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. E. W. Mason

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

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Noam Chomsky

In sixteen extended talks with Alternative Radio's David Barsamian, Noam Chomsky explains why the 'war on drugs' is really a war on poor people; how attacks on political correctness are attacks on independent thought; how historical revisionism has recast the United States as the victim in the Vietnam War. Widely recognized as one of the most original and important thinkers of our age, Chomsky's trenchant analysis of current events is a breath of fresh air in a world more and more polluted by mainstream media.

Chronicles of Dissent

Serhii Plokhy

On 16 July 1945, the Nuclear Age began with the explosion of the first atomic bomb and the words of J. Robert Oppenheimer: 'Now I am become Death, the Destroyer of Worlds.'While the threat of mutually assured destruction kept a lid on a simmering and tense geopolitical landscape, events like the Chernobyl disaster and near-misses like the Cuban Missile Crisis showed that total destruction was only ever one malfunction, mistake, or miscommunication away. Now, as governments re-arm their nuclear arsenals, treaties designed to limit the acquisition and use of nuclear weapons fall away, and nuclear weapons come increasingly within reach of non-state actors, we are on the brink of a renaissance of the nuclear industry.In The Nuclear Age, acclaimed historian Serhii Plokhy paints an intricate picture of a world governed by fear. From the first artificial splitting of the atom in 1917 and the race to create the first atomic bomb in World War II, through the fraught arms race of the Cold War, to the imperialism, neo-colonial motivation and wars being waged today, the threat posed by nuclear weapons is as pertinent as ever. 
 
As he examines the motivations of key players, Plokhy confronts the crucial question of our age: what can we learn from the first nuclear arms race that can help us to stop the new one?

The Nuclear Age

An Epic Race for Arms, Power and Survival

N A M Rodger

At the end of the French and Napoleonic wars, British sea-power was at its apogee. But by 1840, the Admiralty was full of ‘intellects becalmed in the smoke of Trafalgar’. How the Royal Navy reformed and reinvigorated itself in the course of the nineteenth century is just one thread in this magnificent book, the culmination of one of the most admired British historical works in recent decades. 
 
The book is based on a lifetime’s learning, and refuses to accept standard assumptions and analyses. Naval specialists will find much that is new, and will be invigorated by the originality of Rodger’s judgements; but everyone who is interested in the one of the central threads in British history will find it rewarding.

The Price of Victory

A Naval History of Britain: 1815 – 1945

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

Kehinde Andrews

Malcolm X is a titanic figure in political history, but he is also one of the most misunderstood. So much of what we know about his life and politics is from books, films and documentaries that are all guilty of peddling the Malcolm myth for their own nefarious interests. Forever known as the violent Yang to Martin Luther King’s Yin, in the years since his death he has been co-opted into the American project, punished by his enemies for his radicalism, and marginalised by decades of governments, academics and activists. 
 
But here, for the first time, Malcolm is rediscovered. On the centenary of his birthday, in a world shaken by decades of injustice and racism, Malcolm’s political mission is more urgent than ever. In Nobody Can Give You Freedom, Kehinde Andrews reveals his real revolutionary programme. Malcolm’s activism was his philosophy, and paying attention to it reveals the true cultural icon – who, if he were alive today, would tell us to pick up the mantle, and overturn this wicked system for good.

Nobody Can Give You Freedom

The Real Mission of Malcolm X

James Holland

Al Murray

Bestselling historians James Holland and Al Murray tell the unflinching story of the eight surrenders that brought victory to the Allies and ended the Second World War. 
 
‘A gripping, eye-opening and satisfying new account’ The Express 
_________ 
 
From the Italian Alps to northern Germany, to London, New York, Washington and Tokyo, Victory ’45 tells the story of the extraordinary summer when the greatest conflagration the world had ever known finally came to an end after eight surrenders that heralded the Allied victory. 
 
Comprised of eight chapters based around each of those surrenders and the victory celebrations which followed, it will be rich in character and human drama with revealing stories and perspectives behind the end of the war not yet told before. Each chapter will follow the viewpoints of a number of key characters as they traverse these world-changing events – from ordinary servicemen and women and civilians to generals and political leaders. 
 
What took place during the negotiations of those surrenders and the terms that were agreed there would determine the directions the participating countries would take in the years that followed and ultimately the shape of our current world.

Victory '45

The End of the War in Eight Surrenders

Michael Lewis

The government is a vast, complex system that citizens pay for, rebel against, rely upon, dismiss, and celebrate. It’s also our shared resource for addressing the biggest problems of society. And it’s made up of people, mostly unrecognized and uncelebrated, doing work that can be deeply consequential and beneficial to everyone. 
 
Michael Lewis invited his favourite writers to find someone doing an interesting job for the government and write about them. The stories they found are unexpected, riveting, and inspiring, including a former coal miner devoted to making mine roofs less likely to collapse, saving thousands of lives; an IRS agent straight out of a crime thriller; and the manager who made the National Cemetery Administration the best-run organization, public or private, in the entire country. Each essay shines a spotlight on the essential behind-the-scenes work of exemplary federal employees. 
 
Whether they’re digitizing archives, chasing down cybercriminals, or discovering new planets, these public servants are committed to their work and universally reluctant to take credit. Who is Government? shows how the essential business of government makes our lives possible, and how much it matters.

Who is Government?

The Untold Story of Public Service

Terry Deary

It is a truth universally acknowledged that the rich and powerful always look after their own and the working people are always revolting. But every now and again, a new group actually manages to seize power, and it changes history. 
 
Few enjoy the success of Ivaylo, the Bulgarian swineherd who managed to fight off the Mongols, slay the Tsar and marry his widow in the space of a year. But then, some rebels have more modest aims: Spartacus mainly wanted to go home to see his mum. Either way, we have much to learn from the tactics of revolutionaries gone by, like the two suffragists who posted themselves by Royal Mail to see the prime minister. (A first-class idea, though Downing Street declined the parcel.) 
 
From the peasants to the slaves, the martyrs to the mutineers, Revolting celebrates the resilience and determination of those who dared to challenge the status quo.

Revolting

A riotous history of rebellions and revolutions

Josh Dawsey

Tyler Pager

Isaac Arnsdorf

THE INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER 
 
'A well-paced, thorough and often (darkly) humorous account of the two-year campaign season that began when Donald Trump announced he was running for president again . . . Thrilling.' New York Times 
 
The most definitive, deeply researched and authoritative account of the most tumultuous election in US history. 
 
In 2024, Donald Trump made a political comeback on a scale that stunned the world. How did the first US president to become a convicted felon regain control of the White House? And at what cost? 
 
Here, three award-winning reporters bring us the definitive and explosive account of how Trump and his advisers overcame a dozen primary challengers, four indictments, two assassination attempts, and his own past mistakes to defeat the Democrats. It is a damning and revelatory inside account of an election that tested American democracy – and which has already transformed the future of the free world. 
 
‘The most well-sourced and judiciously written reporting from the campaign that you will find . . . 2024 is the best book of its kind I have read.’ Philip Collins, Observer 
 
‘Charts the delusions of the main players and the disastrous debate that reset the campaign . . . 2024 is a book for these times: aptly named deeply sourced.’ Lloyd Green, Guardian 
 
‘By speaking to insiders on all sides of the debate, it lifts the lid on the near misses, fatal errors and lucky saves that led to the situation today.’ Katy Balls, The Times

2024

How Trump Retook the White House and the Democrats Lost America

Quinn Slobodian

After the end of the Cold War, neoliberalism, with its belief in the virtues of markets and competition, seemed to have triumphed. Communism had been defeated – and Friedrich Hayek, the spiritual father of neoliberal economics, had just about lived to see it. But in the decades that followed, Hayek’s disciples knew that they had a problem. The rise of social movements, from civil rights and feminism to environmentalism, were now proving roadblocks in the road to freedom, nurturing a culture of government dependency, public spending, political correctness and special pleading. Neoliberals needed an antidote.In this illuminating new book, historian Quinn Slobodian reveals how, from the 1990s onwards, neoliberal thinkers turned to nature, in an attempt to roll back social changes and to return to a hierarchy of gender, race and cultural difference. He explores how these thinkers drew on the language of science, from cognitive psychology to genetics, in order to embed the idea of ‘competition’ ever deeper into social life, and to advocate cultural homogeneity as essential for markets to truly work. Reading and misreading the writings of their sages, Friedrich Hayek and Ludwig von Mises, they forged the alliances with racial psychologists, neoconfederates, ethnonationalists that would become known as the alt-right.Hayek’s Bastards shows that many contemporary iterations of the Far Right, from Javier Milei to Donald Trump, emerged not in opposition to neoliberalism, but within it. As repellent as their politics may be, these supposed disruptors are not defectors from the neoliberal order, but its latest cheerleaders.

Hayek's Bastards

The Neoliberal Roots of the Populist Right

Devi Sridhar

Have you ever questioned why, despite the avalanche of self-help books and optimization hacks, we remain embroiled in multiple global health crises? Populations worldwide are gaining life-shortening excess weight (even in poorer countries), and water contamination is rampant (even in richer countries). In such dire circumstances, a gratitude journal won’t help. 
 
The stark reality is that we’ve been sold a monumental lie. The obsession with individual health optimization has distracted us from the real game-changer: holding governments accountable for policies that can significantly extend our lifespans. How Not to Die (Too Soon) is a vital, transformative guide that shifts the focus from individual responsibility to societal accountability. It’s time to demand the changes that will save lives.

How Not to Die (Too Soon)

The Lies We’ve Been Sold and the Policies That Can Save Us

With exceptional clarity and power of argument, Noam Chomsky lays bare as no one else can the realities of contemporary geopolitics. Divided into four sections and originally published in the US as individual short books which have collectively sold over half a million copies, How the World Works is a collection of speeches and interviews with Chomsky by David Barsamian, edited by Arthur Naiman. It includes What Uncle Sam Really Wants, about US foreign policy; The Prosperous Few and the Restless Many, about the new global economy, food, Third World 'economic miracles' and the roots of racism; Secrets, Lies and Democracy, about the US, the CIA, religious fundamentalism, global inequality and the coming eco-catastrophe; and The Common Good, about equality, freedom, the media, the myth of Third World debt and manufacturing dissent.

How the World Works

Scott Anderson

THE NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER 
 
NEW STATESMAN, ATLANTIC AND WALL STREET JOURNAL BOOK OF THE YEAR 
 
'A brilliant tale of greed, paranoia and hubris... a good place to start for anyone seeking to understand the current crisis' Financial Times 
 
'If you want to understand the turmoil in Gaza, Syria and beyond, the Iranian Revolution of 1979 is a good place to start' The Times 
 
'Excellent' Telegraph 
 
'Exceptional' New York Times 
 
A spellbinding narrative history of the 1979 Iranian Revolution and its devastating consequences by the Sunday Times bestselling author of Lawrence in Arabia. 
 
Before the revolution, the Shah of Iran seemed invincible. The world watched in awe as he commanded a huge army and oversaw an economy awash with billions of dollars of oil revenues. The regime’s secret police had crushed communist opposition and the Shah appeared to have bought off the conservative Muslim clergy inside the country. On the international stage, Iran had become an invaluable ally to the West during the Cold War. 
 
But village streets spoke of a different country – people derided the Shah as an American lackey and blamed him for economic inequality, for spending recklessly on lavish parties and for ignoring the Muslim majority. When a volcanic religious revolution erupted, led by a fiery cleric named Ayatollah Khomeini, the Shah was forced off the throne and into exile. How did it all go so wrong? 
 
Brilliantly brought to life by the Sunday Times bestselling author Scott Anderson, this gripping behind-the-scenes narrative reveals how the Iranian Revolution was as world-shattering an event as the French and Russian revolutions, and how its repercussions are still felt around the world today. In the Middle East, in India, in Southeast Asia, and now in Europe and the United States, the hatred of economically-marginalized, religiously-fervent masses for a wealthy secular elite has led to violence and upheaval – and Iran was the template. 
 
'Gripping... Anderson does an excellent job of narrating the extraordinary events of the revolution' 
Spectator 
 
'Told with clarity and directness. It is unlikely that a more authoritative account of this torrid period will ever be written' 
Observer 
 
'A sweeping, gripping book, one that makes past times and dead people (often weird, complex and evil) spring to life with its narrative verve and attention to detail... Riveting... Compelling' 
Wall Street Journal 
 
'Timely... a lively tale of palace intrigue' 
New Yorker 
 
'The most compelling account yet of the revolution in Iran... Outstanding' 
Eugene Rogan, author of The Fall of the Ottomans 
 
'Thrilling... the gold standard account of the Shah’s fall... An epic and heart-breaking tragedy' 
Azadeh Moaveni, author of Guest House for Young Widows 
 
‘A masterfully told account… A must-read’ Steve Coll, Pulitzer Prize winning author of Ghost Wars 
 
‘Delivers remarkable new insights into one of history’s least understood upheavals’ Kim Ghattas, author of Black Wave 
 
'Thrilling and fully authoritative' Azadeh Moaveni, award-winning author of Lipstick Jihad and Guest House for Young Widows 
 
'Important and riveting' Sebastian Junger, bestselling author of In My Time of Dying and Tribe

King of Kings

The Fall of the Shah and the Revolution That Forged Modern Iran

Alistair Wood

As a boy, Alistair Wood lived within the walls of an MI6 training camp. After all, he was family. His mother was one of a handful of women to have operated behind the lines in post-war Berlin. His father, once one of Britain’s most highly-regarded intelligence officers, was an absent and perplexing figure, the reasons for his sudden departure from the Service still classified to this day. 
My Family and Other Spies is a gripping exploration of an extraordinary family, a globe-trotting spy story spanning pre-Second World War to the fall of Communism, and a son’s reckoning with the secrets of the past.

My Family And Other Spies

Fara Dabhoiwala

‘Free Speech!’ is a clarion call all over the world, yet what it means today is more contested than ever. Many cultures regard it as dangerous: in China, India, and across the Islamic world, unorthodox views about politics, sex, and religion are repressed and people are often punished for expressing them. Even in the west, where it is held up as a core value, there is widespread discord and disagreement about what freedom of expression means. Amidst perennial imbalances of power, continually evolving cultural taboos, dramatic new technologies and a fast-changing global media landscape, where free speech comes from – and how we might think about it – are critical questions. 
 
Through the lens of history, What Is Free Speech? shows us that freedom of speech is not an absolute from which societies and regimes have drifted or dissented at different times, but something more complicated and interesting. This book explains how to think more deeply about free speech as a global as well as a local question — by tracing how we got into our current predicaments, showing that history complicates our contemporary presumptions, and suggesting fresh possibilities for the future.

What Is Free Speech?

The History of a Dangerous Idea

Robert Macfarlane

At its heart is a single, transformative idea: that rivers are not mere matter for human use, but living beings – who should be recognized as such in both imagination and law. Is a River Alive? takes the reader on an exhilarating exploration of the past, present and futures of this ancient, urgent concept. 
 
The book flows first to northern Ecuador, where a miraculous cloud-forest and its rivers are threatened by goldmining. 
 
Then, to the wounded rivers, creeks and lagoons of southern India, where a desperate battle to save the lives of these waterbodies is under way. 
 
And finally, to north-eastern Quebec, where a spectacular wild river – the Mutehekau or Magpie – is being defended from death by damming in a river-rights campaign. 
 
At once Macfarlane’s most personal and most political book to date, Is a River Alive? will open hearts, spark debates and lead us to the revelation that our fate flows with that of rivers – and always has

Is a River Alive?

Ahmed Alnaouq

Pam Bailey

THE NUMBER 5 SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER 
 
THE IRISH BESTSELLER 
 
'Meaningful and impactful ... A vital [read] ... Tell all your friends' BRITISH VOGUE 
'A powerful collection' SERVICE95 
'This book is a jailbreak and a miracle' NAOMI KLEIN 
'Essential ... A project that insists on liberation' TA-NEHISI COATES 
'Impossible to put down or forget' RIZ AHMED 
'We Are Not Numbers is not just a book - it's my life, their life, and our shared story ... This is Gaza as it truly is, written by those who live it every day' MOTAZ AZAIZA 
'A brilliant collection of voices that lays bare the struggles and suffering of ordinary young Palestinians' MONICA ALI 
 
A teenage girl stares at her roof, hoping it won’t collapse over her head. A young student searches the Internet for photos of libraries around the world, hoping he’ll be able to visit them one day. Another walks around the city, taking notes of all the buildings she dreams of repairing. 
 
These are the stories of young people from Gaza, born under Israeli occupation and blockade. They are people who have endured unspeakable struggles and losses, who keep fighting to be recognised not as numbers, but as human beings with hopes, dreams and lives worth living. 
 
We Are Not Numbers was founded in 2014 to give voice to the youth of Gaza. In this collection, vital, urgent and full of heart, spanning over ten years to the present moment, we gain an unparalleled insight into the past, as well as the current and next generation of Palestinian leaders, artists, scientists and scholars and imagine where we might go from here.

We Are Not Numbers

The Voices of Gaza’s Youth

Steve Coll

The Achilles Trap masterfully untangles the people, ploys of power and geopolitics that led to America's disastrous war with Iraq and, for the first time, details America's fundamental miscalculations during its ruinous, decades-long relationship with Saddam Hussein. 
 
Beginning with Saddam's rise to power in 1979 and the birth of Iraq's secret nuclear weapons programme, Steve Coll traces Saddam's motives through understanding his inner circle. He brings to life the diplomats, scientists, family members and generals who had no choice but to defer to their leader - a leader directly responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Iraqis, as well as the torture or imprisonment of many more. This was a man whose reasoning was impossible to reduce to a simple explanation, and the CIA and successive presidential administrations failed to grasp critical nuances in his paranoia, resentments and inconsistencies - even when the stakes were incredibly high. 
 
Using unpublished and underreported sources, interviews with surviving participants, and Saddam's own transcripts and audio files, The Achilles Trap is a remarkable picture of a dictator who was convinced the world was out to get him and acted accordingly. A work of great historical significance, it is the definitive account of how corruptions of power, lies of diplomacy and vanity - on both sides - led to avoidable errors of statecraft: ones that would enact immeasurable human suffering and forever change our political landscape.

The Achilles Trap

Saddam Hussein, the United States and the Middle East, 1979-2003

Carlo Rovelli

One of our most beloved scientists, a fearless free spirit, Carlo Rovelli is also a masterful storyteller. In this collection of writings, the logbook of an intelligence always on the move, he follows his curiosity and invites us on a voyage through science, literature, philosophy and politics. 
 
Written with his usual clarity and wit, these pieces, most of which were first published in Italian newspapers, range widely across time and space: from Newton's alchemy to Einstein's mistakes, from Nabokov's butterflies to Dante's cosmology, from travels in Africa to the consciousness of an octopus, from mind-altering psychedelic substances to the meaning of atheism. Charming, pithy and elegant, this book is the perfect gateway to the universe of one of the most influential physicists of our age.

There Are Places in the World Where Rules Are Less Important Than Kindness

Dana Mattioli

**LONGLISTED FOR THE FINANCIAL TIMES BUSINESS BOOK OF THE YEAR 2024** 
 
‘Riveting and explosive. This is the business story of our time.’ 
Christopher Leonard, New York Times Bestselling Author of Kochland and The Lords of Easy Money 
 
'A hard-hitting analysis of Amazon’s dominance. Makes a compelling case that no company should be this powerful.' 
Financial Times 
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From veteran Amazon reporter for The Wall Street Journal, The Everything War is the first untold, devastating exposé of Amazon's endless strategic greed, its pursuit of total domination, by any means necessary, and the growing efforts to stop it. 
 
For over twenty years, Amazon was the quintessential American success story, whilst its “customer obsession” approach made it indelibly attractive to consumers across the globe. But the company was not benevolent; it operated in ways that ensured it stayed on top, coming to dominate over a dozen industries beyond retail, growing voraciously by abusing data, exploiting partners, copying competitors, and avoiding taxes—leveraging its power to extract whatever it could, at any cost and without much scrutiny. Until now. 
 
With unparalleled access, and having interviewed hundreds of people – from Amazon executives to competitors to small businesses who rely on its marketplace to survive – Dana Mattioli exposes how Amazon was driven by a competitive edge to dominate every industry it entered, bulldozed all who stood in its way, reshaped the retail landscape, transformed how Wall Street evaluates companies, and altered the very nature of the global economy. 
 
In 2023, the Federal Trade Commission filed a monopoly lawsuit against Amazon in what may become one of the largest antitrust cases in the 21st century. As Amazon’s supremacy is finally challenged, The Everything War is the definitive, inside story of how it grew into one of the most powerful and feared companies in the world – and why this is the most consequential business story of our times. 
 
 
Financial Times Business Book of the Year Award 2024, announced August 2024.

The Everything War

Amazon’s Ruthless Quest to Own the World and Remake Corporate Power

Wes Moore

A powerful memoir from 'the Democrats’ most talented political newcomer since Barack Obama' (Time) 
 
'Spectacular . . . Wes Moore is a proper leader' George Clooney 
 
 
Two kids named Wes Moore shared much more than a name; they shared remarkably similar circumstances. Both grew up father­less and had difficult childhoods; both hung out on street corners with their crews; both ran into trouble with the police. 
 
How, then, did one grow up to be a Rhodes Scholar, decorated veteran, White House Fellow, and leading politician, while the other became a convicted murderer serving a life sentence? 
Wes Moore, the author of this fascinating book, sets out to answer this profound ques­tion. 
 
In December 2000, the Baltimore Sun ran a small piece about Wes Moore, a local student who had just received a Rhodes Scholarship. The same paper also featured an article about a botched armed robbery in which a police officer had been killed. Two of the suspects had gone on the run. One was named Wes Moore. 
 
After following the case to its conclusion, Wes Moore wrote a letter to the other Wes, now a convicted murderer serving a life sentence without the possibility of parole. His letter asked the questions that had been haunting him: who are you? How did this happen? 
 
Through dozens of letters and prison visits, over the course of years, Wes discovered that the other Wes had had a life not unlike his own. 
 
Told in alternating dramatic narratives, The Other Wes Moore takes readers from heart-wrenching losses to moments of surprising redemption, and sheds a powerful light on modern America. 
 
 
'I always walk away from a conversation with Wes Moore with a new perspective…new ideas...with a new way of seeing things...with a new burst of positive energy.' Oprah Winfrey

The Other Wes Moore

Leor Zmigrod

Why do some people become radicalized? Who is most susceptible to ideological thinking? Can we unchain our minds from toxic dogmas? 
 
Drawing on her groundbreaking research, Dr Leor Zmigrod uncovers the hidden mechanisms driving our beliefs and behaviours. She uses the powerful tools of neuroscience to show that our political beliefs are not transient thoughts in our minds, divorced from our bodies – ideologies actually change our neural architecture, our cells. For instance, she demonstrates how a simple card sorting game can reveal your entire approach to life. Cognitive rigidity in such tasks – struggling to adapt to new rules – mirrors the rigidity with which you cling to social and political ideologies. While some individuals are more susceptible to dogmatic thinking than others, all of us can strive to be more flexible. 
 
The Ideological Brain is essential reading in today’s polarized and polarizing world. To foster a more informed, resilient and freer society, we need to zoom into the processes happening inside each of us and learn to spot rigid thinking in ourselves and others. We need to learn to avoid black-and-white thinking and embrace ambiguity. We need to recognize our ability to resist irrational rules and authority. Regardless of your political stance, this book will challenge you to reassess your convictions – and what they are doing to your brain.

The Ideological Brain

How Rigid Beliefs Harm Our Minds & Bodies – And Why It Matters

A Radical Science of Susceptible Minds

Nathan J. Robinson

The land of the free. The home of the brave. But what has America achieved in the aim of ‘spreading democracy’ – except wreak havoc across the globe and establish a reckless foreign policy that serves the interest of few and has endangered all too many? 
 
In this timely book, Noam Chomsky writing with Nathan J. Robinson, vividly traces America’s pursuit of global domination – from Washington’s role in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan – offering an incisive critique of the self-serving myths that dominant elites in the United States continue to push. 
 
Thorough, urgent and provocative, The Myth of American Idealism offers a highly readable entry to the conclusions Noam Chomsky has come to after a lifetime of thought and activism.

The Myth of American Idealism

How U.S. Foreign Policy Endangers the World

Stephan Malinowski

The disappearance of the Hohenzollern family from the history of Germany in November 1918 as the Kaiser fled into Dutch exile is one of the most startling, rapid instances of a once all-powerful royal family becoming almost overnight irrelevant and marginal. Except this is not exactly what happened. 
 
Stephan Malinowski’s German bestseller is an extraordinary work of recovery. It suited both the Weimar Republic and then the Third Reich to view the Hohenzollerns with contempt, and yet the royal family’s hatred of the former and approval of the latter were for millions of Germans a significant factor in their own view of their country and its government. 
 
With forensic and often shocking detail, Malinowski shows that, far from being ridiculous, marginal figures the Hohenzollerns lay at the heart of Germany’s ongoing nightmare. Despite formally losing power, the members of the royal family remained prominent, catastrophically allowing many other conservative Germans to stay distanced from the new republic and to eventually betray conservative traditions and values. Battered from both left and right, the Republic collapsed in 1933 in part because conservative forces, fearful of both Communism and Fascism, had abandoned their own principles just as much as the leading members of former royal family had, who were themselves beguiled by and fooled by Hitler. 
 
This is an important and shocking book, as well as a devastating picture of an inadequate and trivial royal family painfully underequipped to fulfil its role.

The Hohenzollerns and the Nazis

A History of Collaboration

Sulmaan Wasif Khan

In the overwhelming chaos across Asia at the end of the Second World War, one relatively minor issue was the future of the Japanese colony of Taiwan, a large island some one hundred miles off the coast of Fujian. Handed to the Kuomintang-ruled Republic of China, in 1949 it suddenly became the focus of global attention as a random cross-section of defeated Nationalists, including President Chiang Kai-shek, fled there from Mao's triumphant Communist forces. 
 
The Struggle for Taiwan is a balanced and convincing account of the sequence of events that has left Taiwan for generations as a political anomaly, with issues around its status and future continuing to threaten war. With deepening democratization, Taiwan further goads Beijing, remaining functionally independent from China even as Xi Jinping clamours for unification. 
 
This invaluable book allows readers to understand the complex story of this unique place and its role in international relations. With its striking economic dynamism and commitment to democracy, can Taiwan continue - as Hong Kong once did - to thrive, or will China conquer it? And will the world be able to maintain peace across the Taiwan Strait or will it stumble into war?

The Struggle for Taiwan

A History

Kenneth Roth

In three decades under the leadership of Kenneth Roth, Human Rights Watch conducted investigations in 100 countries to uncover abuses – and pressured offending governments to stop them. Roth has grappled with the worst of humanity, taken on the most ruthless oppressors of our time, and persuaded leaders from around the globe to stand up to their repressive counterparts. 
 
The son of a Jew who fled Nazi Germany just before the war began, Roth grew up knowing full well how inhumane governments could be. He has travelled the world to meet cruelty and injustice on its home turf: he arrived in Rwanda shortly after the genocide; scrutinized the impact of Saddam’s invasion of Kuwait; investigated and condemned Israel’s mistreatment of Palestinians. He directed efforts to curtail the Chinese government’s persecution of Uyghur Muslims, to bring Myanmar’s officials to justice after the ethnic cleansing of Rohingya Muslims, to halt Russian war crimes in Ukraine, even to rein in the U.S. government. Roth’s many innovations and strategies included the deployment of a concept as old as mankind – the powerful tool of ‘shaming’ – and here he illustrates its surprising effectiveness against evildoers. 
 
This is a story of wins, losses, and ongoing battles in the ceaseless fight for a more decent world.

Righting Wrongs

Three Decades on the Front Lines Battling Abusive Governments

Jake Tapper

Alex Thompson

'Explosive' Guardian 
'Explosive' The Times 
'Explosive' Daily Mail 
'Explosive' Politico 
'Explosive' New York Times 
 
Joe Biden his family and his senior aides were convinced that only he could beat Donald Trump in the 2024 Presidential Election. So convinced, in fact, that they lied to themselves, allies and the public about his condition and limitations – all but dooming the Democrats to defeat. Here, two of America’s best-respected political journalists take us behind closed doors to uncover the full, unsettling truth about Biden’s decline, and exposing the wider cover-up as an unprecedented deception of the public. 
 
Hailed as an instant classic of political journalism, ?this is the book that revealed Biden's decision to run again as the original sin of his presidency - leading directly to Donald Trump’s return to power, and all that has come since.

Original Sin

President Biden's decline, its cover-up, and his disastrous choice to run again

Annie Jacobsen

In the chaos following the Second World War, the US government faced a critical decision: what to do with the great scientific minds of the Third Reich. Many were accused of war crimes, and others had stood trial at Nuremberg; one was convicted of mass murder. Nevertheless, the US government secretly decided that their knowledge of rocketry and medical advances were vital to the outcome of the Cold War. 
 
Drawing on exclusive interviews with dozens of Paperclip family members, colleagues, and interrogators, and dossiers discovered in archives across the world, Annie Jacobsen follows more than a dozen German scientists through their postwar lives and into one of the most startling, complex, nefarious, and jealously guarded government secrets of the twentieth century. 
 
‘Chilling and riveting ... a remarkable achievement of investigative reporting and historical writing’ Boston Globe 
 
‘The most in-depth account yet of the lives of Paperclip recruits and their American counterparts’ New York Times Book Review

Operation Paperclip

Nazi Scientists in America

This is a book about a team of scientists and psychics with top secret clearances. 
 
For more than forty years, the U.S. government has researched extrasensory perception, using it in attempts to locate hostages, fugitives, secret bases, and downed fighter jets, to divine other nations' secrets, and even to predict future threats to national security. 
 
The intelligence agencies and military services involved include CIA, DIA, NSA, DEA, the Navy, Air Force, and Army-and even the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Now, for the first time, New York Times bestselling author Annie Jacobsen tells the story of these radical, controversial programs, using never before seen declassified documents as well as exclusive interviews with, and unprecedented access to, more than fifty of the individuals involved. Speaking on the record, many for the first time, are former CIA and Defense Department scientists, analysts, and program managers, as well as the government psychics themselves. 
 
Who did the U.S. government hire for these top secret programs, and how do they explain their military and intelligence work? How do scientists approach such enigmatic subject matter? What interested the government in these supposed powers and does the research continue? 
 
Phenomena is a riveting investigation into how far governments will go in the name of national security.

Phenomena

US Government Investigations into ESP and Psychokinesis

President Bill Clinton

A powerful, candid, and richly detailed memoir from an American icon, revealing what life looks like after the presidency: triumphs, tribulations, and all. 
 
On 20th January 2001, after nearly thirty years in politics &mdash; eight of them as President of the United States &mdash; Bill Clinton was suddenly a private citizen. Only fifty-four years old, full of energy and ideas, he wanted to make meaningful use of his skills, his relationships with world leaders, and all he&rsquo;d learned in a lifetime of politics, but how? Just days after leaving the White House, the call came to aid victims of a devastating earthquake in India, and Clinton hit the ground running. Over the next two decades, he would create an enduring legacy of public service and advocacy work, from Indonesia to Louisiana, Northern Ireland to South Africa, and in the process reimagine philanthropy and redefine the impact a former president could have on the world. 
 
Citizen is Clinton&rsquo;s front-row, first-person chronicle of his post-presidential years and the most significant events of the twenty-first century, including 9/11 and the runup to the Iraq War, the Haiti earthquake, the Great Recession, COVID-19, the January 6th insurrection, and the enduring culture wars of our times. Yet Citizen is more than a presidential memoir. These pages capture Clinton in a rare and unforgettable light: not only as celebrated former president and foundation leader, but also as a father, grandfather, and husband. He shares his support for Hillary Clinton during her tenure as senator, secretary of state, and presidential candidate, and openly details the frustration and pain of the 2016 election. 
 
With clarity and compassion, President Clinton also weighs in on the unprecedented challenges brought on by a global pandemic, ongoing inequality, a steadily warming planet, and authoritarian forces dedicated to weakening democracy. In this landmark publication, the highly anticipated follow-up to the best-selling My Life, Clinton pens a clear-sighted account of American democracy on a global stage, offering a frank reflection on the past and, with it, a fearless embrace of our future. Citizen is a testament to one man&rsquo;s unwavering commitment to family and nation, a self-portrait of equal parts eloquence, insight, and candor.

Citizen

My Life After the White House

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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