Tristan Gooley, author of How To Read A Tree 
‘Rob has given the A1 an entirely new sense of life’ Luke Turner, author of Out Of The Woods

The North Road

Frances Ryan

'No one really talks about it. No one really talks about what it is to be a disabled woman, especially a young one … To navigate all the standard parts of life - exams, careers, dating - but with a body that is different from everyone else’s.' 
 
Almost one in four women in the UK have some sort of disability, yet this subject is too often shrouded in silence and stereotypes. Who Wants Normal? by the award-winning journalist and author Frances Ryan is a game-changing take on disability and feminism. 
 
Part memoir, part manifesto, it explores six facets of life: education, careers, health, body image, relationships and representation, as well as how to survive life’s bumps in the road. It draws on Frances’s own experience as well as her interviews with over fifty of Britain’s best-known women and non-binary people with mental and physical health conditions, including Jameela Jamil, Sophie Morgan, Ruth Madeley, Nikki Fox, Rosie Jones, Fearne Cotton, Emma Barnett, Ellie Goldstein and Katie Piper. 
 
Who Wants Normal? lifts the lid on and redefines what it means to be a disabled woman in Britain today. It offers support, inspiration and a sense of solidarity to the many women with disabilities and long-term health conditions – as well as opening the eyes of anyone wanting to better understand life with a disability.

Who Wants Normal?

Life Lessons from Disabled Women

The Disabled Girls’ Guide to Life

Oleksandr Mykhed

‘We were so happy and didn’t know it…’ 
 
A thirty-three-year-old writer lives in a quiet European suburb with his wife and his dog. His parents have bought an apartment nearby. On weekends they go out for brunch, cook and see friends. Life is good; it is normal. Then the invaders come. 
 
Language of War is about what happens when your world changes overnight. When you wake up to the sound of helicopters and the smell of gunpowder. When your home is hit by shells or broken into by gunmen, and you spend another night in a basement-turned-bomb shelter. When, even though you’ve never held a weapon before, you realise the only choice is to fight back. It is about things one can never forget, or forgive. 
 
Bringing together Oleksandr Mykhed’s vivid day-by-day chronicles of the invasion of Ukraine with a chorus of other voices – his family, friends in exile, those who have fought and have witnessed unimaginable atrocities – this book is both a record, and a reckoning. Haunting and timeless, it asks how it is possible to find the words to describe a new reality; how you can still make sense of the world when the only language you can speak is the language of war.

The Language of War

Joe Dunthorne

Joe Dunthorne had always wanted to write about his great-grandfather, Siegfried: an eccentric scientist who invented radioactive toothpaste and a Jewish refugee from the Nazis who returned to Germany under cover of the Berlin Olympics to pull off a heist on his own home. 
 
The only problem was that Siegfried had already written the book of his life – an unpublished, two-thousand page memoir so dry and rambling that none of his living descendants had managed to read it. And, as it turned out when Joe finally read the manuscript himself, it told a very different story from the one he thought he knew… 
 
Thus begins a mystery which stretches across the twentieth century and around the world, from Berlin to Ankara, New York, Glasgow and eventually London – a mystery about the production of something much more sinister than toothpaste. On the trail of one ‘jolly grandpa’ with a patchy psychiatric history and an encyclopaedic knowledge of poison gases, Joe Dunthorne is forced to confront the uncomfortable questions that lie at the heart of every family. Can we ever understand where we come from? Is every family in the end a work of fiction? And even if the truth can be found – will we be able to live with it? 
 
Children of Radium is a remarkable, searching meditation on individual and collective inheritance. Witty and wry, deeply humane and endlessly surprising, it considers the long half-life of trauma, the weight of guilt and the ever-evasive nature of the truth.

Children of Radium

A Buried Inheritance

Yehudis Fletcher

As the daughter of a rabbi raised in an Orthodox Jewish community, Yehudis struggled to conform to the strict expectations placed upon her and her siblings. Outspoken, curious and desperate to know more about G-d, she felt fenced in by arbitrary rules and questions left unanswered. 
 
As she grew older, these restrictions intensified and her questions for G-d hung heavier than ever. Repeatedly let down by those who were supposed to protect her and pushed on to a path that seemed to take her further away from who she really was, she began to yearn for a life where she could embrace all facets of herself. 
 
When Yehudis’s sexuality came to blows with the expectations of her family and her community, the pressure to inhabit a binary position reached fever pitch. Confronted with either losing the faith she loved or losing herself, Yehudis made the most daring decision of all: she decided to stay. 
 
Wry and exhilarating, Chutzpah is a fearless exploration of what is possible when one person simply refuses to choose between abandoning their roots and abandoning themselves.

Chutzpah

A memoir of faith, sexuality and daring to stay

Deepa Paul

What if you dared to want more – from love, from life, from yourself? 
 
Deepa Paul rises from her boyfriend’s bed in the early hours of dawn. She gets dressed, slips away with a kiss and cycles home where she is welcomed lovingly by her husband. There isn’t a glimmer of shame, deception or guilt, only the honesty and compassion needed to make this kind of life possible – even if it wasn’t always this easy. 
 
Whose idea was it? What are the rules? Are you ever jealous? Deepa answers these questions openly and tenderly, as she seeks the truths that so many of us want to discover. Can I ask for what I want? Do I deserve it? Is it worth it? 
 
Beautiful and bold, this is one woman’s story of becoming, of desire and of identity, and of asking the questions she deserved to find the answers to.

Ask Me

A Memoir of Daring to Love Differently

Didier Eribon

A few years ago, Didier Eribon’s mother began to lose her physical and cognitive autonomy. After several months of resistance, Eribon and his brothers were compelled to place her in a nursing home. A few short weeks later, his mother passed away. 
 
In The Life, Old Age, and Death of a Working-Class Woman, Eribon continues the historical, political and personal reflection he began with Returning to Reims, this time turning his attention to the end of life. Tracing his mother’s rapid decline, and drawing on works by Simone de Beauvoir, Norbert Elias, Annie Ernaux and Michel Foucault, among others, Eribon transmutes his rage, sadness and the shame over her death into a strikingly nuanced portrait of the woman who raised him. Here, Eribon asks: how does our society treat the elderly? What is the place of bodies that can no longer assemble, discuss freedom or protest? Can the completely dependent speak for themselves – and if not, who can speak for them? 
 
An honest, original and wide-ranging exploration of the relationship between ageing and class, politics and literature, this is a profound meditation on a fundamental human experience, too often overlooked.

The Life, Old Age, and Death of a Working-Class Woman

Liliane Lijn

In 1958, talented and fearless and eighteen years old, Liliane Lijn left her family home and moved to Paris alone to become an artist. Once there, she found an art world filled with the wild energy of creative revolution – peopled and controlled almost entirely by men. 
 
In the years that followed, Lijn built a life for herself in the city. She embraced the hectic bohemian spirit of the Left Bank. She befriended artists, painters, poets, gallerists and revolutionaries, as the late Surrealists gave way to a burgeoning Pop Art movement. She had disastrous love affairs with difficult men. She experimented boldly, creating ground-breaking sculptures with light, text and movement. And as her profile steadily grew, she was told again and again that there are no great women artists: ‘There never have been.’ 
 
Liquid Reflections is her memoir of these years of experiment and adventure – years when Lijn was constantly in motion, from Paris to New York to Venice to Athens, from paper and canvas to wax and Perspex to oil and water. In love, she became pregnant but rebelled against the idea that a woman could not be both a great artist and a mother. 
 
And she sought – and found – radical pleasure in the act of creative expression and in the living, sensuous world around her. 
 
Based on personal diaries from the time, this is a riveting and revelatory account of a singular coming of age: a glittering portrait of the artist as a young woman. 
 
'I wrote LIQUID REFLECTIONS because I wanted to take my readers on the journey I made to become an artist. It's the story of an idealistic, inspired young woman who refuses to accept the prejudices of her time. Becoming an artist was also a search for my own identity…’ Liliane Lijn

Liquid Reflections

Caroline Elton

Meet Lionel, Caroline’s older brother. Born in the late 1940s, when little was known about autism, Lionel was considered a peculiarity. From the beginning, he was a silent child, oblivious to the people around him and intent only on playing with his toy trucks. By the time he turned four, doctors declared him ineducable and advised that he be institutionalised – a shockingly standard practise at the time. 
 
No one could have predicted that Lionel would go onto music college and find his place in the world. With the help of his mother – who refused to send him away – Lionel lived a life that was certainly unusual but never dull. He had perfect pitch, could multiply three-figure numbers in his head, or work out which day of the week you were born on, the instant you told him your birthday. 
 
But when Lionel’s mother dies, and shortly after he is diagnosed with cancer, his two sisters struggle to fill the void – to become Lionel’s caretaker and support him as they had promised their mother. Looking After is both a portrait of one autistic man's remarkable life, and a heart-rending story of how one family learnt to care for each other, to deal with loss and to be by each other’s side at the very end.

Looking After

Autism, Family and End-of-Life Care

A Portrait of My Autistic Brother

Emma Barnett

The essential companion for every mother embarking on maternity leave 
 
'In one important sense maternity leave is poorly named, as it involves no actual leave. You are constantly on, even when your offspring is having a nap. There is nothing restful about it. In another sense maternity leave is aptly named, because it’s a period of leave from all you know: taking leave of one’s mind, body, job, and relationships' 
 
When Emma Barnett began her second maternity leave, she realized that, despite having been there before, as soon as her first leave finished the rose-tinted lenses had descended and she immediately forgot what the experience was actually like when you’re in it. This collective forgetting, which leads to well-meaning comments such as ‘enjoy every minute’ and ‘treasure this special time’, is doing a disservice to women, leaving them unprepared for the more complicated reality of what it means to be on maternity service. 
 
In this warmly reassuring, refreshingly honest book, Emma sets out to capture this reality, in real time while on her latest tour of duty. She isn’t offering advice on sleep-training or weaning or helping your baby reach milestones. Instead, this book is a celebration and acknowledgement of the work of being on maternity leave, with its soaring highs and challenging lows, and its impact on how women feel about our purpose and ourselves.

Maternity Service

A Love Letter to Mothers from the Front Line of Maternity Leave

Tao Leigh Goffe

Our planet is on the precipice of ecological breakdown and climate despair is at an all-time high. But there are many communities who have survived beyond the environmental destruction wrought on them by colonialism – and they hold the solutions for climate repair. 
 
Using the Caribbean as a case study, Tao Leigh Goffe traces the history of the islands back to the arrival of Christopher Columbus, when the Caribbean became the subject of Western exploitation. Charting the ecological forces that have shaped the islands – from guano to coral reefs, sugarcane to mongooses – and learning from Black, Indigenous and Asian island histories, Goffe makes the argument that the extractivist capitalism that is the origin of the climate crisis is borne from colonial thinking – and that to fight one effectively is to fight both. 
 
Treating the Caribbean as both a warning and a guide, Dark Laboratory is a lyrical, vibrant and urgent investigation into the greatest threat facing humanity.

Dark Laboratory

On Columbus, the Caribbean, and the Origins of the Climate Crisis

Viv Groskop

'Full of helpful concepts... I'm finding it very useful.' Philippa Perry 
'Plenty of tips and tricks.' Sunday Times 
 
Most books about public speaking don't tell you what to do when you open your mouth and nothing comes out. And they don't tell you how to get over the anxiety about performance that most people naturally have. They don't tell you what to do in the moments when you are made, as a woman, to feel small. They don't tell you how to own the room. 
 
This book does. 
 
From the way Michelle Obama projects 'happy high status', and the power of J.K. Rowling's understated speaking style, to Virginia Woolf's leisurely pacing and Oprah Winfrey's mastery of inner conviction, what is it that our heroines do to make us sit up and listen - really listen - to their every word? And how can you achieve that impact in your own life? 
 
Here's how.

How to Own the Room

Women and the Art of Brilliant Speaking

Nora Ephron

Soak up the wisdom of the inimitable Nora Ephron with this stunning 20th-anniversary special edition, featuring a foreword by Dolly Alderton. The perfect gift for yourself or a friend. 
 
'Ephron has an uncanny ability to sound like your best friend, whoever you are' NEW YORK TIMES. 
 
'The book that most influenced me' LILY ALLEN 
 
Acclaimed Hollywood filmwriter and director Nora Ephron examines the indignities of ageing in a collection of wickedly witty autobiographical pieces such as 'I Hate My Handbag', 'Blind as a Bat' and 'What I Wish I'd Known'. I Feel Bad About My Neck offers the consolation that no matter how much your neck sags, your boobs droop, your skin wrinkles and your children don't appreciate you, someone has been there before you. 
 
Nora Ephron captures the essence of what it means to be an older woman in an irresistible, laugh-out-loud funny, frank and unexpectedly moving book that every woman should have on their shelves.

I Feel Bad About My Neck

And Other Thoughts On Being a Woman

with a new introduction from Dolly Alderton

Hilton Als

What are the forces that shape us? In The Women, Hilton Als explores—with breath taking originality—the role of sexual and racial identity in marginalized lives. With a blend of fact and fiction, Als brings to vivid life a number of extraordinary characters, including: his mother, a singular woman whose West Indian heritage and determination inspired her son to write; Malcolm X's mother, whose mixed-race background and eventual descent into madness contributed to her son's burgeoning misogyny and fear; brilliant, Harvard-educated Dorothy Dean, who deeply empathized with white gay men; and Owen Dodson, teacher and poet, who played an important role in the author's development as a gay man, and thinker. 
 
Combining memoir, cultural history, social theory and storytelling, The Women is a profoundly innovative work which has inspired a generation of writers. Here, Als submits both racial and sexual stereotypes to scrutiny, showing ‘no mercy but every tenderness’. The results are exhilarating. The Women is that rarest of books: a memorable work of self-investigation that creates a form of all its own.

The Women

The year is 1Q84. This is the real world, there is no doubt about that. But in this world, there are two moons in the sky. Discover the 1Q84 Trilogy by Haruki Murakami.

1Q84

365 Days of Art

A BBC Christmas

A Black Book Thriller

A Box Full of Murders

A Cal Leandros Novel

A Christmas Mystery

The intelligent and capable police commissioner Guido Brunetti confronts crime in and around his home town of Venice.

A Commissario Brunetti Mystery

A DC Smith / Kings Lake Investigation Series

A Daisy Story

Chronicling the lives of over three hundred characters, unrivalled for its scope and humour, this is a unique evocation of life in twentieth-century England.

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