Joseph Delaney used to be an English teacher, before becoming the best-selling author of the Spook's series, which has been published in 30 countries and sold over 4.5 million copies worldwide. The first book, The Spook's Apprentice, was adapted into a major motion picture starring Jeff Bridges and Julianne Moore.

Joseph Delaney

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Paul Stewart

1955, Kenya. A group of four acquaintances set out to drive from Nairobi to London, via the Sahara desert, in a 8 horse-power Morris Traveller. Under the leadership of Alan Cooper, a down-on-his-luck farmer, the group was made up of a worldly field biologist who recorded the whole trip on her 8mm cine camera, a genteel schoolmistress of uncertain age in search of romance, and a 17-year-old boy whose mother had insisted that the trip would make a man of him. What united them was a desire for adventure. 
 
As they set off through Equatorial Africa the omens seemed against them. The Mau Mau uprising against British rule in Kenya was at it's height and the days of colonial rule were ending. Their journey was to take them through an Africa that very soon would cease to exist. But it was the desert that turned their joyride into a nightmare. What began as an adventure ended as a desperate fight for life in the blazing sands of the Sahara. Trek brings this story to dramatic life and is a classic account of survival against the odds.

Trek

Tim Bauerschmidt

Ramie Liddle

'A life-affirming book' Daily Mail 
 
'An uplifting personal story of a year lived like no other' Daily Express 
 
Two days after her husband of sixty-seven years dies, nonagenarian Miss Norma is diagnosed with cancer. When given her treatment options - surgery, chemo and radiotherapy - she rises to her full five feet and says in the strongest voice she can muster: 'I’m ninety years old. I’m hitting the road!' 
 
 Driving Miss Norma is the story of her inspirational road trip across the US in a thirty-six-foot motorhome with her son, Tim, his wife, Ramie and their Poodle, Ringo - showing us that it's never too late to begin an adventure, inspire hope or become a trailblazer. As the journey unfolds, Miss Norma finally spreads her wings and lives life on her own terms for the very first time. With each adventure a once timid Miss Norma says YES to living in the face of death - whether it's experiencing her very first pedicure or taking the hot air balloon ride her late husband never found time for. 
 
 With each passing mile - and one hilarious visit to a cannabis dispensary - Miss Norma’s health improves and conversations that had once been taboo begin to unfold. Norma, Tim and Ramie bond in ways they could never have anticipated and their definitions of home, family and friendship are rewritten as strangers become friends and shower them with kindness. 
 
Bursting with Miss Norma’s generous spirit, Driving Miss Norma ignites a renewed sense of life, family, fun and self-discovery - at any age.

Driving Miss Norma

Joshua Davis

Joshua Davis had a dream. He dreamt of being the best. It didn't really matter what he was the best at, he just wanted to be number one, the big enchilada, to say that he had made it. This is how it began: Josh was driving through the Mojave Desert one day when he saw a sign for the American arm-wrestling championship - all comers welcome. He decided to enter. He came fourth, out of four, but this was enough to secure him a place on Team USA and the chance of a show-down with the 'Russian Ripper' at the world championships in Poland (that didn't end very well either). 
 
But Josh had tasted the dizzy rush of competition and wanted more. And more turned out to be the most outlandish contests in the world - from bull fighting in Spain and backward running in Italy, to sumo wrestling and the World Sauna Championship in Finland. 
 
Joshua's quest is by turns hilarious, harrowing and a little insane, but it is also inspiring - because, after all, every underdog deserves his day.

The Underdog

William Black

In Al Dente, William Black travels the length and breadth of Italy in order to get to the roots of Italian food. Our intrepid gastronome eats whatever gets in his way which often isn't quite what it seems. If it's cheese then it may be considered ripe only when it has been predigested by maggots or perhaps made solely from the milk of tired cows. A bowl of pasta might come with donkey sauce. A dish of wind dried tuna apparently includes its testicles. A lovely risotto has been made with seagull broth... 
 
William's dedication to his task knows alarmingly few bounds. His quest for the most delicious and authentic cooking and the very finest ingredients takes him to some wonderfully familiar places as well as others far off the beaten track: he drinks great coffee in Turin, chases rabbits in Ischia and views the mattanza, the annual tuna catch, off the coast of Sardinia. One minute he's scoffing eel brodetto, the next waxing lyrical about the joys of frog risotto. And as he eats his way to the country's culinary heart, he unearths the fascinating story of his own family's role in Italian history. 
 
A joy from cover to cover and 100 per cent mierda di bufala-free, Al Dente is a must for anyone with an interest in Italy or its food. It will probably make you want to book a holiday and it will certainly make you laugh.

Al Dente

Evan Wright

Hella Nation charts Wright's deeply personal journey, from his stark but sympathetic portrayals of sex workers in Porn Valley to his raw portrait of a Hollywood über-agent turned war documentarian and hero of America's far right. Along the way he meets runaway teens in Hollywood earning corporate dollars as skateboard pitchmen, radical anarchists plotting the overthrow of capitalism from tree-sits in the Oregon rainforest and young American troops on the hunt for terrorists in the combat zones of the Middle East. His subjects are people for whom The American Dream is either just out of grasp, or something they have chosen to reject altogether. 
 
Sometimes frightening, usually profane, and often darkly comic, Hella Nation is Wright's meticulously observed tour of the jagged edges of all those other Americas hiding in plain sight.

Hella Nation

In Search of the Lost Tribes of America

Mark Beaumont

The inspiring story of one man's record-breaking cycle around the world. 
 
On Monday 18th September 2017, Mark Beaumont pedalled through the Arc de Triomphe in Paris. 78 days, 14 hours and 40 minutes earlier he set off from the same point, beginning his attempt to circumnavigate the world in record time. Covering more than 18,000 miles and cycling through some of the harshest conditions one man and his bicycle can endure, Mark made history. He smashed two Guinness World Records and beat the previous record by an astonishing 45 days. 
 
 Around the World in 80 Days is the story of Mark's amazing achievement - one which redefines the limits of human endurance. It is also an insight into the mind of an elite athlete and the physical limits of the human body, as well as a kaleidoscopic tour of the world from a very unique perspective; inspired by Jules Verne's classic adventure novel, Mark begins his journey in Paris and cycles through Europe, Russia, Mongolia and China. He then crosses Australia, rides up through New Zealand and across North America before the final 'sprint finish' thorough Portugal, Spain and France, all at over 200 miles a day. This is the story of a quite remarkable adventure, by a quite remarkable man.

Around the World in 80 Days

My World Record Breaking Adventure

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