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

A. J. Liebling, born in Manhattan in 1904, joined the staff of the New Yorker in 1935 and contributed innumerable articles to the magazine throughout his lifetime, on subjects ranging from food to boxing and France to horse racing. As a war correspondent during the Second World War, he reported from France, England and Algeria, and participated in the Normandy landings. In later life he married the writer Jean Stafford, his third wife. He died in 1963.

A. J. Liebling

A. J. Rosen is an author of YA fantasy novels and is an ambassador for Wattpad, known as @agatharoza. Entwined is her first novel.

A. J. Rosen

A. K. Davidson

A. O. Scott has been a film critic at the New York Times since 2000. His writing has appeared in many other publications, including the New York Review of Books, Slate, the New Yorker and the Nation. A finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in criticism in 2010, Scott is currently Distinguished Professor of Film Criticism at Wesleyan University. He lives with his family in Brooklyn, New York. 
 
@aoscott

A. O. Scott

A.S. Byatt (1936-2023) was a novelist, short-story writer and critic of international renown. Her novels include Possession (winner of the Booker Prize 1990), the Frederica Quartet and The Children’s Book, which was shortlisted for the Booker Prize and won the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for Fiction. She was appointed CBE in 1990 and DBE in 1999, and was awarded the Erasmus Prize 2016 for her ‘inspiring contribution to life writing’ and the Pak Kyongni Prize 2017. In 2018 she received the Hans Christian Andersen Literature Award.

A. S. Byatt

A. T. Williams won the George Orwell Prize for Political Writing in 2013 for his book A Very British Killing: The Death of Baha Mousa. He lives in Warwickshire.

A. T. Williams

A. W. Chase

Dubbed ‘The new queen of spy fiction’ by the Guardian newspaper, and ‘the real thing’ by the Washington Post, A.C. 'Ava' Glass is the CWA Dagger-shortlisted author of Alias Emma (The Chase), The Traitor and The Trap. The Traitor was a 2023 Richard and Judy Bookclub pick. Alias Emma was a Barnes and Noble book of the month. A former crime reporter and communications consultant, for five years Ava worked closely with spies. Her time in that world fascinated her, and the people she met back then inspire every book she writes.

A.C. Glass

A.E. Housman

Arthur Edward Waite was the designer and co-creator of the now famous Rider Waite Tarot deck. 
 
An American-born British poet and scholarly mystic, his strong interest in all esoteric matters - divination, magic, Kabbalism, alchemy and Freemasony - led to him penning a number of books. These include the Key to the Tarot, The Book of Ceremonial Magic and A New Encyclopedia of Freemasony.

A.E. Waite

A.E. Warren is the author of the Tomorrow's Ancestors series, which consists of Subject Twenty-One, The Hidden Base, The Fourth Species and The Final Rising. 
 
After spending eight years working as a lawyer, she began to write in the evenings and early mornings as a form of escapism from life in a very small cubicle with lots of files. She self-published her first novels in her spare time, which were picked up by Del Rey UK which is the science fiction/fantasy imprint of Penguin Random House. 
 
 She is an avid reader, occasional gamer and fair-weather runner. She lives in the UK with her husband, daughter and hopefully, one day, a wise border terrier named Austen.

A.E. Warren

A.G.D. Maran

A.J. Ayer

A.J. Cronin

A K Benedict writes crime and speculative fiction in a room filled with clowns, mannequins and Doctor Who figures. Her first novel, The Beauty of Murder, was nominated for an eDunnit award and is in development for a major 8-part TV series by Company Pictures. Her second, Jonathan Dark or The Evidence of Ghosts, came out in February 2016. She's written Torchwood audio dramas for Big Finish and her short stories have featured in anthologies including Great British Horror and Best British Short Stories. She lives in St Leonards-on-Sea with her dog, Dame Margaret Rutherford.

A.K.Benedict

A. L. Kennedy has twice been selected as one of Granta’s Best of Young British Novelists and has won a host of other awards – including the Costa Book of the Year for her novel Day. She lives in Essex.

A.L. Kennedy

A.M. Ellis is a speculative fiction author and lover of everything steeped in myth and mystery. Her stories often lean into diverse voices, not only in her identity as a Black woman, but in exploring neurodivergence and mental health. A proud introvert and nostalgic gamer, she lives in Maryland, USA, with her husband and three children.

A.M. Ellis

A.N. Wilson was born in 1950 and educated at Rugby and New College, Oxford. A Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, he holds a prominent position in the world of literature and journalism. He is an award-winning biographer and a celebrated novelist, winning prizes for much of his work. He lives in North London.

A.N. Wilson

A. T. Emerald lives with her husband and baby daughter in Nottinghamshire. She discovered her love of writing in 2020 and has not shut up about enemies to lovers ever since. She loves iced matcha, torrid love confessions with knives pressed to throats (fictional, of course) and does not accept bills for any therapy her books might incur.

A.T. Emerald

A.W. Priest

A.B.C. Merriman-Labor was a barrister, writer and munitions worker born in Freetown, Sierra Leone in 1877. His published works include A Series of Lectures on the Negro Race and The Story of the African Slave in a Nutshell. He also edited two editions of the Handbook of Sierra Leone. He arrived in the UK in 1904 to study law. In 1907, he organised a centenary commemoration of the abolition of the slave trade in Westminster Abbey. He later embarked on an 'entertainment-lecture' tour called Life and Scenes in Britain, travelling across thousands of miles of West, South West and Central Africa, which he expanded on to create Britons Through Negro Spectacles.

ABC Merriman-Labor

AJ Cronin

AJ Molloy

Aabria Iyengar is an American actress and author.

Aabria Iyengar

Aaliya Jaleel is a freelance illustrator, designer, and visual development artist, currently majoring in Animation at the University of Texas at Dallas. She is also the illustrator of Under My Hijab and Muslim Girls Rise. You can visit her online at www.aaliyamj.com.

Aaliya Jaleel

Aaron Allston

After more than fifteen years of experience as a clinical psychotherapist, Dr Aaron Balick has taken the amazing insights from psychology and psychotherapy out of the consultation room and made them accessible to the wider world. 
 
He has been an ‘agony uncle’ for many years for both CBBC and BBC Radio 1, as well as on television, including BBC Worldwide, BBC 3 and BBC Learning.

Aaron Balick

Aaron Carroll

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Jason Fox

THE INSTANT SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER. 
 
Discover how to become the best version of yourself with this game-changing, personal development plan from the star of Channel 4’s SAS: Who Dares Wins and author of Battle Scars and Life Under Fire. 
 
‘A motivational masterclass with a proven framework for improving every day.' Aldo Kane 
 
Challenge your limits, change your habits and transform your life. 
 
In Embrace the Chaos, Special Forces veteran Jason Fox sets out a revolutionary programme of personal challenges designed to help you reboot, disrupt your thinking, and grow your capabilities. 
 
Across 52 short chapters of practical advice - battle-tested on elite military operations and extreme expeditions - Foxy mentors you through a series of tasks that will enhance your life. 
These exercises range from micro-adventures and small habit changes to addressing your routine, cleansing your relationships, setting personal goals and learning new skills. 
 
In this life-changing book you’ll find: 
- A new challenge for every week of the year. 
- Practical advice and tips. 
- Physical and creative tasks. 
- Mentoring guidance through each process. 
 
Whether you’re looking for adventure, in need of mental clarity, or seeking military grade productivity, Embrace the Chaos will push you physically and mentally to become the best version of yourself.

Embrace the Chaos

52 Tactics to Make Every Day Count

Scott Bateman

THE SUNDAY TIMES TOP 10 BESTSELLER 
 
Read the legendary story of the Lockheed C-130 Hercules aircraft, seen through the eyes of former RAF captain Scott Bateman 
'An engaging and revealing read' JOHN NICHOL‘An action-packed insider’s account of what it’s like to fly this legendary flying machine in peace and war’ KeyAero.com 
-- 
 
Take wing with an unsung hero . . . 
Hercules is the hero of the skies we never talk about. First to land in any combat zone and last out, the Hercules always unflashily gets the job done – whether that’s a risky air drop or hauling out troops in an emergency evac. 
Also working as an aerial tanker, gunship, spyplane, air-sea rescuer and even a precision bomber, its versatility has time and again seen the Hercules give the RAF their edge – from Antarctica to Iraq, Afghanistan to the Falklands. 
Captain Scott Bateman drags us into the cockpit and buckles us in for an extraordinary pilot’s seat view of this aircraft’s 50-year history. 
Anytime. Anywhere. Anyhow.

Hercules

Ben Macintyre

On April 30, 1980, six heavily armed gunmen burst into the Iranian embassy on Princes Gate, overlooking Hyde Park in London. There they took 26 hostages, including embassy staff, visitors, and three British citizens. 
A tense six-day siege ensued as millions gathered around screens across the country to witness the longest news flash in British television history, in which police negotiators and psychiatrists sought a bloodless end to the standoff, while the SAS – hitherto an organisation shrouded in secrecy – laid plans for a daring rescue mission: Operation Nimrod. 
 
Drawing on unpublished source material, exclusive interviews with the SAS, and testimony from witnesses including hostages, negotiators, intelligence officers and the on-site psychiatrist, bestselling historian Ben Macintyre takes readers on a gripping journey from the years and weeks of build-up on both sides, to the minute-by-minute account of the siege and rescue. 
 
Recreating the dramatic conversations between negotiators and hostages, the cutting-edge intelligence work happening behind-the-scenes, and the media frenzy around this moment of international significance, The Siege is the remarkable story of what really happened on those fateful six days, and the first full account of a moment that forever changed the way the nation thought about the SAS – and itself.

The Siege

The Remarkable Story of the Greatest SAS Hostage Drama

John Humphreys

Stuart Tootal

A powerful and authentic account of WWII from 101-year-old veteran John Humphreys, from boy soldier in the Royal Engineers to jumping into Arnhem with the Parachute Regiment in 1944, spearheading the attack on the bridge. For days they held on, outnumbered and outgunned by a German army fighting to the last bullet. But the Bridge Too Far is only the climax of this extraordinary story... The Last Para is the final firsthand account of this legendary action, told with incredible honesty and irrepressible spirit.

Arnhem’s Last Para

Serhii Plokhy

On 24 February 2022, the first day of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, armoured vehicles approached the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in northern Ukraine. It was the most direct way for them to reach the capital - and an extraordinarily reckless plan after the disaster that had taken place there three decades earlier. Russian occupation of the plant had begun. It would last thirty-five days. 
 
Closely reported and narrated from multiple perspectives, this is the story of the Ukrainians who were held hostage and worked shifts for weeks instead of days to spare the world a new nuclear accident. We meet Valentyn Heiko, the foreman who had also been there for the clean-up of the Chernobyl accident in 1986 and turned sixty during the occupation; plant workers who found a way to celebrate International Women’s Day despite all odds; Russian officers who had no knowledge of nuclear reactors; and four stalkers who were caught in the middle and stood in for the overworked cook. 
 
Gripping and unforgettable, Chernobyl Roulette sounds the alarm about the dangers of nuclear sites in an unprecedented time, when plant workers are left to fight on their own while the world holds its breath. In a book that reads like a thriller, Serhii Plokhy tells a remarkable story about human nature, uncertainty and courage.

Chernobyl Roulette

A War Story

Robert Darnton

‘Events do not come naked into the world. They come clothed – in attitudes, assumptions, values, memories of the past, anticipations of the future, hopes and fears and many other emotions. To understand events, it is necessary to describe the perceptions that accompany them, for the two are inseparable.’ 
 
When a Parisian crowd stormed the Bastille in July 1789, it triggered an event of global consequence: the overthrow of the monarchy and the birth of a new society. Most historians account for the French Revolution by viewing it as the outcome of underlying conditions such as a faltering economy, class conflict or Enlightenment ideology. Without denying any of these, Robert Darnton offers a different explanation: what Parisians themselves, those at the centre of the Revolution, thought was happening at the time and how it guided their actions. 
 
To understand the rise of what he calls ‘the revolutionary temper’, Darnton draws on a lifetime’s study of pamphlets, books, underground newsletters, songs and public performances, exploring Paris as an information society not unlike our own. Its news circuits were centred in cafes and market-places, on park benches, and under the Palais-Royal’s Tree of Cracow, a favourite gathering-place for gossips. He shows how the events of forty years – from disastrous treaties, official corruption and royal scandal to thrilling hot-air balloon ascents and a new conception of the nation – all entered the collective consciousness of ordinary Parisians. As news and opinion travelled across this profoundly unequal society, public trust in royal authority eroded, its legitimacy was undermined, and the social order unravelled. 
 
Much of Robert Darnton’s work has explained the hidden dynamics of history, never more so than in this exceptional book. It is a riveting narrative, but it adds a new dimension, the perceptions of contemporary Parisians, which allows us to see these momentous decades afresh.

The Revolutionary Temper

Paris, 1748–1789

Jonathan Dimbleby

THE INSTANT SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER 
 
2025 marks the 80th anniversary of VE Day. Read and remember the history that led to this important moment. 
 
'This book is his best yet . . . Dimbleby’s work is in a different league, told with such skill and judgment' Dominic Sandbrook, Sunday Times 
 
A gripping and authoritative account of the year that sealed the fate of the Nazis, from the bestselling historian 
 
June 1944: In Operation Bagration, more than two million Red Army soldiers, facing 500,000 German soldiers, finally avenged their defeat in Operation Barbarossa in 1941. The same month saw the Allies triumph on the beaches of Normandy, but, despite the myths that remain, it was the events on the Eastern Front that sealed Hitler's fate and destroyed Nazism. 
 
In his new book, bestselling historian Jonathan Dimbleby describes and analyses this momentous year, covering the military, political and diplomatic story in his evocative style. Drawing on previously untranslated German, Russian and Polish sources, we see how sophisticated new forms of deception and ruthless Partisan warfare shifted the Soviets’ fortunes, how their triumphs effectively gave Stalin authority to occupy Eastern Europe and how it was the events of 1944 that enabled Stalin to dictate the terms of the post-war settlement, laying the foundations for the Cold War . . . 
 
'Mr. Dimbleby is a sure-footed guide to the labyrinthine military operations along a front line that extended nearly 2,000 miles, from the Baltic to the Black Sea' Wall Street Journal 
 
'Terrific . . . a tour de force' Sir Richard Evans 
 
'Military history at its very best' Keith Lowe 
 
Sunday Time Bestseller, June 2024

Endgame 1944

How Stalin Won The War

Hampton Sides

In July 1776, Captain James Cook began his third voyage in HMS Resolution. Two-and-a-half years later, in Hawaii, Cook was killed – stabbed by the indigenous population. 
 
What brought Cook to this end, so far from his reputation? Cook was renowned for humane leadership, dedication to science and respect for indigenous societies. 
 
Cook’s new voyage carried secret orders, and the Captain grew strange, delivering savage punishments and leading his ships into danger. The mission revealed the sharp edge of a colonial sword, leaving catastrophe in its wake. And, on the shores of Hawaii, Cook’s expedition finally tore itself apart…

The Wide Wide Sea

Phillips Payson O'Brien

In THE STRATEGISTS, Professor Phillips Payson O'Brien shows how the views these five leaders forged in WW1 are crucial to understanding how they fought WW2. For example, Churchill's experiences of facing the German Army in France in 1916 made him unwilling to send masses of British soldiers back there in the 1940s, while Hitler's mistakes on the Eastern Front were influenced by his reluctance to accept that conditions had changed since his own time fighting. The implications of the power of leaders remain with us to this day: to truly understand what is happening in Ukraine, for example, requires us to know what has influenced the leaders involved. 
 
This is a history in which leaders – and their choices – matter. For better or worse.

The Strategists

Churchill, Stalin, Roosevelt, Mussolini and Hitler – How War Made Them, And How They Made War

Nick Lloyd

In the second volume of his landmark First World War trilogy, Professor Nick Lloyd tells the story for the first time of what Winston Churchill once called the 'unknown war': the vast conflict in Eastern Europe and the Balkans that brought about the collapse of three empires. 
 
Much has been written about the fighting in France and Belgium, yet the Eastern Front was no less bloody. Between 1914 and 1917, huge numbers of people - perhaps as many as 16 million soldiers and two million civilians - were killed, wounded or maimed in enormous battles that sometimes ranged across a front of 100 km in length. 
 
Through intimate eyewitness reports, diary entries and memoirs - many of which have never been translated into English before - Lloyd reconstructs the full story of a war that began in the Balkans as a local struggle between Austria-Hungary and Serbia, and which sucked in Russia, Germany and Italy, right through to the final collapse of the Habsburg Empire in 1918. 
 
The Eastern Front paints a vivid and authoritative picture of a conflict that shook the world, and that remains central to understanding the tragic, blood-soaked trajectory of the entire twentieth century, including the current war in Ukraine.

The Eastern Front

A History of the First World War

Paul Beaver

Small in stature but immense in reputation and talent, there was more to Eric 'Winkle' Brown than met the eye.From shooting down Luftwaffe bombers in the Battle of the Atlantic and narrowly escaping from a torpedoed ship, to a never-to-be-repeated litany of world records as a test pilot, his unparalleled flying career saw him take the controls of over four hundred different kinds of aircraft-more than any other pilot in history. 
 
A legend in his own lifetime, and by his death, a national treasure, there have always been mysteries at the heart of his story…

Winkle

The Extraordinary Life of Britain’s Greatest Pilot

Geoffrey Robertson

In a newly updated edition of Crimes Against Humanity, Geoffrey Robertson QC explains why we must hold political and military leaders accountable for genocide, torture and mass murder. He shows how human rights standards can be enforced against cruel governments, armies and multi-national corporations. This seminal work contains a critical perspective on events such as the invasion of Iraq, the abuses at Abu Ghraib, the killings in Darfur, the death of Milosevic and the trial of Saddam Hussein. 
 
Cautiously optimistic about ending impunity, but unsparingly critical of diplomats, politicians, Bush lawyers and others who evade international rules, this book will provide further guidance to a movement which aims to make justice predominant in world affairs.

Crimes Against Humanity

The Struggle For Global Justice

Sinclair McKay

This insightful portrait of Winston Churchill delves beyond well-known political events, incorporating perspectives from various individuals who encountered him throughout his life. From Bletchley Park codebreakers to Hollywood stars, Harold Wilson to Gandhi, these lesser-known interactions reveal glimpses of the man behind the legend. 
 
We meet Churchill the mischievous schoolboy with a penchant for singing obscene songs, and Churchill the elder statesman shedding a tear in the House of Commons smoking room. Other incidents include a young journalist rudely dismissing a call from Churchill as a prank, and a visiting Dwight D. Eisenhower dreaming of being strangled, only to awake entangled in Churchill's borrowed nightshirt. 
 
The book showcases the profound transformations during Churchill's lifetime, which ran from Benjamin Disraeli's premiership to the release of the Rolling Stones' Route 66, and the shift from steam to atomic power. Examining controversial aspects of his legacy, this multifaceted portrait challenges preconceived notions, inviting readers to reconsider the complexities of Churchill.

Meeting Churchill

A Life in 90 Encounters

Frank Trentmann

In 1945, Germany lay in ruins, morally and materially. The German people stood condemned by history, responsible for a horrifying genocide and a war of extermination. But by 2015 Germany looked to many to be the moral voice of Europe, welcoming almost one million refugees. At the same time, it pursued a controversially rigid fiscal discipline and made energy deals with a dictator. Many people have asked how Germany descended into the darkness of the Nazis, but this book asks another vital question: how, and how far, have the Germans since reinvented themselves? 
 
Trentmann tells the dramatic story of the Germans from the middle of the Second World War, through the Cold War and the division into East and West, to the fall of the Berlin Wall and the reunited nation's search for a place in the world. Their journey is marked by extraordinary moral struggles: guilt, shame and limited amends; wealth versus welfare; tolerance versus racism; compassion and complicity. Through a range of voices - German soldiers and German Jews; environmentalists and coal miners; families and churches; volunteers, migrants and populists - Trentmann paints a remarkable and surprising portrait over 80 years of the conflicted people at the centre of Europe.

Out of the Darkness

The Germans, 1942-2022

John Buckley

Spencer Jones

&lsquo;The Armchair General team has done it again. An absorbing read for Christmas.&rsquo; 
Peter Caddick-Adams 
 
&lsquo;Brilliant and immersive.&rsquo; 
Harry Sidebottom 
 
The second book in the Armchair General series, where YOU choose the fate of the First World War 
 
________________________________ 
 
HISTORY IS WRITTEN BY THE VICTORS. WILL IT BE YOU? 
 
TAKE THE HOTSEAT 
Assume the role of real historic decision-makers: general, leaders, soldiers and intelligence officers of the Allied Forces during World War I. 
 
EXAMINE THE INTELLIGENCE 
Explore eight key moments from the First World War, using real contemporaneous intelligence: including the July Crisis, the Battle of the Somme, and the Russian Revolution. 
 
CONSIDER THE SCENARIO &amp; MAKE YOUR DECISION 
From battlefields to the Royal Courts, each tactical and strategic decision you make leads to a different outcome. 
 
Will you follow the path of the past - or shape a new history...? 
________________________________ 
 
PRAISE FOR THE ARMCHAIR GENERAL SERIES 
 
'An original and exciting approach...The Armchair General adds enormously to our understanding of the conflicts' JAMES HOLLAND 
 
'A reminder that history is a never ending now, a relentless and endless present that comes without the luxury of hindsight' AL MURRAY 
 
'Wonderfully original...putting readers at the heart of the decision-making process and allowing them, literally, to change the course of history. This is counterfactual history at its very best' SAUL DAVID

The Armchair General World War One

Can You Win The Great War?

Ian Johnson

A documentary filmmaker who uncovered a Mao-era death camp; an independent journalist who gave voice to the millions who suffered through Covid; a magazine publisher who dodged the secret police: these are some of the people who make up Sparks: China's Underground Historians and their Battle for the Future, a vital account of how some of China's most important writers, filmmakers, and artists have overcome crackdowns and censorship to challenge the Chinese Communist Party on its most sacred ground - its monopoly on history. 
 
In traditional China, dynasties rewrote history to justify their rule by proving that their predecessors were unworthy of holding power. The Chinese Communist Party builds on these ideas to whitewash its misdeeds and justify its rule. 
 
But in recent years, critical thinkers from across the land have begun to challenge this state-led disremembering. Using digital technologies to bypass China's legendary surveillance state, their samizdat journals, guerilla media posts, and underground films document a pattern of disasters: from past famines and purges to the ethnic clashes and virus outbreaks of the present. 
 
Based on years of research in Xi Jinping's China, Sparks challenges stereotypes of a China where the state has quashed all free thought, revealing instead a country engaged in one of humanity's great struggles of memory against forgetting - a battle that will shape the China that emerges in the mid-21st century.

Sparks

China's Underground Historians and Their Battle for the Future

Yaroslav Trofimov

Since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, Yaroslav Trofimov has spent months on end at the heart of the conflict, very often on its front lines. In this authoritative account, he traces the war’s decisive moments—from the battle for Kyiv to more recently the gruelling and bloody arm wrestle involving the Wagner group over Bakhmut—to show how Ukraine and its allies have turned the tide against Russia in a modern-day battle of David and Goliath. Putin had intended to conquer Ukraine with a vicious blitzkrieg, in a few short weeks. But in the face of this existential threat, the Ukrainian people fought back, turning what looked like certain defeat into a great moral victory, even as the territorial battle continues to seesaw to this day. This is the story of their epic bravery in the face of almost unthinkable aggression.

Our Enemies Will Vanish

Nathan Thrall

Milad is five years old and excited for his school trip to a theme park on the outskirts of Jerusalem, but tragedy awaits: his bus is involved in a horrific accident. His father, Abed, rushes to the chaotic site, only to find Milad has already been taken away. Abed sets off on a journey to learn Milad's fate, navigating a maze of physical, emotional, and bureaucratic obstacles he must face as a Palestinian. 
 
Interwoven with Abed's odyssey are the stories of Jewish and Palestinian characters whose lives and pasts unexpectedly converge: a kindergarten teacher and a mechanic who rescue children from the burning bus; an Israeli army commander and a Palestinian official who confront the aftermath at the scene of the crash; a settler paramedic; ultra-Orthodox emergency service workers; and two mothers who each hope to claim one severely injured boy. 
 
A Day in the Life of Abed Salama is a deeply immersive, stunningly detailed portrait of life in Israel and Palestine, and an illumination of the reality of one of the most contested places on earth.

A Day in the Life of Abed Salama

A Palestine Story

Ranulph Fiennes

Co-opted by the British military, archaeologist and adventurer Thomas Edward Lawrence became involved in the 1916 Arab Revolt, fighting alongside guerilla forces, and made a legendary 300-mile journey through blistering heat. He wore Arab dress, and strongly identified with the people in his adopted lands. 
 
 By 1918, he had a £20,000 price on his head. 
 
 Despite people's fascination, Lawrence has long remained unknowable, one of history's most enigmatic explorers. But with in-depth knowledge of what it takes to venture into the unknown, this authoritative biography from explorer Ranulph Fiennes at last brings enthralling insight and clarity to this remarkable life.

Lawrence of Arabia

The definitive 21st-century biography of a 20th-century soldier, adventurer and leader

Shaun Pinner

READ FORMER BRITISH ARMY SOLDIER SHAUN PINNER’S EXTRADORDINARY FIRST-HAND ACCOUNT OF THE WAR IN UKRAINE 
 
For fans of Bravo Two Zero, Touching the Void, and No Way Out 
‘A hell of a story’ Sgt Dan Mills, Sniper One 
 
 ‘A remarkable book’ Andrew Marr 
---- 
‘Live. Fight. Survive,’ she said. So, he did . . . 
 There are just two places Shaun Pinner has felt most at home: first, during his nine years in the British Army and, second, in Ukraine, where he settled after marrying. It was only natural then, that when Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, he was on the front line leading a section of marines. 
 Outnumbered and outgunned, Pinner's troops staged a fighting retreat to Mariupol for that remarkable, defiant last stand against Putin’s war machine. But this was just the beginning of Shaun’s ordeal. When his troops were ambushed, Shaun was captured – and his war shifted from the battlefield to the interrogation room, when the real fight for survival began . . . 
--- 
‘A remarkable story from the frontline. Extraordinary descriptions [of] what it's actually like to be in a trench fighting in the winter on the front line against the Russians’ ANDREW MARR 
 ‘An extraordinary real-life story’ ENTERTAINMENT FOCUS 
‘I was mesmerised. Unforgettable’ COLONEL RICHARD KEMP, CO-AUTHOR OF ATTACK STATE RED

Live. Fight. Survive.

An ex-British soldier’s account of courage, resistance and defiance fighting for Ukraine against Russia

Christabel Bielenberg

On 29 September 1934, at the German Embassy office in London, Christabel Bielenberg officially became a German citizen. Having met her German husband Peter two years prior, Christabel decided to renounce her British citizenship, planning to start married life with Peter in Berlin. Though Adolf Hitler had risen to power in 1933, Christabel and Peter were convinced the German people would see through the newly elected chancellor. 
 
But soon Christabel found herself living under the horrors of Nazi rule and Allied bombings as the war progressed. Closely associated with resistance circles, her husband was arrested after the failure of the plot against Hitler’s life on 20 July 1944, and she herself was interrogated by the Gestapo. Though she lived in constant fear for her and her family’s safety, Christabel survived the war with the help of other like-minded Germans who were against Hitler and the Third Reich. 
 
With various memorable encounters – from a simple-minded Nazi official who was also her odd-job gardener to the good-hearted Black Forest villagers who sheltered her till the liberation – Christabel shares not only the hardships and worry but also the humour and humanity she found during these dark days. The human dimension of her writing brings about an unforgettable portrait of an evil time.

The Past Is Myself

Julian Jackson

Few images more shocked the French population during the Occupation than the photograph of Marshal Philippe Pétain - the great French hero of the First World War - shaking the hand of Hitler on 20 October 1940. In a radio speech after this meeting, Pétain told the French people that he was 'entering down the road of collaboration'. He ended with the words: 'This is my policy. My ministers are responsible to me. It is I alone who will be judged by History.' Five years later, in July 1945, the hour of judgement - if not yet the judgement of History - arrived. Pétain was brought before a specially created High Court to answer for his conduct between the signing of the armistice with Germany in June 1940 and the Liberation of France in August 1944. 
 
Julian Jackson uses Pétain's three-week trial as a lens through which to examine the central crisis of twentieth-century French history - the defeat of 1940, the signing of the armistice and Vichy's policy of collaboration - what the main prosecutor Mornet called 'four years to erase from our history'. As head of the Vichy regime in the Second, Pétain became one of France's most notorious public figures, and the lightening-rod for collective guilt and retribution immediately after the Second World War. In France on Trial Jackson blends politics and personal drama to explore how different national factions sought to try to claim the past, or establish their interpretation of it, as a way of claiming the present and future.

France on Trial

The Case of Marshal Pétain

Rachel Chrastil

Less than a month after it marched into France in summer 1870, the Prussian army had devastated its opponents, captured Napoleon III and wrecked all assumptions about Europe's pecking order. Other countries looked on in helpless amazement. A new German Empire was proclaimed (as a deliberate humiliation) in the Palace of Versailles, leaving the French to face civil war in Paris, reparations and the loss of Alsace and Lorraine. 
 
Bismarck's War tells the story of one of the most shocking reversals of fortune in modern European history. The Franco-Prussian War was deliberately engineered by Bismarck, both to destroy French power and to unite Germany. It could not have worked better, but it also had lurking inside it the poisonous seeds of all the disasters that would ravage the twentieth century. 
 
Chrastil's book explores the military, technological, political and social events of the war, its human cost and the way that the sheer ferocity of war, however successful, has profound consequences for both victors and victims.

Bismarck's War

The Franco-Prussian War and the Making of Modern Europe

David Omand

'David Omand is exactly the man you need in a crisis' RORY STEWART 
 
From the former Director of GCHQ comes a guide to surviving crises using the latest intelligence strategies 
 
War, terrorism, cyberattack, climate change, the threat of AI: it has never been more important to be prepared for the crises that await us. 
 
In How to Survive a Crisis, Professor Sir David Omand draws on his experience in defence, security and intelligence, including as Director of GCHQ and UK Security and Intelligence Coordinator, to show how you can detect a looming crisis and extinguish it (or at least survive it with minimum loss). 
 
Using gripping real-world examples from Omand's storied career, and drawing lessons from historic catastrophes such as Chernobyl, 9/11, the Deepwater Horizon oil spill and the WannaCry ransomware cyberattack, this empowering book is filled with practical advice on how to survive the multiplying crises of the future. Not every crisis need tip into disaster, if we have invested in we are prepared for it. 
 
'This book is the instruction manual we all need' SIR ALEX YOUNGER, CHIEF OF MI6 
 
UPDATED WITH A NEW FOREWORD

How to Survive a Crisis

Lessons in Resilience and Avoiding Disaster

Tom Whipple

'Deeply researched and engagingly written' The Times 
'Has the pace and style of a well-crafted thriller' Mail on Sunday 
'Chock full of memorable characters and written with all the drama and pace of a Robert Harris thriller' Rowland White, author of Mosquito 
 
Summer 1939. War is coming. The British believe that, through ingenuity and scientific prowess, they alone have a war-winning weapon: radar. They are wrong. The Germans have it too. 
 
They believe that their unique maritime history means their pilots have no need of navigational aids. They are wrong. Most of the bombs the RAF will drop in the first years of the war land miles from their target. 
 
They also believe that the Germans, without the same naval tradition, will never be able to find targets at night. They are, again, wrong. 
 
In 1939 the Germans don't just have radar to spot planes entering their airspace, they have radio beams to guide their own planes into enemy airspace. 
 
This war will be fought on land and sea and in the air, but it will also be fought on the airwaves. It will be fought between scientists on both sides at the forefront of knowledge, and the agents and commandos they relied on to bolster that knowledge. Thanks to one young engineer, Reginald Jones, the British develop radar technology that went on to help the Allies win the war. 
 
Relying on first-hand accounts from Reginald Jones as well as papers recently released by the Admiralty, The Battle of the Beams fills a huge missing piece in the canon of World War II literature. It is a tale that combines history, science, derring do and dogged determination and will appeal as much to fans of World War II history as to those fascinated by the science behind the beams that changed our lives. 
 
The radio war of 1939-45 is one of the great scientific battles in history. This is the story of that war.

The Battle of the Beams

The secret science of radar that turned the tide of the Second World War

James Holland

'Richly impressive, hard to surpass' William Boyd 
'A notable account of an epic human experience' Max Hastings 
&lsquo;James Holland brings every inch of this battle vividly to life&rsquo; History Revealed 
&lsquo;This excellent book&hellip;The Savage Storm reinforces Holland&rsquo;s reputation as certainly the busiest and probably the most popular military historian of the second world war working today&rsquo; Spectator 
&lsquo;A must for anyone wanting to better understand the brutal campaign&hellip; thoroughly deserves a place on the bookshelf&rsquo; Soldier Magazine 
_____________________ 
 
From the bestselling author of Brothers in Arms comes the story of the most pivotal Allies campaign of World War II. 
 
With the invasion of France the following year taking shape, and hot on the heels of victory in Sicily, the Allies crossed into Southern Italy in September 1943. They expected to drive the Axis forces north and be in Rome by Christmas. And although Italy surrendered, the German forces resisted fiercely and the swift hoped-for victory descended into one of the most brutal battles of the war. 
 
Even though shipping and materiel were already being safeguarded for the D-Day landings, there were still huge expectations on the progress of the invading armies, but those shortages were to slow the advance with tragic consequences. As the weather closed in, the critical weeks leading up to Monte Cassino would inflict a heavy price for every bloody, hard fought mile the Allied troops covered. 
 
Chronicling those dark, dramatic months in unflinching and insightful detail, The Savage Storm is unlike any campaign history yet written. James Holland has always recounted the Second World War at ground level, but this version telling brings the story vividly to life like never before. Weaving together a wealth of letters, diaries, and other incredible documents, Holland traces the battles as they were fought - across plains, over mountains, through shattered villages and cities, in intense heat and, towards the end, frigid cold and relentless rain - putting readers at the heart of the action to create an entirely fresh and revealing telling of this most pivotal phase of the war. 
_____________________ 
 
Praise for James Holland 
 
'Impeccably researched and superbly written' Observer 
'Holland has something new to say.... Filled with insight and detail' Neil Oliver 
'James Holland is the best of the new generation of WW2 historians' Sebastian Faulks 
'[A] captivating and dramatic account. . . Drawn from letters and diaries, Holland&rsquo;s immersive narrative is told through the eye-level perspectives... Readers will be enthralled' Publishers Weekly 
&lsquo;A remarkable achievement by a historian at the height of his powers. Holland has successfully illustrated both the significance and the savagery of the Italian campaign... through a powerful and compelling narrative&rsquo; Military History Matters

The Savage Storm

The Brutal Battle for Italy 1943

Michael Palin

Discover Michael's new travel adventure, Michael Palin in Venezuela, available now. 
 
'I cannot remember the last time I read a book so immediately absorbing and affecting. Michael Palin has never been better – which is, of course, saying a great deal.' BILL BRYSON 
___________________________________ 
 
From the time, many years ago, when Michael Palin first heard that his grandfather had a brother, Harry, he was determined to find out more about him. 
 
The quest that followed involved hundreds of hours of painstaking detective work. Michael dug out every bit of family gossip and correspondence he could. He studied every relevant official document. He tracked down what remained of his great-uncle Harry's diaries and letters, and pored over photographs of First World War battle scenes to see whether Harry appeared in any of them. He walked the route Harry took on that fatal, final day of his life amid the mud of northern France. And as he did so, a life that had previously existed in the shadows was revealed to him. 
 
Great-Uncle Harry is an utterly compelling account of an ordinary man who led an extraordinary life. A blend of biography, history, travelogue and personal memoir this is Michael Palin at his very finest. 
___________________________________________ 
 
PRAISE FOR EREBUS: 
 
'Beyond terrific. I didn't want it to end.' BILL BRYSON 
 
'Magisterial . . . Palin brings energy, wit and humanity to a story that has never ceased to tantalise people.' THE TIMES 
 
'Everybody's talking about it . . . A brilliant book.' CHRIS EVANS 
 
'I absolutely loved it: I had to read it at one sitting.' LORRAINE KELLY

Great-Uncle Harry

A Tale of War and Empire

Rowland White

'Captivating' Daily Telegraph 
'Stunning' James Holland 
'Superb' Daily Express 
'Wonderful' John Nichol 
'Remarkable' RAF News 
_________________________________Built of lightweight wood, powered by two growling Rolls-Royce Merlin engines, impossibly aerodynamic, headspinningly fast and armed to the teeth, the de Havilland Mosquito was the war-winning wonder that should never have existed: the aircraft the RAF didn't think it wanted then couldn't do without. 
 
Flying on operations barely eighteen months after a single prototype was ordered off the drawing board, it was the answer to its pilots' prayers: a stunningly versatile warplane capable of leaving the Luftwaffe in its wake to attack when and where the enemy was least expecting it. 
 
Excelling as a spyplane, night-fighter and pathfinder for Bomber Command's heavies the Mossie's reputation was cemented by a series of daredevil bombing raids across occupied Europe, including on Berlin itself, where only surprise, speed and precision could ensure success. 
 
So when Churchill's top secret Special Operations Executive needed to destroy the Gestapo HQ in the centre of downtown Copenhagen to prevent a devastating Nazi last stand that might prolong the war for many months, there was only one machine for the job. 
 
This is the story of that legendary aircraft told through that one impossible mission. 
 
Like Rowland White's previous books, Mosquito is an unputdownable mix of utterly compelling storytelling, incredible human stories and fascinating technological detail, which sheds never-before-told light on a pivotal mission that helped bring the war to its bloody and brutal close. 
_________________________________ 
 
Praise for Mosquito 
 
’10/10' Helen Fry 
'Excellent ... provides thrilling accounts' The Past 
'A brilliant read' Army Rumour Service Book Club 
'A triumph' Damcasters podcast 
'A tremendous book ... can't recommend it more highly' We Have Ways podcast 
'An addictive, moving and tenaciously researched tale ... his best book to date' Flypast 
'Mosquito reads like a thriller... Unreservedly recommended' Aviation Historian 
'It's like the best adventure stories except this one is the real thing' Best of British 
'A fascinating insight into one of the aircraft's most dramatic episodes' History of War 
'White immerses the reader in the action from the first page ... a must read' Flight International 
'Thrilling... A multi-layered, painstakingly assembled narrative... an instant classic' Warships IF

Mosquito

The RAF's Legendary Wooden Wonder and its Most Extraordinary Mission

Christopher Clark

There can be few more exciting or frightening moments in European history than the spring of 1848. As if by magic, in city after city, from Palermo to Paris, huge crowds gathered, sometimes peaceful and sometimes violent, and the political order that had held sway since the defeat of Napoleon simply collapsed. 
 
Christopher Clark's spectacular new book recreates with verve, wit and insight this extraordinary period. Some rulers gave up at once, others fought bitterly, but everywhere new politicians, beliefs and expectations surged forward. The role of women in society, the end of slavery, the right to work, national independence and the emancipation of the Jews all became live issues. 
 
Clark conjures up both this ferment of new ideas and then the increasingly ruthless series of counter-attacks launched by regimes who still turned out to have many cards to play. But even in defeat, exiles spread the ideas of 1848 around the world and - for better and sometimes much worse - a new and very different Europe emerged from the wreckage.

Revolutionary Spring

Fighting for a New World 1848-1849

Katja Hoyer

In 1990, a country disappeared. When the iron curtain fell, East Germany simply ceased to be. For over forty years, from the ruin of the Second World War to the cusp of a new millennium, the GDR presented a radically different German identity to anything that had come before, and anything that exists today. Socialist solidarity, secret police, central planning, barbed wire: this was a Germany forged on the fault lines of ideology and geopolitics. 
 
In Beyond the Wall, acclaimed historian Katja Hoyer offers a kaleidoscopic new vision of this vanished country. Beginning with the bitter experience of German Marxists exiled by Hitler, she traces the arc of the state they would go on to create, first under the watchful eye of Stalin, and then in an increasingly distinctive German fashion. From the building of the Berlin Wall in 1961, to the relative prosperity of the 1970s, and on to the creaking foundations of socialism in the mid-1980s, Hoyer argues that amid oppression and frequent hardship, East Germany was yet home to a rich political, social and cultural landscape, a place far more dynamic than the Cold War caricature often painted in the West. 
 
Powerfully told, and drawing on a vast array of never-before-seen interviews, letters and records, this is the definitive history of the other Germany, the one beyond the Wall.

Beyond the Wall

East Germany, 1949-1990

A Private Thriller

A series of children's modern classic novels by renowned 20th century children's writers. All the titles in this series have the A Puffin Book logo, contemporary-style covers, and child-friendly endnotes.

A Puffin Book

A Ripley Novel

A Slice of the Moon

A Victorian Mystery

A Walk in...

A Women’s Murder Club Thriller

A chef Paul Delamare Mystery

Aberrations

Across the Universe

Actiphons

Adelia Aguilar

Adrian Mole

Adventures in Time

Aftermath

Against War

Age of X

Agent 21

Agent Z

Detective Aidan Waits is a troubled junior detective haunted by his past. Facing an uncertain future, and disconnected from his history, DC Waits and his partner, Detective Inspector Peter 'Sutty' Sutcliffe work on Manchester's streets to uncover the city's worst criminals among the grime of the underworld.

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