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Copper: A Dog's Life
By Annabel Goldsmith. 2006
A loveable local legend and true character to all who knew him, Copper was no ordinary dog. With more stories…
to tell than you could count on the pads of one paw, this curly-tailed, shaggy-bearded mongrel (but don't let him hear you call him that) led a truly astonishing life. Famed for his remarkable wanderlust, canine curiosity took him all over the place, from Richmond and Kingston to Brighton, sometimes travelling on buses with his friend Jessie the cat, often stopping off at his favourite pubs, or chasing unsuspecting joggers in the park - a hobby which nearly ended his life. In this delightful book, Copper tells us of his astounding adventures with the finest of tail-wagging wisdom. He sniffs out all the important things in life: the comings and goings, the loves and losses - and, of course, what it's like to live in high society. Sometimes cheeky, most of the time charming, but always cherished, Copper's story is by turns funny and moving, the tale of a real canine hero.There's an epidemic sweeping the nationSymptoms include:*Acute embarrassment at the mere notion of 'making a fuss'*Extreme awkwardness when faced with…
any social greeting beyond a brisk handshake *An unhealthy preoccupation with meteorology Doctors have also reported several cases of unnecessary apologising, an obsessive interest in correct queuing etiquette and dramatic sighing in the presence of loud teenagers on public transport. If you have experienced any of these symptoms, you may be suffering from VERY BRITISH PROBLEMS.VERY BRITISH PROBLEMS are highly contagious. There is no known cure.Rob Temple's hilarious new book reveals all the ways in which we are a nation of socially awkward but well-meaning oddballs, struggling to make it through every day without apologising to an inanimate object. Take comfort in misfortunes of others. You are not alone.Today in History: Disney
By Eve Zibart. 2006
This irresistible read is packed with fun facts and tasty tidbits about Disney, from stories about the entertainment empire's founding…
family to the inspiration for many of the popular theme park attractions. Memorable dates include: May 11, 1904 - The great surrealist painter Salvador Dali was born in Igueras, Catalonia. His 1946 collaboration with Walt Disney was one of the most unusual partnerships in the entertainment industry. December 2, 1929 - The Haunted House, in which Mickey Mouse takes shelter from the storm in what turns out to be a well populated mansion, was released in theaters. This movie was the first time animators created what was to become a popular Disney setting. January 9, 1937 - The release of Donald Duck's second film, Don Donald, proved that Donald was capable of carrying a series without any help from Mickey. It also served as the debut vehicle for a ducky girlfriend called Donna, who was later renamed Daisy.Released to coincide with the company's 18-month-long 50th anniversary celebrations, Today in History: Disney has something for Disney fans of every generation.The Rhyme of History
By Margaret Macmillan. 2013
As the 100th anniversary of World War I approaches, historian Margaret MacMillan compares current global tensions--rising nationalism, globalization's economic pressures,…
sectarian strife, and the United States' fading role as the world's pre-eminent superpower--to the period preceding the Great War. In illuminating the years before 1914, MacMillan shows the many parallels between then and now, telling an urgent story for our time. THE BROOKINGS ESSAY: In the spirit of its commitment to high-quality, independent research, the Brookings Institution has commissioned works on major topics of public policy by distinguished authors, including Brookings scholars. The Brookings Essay is a multi-platform product aimed to engage readers in open dialogue and debate. The views expressed, however, are solely those of the author.These Wonderful Rumours!: A Young Schoolteacher's Wartime Diaries 1939-1945
By Juliet Gardiner, May Smith. 2012
May Smith is twenty-four at the outbreak of World War Two; at night, the sirens wail, and the young men…
of the village leave to fight. But still, ordinary life goes on: May goes shopping, plays tennis, takes holidays and even falls in love - while recording it faithfully in her diary.'May is simply a joy, a bright spark in dark times' The TimesThe First London Olympics: 1908
By Rebecca Jenkins. 2008
In the summer that saw the first successful flight of the Zeppelin, a 140 acre site of scrubland in West…
London was transformed into the White City, which housed the 1908 Franco-British Exhibition - and a state-of-the-art stadium built to house the first London Olympics. The Olympics were organised by volunteers in just 18 months and at a fraction of the cost of the modern Olympics and yet, just as today, the sport was overshadowed by doping scandals and caused international uproar. The ferocious competitiveness of a US team dominated by New York Irish Americans led to a succession of 'scandals' culminating in the historic marathon when Italian confectioner baker Dorando Pietri's heroic efforts at the limits of exhaustion so entranced on-lookers that track officials helped him across the finish line. Coinciding with the 100th Anniversary of the first London Olympics, this delightful social and sporting history - illustrated with over 70 contemporary images - provides a thought-provoking contrast to the forthcoming 2012 Olympic Games.What's Tha Up To?: Memories of a Yorkshire Bobby
By Martyn Johnson. 2012
'I've turned boys into men and policemen into coppers,' said the Sergeant. 'Policemen have got brains, but coppers, they've got…
brains and common sense.'No two days were ever the same for bobby-on-the-beat Martyn Johnson. Come rain or come shine, he patrolled his patch with a sharp eye for troublemakers and a kind word for those in need of a friend. Whether he was pursuing unlikely coal thieves, tracking down peacocks gone AWOL or investigating mysterious flying saucers over Sheffield, PC Johnson faced every new challenge with a smile and a healthy dose of his copper's common sense. In his charming and funny memoir, Martyn Johnson recalls the rogues, cheats and scoundrels - as well as the many friends - who made his life on the beat so unforgettable.On Deep History and the Brain
By Daniel Lord Smail. 2008
When does history begin? What characterizes it? This book dissolves the logic of a beginning based on writing, civilization, or…
historical consciousness and offers a model for a history that escapes the continuing grip of the Judeo-Christian time frame.Spies In The Sky: The Secret Battle for Aerial Intelligence During World War II
By Taylor Downing. 2011
SPIES IN THE SKY is the thrilling, little-known story of the partner organisation to the famous code-breaking centre at Bletchley…
Park. It is the story of the daring reconnaissance pilots who took aerial photographs over Occupied Europe during the most dangerous days of the Second World War, and of the photo interpreters who invented a completely new science to analyse those pictures. They were inventive and ingenious; they pioneered the development of 3D photography and their work provided vital intelligence throughout the war.With a whole host of colourful characters at its heart, from the legendary pilot Adrian 'Warby' Warburton, who went missing while on a mission, to photo interpreters Glyn Daniel, later a famous television personality, and Winston Churchill's daughter, Sarah, SPIES IN THE SKY is compelling reading and the first full account of the story of aerial photography and the intelligence gleaned from it in nearly fifty years.The Middle-Class ABC
By Fi Cotter-Craig, Zebedee Helm. 2012
The Middle Class ABC is the book loos, bedside tables and farmers markets the length and breadth of the land…
have been waiting for - a humorous celebration of the facts (some are even true) and foibles, manners and mores, peccadilloes and armadillos, of contemporary British middle-class life.Letter by letter, the occasionally clever, witty and absurd observations and cartoons will ring true for all good Middlings. WARNING: you might even recognize your own or your friends' choices of children's names, foodie fads, holiday destinations . . . Crammed with affectionately teasing jokes and some truly dreadful puns, this is a book to enjoy at any time of the year in the course of going about one's business.National Service: Tales From the Conscripts, 1946-62
By Colin Shindler. 2012
Permission to speak, Sah!In the aftermath of the Second World War, over two million men were conscripted to serve in…
Britain's armed services. Some were sent abroad and watched their friends die in combat. Others remained in barracks and painted coal white. But despite delivering such varied experiences, National Service helped to shape the outlook of an entire generation of young British males.Historian Dr Colin Shindler has interviewed a wide range of ex-conscripts, from all backgrounds, across all ranks, and spanning the entire fourteen years that peacetime conscription lasted, and captured their memories in this engrossing book. From them, we experience the tension of a postwar Berlin surrounded by Russians, the exotic heat and colour of Tripoli in 1948, the brief but intense flashpoint of the Suez Crisis, and the fear of the Mau Mau uprising in Kenya. But we also hear about the other end of the scale, the conscripts who didn't make it outside the confines of their barracks, or in one case, beyond his home town.Through these conversations we learn as much about the changing attitudes of servicemen as war became more of a distant memory as we do about the varied nature of their experiences. We see, too, the changing face of British society across these pivotal years, which span everything from the coronation of Elizabeth II, to the birth of rock 'n' roll, to the beginning of the end of the Empire. The stories within these pages are fascinating. And they deserve to be told before they are lost forever.For nine hundred years the British aristocracy has considered itself ideally qualified to rule others, make laws and guide the…
fortunes of the nation. Tracing the history of this remarkable supremacy, ARISTOCRATS is a story of wars, intrigue, chicanery and extremes of both selflessness and greed. James also illuminates how the aristocracy's infatuation with classical art has forged our heritage, how its love of sport has shaped our pastimes and values - and how its scandals have entertained the public. Impeccably researched, balanced and brilliantly entertaining, ARISTOCRATS is an enthralling history of power, influence and an extraordinary knack for survival.The Cruise of the Corwin
By John Muir. 1993
This latest addition to the John Muir Library -- our ongoing program to reissue the complete works of the first…
great conservationist author -- combines adventures in the Arctic North with Muir's perceptions. Founder of the Sierra Club, Muir did more than any other individual to shape the 20th-century conservation movement.Constantinople: City Of The World's Desire, 1453-1924 (Constantinople Ser.)
By Philip Mansel. 2006
Philip Mansel's highly acclaimed history absorbingly charts the interaction between the vibrantly cosmopolitan capital of Constantinople - the city of…
the world's desire - and its ruling family. In 1453, Mehmed the Conqueror entered Constantinople on a white horse, beginning an Ottoman love affair with the city that lasted until 1924, when the last Caliph hurriedly left on the Orient Express. For almost five centuries Constantinople, with its enormous racial and cultural diversity, was the centre of the dramatic and often depraved story of an extraordinary dynasty.Migra! A History of the U. S. Border Patrol
By Kelly Lytle Hernandez. 2010
This is the untold history of the United States Border Patrol from its beginnings in 1924 as a small peripheral…
outfit to its emergence as a large professional police force. To tell this story, Kelly Lytle dug through a gold mine of lost and unseen records stored in garages, closets, an abandoned factory, and in U.S. and Mexican archives.Because You Died: Poetry and Prose of the First World War and After
By Vera Brittain. 2008
This collection of Vera Brittain's poetry and prose, some of it never published before, commemorates the men she loved -…
fiancé, brother and two close friends - who served and died in the First World War. It draws on her experiences as a VAD nurse in London, Malta, and France, and illustrates her growing conviction of the wickedness of all war.Illustrated with many extraordinary photographs from Brittain's own albums, and edited with a new introduction by Mark Bostridge, Because You Died is an elegy to men who lost their lives in a bloody conflict, and a volume of remembrance to mark the ninetieth anniversary of the Armistice.The Beastly Battles Of Old England: The Misguided Manoeuvres of the British at War
By Nigel Cawthorne. 2011
Throughout history the English have been a warlike lot. Often we fight among ourselves - there have been a good…
few civil wars - and when we were not slaughtering each other, we practiced on our neighbours, the Scots, the Irish, the French... When that got too easy, we set off around the world to find other people to fight. This was usually done with a hubris that invited some ludicrous pratfall. In The Beastly Battles of Old England, Nigel Cawthorne takes us on a darkly humorous journey through some of our ill-advised military actions. From the war over a severed ear to a general seeking out his rival's mistresses to even the score, it is a miscellany of insufferable arrogance, reckless gallantry, stunning stupidity, massive misjudgements and general beastliness.Them And Us: Changing Britain - Why We Need a Fair Society
By Will Hutton. 2011
The suddenness and depth of the recession has raised questions about the workability of capitalism not seen since the 1930s.…
One of the constraints on recovery is the growing belief that if the old model did not work there is no new one on offer. This book sets out to provide one, arguing that reconstructing a bust financial system is not just a technical question. It cannot be done without a wholescale revision of the wider system and values on which it is based. And fairness must be placed at the heart of the new capitalism if our society is to recover its values.Will Hutton's new book musters brilliant, convincing arguments which will lend favour on both right and left. It is set to be a book which captures the mood of the moment in the same way that THE STATE WE'RE IN did.The A-Z of Living Together
By Jeff Green. 2002
What happens when those two most incompatible of creatures - the human male and the human female - settle down…
for a life of togetherness and arguments about the toilet seat? Award-winning comedian Jeff Green bravely sets out to discover the truth. Why is, 'Wow, you're a fantastic cleaner', not considered a compliment? And what is it about women and candles...? Along the way he offers helpful advice (why you shouldn't cheer when your partner says, 'I'm not angry, I'm disappointed'), handy tips (ways to avoid becoming broody: get up every hour throughout the night and burn £200) and essential buys (see 'exercise equipment and other places to hang wet washing'). Whether you're hopelessly coupled or gratefully single, The A-Z of Living Together has all the answers you need. Because it's not just men who behave badly...The A-Z of Having a Baby
By Jeff Green. 2006
Congratulations! You're having a baby! Or maybe you're a proud parent, holding your little bundle of joy with a mixture…
of ecstasy, wonder and sheer unadulterated TERROR? But don't panic! Real help is at hand, in the form of new dad and award-winning comedian Jeff Green. Let him guide you through the late nights, the stretch marks, the haemorrhoids... (and that's just the dads) and reassure you that you are NOT ALONE. So Dad, if you're suffering from father blues (the slow realisation that all your holidays will now be at Center Parcs), and Mum, if you're still miffed that your partner kept just out of punching range during childbirth, then this book is most definitely for you. Because it's not just babies who have teething problems...