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Julian Hoppit

It has always been an important part of British self-image to see the United Kingdom as an ancient, organic and sensibly managed place, in striking contrast to the convulsions of other European countries. Yet, as Julian Hoppit makes clear in this fascinating and surprising book, beneath the complacent surface the United Kingdom has in fact been in a constant, often very tense argument with itself about how it should be run and, most significantly, who should pay for what. 
 
 The book takes its argument from an eighteenth century cartoon which shows the central state as the 'Dreadful Monster', gorging itself at the dinner table on all the taxes it can grab. Meanwhile the 'Poor Relations' - Scotland, Wales and Ireland, both poor because of tax but also poor in the sense of needing special treatment - are viewed in London as an endless 'drain on the state'. With drastically different levels of prosperity, population, industry, agriculture and accessibility between the United Kingdom's different nations, what is a fair basis for paying for the state?

The Dreadful Monster and its Poor Relations

Taxing, Spending and the United Kingdom, 1707-2021

Louai Al Roumani

A STORY OF HOPE, PERSEVERANCE AND RESILIENCE IN THE MIDST OF CHAOS 
 
Louai Al Roumani was head of finance and planning at one of the largest banks in Syria when the war broke out in 2011. 
 
In Lessons from a Warzone, Al Roumani shares his very personal account of coping with the day-to-day realities of leading an organization in dangerous and hostile conditions. His story shows how inspiration can come from the unlikeliest of places, and how a business can not only survive in chaos, but can learn to thrive - the bank became the undisputed sector leader as people's trust in its capability to protect their life-long savings strengthened. 
 
In this book, Al Roumani distils the knowledge and skills he and his colleagues developed while steering the bank through four impossible years into ten lessons applicable to any leader facing a crisis today. His valuable and often counterintuitive advice will help anyone understand how to be resilient even in the most challenging of times.

Lessons from a Warzone

How to be a Resilient Leader in Times of Crisis

David Kynaston

A World of Its Own tells the story of the City of London's nineteenth century ascent to its position as the world's leading international financial centre. We witness the rise of the merchant banks, the growth of the Stock Exchange, the internationalism of the money market, and the characters behind these developments, like the mercurial Nathan Rothschild or the dour Joshua Bates. 
 
High history is interwoven with high drama: the burning of the Royal Exchange on a snowy night in 1838, the hectic making of fortunes from South American guano; the Baring crisis of 1890, when the city's most respected house was rescued by its keenest rival. A World of Its Own is at once a powerful narrative, peopled with extraordinary characters, and a brilliant work of social and economic history.

The City Of London Volume 1

A World of its Own 1815-1890

Hsiao-Hung Pai

You know the people in this book. 
 
You&rsquo;ll remember the harassed waitress from your local Chinese restaurant. You&rsquo;ve noticed those builders across the street working funny hours and without helmets. You&rsquo;ve eaten the lettuce they picked, or bought the microwave they assembled. The words &lsquo;cockle-pickers&rsquo;, &lsquo;Morecambe Bay&rsquo;, &lsquo;Chinese illegals found dead in lorry&rsquo; will ring a bell. 
 
But did you know that there are hundreds of thousands of undocumented Chinese immigrants in Britain? They&rsquo;ve travelled here because of desperate poverty, and must keep their heads down and work themselves to the bone. 
 
Hsiao-Hung Pai, the only journalist who knows this community, went undercover to hear the stories of this hidden work force. She reveals a scary, shadowy world where human beings are exploited in ways unimaginable in our civilized twenty-first century. 
 
CHINESE WHISPERS exposes the truth behind the lives of a hidden work force here in Britain. You owe it to yourself, and them, to read it.

Chinese Whispers

The True Story Behind Britain's Hidden Army of Labour

Yanis Varoufakis

**THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER** 
 
Yanis Varoufakis, world renowned economist, writes to his daughter to teach her the hazards of capitalism. 
 
'Why is there so much inequality?' asked Xenia to her father. Answering her questions in a series of accessible and tender letters, Varoufakis educates her to what economics and capitalism is and why it is so dangerous. 
 
Taking from memories of her childhood and a variety of well-known tales - from Oedipus and Faust to Frankenstein and The Matrix - Varoufakis turns Talking To My Daughter into an enjoyable and engaging read, without ever shying from the harder truths. Greece's former finance minister explains everything you need to know to understand why economics is the most important drama of our times. 
 
In answering his daughter's deceptively simple questions, Varoufakis disentangles our troubling world with remarkable clarity and child-like honesty, as well as inspiring us to make it a better one. 
 
'Utterly accessible, deeply humane and startlingly original - a potent democratic tool at the perfect time' Naomi Klein

Talking to My Daughter

Eliza Filby

The Sunday Times Bestseller! 
 
Many of us grew up believing in a meritocracy, where hard work and a good education brings rewards. Go to university, get a job, put in the hours and things will be OK. That’s what we were told – but the reality is that life chances and opportunities are no longer shaped by what we learn or earn but by whether we have access to the Bank of Mum and Dad. We’re living in an inheritocracy, where parental support is what matters most – whether that’s covering the cost of university, stumping up for a house deposit or helping with childcare. And let’s be honest, this isn’t something we like to talk about with our friends, families or as a society. It’s a modern taboo. 
 
In this timely and revealing book, generational expert Eliza Filby explores the emergence of this inheritocracy through her own life story, revealing how her family’s financial circumstances shaped everything from her education to her dating life, from her career to her class identity. Inheritocracy is a thought-provoking and candid blend of memoir and cultural commentary, told through Eliza’s humorous and insightful voice. 
 
With trillions of pounds set to be passed down the generations over the next two decades, a significant divide is emerging between those who can rely on family wealth and those who can’t. Inheritocracy offers a fresh, captivating and honest look at our recent past and a future that will be shaped – for better or worse – by family fortunes.

Inheritocracy

It’s Time to Talk About the Bank of Mum and Dad

The City of London. Vol IV: A Club No More is the fourth and final volume of David Kynaston's epic history of the square mile in the modern era. This lively and informative book takes the story from the post-war era, when the City was hemmed in by bombsites and austere Chancellors, through to very recent developments, such as the "Big-Bang" deregulation of 1986. This is as much a social history as a financial study, with interesting discussions of the changing class and complexion of the City, and with fascinating details on the early computerisation of the big companies. As with earlier volumes Kynaston's style is that of an anecdotal storyteller. Colourful characters, dramatic boardroom struggles and heated exchanges between politicians and bankers dominate the pages.

The City Of London Volume 4

John Lanchester

John Lanchester's Whoops! Why Everyone Owes Everyone and No One Can Pay is the unbelievable true story of the economic crisis. 
 
 We are, to use a technical economic term, screwed. The cowboy capitalists had a party with everyone's money and now we're all paying for it. What went wrong? And will we learn our lesson - or just carry on as before, like celebrating surviving a heart attack with a packet of Rothmans? 
 
 John Lanchester travels with a cast of characters - including reckless banksters, snoozing regulators, complacent politicians, predatory lenders, credit-drunk spendthrifts, and innocent bystanders to understand deeply and genuinely what is happening and why we feel the way we do. 
 
 'Devastatingly funny ... the route map to the crazed world of contemporary finance we have all been waiting for' &amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;Will Self 
 
 'Bang on the money' &amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;Independent 
 
 'Explains the crisis in a way that actually sticks ... to my amazement, I finally grasp it' &amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;Janice Turner, The Times 
 
 'Endlessly witty ... will turn any reader into an expert within the space of 200 pages' &amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;Jonathan Coe 
 
 'Terrific ... there is no better guide to the crazy world of high finance' &amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;GQ 
 
 John Lanchester is a journalist, novelist and winner of the Whitbread First Novel Award. His fiction includes Mr Philips, The Debt to Pleasure and Capital. He is a regular contributor to the London Review of Books and the New Yorker, with a monthly column in Esquire.

Whoops!

Why Everyone Owes Everyone and No One Can Pay

Between 1890 and 1914 the City of London was all dominant as Britain's legendary gold standard reigned supreme across the globe. Golden Years anatomises an elite at the height of its powers. Combining brilliant scholarship with high entertainment, and drawing on an unparalleled range of original sources, David Kynaston brings the city triumphant into the mainstream of British and world history.

The City Of London Volume 2

Golden Years 1890-1914

Caroline Knowles

London is a plutocrat's paradise, with more resident billionaires than New York, Hong Kong or Moscow. Far from trickling down, their wealth is burning up the environment and swallowing up the city. But what do we really know about London's super rich, and the lives they lead? 
 
To find out more about this secretive elite, sociologist Caroline Knowles walks the streets of London from the City to suburban Surrey. Her walks reveal how the wealthy shape the capital in their image, creating a new world of gated communities and luxury developments. Along the way we meet a wide and wickedly entertaining cast of millionaires, billionaires and those who serve them: bankers, tech tycoons, Conservative party donors, butlers, bodyguards, divorce lawyers and many more. 
 
Jaw-dropping, enraging and enlightening, Serious Money explodes the fiction that wealth is a condition to aspire to, revealing the isolation and paranoia which accompany it when the plutocrat's recompense - a life of unlimited luxury - ultimately proves hollow. It is a powerful reminder that it is not just the super-rich who get to make the city: we make it too, and could demand something different. Because serious money is good for no one - not even the rich.

Serious Money

Walking Plutocratic London

Steven D. Levitt

Stephen J. Dubner

In this Freak 'how-to' guide, the mavericks behind the Freakonomics phenomenon teach you their secrets: how to challenge conventional wisdom, unravel life's secret codes and think differently - that is, think like a Freak. Levitt and Dubner see the world like no-one else. Now you can too. 
 
'My gut reaction to this life-changing book is "Where have you been all my life?" You will turn pages with delight' Jeffery Taylor, Sunday Express 
 
'Captivating, intellectually robust, funny, surprising and wise. What else can one ask?' Daniel Finkelstein, The Times 
 
 'Illuminating, good fun, endearing, genial ... I was delighted' Philip Roscoe, The Times Higher Education 
 
'It's about how to look at the world, and see the ugly truth ... excellent stuff' William Leith, Spectator 
 
'A phenomenon ... their approach has won them a cult following' Observer

Think Like a Freak

Secrets of the Rogue Economist

David Edgerton

Out of a liberal, capitalist, genuinely global power of a unique kind, there arose from the 1940s a distinct British nation. This nation was committed to internal change, making it much more like the great continental powers. From the 1970s it became bound up both with the European Union and with foreign capital in new ways. David Edgerton's fascinating perspective produces refreshed understanding of everything from the nature of British politics to the performance of British industry. 
 
Packed with surprising examples and arguments, The Rise and Fall of the British Nation gives us a grown-up, unsentimental history, one which is crucial at a moment of serious reconsideration for the country and its future.

The Rise and Fall of the British Nation

A Twentieth-Century History

Blake Mycoskie

In 2006, while travelling in Argentina, young entrepreneur Blake Mycoskie encountered children too poor to afford shoes, who developed injuries on their feet that often led to serious health problems. Blake knew he wanted to help, but rather than start a charity, he went against conventional wisdom and created a for profit business to help the children who he met. With the help of a local shoemaker, Blake struck out to merge activism and fashion in the form of a local canvas shoe worn by farmers and gauchos alike, called the alpargata. Blake called his creation TOMS Shoes (which stands for "Tomorrow's Shoes") and promised to give a pair of new shoes to a child in need for every pair that he sold. Starting with only two hundred pairs of handmade shoes, optimism, and entrepreneurial charisma, Blake successfully launched TOMS into the high fashion world. They can now be seen adorning the feet of celebrities such as Keira Knightley, Scarlett Johansson, and Tobey Maguire. 
 
Blake's mission is to prove that you can achieve financial success and make the world a better place at the same time. In this book, he shares the six counterintuitive principles that have guided the growth of TOMS for the past three years: 
 
Make business personal 
Be resourceful without resources 
Reverse retirement 
Keep it simple 
Stay humble 
Give more, advertise less 
 
The result is an inspiring account of a young man whose entrepreneurial spirit was able to affect change in the world, and a call to others to be inspired to do the same. 
 
As part of the One for One initiative, Random House will provide a new book to a child in need with every copy of Start Something That Matters purchased.

Start Something That Matters

Joe Mayes

AS HEARD ON BBC RADIO 4 TODAY 
 
Do you have what it takes to be the Chancellor? Find out in this interactive adventure where YOU are in charge, from award-winning political reporter Joe Mayes. 
 
“This clever, witty book is so much fun to play with. I loved it, right up to the moment that I was stabbed in the back by the Prime Minister.” – TIM HARFORD, bestselling author of The Undercover Economist 
________________________ 
 
Congratulations! 
 
You’ve just become the Chancellor of the Exchequer – one of the most powerful people in Britain. 
 
The Budget is fast approaching. And as you turn each page, you’ll face dilemmas and tough choices of every kind, including bailing out big business, negotiating with trade unions and managing the media fallout from your Budget choices. 
 
Will you overspend and trigger an economic crisis, or tighten the purse strings too much and crater your party’s approval ratings? Or will you play your cards just right enough to lead your party to victory at the next general election? It’s all up to you. 
 
Are you ready? 
________________________ 
 
“A political and economic handbook for our age” - MISHAL HUSAIN 
 
“A must-read for armchair Chancellors” - JEREMY HUNT 
 
“A fabulous choose-your-own adventure” - KITTY DONALDSON 
 
“Engaging, and highly readable” - NORMAN LAMONT

Can You Run the Economy?

An interactive adventure inside the Treasury

VINTAGE MINIS: GREAT MINDS. BIG IDEAS. LITTLE BOOKS. 
 
How do we choose between what is fair and just, and what our debtors demand of us? Yanis Varoufakis was put in such a dilemma in 2015 when he became the finance minister of Greece. In this rousing book, he charts the absurdities that underpin calls for austerity, as well as his own battles with a bureaucracy bent on ignoring the human cost of its every action. Passionately outspoken and tuned to the voices of the oppressed, Varoufakis presents a guide to modern economics, and its threat to democracy, like no other. 
 
Selected from the books And the Weak Suffer What They Must? and Adults in the Room

Austerity

Vintage Minis

Keith Wrightson

This important new book, widely praised in hardcover (Yale UP) redefines the economic history of early modern Britain for a new generation of readers.  Wrightson writes evocatively about the basic institutions and relationships of economic life, tracing the process of change, and examining how these changes affected men, women and children at all social levels.  Novel in its structure, scope, and emphasis on the lived experience of the period, the book vividly demonstrates the gains and costs of economic change.

Earthly Necessities

Economic Lives in Early Modern Britain, 1470-1750

Liaquat Ahamed

THIS HAS HAPPENED BEFORE. 
 
The current financial crisis has only one parallel: the Wall Street Crash of 1929 and subsequent Great Depression of the 1930s, which crippled the future of an entire generation and set the stage for the horrors of the Second World War. Yet the economic meltdown could have been avoided, had it not been for the decisions taken by a small number of central bankers. 
 
In Lords of Finance, we meet these men, the four bankers who truly broke the world: the enigmatic Norman Montaguof the bank of England, Benjamin Strong of the NY Federal Reserve, the arrogant yet brilliant Hjalmar Schacht of the Reichsbanlk and the xenophobic Emile Moreau of the Banque de France. Their names were lost to history, their lives and actions forgotten, until now. Liaquat Ahamed tells their story in vivid and gripping detail, in a timely and arresting reminder that individuals - their ambitions, limitations and human nature - lie at the very heart of global catastrophe.

Lords of Finance

1929, The Great Depression, and the Bankers who Broke the World

Philip Roscoe

Is a promotion at work worth more than time with family? Does the price of cheap socks compensate for their being made by children? Might a new lover be better than the one you have? 
 
Every day we make decisions - where to live, what to eat, how to educate our children and care for our parents - in which the influence of economics promotes self-interest over social obligations. All of today's big problems require collective action, so economics is our biggest obstacle to change. But none of this is inherent to human behaviour. This inspiring book offers a different way.

A Richer Life

How Economics Can Change the Way We Think and Feel

Nassim Nicholas Taleb

'Really made me think about how I think' - Mohsin Hamid, author of Exit West 
 
Tough times don't last. Tough people do. 
 
In The Black Swan, Taleb showed us that highly improbable and unpredictable events underlie almost everything about our world. Here Taleb stands uncer&shy;tainty on its head, making it desirable, even necessary. The antifragile is beyond the resilient or robust. The resil&shy;ient resists shocks and stays the same; the antifragile gets better and better. 
 
Just as human bones get stronger when subjected to stress and tension, many things in life benefit from stress, disorder, volatility, and turmoil. What Taleb has identified and calls antifragile are things that not only gain from chaos but need it in order to survive and flourish. 
 
Antifragile is a blueprint for living in a Black Swan world. Erudite, witty, and iconoclastic, Taleb's message is revolutionary: the antifragile, and only the antifragile, will make it. 
 
'The hottest thinker in the world' Bryan Appleyard, Sunday Times

Antifragile

Things that Gain from Disorder

Daniel Chandler

Despite the enormous problems we face and widespread dissatisfaction with the status quo, it's surprisingly hard to find a coherent vision of what a better, fairer society would look like. 
 
Free and Equal provides that vision. In this hugely ambitious and exhilarating debut, philosopher and economist Daniel Chandler argues that the ideas we need are hiding in plain sight, in the work of the twentieth century's greatest political philosopher, John Rawls. Although they have revolutionised philosophy, his ideas have had little impact on politics - until now. Taking Rawls's humane and egalitarian liberalism as his starting point, Chandler builds a careful and ultimately irresistible case for a progressive agenda that would fundamentally reshape our political and economic institutions. 
 
This is a book brimming with hope and possibility - a much-needed alternative to the cynicism that pervades our politics, setting out a 'realistic utopia' that can galvanise people from all walks of life. Free and Equal has the potential not only to transform contemporary debate, but to offer a touchstone for a modern, egalitarian liberalism for many years to come, cementing Rawls's place in political discourse, and firmly establishing Chandler as a vital new voice for our time.

Free and Equal

What Would a Fair Society Look Like?

Walt Bogdanich

Michael Forsythe

**A TIMES AND NEW YORK TIMES BOOK OF THE YEAR 2022** 
 
An explosive exposé of a firm whose work has made your world more unequal, more corrupt and more dangerous. 
 
McKinsey & Company have earned billions consulting almost every major corporation in the world - and countless governments, including our own. Shielded by NDAs, their practices have remained vague - until now. 
 
In this propulsive investigation, prize-winning journalists Walt Bogdanich and Michael Forsythe reveal the jaw-dropping reality. McKinsey's work includes ruthless cost-cutting in the NHS, troubleshooting for Big Oil, executing Trump's immigration policies (the ones that put children in cages) as well as advising some of the world's most unsavoury despots. 
 
'A story of secrecy, delusion and untold harm' OBSERVER 
 
'Makes you so angry...the evidence the authors winkle out is astonishing' SUNDAY TIMES 
 
'Panoramic, meticulously reported and ultimately devastating' PATRICK RADDEN KEEFE 
 
'A harrowing account of decades of dishonourable exploits' ECONOMIST

When McKinsey Comes to Town

The Hidden Influence of the World's Most Powerful Consulting Firm

Niall Ferguson

Bread, cash, dosh, dough, loot. Call it what you like, it matters now more than ever. In The Ascent of Money, Niall Ferguson shows that finance is the foundation of all human progress and the lifeblood of history. From the cash injection that funded the Italian Renaissance to the stock market bubble that sparked the French Revolution, from the bonds that fuelled Britain's war effort to the Wall Street Crash and today's meltdown, this is the story of boom and bust as it's never been told before. Whether you're scraping by or rolling in it, there's no better time to understand the ascent of money.

The Ascent of Money

A Financial History of the World

Philip Coggan

What happens in the City has never affected us more 
 
In this excellent guide, now fully revised and updated, leading financial journalist Philip Coggan cuts through the headlines, the scandals and the jargon to explain the nuts and bolts of the financial system. 
What causes the pound to rise or interest rates to fall? Which are the institutions that really matter? Why is it we need the Money Machine - and what happens when it crashes? Coggan provides clear and concise answers and shows why we should all be more familiar with a system we so intimately depend upon.

The Money Machine

How the City Works

Gordon Brown

Former Prime Minister and the country’s longest-serving Chancellor, Gordon Brown has been a guiding force for Britain and the world over three decades. This is his candid, poignant and deeply relevant story. 
 
In describing his upbringing in Scotland as the son of a minister, the near loss of his eyesight as a student and the death of his daughter within days of her birth, he shares the passionately-held principles that have shaped and driven him, reminding us that politics can and should be a calling to serve. Reflecting on the personal and ideological tensions within Labour and its successes and failures in power, he describes how to meet the challenge of pursuing a radical agenda within a credible party of government. 
 
He explains how as Chancellor he equipped Britain for a globalised economy while swimming against the neoliberal tide and shows what more must be done to halt rising inequality. In his behind-the-scenes account of the financial crisis and his leading role in saving the world economy from collapse, he addresses the question of who was to blame for the crash and why its causes and consequences still beset us. 
 
From the invasion of Iraq to the tragedy of Afghanistan, from the coalition negotiations of 2010 to the referendums on Scottish independence and Europe, Gordon Brown draws on his unique experiences to explain Britain’s current fractured condition. And by showing us what progressive politics has achieved in recent decades, he inspires us with a vision of what it might yet achieve today. 
 
Riveting, expert and highly personal, this historic memoir is an invaluable insight into our times.

My Life, Our Times

Piers Brendon

Piers Brendon's magisterial overview of the 1930s is the story of the dark, dishonest decade - child of one world war and parent of the next - that determined the course of the twentieth century. 
 
Dealing individually with each of the period's great powers - the USA, Germany, Italy, France, Britain, Japan, Spain and Russia - Brendon takes us through the ten years dominated by the Great Depression and political turmoil. When Broadway, Piccadilly Circus, the Kurfurstendamm and the Ginza - neon metaphors of hope after four years of carnage - grew dim as the giants of unemployment, hardship, strife and fear took their hold. From the concentration camps of Dachau and Kolyma, the Ukraine famine and the American Dust Bowl, to the Moscow metro, the Empire State Building and the Paris Exposition, The Dark Valley brings the 1930's back to life through meticulous scholarship. 
 
Brendon examines the great leaders - Hitler, Stalin, Mussolini, Mao Tse-Tung, Haile Selassie and countless others - not with hindsight but in the context of their age; but also, through a vivid chronicling of contemporary experience, he gives us a sense of what it was to be living then.

The Dark Valley

Ruchir Sharma

THE INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER 
 
'Entertaining, acute and disarmingly honest' Economist 
 
'A vital guide to the new economic order' Rana Foroohar, Time 
 
The crisis of 2008 ended the illusion of a golden era in which many people imagined that prosperity and political calm would continue to spread indefinitely. In a world now racked by slowing growth and mounting unrest, how can we discern which nations will thrive and which will fail? 
 
Shaped by prize-winning author Ruchir Sharma's twenty-five years travelling the world, The Rise and Fall of Nations rethinks economics as a practical art. By narrowing down the thousands of factors that can shape a country's future, it spells out ten clear rules for identifying the next big winners and losers in the global economy. 
 
'The nub of the book is how to spot which countries are likely to succeed, and which to fail, in this impermanent world. Sharma offers a framework of 10 rules. The more of these rules countries achieve, the more they are likely to rise rather than fall ... it may just help you avoid picking losers' David Smith, Sunday Times 
 
'Amazing ... fascinating insights ... quite simply the best guide to the global economy today' Fareed Zakaria 
 
'Lively and informative' Martin Wolf, Financial Times 
 
'As ambitious as it is well executed ... a mix of humble pragmatism and daring decisiveness' Reuters

The Rise and Fall of Nations

Ten Rules of Change in the Post-Crisis World

Joseph Sassoon

The Sassoons were one of the great business dynasties of the nineteenth century, as eminent as traders as the Rothschilds were bankers. This book reveals the secrets behind the family's phenomenal success: how a handful of Jewish exiles from Ottoman Baghdad forged a mercantile juggernaut from their new home in colonial Bombay, the vast network of agents, informants and politicians they built, and the way they came to bridge East and West, culturally as well as commercially. 
 
Through the lives these ambitious figures built for themselves, the reader is drawn into a captivating world of politics and power, innovation and intrigue, high society and empire. The Global Merchants is thus at once a portrait of a single family and a panorama of the hundred and thirty years of their prominence: from the Opium Wars to the American Civil War, the establishment of the British Raj to India's independence. Together these give a fresh perspective on one of the defining forces of their age and the present: globalization. The Sassoons were variously its agents, advocates and casualties, and watching them moving through the world, we perceive the making of our own.

The Global Merchants

The Enterprise and Extravagance of the Sassoon Dynasty

Sebastian Mallaby

From an award-winning financial historian comes the gripping, character-driven story of venture capital and the world it made 
 
Innovations rarely come from "experts." Jeff Bezos was not a bookseller; Elon Musk was not in the auto industry. When it comes to innovation, a legendary venture capitalist told Sebastian Mallaby, the future cannot be predicted, it can only be discovered. Most attempts at discovery fail, but a few succeed at such a scale that they more than make up for everything else. That extreme ratio of success and failure is the power law that drives venture capital, Silicon Valley, the tech sector, and, by extension, the world. 
 
Drawing on unprecedented access to the most celebrated venture capitalists of all time, award-winning financial historian Sebastian Mallaby tells the story of this strange tribe of financiers who have funded the world's most successful companies, from Google to SpaceX to Alibaba. With a riveting blend of storytelling and analysis, The Power Law makes sense of the seeming randomness of success in venture capital, an industry that relies, for good and ill, on gut instinct and personality rather than spreadsheets and data. We learn the unvarnished truth about some of the most iconic triumphs and infamous disasters in the history of tech, from the comedy of errors that was the birth of Apple to the venture funding that fostered hubris at WeWork and Uber to the industry's notorious lack of women and ethnic minorities. 
 
Now the power law echoes around the world: it has transformed China's digital economy beyond recognition, and London is one of the top cities for venture capital investment. By taking us so deeply into the VCs' game, The Power Law helps us think about our own future through their eyes.

The Power Law

Venture Capital and the Art of Disruption

In his rich and nuanced portrait of the remarkable, elusive Rothschild family, Oxford scholar and bestselling author Niall Ferguson uncovers the secrets behind the family's phenomenal economic success. He reveals for the first time the details of the family's vast political network, which gave it access to and influence over many of the greatest statesmen of the age. And he tells a family saga, tracing the importance of unity and the profound role of Judaism in the lives of a dynasty that rose from the confines of the Frankfurt ghetto and later used its influence to assist oppressed Jews throughout Europe. A definitive work of impeccable scholarship with a thoroughly engaging narrative, &lsquo;The House of Rothschild&rsquo; is a biography of the rarest kind, in which mysterious and fascinating historical figures finally spring to life.

The House of Rothschild

Money's Prophets 1798-1848

Nicholas Shaxson

This is a book that none of us can afford to ignore – an agenda-setting, campaigning investigation that shows how global finance works for the few and not the many. 
 
** A Financial Times Book of the Year ** 
‘Essential reading’ YANIS VAROUFAKIS 
 
We need finance – but when finance grows too big it becomes a curse. 
 
The City of London is the single biggest drain on our resources, sucking talent out of every sphere, siphoning wealth and hoovering up government time. Yet to be ‘competitive’, we’re told we must turn a blind eye to money laundering and appease big business with tax cuts. 
 
Tracing the curse back through economic history, Nicholas Shaxson uncovers how we got to this point. Moving from offshore tax havens to the bizarre industry of wealth management, he tells the explosive story of how finance established a stranglehold on society – and reveals how we can begin to break free. 
 
‘A radical, urgent and important manifesto for improving our country’ 
 Oliver Bullough, Observer 
 
‘Superbly written… A must-read’ 
 Misha Glenny, author of McMafia 
 
‘Hard-hitting, well written and informative’ 
 Financial Times

The Finance Curse

How global finance is making us all poorer

Roald Dahl

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Which Roald Dahl hero are you?

A photo of a young girl laying on the floor with a pair of headphones on, looking at her phone whilst she plays an audiobook

10 audiobooks for a listen-aloud adventure

How to be a great storyteller | The Roald Dahl Museum

How to be a great storyteller

6 of the most gloriumptious Roald Dahl heroes

Are you Roald Dahl's biggest fan?

Ten hopscotchy moments in Roald Dahl books

10 hopscotchy moments in Roald Dahl books

Christmas gifts for 2025: Books for 6 to 9-year-olds

A picture of a few sheets from the Roald Dahl activity pack on a light purple background

Crafts &amp; activities

Download the Roald Dahl Story Day 2021 activity pack

11 inspirational quotes that celebrate books and the joy of reading

A photo of a young boy holding a copy of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and a 'golden ticket' from the book. He is standing against a bright purple background

Make your own Charlie and the Chocolate Factory costumes

Things you didn't know classic Puffin children's books

4 things you didn’t know about these classic Puffin children’s books

An illustration by Quentin Blake of The BFG holding Sophie in his hand

13 inspiring Roald Dahl quotes

A photo of the DIY Enormous Crocodile word game. You can see a child's hands holding the cardboard crocodile and in the background is the book Roald Dahl: Words

Make an Enormous Crocodile word game

How to write a laugh-out-loud story by Steven Butler

How to write a laugh-out-loud funny story

An image of three classic children's books on a light blue background with a shape that has a star pattern

Showing results for: ‘roald dahl’

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