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Eileen Munro

Carol McKay

When Eileen Munro's mother became pregnant at 16, she was told to give her baby away to a 'good family', but the couple who paid the fee at the Salvation Army mother-and-baby home in Glasgow in 1963 turned out to be alcoholics who neglected and physically abused Eileen. Then, when their marriage broke down, they failed to protect her from sexual abuse at the hands of a family friend. 
 
After watching her adoptive mother drown on inhaled vomit, Eileen and her younger sister were taken into care, but her nightmare was to continue as she was subjected to further physical, sexual and emotional abuse. 
 
At the age of only seventeen, seven months into a secret pregnancy, she decided that the only way out was through a bottle of painkillers; when she survived and gave birth to a beautiful baby boy, he became her lifeline.

As I Lay Me Down to Sleep

Jan de Vries

MOTHER AND CHILD is the long awaited follow up to Jan's phenomenally successful Preganancy and Childbirth and the next instalment in his excellent Well Woman series. In Mother and Child Jan De Vries focuses on the first crucial years of a child's life and explores the unique relationship that develops between mother and child in these formative years. The book comprises practical advice for new mothers dealing with the stress of their first baby and gives suggestions on how to recognise and treat the many diseases to which children are prone in their early years. There is also valuable advice on child healthcare and covers everything from sleep disorders to breastfeeding. Not only is Jan De Vries a professional authority on alternative healthcare, but he is also a father of four and grandfather of ten. Jan De Vries was born in 1937 and after initially graduating in pharmacy he soon moved on to study alternative medicine. He set up his first clinic in Troon in 1970 and today has clinics in Edinburgh, London, Belfast, Dublin and Manchester. Writing extensively on the value of alternative medicine and the importance of maintaining a healthy lifestyle, he also lectures throughout the world and makes regular television and radio appearances.

Mother and Child

Jacqueline Pascarl

At seventeen, Jacqueline Pascarl married a royal prince and embarked on what she believed would be a fairy-tale existence. But it soon became a nightmare. After years of abuse at the hands of her husband, Jacqueline escaped with her children, hoping to leave her past behind. But what followed would haunt her for the next fourteen years. 
 
In this heart-rending story, Jacqueline describes how her husband kidnapped their two young children and forced them to cut off all contact with her. She tells of the pain and helplessness she felt at their loss but also of how she channelled her grief, forging an existence as an aid worker and humanitarian ambassador, all the while desperately hoping to hear news of them. 
 
In 2006, she was reunited with her long-lost children, and in Abducted she reveals the dramatic events that led to their meeting. This is a candid, compelling account of living under the shadow of child abduction. It is an unforgettable ride through tragedy, loss and, finally, triumph.

Abducted

The Fourteen-Year Fight to Find My Children

In Once I Was a Princess, Jacqueline Pascarl related the gripping story of her abusive childhood and her subsequent teen marriage to a prince. What should have been a fairy tale with a happy ending deteriorated into a nightmare of deceit and betrayal - ending in the kidnapping of her two small children by her former husband, who spirited them back to Malaysia. 
 
In Since I Was a Princess, Pascarl peels back the layers of her life after the abduction. She tells how she channelled her grief, forging an existence as an aid worker and humanitarian ambassador in war-torn countries and working with refugees and the dispossessed. She describes how she persuaded some of the world's most influential figures to support her aid work and became a human rights activist on the international stage, championing the cause of other parents whose children had been kidnapped and reuniting scores of families. 
 
Pascarl also explains how she lived frenetically as she painfully rebuilt her life and re-evaluated her relationships, grappling with the emotional complexities of a new pregnancy and beginning a second family. And she reveals for the first time the dramatic details of how, at last, she was able to be reunited with her long-lost children and make her family whole. 
 
Candid and compelling, Since I Was a Princess is an unforgettable ride through tragedy, loss and, finally, triumph.

Since I Was a Princess

Sarah Bridge

Sarah Bridge is smart, successful . . . and single. As a newspaper journalist, she has a hectic day job, a busy social life and is perfectly happy with both. But something – or someone – is missing. 
 
Embarking on a quest to find her soulmate, she tries everything: from speed-dating and wine-tasting to Scottish dancing and singles holidays, island-hopping and army assault courses to self-help books and fortune-telling. Whether climbing mountains in Morocco or swimming at midnight in the Caribbean, Sarah is on a mission to meet Mr Right. But will anything actually work? And how will she feel after putting herself, and her heart, out there? 
 
 First Catch Your Husband is an entertaining, touching and thought-provoking account of life on the front line of dating. It’s an inspiring tale for anyone who’s ever been, or wanted to be, in love.

First Catch Your Husband

Adventures on the Dating Front Line

Reg McKay

Armed Candy is the true story of one woman's struggle for survival on Britain's meanest streets. 
 
 Kay has spent her whole life trying to escape. Sexually abused by her grandmother, she pleaded to return to her mother's care. But instead of finding a safe haven, Kay entered a world of drug abuse, swinging and dabbling in the occult. Although still a small child, she was soon buying drugs for her mother and being moved out of her bed as orgies ensued in her home. 
 
 When she tried to escape, she ended up in a violent marriage, from which she fled in fear of her life. Turning to her mother for help, she was tricked into prostitution, her own mother acting much like a pimp. 
 
 Kay became a high-class call girl, but then, through a chance meeting, she got involved with the most dangerous criminal gang in Glasgow. Women associated with such gangs are often seen as decorative arm candy, but Kay 
 was admitted to the inner core, where she became involved in making decisions of life and death. 
 
 She fell in love with the gang's equaliser, a young man feared throughout the country, and together they formed a formidable partnership. But they were too successful, and when they appeared to threaten some powerful interests they had to be taken out. The day that Kay's lover was gunned down in broad daylight saw the beginning of a reign of death in the city, as the organised crime world became paranoid and turned in on itself. For Kay, it was the beginning of her way out.

Armed Candy

A True-Life Story of Organised Crime

Steven Preece

In Amongst the Marines, Steven Preece vividly depicted his excessive, violent lifestyle as an elite Royal Marine Commando. Now Always a Marine covers the author's struggle to leave that lifestyle behind following his departure from the service. 
 
Back on civvy street for the first time in over seven years, Preece finds it extremely difficult to adapt and struggles to shake off the belligerent mentality he developed while in the Marines. Despite these difficulties, he marries and starts a family, but this positive change is not enough to turn his life around. 
 
Preece soon discovers that his tendency towards violence will not be tolerated in the civilian workplace and, after finding himself blacklisted by many companies in his area, he is forced to look for employment abroad. This quest for work takes Preece to France, where he is caught up in a hotel fire; Germany, where he is double-crossed out of his job and later teams up with an ex-SAS trooper; Morocco, where an incident lands him in jail and he is later shot at by border police; and Thailand, where he fights in a boxing ring with a former French Legionnaire and gets caught up in a business scam. 
 
Having settled back in the UK, Preece's behaviour remains excessive. He severely injures his head and suffers minor brain damage after a heavy-drinking session. Upon recovering, he looks for something else to believe in and begins training in ninjutsu, the martial art of the ninjas, who view aggression as a sign of weakness. This, combined with the love of his family, finally enables him to put his past behind him. 
 
Always a Marine is the action-packed, often shocking account of one ex-Marine's 13-year struggle to control the aggression he learnt as a serviceman in order to become a respectable civilian.

Always a Marine

The Return to Civvy Street

Laura Walsh

'At the lowest moment in my life, I stood at the gates of hell. I saw what it was like. I can never, ever go back there again.' 
 
When Laura Walsh walked into her four-month-old daughter's bedroom, she was confronted with a mother's worst nightmare. Her beautiful baby was dead in her cot. This tragedy marked the beginning of Laura's journey of self-destruction. She became addicted to painkillers and alcohol, her marriage failed and she lost her house and alienated her friends and family. 
 
Lying and stealing to acquire tablets and booze, Laura spent several desperate years in the wilderness, years in which her two remaining children had to watch their mum become a sordid shadow of the woman they loved. She was ashamed but unable to find the strength to fight back - until one Christmas when her addictions finally threatened to kill her. 
 
Ashamed is the inspirational account of how Laura found the strength to step back from hell, launch a successful business and become a mother to her children once again.

Ashamed

HIDDEN DANGERS IN WHAT WE EAT AND DRINK deals succinctly with the hazards that growing children, teenagers and adults are exposed to. Food and drink today contain many additives, E numbers and other hidden dangers that could affect people physically, mentally and emotionally. The growth in the problems of hyperactivity and autism are just two examples of the perils of an unbalanced food pattern. This book contains advice on food and dietary management, highlights the potential problems with what we consume and provides sensible advice on how to adjust our food pattern accordingly when certain problems arise. The immune system is very complex and depends on the nutritional values necessary for energy and vitality. In today's fast moving society, there are many convenience foods available. These foods can ultimately damage the immune system and, as such, there is a great need for more natural input in order to get the right output, namely healthy living. This carefully researched book gives the opportunity for the readers to help themselves to improved health through making wise choices regarding food and drink.

Hidden Dangers in What We Eat and Drink

A Lifelong Guide to Healthy Living

Martin Spinelli

'In the pit of my stomach, as I kissed my four-year-old son Lio and my darling wife Sasha goodbye, I knew something was up. By that evening, the police had told me about the crash. 
 
'Lio's bright and talented mother was killed that day, and he narrowly escaped the same fate. But instead of it being an ending for us, the crash was a beginning. 
 
'Lio's miraculous recovery from severe brain damage and a coma defied medical science. As I witnessed his astonishing journey - from intensive care bed to 10 Downing Street - and fought to pull him through horrific injuries and the loss of his mother, I found real purpose and meaning for the first time in my life.' 
 
After the Crash is much more than a moving personal story. It's a handbook for dealing with disaster, not just surviving it but mastering it and using it to transform your life for the better.

After the Crash

Rachael Oakes-Ash

Between the ages of 17 and 31, Rachael Oakes-Ash lost 63kg and gained 76kg on a roller-coaster of body image problems and food obsession. She went through anorexia, bulimia, bulimarexia, gym mania, strict dieting and binge eating before she finally she figured out how to stop torturing herself and hating her body. Good Girls Do Swallow is the very black and very funny story of her downfall and her recovery. 
 
 Rachael might have taken things further than many of us, but this is a story every woman can relate to. You might not have rescued food from the rubbish bin in a moment of binge-madness but if you've ever felt lousy and reached for a chocolate biscuit for comfort, this book is for you. 
 
 'What the diet promised, I got,' writes Rachael. `I got the body that can wear the clothes. I got the job I love, I got the man I want. But I only got it for keeps when I stopped dieting.' From the Carol Brady Syndrome and Thindarella to Mutiny in Aisle Six, Good Girls Do Swallow tells how she did it.

Good Girls Do Swallow

The Darkly Comic True Story of How One Woman Stopped Hating Her Body

Elizabeth Gabriel

You never know how you'd react if it happened to you, and the last thing I want is to dictate to people. I don't wonder: why me? But: why not me?' - Elizabeth GabrielThere are many books about the processes people go through when they discover they have cancer. What makes Flying Crooked different is the way in which Elizabeth Gabriel accepts the disease and its consequences. She continues to enjoy life, refuses radiotherapy and rejects the idea of wearing a prosthesis after one of her breasts has been removed. The choices she makes are in sharp contrast to those made by her ex-lover Simon when he, shortly after her operation, is diagnosed with prostate cancer. Their different ways of coping form a well-balanced diptych: on her part, acceptance and the peace that this brings, as opposed to, on his part, fighting and anger at the cost of precious energy and enjoyment. Flying Crooked describes the process of a search for balance. The open, direct and unsentimental manner in which Gabriel describes her decisions as well as her experiences in hospital and out of it are deeply refreshing. And yet this autobiographical novel is more than an account of coping with disease; it is an inspirational story of love and friendship and faith.

Flying Crooked

An Inspiring Tale of Loss and Love

Geoffrey Beattie

Ben Beattie

Geoffrey Beattie is an extremely successful academic and celebrity psychologist. He was perhaps a less successful father. His obsession with his career and his driving passion for running when he was at home almost destroyed his relationship with his son, but, ironically, it is running that has brought them back together. 
 
Chasing Lost Times is the emotional story of a father and son trying to repair a relationship through a shared activity that depends on sheer physical effort, the kind of physical effort that may once have been the source of commonality between father and son in all previous generations but which seems to be absent in the modern world.

Chasing Lost Times

A Father and Son Reconciled Through Running

Shortly after the success of his autobiography A STEP AT A TIME, many readers asked Jan de Vries for more information regarding his 45 years of experience in the practice of naturopathy.In TREATING BODY, MIND AND SOUL, Jan shares with his readers the many ways in which he treats his patients and details the more extraordinary cases that he has dealt with over the years. In doing so, he provides a clear idea of how the body really works and what physical problems can occur. He also illustrates how some unusual cases have been dealt with successfully in an unorthodox way using complementary therapies. Some of the astounding cases mentioned in his autobiography are dealt with in this book more explicitly to show the way de Vries sees the body as a whole and how, with some small adjustments, he has brought many people newfound health and happiness. Treating people with mental and emotional health problems is a major aspect of Jan's work and over the years he has developed various alternative methods that compliment orthodox treatments. This book reveals intriguingly his success in treating problems of the mind using breathing exercises, homeopathic and herbal remedies as well as cranial osteopathy and acupuncture. Jan also delves into the mystery of the soul and shares his thoughts and theories on why it is entwined so fully with the body and mind. He opines on the twenty-first century diseases that are so often misunderstood and, in many cases, go unidentified and gives tips on how to deal with them.

Treating Body, Mind and Soul

Alternative Solutions for Modern Living

David Leslie

'Mummy, take me home,' sobbed little Jasmine Chapman as she was ripped from her mother's arms. But there was nothing that Morag could do . . . except continue to fight for custody of the child she loved so much. 
 
When their relationship ended, Jasmine's parents argued bitterly about her future. But they were unable to come to an amicable agreement, and a UK court ruled that the case be heard in the US, the home of Jasmine's father. Fearing that she would lose her child, Morag fled from Texas with her daughter, only to be hauled back in shackles and incarcerated in a grim American prison. 
 
When Morag was eventually freed and awarded custody of her little girl, she thought her nightmare was over. However, back in the UK, every move she made was watched and every mistake recorded. Morag sank into deep depression and became lost in a haze of alcohol and drugs. The once beautiful and desirable young woman found her life spiralling out of control. Eventually, she lost the daughter she had fought so hard to keep. 
 
Mummy, Take Me Home is the gripping and disturbing true-life story of a tug of love that no mother should ever face and no child should be forced to endure.

Mummy, Take Me Home

A Mother's Tug-of-Love Torment

Peta Mathias

Writer and broadcaster Peta Mathias is a woman who has never been afraid to embrace life with all its glorious inconsistencies, joys and heartbreaks. In Fabulous, she becomes every woman's confidante, as she shares with us the wisdom she has learnt over years of living outrageously. She is a woman who appreciates the importance of a gorgeous pair of shoes and the perfect shade of lipstick. She knows the value of good friends, great music, lively conversation, beautiful surroundings and a one-way ticket to an exotic destination. And having loved and lost - more than once - Peta also has her own theories on why relationships begin and end. And then there's the sex chapter! 
 
Inspirational, razor-witted and irresistibly funny, Fabulous is a must-read for each and every fabulous woman out there.

Fabulous

Thoughts on Being a Woman

Helen Newlove

When Helen was 20, she met Garry Newlove at a local disco. They married in 1986 and had three daughters. On 10 August 2007, Garry was brutally beaten by a gang of youths outside the family home in Warrington. He died two days later. It was an act of violence that shocked the nation and would have a profound impact on the lives of Helen and her children. 
 
After the ordeal of a ten-week trial and the murder conviction of three youths, Helen held a press conference, giving a speech that attracted national media attention and propelled her into the role of a campaigner for victims’ rights and against the lawlessness that blights so many of our towns and cities. 
 
In 2010, Helen was appointed a seat in the House of Lords among some of the most powerful and influential people in the country. Today, she is Baroness Newlove of Warrington, a tireless campaigner against antisocial behaviour and for the rights of victims and witnesses. 
 
In this engaging memoir, Helen recounts how her family was shattered by Garry’s murder and how good unexpectedly came out of evil. Her remarkable story is not one of politics and committees; it is about real people and the impact that crime has on us all.

It Could Happen to You

The Inspirational Story of the Crime Victim Who Became the People's Crusader

Mick North

Mick North's daughter Sophie was one of the children killed in the massacre at Dunblane Primary School. Dunblane: Never Forget is a personal account of Mick's life before and after the massacre and includes a critical assessement of the events that led to the tragedy and those that have followed. 
 
 He begins by recalling his arrival in Stirling and how he and Barbara moved to Dunblane while awaiting the birth of their only child. A few months later Barbara was diagnosed with cancer and the family had to deal with her terminal illness. After the death of Barbara, father and daughter became an inseparable team until that dreadful day in 1996. 
 
 North writes about how he and the other families dealt with public sympathy, the anti-handgun campaign, the memorial service, the television programmes, newspaper interviews and the creation of the Dunblane Memorial Garden. He describes how it felt to attend a public inquiry into the murder of his child, criticises the local police force and details the ambivalent attitude of the Dunblane community.

Dunblane

Never Forget

Allaying the doubts and fears which surround the most natural and yet probably the most traumatic experience a woman will go through, Pregnancy and Childbirth takes you step by step through conception, pregnancy, labour and the care of your baby. Calling upon a lifetime's experience in helping couples who have come to him following years of trying for a baby, Jan de Vries explains how he has helped them with either herbal or homoeopathic medicine, acupuncture or osteopathy. He describes how acupuncture can help, especially during labour, and provides advice for couples who have undergone severe stress when dealing with problems such as impotence, or feelings of inadequacy or rejection. What emerges from his extensive research is an overwhelming sense of hope in the wonder of nature and joy at the miracle of each new birth.

Pregnancy and Childbirth

Jason Peter

Tony O'Neill

Blighted by a neck injury at a young age, sports superstar Jason Peter was forced to retire prematurely. In just a few short years, Peter's brilliant career was in ruins as he found himself consumed by painkillers, then crack and finally heroin. His addiction transformed him from a pumped-up athletic gladiator to a small, wispish shell of his former self. 
 
In Millionaire Junkie, Peter tells of the lost days and nights spent prowling the streets of Manhattan, flying cross-country with high-class call girls and doing piles of heroin and cocaine. It is a visceral, ragged-edged story of true glory, self-destruction, addiction and, finally, redemption.

Millionaire Junkie

My Journey Down to Heroin - and Back

Yvonne Collinson Heath

Yvonne Collinson Heath will never forget the telephone call that changed her life for ever. On 23 March 2002, her eldest son, James – a private with the Royal Logistic Corps – was found dead in mysterious circumstances at the notorious Deepcut barracks. He had a single gunshot wound to the head. It was a tragedy that to this day raises questions. 
 
A Mother’s War recounts Yvonne’s anguish at losing her son, a boy who dreamed of serving his country but died before he had even reached his 18th birthday. It is also the powerful story of an extraordinary woman who overcame adversity – including the hurt of being abandoned by her father, bullied as a child and abused by a trusted uncle – to find love and raise a son, only to see him cruelly taken from her within weeks of his joining the Army. It reveals how her decade-long quest for answers uncovered sinister secrets and a series of cover-ups that went right to the heart of Whitehall. 
 
Above all else, A Mother’s War is the story of how Yvonne’s grief triggered a search for the truth that took her to Downing Street and captured the hearts of the nation.

A Mother's War

One Woman's Fight for the Truth Behind Her Son's Death at Deepcut

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