Title search results
Showing 1 - 20 of 26592 items
Sarah's Diary: An unflinchingly honest account of one family's struggle with depression
By Sarah Griffin. 2007
'I was fourteen when I found my Dad trying to commit suicide in the garage. Sounds shocking doesn't it? But…
that was part of me, part of living with my Dad'Sarah's Diary is the very personal diary of Sarah Griffin - an ordinary teenage girl learning to deal with the ups and downs of family life. On the outside hers was like any other family, but behind closed doors lay a sad and lonely secret. Sarah's Dad had depression -- a condition we've all heard of but seldom discuss. Beautifully written, brutally honest, Sarah's story is compelling reading.Rough: How violence has found its way into the bedroom and what we can do about it
By Rachel Thompson. 2021
**AS HEARD ON BBC RADIO 4'S WOMEN'S HOUR**Rough is a revolutionary non-fiction work exploring the narratives of sexual violence that…
we don't talk about.A bad sexual experience.A grey area. Not rape but... A violation .These are the terms we use to describe the experiences we don't have words for. The way we talk about topics such as sex, consent, assault aren't fit for purpose.Through powerful testimony from 50 women and non-binary people, this book shines a light on the sexual violence that takes place in our bedrooms and beyond, sometimes at the hands of people we know, trust, or even love. Rough investigates violations such as 'stealthing,' non-consensual choking, and non-consensual rough sex acts that our culture is only starting to recognise as sexual violence.The book explores the ways in which systems of oppression manifest in our sexual culture - from racist microaggressions, to fatphobic acts of aggression, and ableist dehumanising behaviour. An intersectional, sex-positive, kink-positive work, the book also examines how white supremacy, transphobia, biphobia, homophobia, and misogyny are driving forces behind sexual violence.Rough is an urgent, timely call for change to the systems that oppress us all.'An incredible investigation into a frighteningly common part of our sexual experience,' Dr Fern Riddell'Rough speaks to how many women often feel after sexual encounters ...This book is excellent and demonstrates just how valid those feelings are,' Adele Walton, founder of Humanitarian HotgirlA Room of One's Own (Penguin Great Ideas)
By Virginia Woolf. 2004
Throughout history, some books have changed the world. They have transformed the way we see ourselves - and each other.…
They have inspired debate, dissent, war and revolution. They have enlightened, outraged, provoked and comforted. They have enriched lives - and destroyed them. Now Penguin brings you the works of the great thinkers, pioneers, radicals and visionaries whose ideas shook civilization, and helped make us who we are.Republic of Shame: Stories from Ireland's Institutions for 'Fallen Women'
By Caelainn Hogan. 2019
'At least in The Handmaid's Tale they value babies, mostly. Not so in the true stories here' Margaret Atwood '[A]…
furious, necessary book' Sinéad GleesonUntil alarmingly recently, the Catholic Church, acting in concert with the Irish state, operated a network of institutions for the concealment, punishment and exploitation of 'fallen women'. In the Magdalene laundries, girls and women were incarcerated and condemned to servitude. And in the mother-and-baby homes, women who had become pregnant out of wedlock were hidden from view, and in most cases their babies were adopted - sometimes illegally. Mortality rates in these institutions were shockingly high, and the discovery of a mass infant grave at the mother-and-baby home in Tuam made news all over the world. The Irish state has commissioned investigations. But the workings of the institutions and of the culture that underpinned it - a shame-industrial complex - have long been cloaked in secrecy and silence. For countless people, a search for answers continues. Caelainn Hogan - a brilliant young journalist, born in an Ireland that was only just starting to free itself from the worst excesses of Catholic morality - has been talking to the survivors of the institutions, to members of the religious orders that ran them, and to priests and bishops. She has visited the sites of the institutions, and studied Church and state documents that have much to reveal about how they operated. Reporting and writing with great curiosity, tenacity and insight, she has produced a startling and often moving account of how an entire society colluded in this repressive system, and of the damage done to survivors and their families. In the great tradition of Anna Funder's Stasiland and Barbara Demick's Nothing to Envy: Real Lives in North Korea - both winners of the Samuel Johnson Prize - Republic of Shame is an astounding portrait of a deeply bizarre culture of control.'Achingly powerful ... There will be many people who don't want to read Republic of Shame, for fear it will be too much, too dark, too heavy. Please don't be afraid. Read it. Look it in the eye' Irish Times'A must read for everyone' Lynn Ruane'Republic of Shame is a careful, sensitive and extremely well-written book - but it is harrowing. It would break your heart in two' Ailbhe Smyth'Hogan's captivatingly written stories of people who were consigned to what she calls the "shame-industrial complex" puts faces - many old now, and lined with pain - to the clinical data ... Brilliant' Sunday Times'Utterly brilliant. Please read it' Marian Keyes'Riveting, immensely insightful and horrifically recognisable' Emma Dabiri'[A] sensitive, can't-look-away book ... Through moving stories, Hogan shows how the past is still present' NPRRed Sky at Night: The Book of Lost Country Wisdom
By Jane Struthers. 2009
The indispensable guide to everything we knew and loved before modern life got in the way. This gorgeous and beautifully…
illustrated countryside miscellany is the perfect purchase for anyone wanting to go back to their roots and rediscover a lost world...'Beautiful book' -- ***** Reader review'A delightful book with some lovely illustrations' -- ***** Reader review'A heart-warming read, I love this book' -- ***** Reader review'Magical' -- ***** Reader review'Lovely book to just DELVE into' -- ***** Reader review'A little gem!' -- ***** Reader review'Sheer delight!' -- ***** Reader review****************************************************************************************************Ever wondered how to predict the weather just by looking at the sky?Or wanted to attract butterflies to your garden?Is there a knack to building the perfect bonfire?And how exactly do you race a ferret?In this world of traffic tailbacks, supermarket shopping and 24-hour internet access, it's easy to feel disconnected from the beauty and rhythms of the natural world.If you have ever gazed in awe at stars in the night's sky, tried to catch a perfect snowflake or longed for the comfort of a roaring log fire, then this is the book for you.From spotting Britain's five kinds of owl to gardening by the phases of the moon, from curing a cold to brewing your own ale, and from navigating by the stars to making sloe gin, Red Sky at Night is packed with instructions and lists, ancient customs and old wives tales, making it an indispensable guide to countryside lore.The Private Life Of Islam: An Algerian Diary
By Dr Ian Young. 1974
Ian Young spent a summer as a medical student in a provincial maternity unit in Algeria. This book is taken…
from the diary he began on arrival, when he found himself the privileged witness of the insides not just of Kabyl women, but also some much-trumpeted ideology. The immediate villains are a couple of expatriate Bulgarian gynaecologists. Dr Vasilev, at the closing stages of a career of fathomless incompetence, forms a bond of affection with the author and they spend many hours in the office over an old route map of Bulgaria, discussing mileages and motorcycles as Maternity drifts beneath them like an abandoned ship. Dr Kostov packs a powerful bedside punch and saves his humanitarian feelings for the health of the Deutschmark. The two form a macabre comic team as they take the reader through a series of medical nightmares. But their lot is scarcely more enviable than that of their female victims: the foreign doctors are the unhappy executors, working in blood, excrement and death, of the most respected attitudes in Algeria. The Private Life of Islam is a ruthlessly clear-sighted view of a particular place at a particular time. It is also a classic in the art of story-telling.'A real achievement, personal as well as literary.' David Pryce-Jones, The Times'A parable of the reality behind a vast amount of modern social and political fantasy, even in the most developed of countries.' David Holden, Sunday TimesPreventable: How a Pandemic Changed the World & How to Stop the Next One
By Devi Sridhar. 2022
**THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER | BBC RADIO 4 BOOK OF THE WEEK**The definitive story of COVID-19 and how global politics…
shape our health - from a world-leading expert and the pandemic's go-to science communicator Professor Devi Sridhar has risen to prominence for her vital roles in communicating science to the public and speaking truth to power. In Preventable she highlights lessons learned from outbreaks past and present in a narrative that traces the COVID-19 pandemic - including her personal experience as a scientist - and sets out a vision for how we can better protect ourselves from the inevitable health crises to come.In gripping and heartfelt prose, Sridhar exposes the varied realities of those affected and puts you in the room with key decision makers at crucial moments. She vibrantly conveys the twists and turns of a plot that saw: deadlier varients emerge (contrary to the predictions of social media pundits who argued it would mutate to a milder form); countries with weak health systems like Senegal and Vietnam fare better than countries like the US and UK (which were consistently ranked as the most prepared); and the quickest development of game-changing vaccines in history (and their unfair distribution)Combining science, politics, ethics and economics, this definitive book dissects the global structures that determine our fate, and reveals the deep-seated economic and social inequalities at their heart - it will challenge, outrage and inspire.'A brutally compelling reminder that if voices like Devi's had been listened to, so many more could have lived' OWEN JONES'One of the most brilliant scientists in the world who has been proven consistently right in this crisis' PIERS MORGAN'Excellent . . . Fair, clear and compelling' NICOLA STURGEON'Those who have found Professor Devi Sridhar's expertise and calm advice invaluable since the arrival of Covid-19 will be glad to know that she has written Preventable' RACHEL COOKE, Guardian, Non-fiction to look out for in 2022Please Don't Cry: A family torn apart by grief. An incredible act of love.
By Jane Plume. 2014
'I’m glad I could do her this one last favour. If it had been the other way round, I know…
Gina would have done the same for me.’Jane and Gina were the best of friends. When Gina’s husband Shaun was diagnosed with terminal cancer in 2009, Jane vowed to do everything she could to help her best mate and her two small sons through the awful time to come. But things were about to take a tragic turn for the worse. In 2010, Gina was killed in a shock car crash. Though devastated by her own grief, Jane knew that Gina needed her now more than ever – to help with the boys she had left behind. And after cancer claimed Shaun's life, Jane stepped in to care for the two orphans, becoming the mother her best friend could no longer be.This is the moving true story behind an incredible act of love.Peter 2.0: The Human Cyborg
By Peter Scott-Morgan. 2021
The incredible book behind the primetime Channel 4 documentary, Peter: The Human Cyborg'A remarkable account of what it means to…
be human and what technology can really achieve' Sunday Telegraph'Peter's story is one of the most extraordinary you will ever hear. I urge people to read it' Stephen Fry'A remarkable story . . . you're left desperate to take nothing for granted' Radio Times __________ Peter, a brilliant scientist, is told that he will lose everything he loves. His husband. His family. His friends. His ability to travel the world. All will be gone. But Peter will not give up. He vows that this will not be the end and instead seeks a completely new beginning . . . Peter has Motor Neurone Disease, a condition universally considered by doctors to be terminal. He is told it will destroy his nerve cells and that within about two years, it will take his life too. But, face-to-face with death, he decides there is another way. Using his background in science and technology, he navigates a new path, one that will enable him not just to survive, but to thrive. This is the astonishing true story about Peter Scott-Morgan: the first person to combine his very humanity with artificial intelligence and robotics to become a full Cyborg. His discovery means that his terminal diagnosis is negotiable, something that will rewrite the future.And change the world. By embracing love, life and hope rather than fear, tragedy and despair, he will become Peter 2.0. __________'Compelling . . . Scott-Morgan is a true one-off. It is in the telling of the love story, rather than the technical details of becoming a cyborg, that this book succeeds' The Times 'What's striking is Peter's constant optimism, bravery and his ability to find radical answers to problems that have confounded Britain's brightest minds' Daily Telegraph 'A soaring love story' Financial Times 'Fascinating and extremely moving' SunOur Billie
By Ian Clayton. 2010
'An astonishing work' - Joanne HarrisEvery parent's worst nightmare became a reality for Ian Clayton. On a short holiday break…
in Hay-on-Wye he took his nine-year-old twins canoeing, and in a freak accident his daughter Billie was drowned. In a remarkably frank and vivid way Clayton describes what happened on that spring day, his desperate attempts to save his two children, and then what it felt like two years later to come face to face with the men who hired out the canoe.But Our Billie is not a story of bitterness and recrimination. Instead it's the story of how a family attempts to come to terms with something which makes no sense at all. Through his memories of Billie and his wonderfully affectionate portrait of the small town in Yorkshire where the family has lived for generations, he weaves a story of loss and remembering, of gratitude and forgiveness.Openhearted: Eighty Years of Love, Loss, Laughter and Letting Go
By Ann Ingle. 2021
SHORTLISTED FOR TWO IRISH BOOK AWARDS'Something they don't tell you about getting older is that you fall. Oh, you hear…
about it in passing, of course, "She had a fall, poor thing". Falling is not something you ever think about as a younger woman. You think about falling in love . . .'At 20 Londoner Ann Ingle fell madly in love with an Irish fellow she met on holiday in Cornwall. At the church to arrange their shotgun wedding she discovered that he hadn't even told her his real name.Sixty-odd years later Ann looks back on that first glorious fall and in a series of essays considers what she has learned from the life that followed - bringing eight children into the world, their father's years of mental illness and tragic death at 40, being a cash-strapped single mother in 1980s Dublin, coming into her own in her middle years - going to college, working and writing, and continuing to evolve and learn into her ninth decade, even as she accepts the realities of being 'old'.Candid about everything that matters - love, sex, heartbreak, money, class, religion, mental health, rearing children (and letting them go), reading and writing, ageing - Open-Hearted is a compelling story about living life in a spirit of curiosity and delight and with a willingness to look for good in others._________________________________'By some distance the most courageous, most poignant, most life-affirming memoir I've read in the last twenty years and more' Paul Howard'Genuinely inspirational. I LOVE ANN INGLE' Marian Keyes'What a beautiful openhearted, at times broken-hearted memoir ... honest, funny, searingly direct, a wonderful voice ... remarkable' Joe Duffy'Really beautiful. Searingly honest, astonishingly frank and very, very funny' Maia DunphyOne Last Goodbye: Sometimes only a mother's love can help end the pain
By Kay Gilderdale. 2011
Watching her child die is the hardest thing a mother can ever do. But for Kay Gilderdale, saying a final…
goodbye to her only daughter Lynn was exceptionally painful: she'd played a part in her death.Lynn was just 14 when she was struck down by the crippling disease ME, leaving her paralysed and in constant agony. Over the next 17 years, she became desperate to escape her miserable existence, even begging her mum to help her die. So, one night, when Kay found Lynn attempting suicide, she was forced to make an impossible decision. Continue watching her child suffer or help her end the pain?Eventually, fighting her every instinct, Kay helped her precious daughter take a fatal overdose. But while Lynn was finally free, her mother faced a fresh agony - a possible lifetime behind bars. The highly controversial trial that followed opened a fierce public debate on assisted suicide. Is it murder or mercy?Here, in her heartbreaking story, Kay reveals the harrowing truth behind the headlines and the desperate lengths a mother will go to for the love of a child.One Day at a Time: A Memoir
By Susan Lewis. 2011
She was only nine when her world fell apart. The struggle to understand took a lifetime.In 1960s Bristol, Susan's family…
was like any other with its joys and frustrations, and fierce loyalties. Then tragedy struck and left a legacy that was to last a lifetime.Susan was only nine when her mother died. A year later she was sent away to school. She didn't want to go, and didn't understand why she had to. In her struggle to cope with an uncertain world - a world where nothing seemed to make sense any more - she pushed away the one person she loved best, her father. It wasn't until adulthood beckoned that she realised that, in order to turn their relationship around, she had to learn to love - and trust - again.On Liberty and the Subjection of Women
By John Stuart Mill. 2006
A prodigiously brilliant thinker who sharply challenged the beliefs of his age, the political and social radical John Stuart Mill…
was the most influential English-speaking philosopher of the nineteenth century. Regarded as one of the sacred texts of liberalism, his great work On Liberty argues lucidly that any democracy risks becoming a 'tyranny of opinion' in which minority views are suppressed if they do not conform with those of the majority. Written in the same period as On Liberty, shortly after the death of Mill's beloved wife and fellow-thinker Harriet, The Subjection of Women stresses the importance of equality for the sexes. Together, the works provide a fascinating testimony to the hopes and anxieties of mid-Victorian England, and offer a compelling consideration of what it truly means to be free.The Old Dog and Duck: The Secret Meanings of Pub Names
By Albert Jack. 2009
This is a book for everyone who has ever wondered why pubs should be called The Cross Keys, The Dew…
Drop Inn or The Hope and Anchor. You'll be glad to know that there are very good - strange and memorable - reasons behind them all.After much research about (and in) pubs, Albert Jack brings together the stories behind pub names to reveal how they offer fascinating and subversive insights on our history, customs, attitudes and jokes in just the same way that nursery rhymes do. The Royal Oak, for instance, commemorates the tree that hid Charles II from Cromwell's forces after his defeat at Worcester; The Bag of Nails is a corruption of the Bacchanals, the crazed followers of Bacchus, the god of wine and drunkenness; The Cat and the Fiddle a mangling of Catherine La Fidele and a guarded gesture of support for Henry VIII's first, Catholic, wife Catherine of Aragon; plus many, many more. Here too are even more facts about everything from ghosts to drinking songs to the rules of cribbage and shove hapenny, showing that, ultimately, the story of pub history is really the story of our own popular historyThe Nightingale: ‘The nature book of the year’
By Sam Lee. 1819
'Wondering and wonderful. The nature book of the year.' JOHN LEWIS-STEMPEL'This lovely book is almost as thrilling as the bird's…
immortal song - balm for a troubled soul and a glimpse of paradise.' JOANNA LUMLEY______________________________Come to the forest, sit by the fireside and listen to intoxicating song, as Sam Lee tells the story of the nightingale.Every year, as darkness falls upon woodlands, the nightingale heralds the arrival of Spring. Throughout history, its sweet song has inspired musicians, writers and artists around the world, from Germany, France and Italy to Greece, Ukraine and Korea. Here, passionate conservationist, renowned musician and folk expert Sam Lee tells the story of the nightingale. This book reveals in beautiful detail the bird's song, habitat, characteristics and migration patterns, as well as the environmental issues that threaten its livelihood.From Greek mythology to John Keats, to Persian poetry and 'A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square', Lee delves into the various ways we have celebrated the nightingale through traditions, folklore, music, literature, from ancient history to the present day. The Nightingale is a unique and lyrical portrait of a famed yet elusive songbird.______________________________'Sam Lee has brought the poetic magic that has long enchanted so many of his musical fans into the written word. Allow yourself to glimpse the world Sam sees, to be part of his love affair with the nightingale, and you will no doubt be delighted.' LILY COLE'A wonderful book.' STEPHEN MOSS'A magical marriage of the lyrical and practical: a book that makes us want to seek out the nightingale and then reveals how we can.' TRISTAN GOOLEYThe Naughty Nineties: Football's Coming Home
By Martin King, Martin Knight. 1999
Football has reinvented itself. As television money has poured into the game, the traditional working-class fans have poured out -…
not by choice, but by economic necessity. According to those in charge of the game the football hooligan has at last been eliminated from the landscape. But how true is this much-vaunted claim? Martin King, author of Hoolifan, brings his story up to date in The Naughty Nineties. Ironically, he finds that football hooligans now really are in the minority but they are far more dangerous and committed than ever before.My Sister Milly
By Gemma Dowler. 2017
You've seen Manhunt, now read this powerful and personal account from Milly Dowler's sister Gemma . . . 'My name…
is Gemma Dowler. On 21 March 2002, a serial killer named Levi Bellfield stole my sister and sent our family to hell . . .'In My Sister Milly, Gemma Dowler recounts the terrible day of Milly's disappearance, the suspicions that fell on the family, the torture of encountering the murderer in court, the fatal errors made by the police, how it very nearly destroyed her family and how love and hope helped the family survive.Everyone thinks they know the story of Milly Dowler, but only one person knows the true pain of having lost her sister, and how a family can rediscover hope to survive.________________'Compelling. An amazing book'Jeremy Vine, BBC Radio 2'Heartbreaking' Daily Mail'Tragic, poignant, full of emotional memories'Daily MirrorMy Own Story: Inspiration for the major motion picture Suffragette (Vintage Feminism Short Editions Ser.)
By Emmeline Pankhurst. 2015
The great leader of the women’s suffrage movement tells the story of her struggles in her own words.Emmeline Pankhurst grew…
up all too aware of the prevailing attitude of her day: that men were considered superior to women. When she was just fourteen she attended her first suffrage meeting, and returned home a confirmed suffragist. Throughout the course of her career she endured humiliation, prison, hunger strikes and the repeated frustration of her aims by men in power, but she rose to become a guiding light of the Suffragette movement. This is the story, in Pankhurst’s own words, of her struggle for equality.A Mother's War: One Woman's Fight for the Truth Behind Her Son's Death at Deepcut
By Yvonne Collinson Heath. 2013
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.