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The Girl in the Wicker Basket
By Ann Kenny. 2008
When Ann Kenny was four years old her foster mother hit her across the face with a fireplace shovel. She…
was left lying unconscious on the cold hard floor while the family went to mass. She almost lost an eye.This is just one of the childhood incidents Ann recalls in her vivid, shocking memoir of growing up in rural Ireland, in a house where she wasn't wanted. Her early story is Cinderella-like, but without the happy ending: she had two older sisters who were loved, but Ann was put to work on household chores and received constant neglect and physical abuse, and sexual abuse from her grandfather. On growing up Ann found it hard to escape the shadows of her past, marrying an alcoholic and effectively raised her children herself. Ann eventually found the road to recovery and her book is a testament to the strength of a survivor. She began writing the book as she set to find out who was the tiny child she remembered left in a wicker basket - that child turned out to be herself.When did you last tell your children to put their hand over their mouth when they yawn? When did you…
last suggest that when they are introduced to someone they should shake hands firmly and look them in the eye? Do you suggest that they should wait until everyone is served before they eat rather than hoover up the best bit for themselves? Do you demand that your young daughter dress decorously lest she elicit outraged looks? Do you think that the children of today have disgraceful manners? Unlike, of course, when you were young ... Well, that's certainly what Erasmus of Rotterdam thought in 1530 when he published De Civilitate Morum Puerilium: A Handbook on Good Manners for Children. He felt that learning good manners was crucial to a child's upbringing, and that the uncouth and ill-disciplined behaviour around him demanded a new kind of book. After all, as William of Wykeham memorably said in the 1350s, 'Manners maketh man'. A Handbook on Good Manners for Children is considered to be the first treatise in Western Europe on the moral and practical education of children. It was a massive bestseller - indeed the biggest-selling book of the sixteenth century - going into 130 editions over 300 years and being translated into 22 languages within ten years of its publication. In it, Erasmus concerns himself with matters such as how to dress, how to behave at table, how to converse with one's elders and contemporaries, how to address the opposite sex and much else. For example: Table Manners 'It's just as rude to lick greasy fingers as it is to wipe them on your clothing, Use a cloth or napkin instead.''Some people, no sooner than they've sat down, immediately stick their hands into the dishes of food. This is the manner of wolves.' 'Making a raucous noise or shrieking intentionally when you sneeze, or showing off by carrying on sneezing on purpose, is very ill-mannered.''To fidget around in your seat, and to settle first on one buttock and then the next, gives the impression that you are repeatedly farting, or trying to fart.' The advice is as relevant today as it was 500 years ago.At the vulnerable age of 12, Lara McDonnell was picked out by a gang of men who befriended her, showered…
her with attention and gained her trust. Manipulated and groomed, her life quickly spiralled out of control as the men trafficked her around the country, deliberately keeping her compliant with drink and drugs. Deeply disturbed, and frightened about what the gang would do to her if she tried to break free, it would take over 4 years for Lara to find the strength to fight back, flee Oxford and escape her nightmare.This is her heartbreaking story.Girl A: The truth about the Rochdale sex ring by the victim who stopped them
By Anonymous. 2013
**THE TRUE STORY BEHIND THE CRITICALLY ACCLAIMED BBC DRAMA ‘THREE GIRLS’ ** What do they find attractive about me? An…
underage girl who just lies there, sobbing, looking up at them...as they come to me one by one.This is the shocking true story of how a young girl from Rochdale came to be Girl A – the key witness in the trial of Britain’s most notorious child sex ring.Girl A was just 14 when she was groomed by a group of nine Asian men. After being lured into their circle with free gifts, she was plied with alcohol and systematically abused. She was just one of up to fifty girls to be 'passed around' by the gang. The girls were all under-16 and forced to have sex with as many as twenty men in one night. When details emerged a nation was outraged and asked how these sickening events came to pass. And now, the girl at the very centre of the storm reveals the heartbreaking truth.The Gypsy Code: The true story of hide-and-seek in a violent underworld
By Mike Woodhouse. 2019
The Gypsy Code is a true story of secret identity, revenge and forbidden love that's perfect for fans of Running…
with the Firm, Undercover and Soldier Spy.Mike Woodhouse had everything: an engineering business, a wine bar, a home, a Range Rover and a boat. Then he caught a group of travellers stealing from his warehouse. A car chase, petrol bombing and court case later, and everything had changed.A marked man, Mike was forced to leave everything behind and move to the Peak District for a fresh start. But his old life was never far behind and when he fell for Rhoda, a Romany Gypsy, kin to the very people he was hiding from, he knew he wouldn't be safe for much longer . . .Gypsy Empire
By Eamon Dillon. 2013
Irish Travellers have never enjoyed a higher profile, at home and abroad, for good reasons and bad. On the one…
hand are the positive stories like the success of boxers such as John Joe Nevin and Tyson Fury, the popularity of Big Fat Gypsy Wedding and Paddy Doherty’s victory on Celebrity Big Brother. On the other are controversial news stories such as the Dale Farm stand-off and the recent convictions for slavery. Gypsy Empire delves into the heart of Traveller life, focusing on three aspects that have coloured perceptions of Travellers among the wider community: family feuds, bare-knuckle fights and trading. Many Irish Travellers are driven by the need to prove their status among their own, a powerful instinct epitomised by those who engage in brutal bare-knuckle fights. These bouts are fuelled by family feuds which sometimes erupt in vicious acts of violence. We meet many colourful characters, among them some of the world’s most prolific and gifted criminals, their self-reliance providing an edge over other crime gangs.This is a golden era for the Traveller clans which are expanding and growing like never before. Gypsy Empire takes the reader inside the hidden world of Irish Travellers.The God Squad
By Paddy Doyle. 1988
The past they tried to hide.His mother died from cancer in 1955. His father committed suicide shortly thereafter. Paddy Doyle…
was sentenced in an Irish district court to be detained in an industrial school for eleven years. He was four years old...Paddy Doyle's prize-winning bestseller, The God Squad, is both a moving and terrifying testament of the institutionalised Ireland of less than fifty years ago, as seen through the bewildered eyes of a child. During his detention, Paddy was viciously assaulted and sexually abused by his religious custodians, and within three years his experiences began to result in physical manifestations of trauma. He was taken one night to hospital and left there, never to see his custodians again. So began his long round of hospitals, mainly in the company of old and dying men, while doctors tried to diagnose his condition. This period of his life, during which he was a constant witness to death, culminated in brain surgery at the age of ten - by which time he had become permanently disabled.The God Squad is the remarkable true story of a survivor, told with an extraordinary lack of bitterness for one so shockingly and shamefully treated. In Paddy Doyle's own words: 'It is about a society's abdication of responsibility to a child. The fact that I was that child, and that the book is about my life, is largely irrelevant. The probability is that there were, and still are, thousands of 'me's.'The Guv'nor and Me: My Life with Lenny McLean
By John ‘The Houchin, Lee Wortley, Anthony Thomas. 2021
Don't cross The Neck.As the right-hand man to 'The Guv’nor' himself, Lenny McLean, John 'The Neck' Houchin is a living…
legend and is now telling his story for the first time. John trained daily with Lenny in the gym to achieve his huge bulk and neck, all 23 inches of it, required to frighten the hell out of troublemakers. As the enforcers for the Krays and the Richardsons, they worked together regularly over many years 'sorting out' whatever needed sorting. These are the mean streets of London back when swift justice as well as fearless loyalty were the order of the day. A new insider take from one of the most notorious characters of the time, this book is full of chippy dialogue, gangster banter, the biggest brawls, old school honour codes and pithy reflection on the changing times – from the hard men to the high life.Sharpen your mind to beat the smartest brains in Britain with the original official GCHQ puzzle bookWould GCHQ recruit you?…
Pit your wits against the people who cracked Enigma in the official puzzle book from Britain's top secret intelligence and security organisationOver the years, their codebreakers have helped keep our country safe, from the Bletchley Park breakthroughs of WWII to the modern-day threat of cyber attack. So it comes as no surprise that, even in their time off, the staff at GCHQ love a good puzzle.Whether they're recruiting new staff or challenging each other to the toughest Christmas quizzes and treasure hunts imaginable, puzzles are at the heart of what GCHQ does. Now they're opening up their archives of decades' worth of codes, puzzles and challenges for everyone to try.In this book you will find:- Tips on how to get into the mindset of a codebreaker- Puzzles ranging in difficulty from easy to brain-bending- A competition section where we search for Britain's smartest puzzlerWith hundreds of stimulating puzzles, The GCHQ Puzzle Book is the perfect companion and will keep you occupied as you attempt to beat the smartest brains in Britain.GOOD LUCK!'Fiendish . . . as frustrating, divisive and annoying as it is deeply fulfilling' Guardian'Ideal for the crossword enthusiast' Daily TelegraphLooking for more ways to test yourself? The GCHQ Puzzle Book 2, a new collection of head-scratching, mind-boggling and brain-bending puzzles is out now!Composed and published while John Bunyan (1628-1688) was in prison for his religious principles, Grace Abounding is an extraordinary spiritual…
autobiography. It was written in an age when religious radicalism was regarded as socially subversive, and is a haunting, often harrowing and ultimately inspiring account of his inner life: his long struggle with and eventual triumph over doubt and despair, his spiritual regeneration and his subsequent emergence as a preacher and writer of great imaginative power. God and Satan are the chief protagonists in Bunyan's drama, existing not as theological concepts but as terrifyingly immediate adversaries in the competition for his soul. Yet he finds his spiritual defences in the Bible, and Grace Abounding charts his passionate and imaginative involvement with this ultimate source of wisdom.The Frog Princess
By Angie Beasley. 2011
The Frog Princess is the story of Angie Beasley's transformation from ugly duckling to beauty queen.With few jobs around, bland…
food and cold weather, the best that Angie could hope for was a job at the local Findus factory. Her family didn't have it easy. Her baby brother was a cot death and the tragedy caused her mother to turn to the Jehovah's Witness faith. Their poverty, now combined with an austere belief system, meant no Christmas, no birthdays and little joy. But aged 16, Angie decided that she was destined for bigger things. After seeing a TV advertisement she entered a beauty pageant. And won. She went on to take 25 titles, including Miss Leeds, and her home town title Miss Cleethorpes, giving her the opportunity to model while travelling the world.Just as Angie felt that life couldn't get any better, she got engaged to a man who trapped her in a terrifying cycle of domestic violence. When she eventually escaped him, she had lost all of her money and self-esteem. She was on the bottom rung of the ladder yet again. But Angie picked herself up, turned her talents to event management and grafted her way to becoming Director of Miss England.Evoking the magical, lost world of the 1970s beauty pageant, The Frog Princess is Angie Beasley's real life fairytale.The eldest of six children, Angie Beasley (nee Chapman) was born in 1963 in Grimsby. With few prospects in life beyond the local fish factories, she decided to enter Miss Yorkshire Television at the age of 16. Within eight years, Angie had gone on to win twenty-five beauty titles, leading to work in the entertainment industry. She is now the Director of Miss England Limited, and lives in Leicester with her son.A Friend for Christmas
By Gloria Stewart. 2018
Yorkshire, Christmas, 1953. They'd had a cold and hungry winter but Gloria's mother had scrimped and saved to ensure the…
fire was lit and her five children each had a plate full of food. There was even a place at the table ready for an unexpected visitor; every year there seemed to be someone in need.Despite the busy household, Gloria often ended up playing by herself. That is, until a knock on the door that brought a scruffy pup into her life and her heart. Over the years, Gloria adopted many more dogs, even the odd cat, who helped her through the good times and the bad; through illness, love and loss. They even helped her to carry on her mother's legacy, bringing warmth, food and happiness to those alone at Christmas.Murder has transfixed the popular press for centuries. But it was only in the second half of the twentieth century…
that murder began saturating front pages and making these monsters what we today recognise as modern celebrities. It was three serial killers, caught and executed in the few years after the end of the Second World War, who precipitated a level of public furore never seen before. Neville Heath, a 'charming' sadist who killed two women; John George Haigh, the Acid Bath Killer who killed between six and nine men and women; and John Christie, the ineffectual necrophile, who killed between six and eight women. The modern news coverage finds its roots with these three men whom the crime historian Donald Thomas called the 'Postwar Psychopaths'. Their crimes were the first to generate a tabloid frenzy the like of which we see all around us today. It was not only the murderers who captured the public's imagination. It was the detectives who hunted them down, the judiciary who tried them, and the man who executed them, the legendary hangman Albert Pierrepoint.This book tells the stories of these three infamous serial killers against the backdrop of the tabloid frenzy that surrounded them.The last time that anyone heard from 35-year-old Claudia Lawrence, a chef at the University of York, was when she…
sent a text message to a friend on 18 March 2009 at 8.23 p.m. She has never been heard from or seen again, and her disappearance is a mystery that endures to this day.What happened to Claudia that early spring evening – or was it early the following morning on her way to work? There had been nothing abnormal about her behaviour before she vanished, and there were no signs of a struggle at her home. A Crimewatch reconstruction has been broadcast, and the police investigation into the case has cost more than £750,000. Dozens of interviews have thrown up numerous leads, but there are no concrete clues.With extensive access to her family and friends, in Gone, Neil Root assesses the facts and theories and asks: where is Claudia?The Funny Christmas Stocking Filler Book
By Jonathan Swan. 2016
Say stuffing balls to Christmas and survive the festive season with The Funny Christmas Stocking Filler BookGuaranteed to entertain and…
amuse, this book contains everything you need to get you from the turkey to the Queen’s speech! It’s the perfect distraction from rubbish Christmas telly and tipsy relatives, and could even help you dodge the washing up. The Funny Christmas Stocking Filler Book is packed full of hilarious games, dubious jokes and fun Christmas facts. Involve your sleeping relatives in a game of human buckaroo, play sprout golf or the Christmas movie charade game, or entertain the family with amazing Christmas trivia. For best results, consume with alcohol!The Gold: The real story behind Brink’s-Mat: Britain’s biggest heist
By Neil Forsyth, Thomas Turner. 2023
The real story that inspired the BBC drama, The GoldOn Saturday, 26 November 1983, an armed gang stole gold bullion…
worth almost £26 million from the Brink's-Mat security depot near London's Heathrow Airport. It was the largest robbery in world history, and only the start of an extraordinary story. For forty years, myths and legends have grown around the Brink's-Mat heist and the events that followed.The heist led to a wave of international money laundering, provided dirty money that helped fuel the London Docklands property boom, caused seismic changes in both British crime and policing, and has been linked to a series of deaths that continued until 2015.The Gold is the conclusion of extensive research and includes exclusive testimony from one of the original robbers who gives his version of events for the first time. The result is the astonishing true story of the robbery of the century.Fat Freddie: A gangster’s life – the bloody career of Freddie Thompson
By Stephen Breen. 2020
The No 1 Bestseller'A fascinating read' Seán O'Rourke, RTÉ Radio One'Fat' Freddie Thompson first appeared in court in 1997. He…
was sixteen and already aspiring to be a major crime boss. Over the next twenty years his criminal career would be marked by mayhem, brutality and murder.In 2000 a row over a failed drugs deal ignited a murderous feud in Dublin's south inner city. The Crumlin-Drimnagh feud's first victim was a friend of Thompson's and he led his Crumlin crew in a series of tit-for-tat killings. Sixteen young men would lose their lives over the next fifteen years.Meanwhile, childhood friend, Daniel Kinahan, had become a senior figure in his father Christy Kinahan's international crime cartel. Working with the Kinahan Cartel Thompson launched himself as a drugs dealer in Dublin. When another deadly feud broke out in 2016 - between the powerful Kinahans and veteran Dublin criminal, Gerry 'The Monk ' Hutch - Thompson was ready to get his hands dirty. But Thompson's loyalty would be his undoing. In August 2018 he was convicted of murder and jailed.Fat Freddie is a gripping account of the rise and fall of Freddie Thompson. Award-winning crime journalist, Stephen Breen, co-author of the No 1 bestselling The Cartel, has written the definitive portrait of a notorious Dublin gangster, a shocking story of double-crossing, vengeance and murder.Football Dynamo: Modern Russia and the People's Game
By Marc Bennetts. 2008
In 1991, the collapse of the USSR seemed to signal the death of the Russian football industry, as the money,…
the players and the fans left. But now the oligarchs who profited from the post-Soviet turmoil are supporting the nation's football clubs and their dreams of glory, resulting in unprecedented success. Along this journey into the heart of Russian football, Marc Bennetts meets the managers, oligarchs, players, pundits and fans that define the Russian Premier league, now the fastest-growing and most intriguing football league in the world. From Andrei Arshavin and the national team's adventures at Euro 2008 to the symbolism of a club from war-torn Chechnya lifting the Russian FA Cup, Football Dynamo uncovers shocking revelations about corruption, hooliganism and racism, but also the true beauty of the game and the country.Famous Trials: Unwanted Spouses (Penguin Specials)
By Alex McBride. 2012
From the legendary Famous Trials series of real-life courtroom dramas, two classic murder trials abridged and refreshed as Penguin Specials…
for modern readers, selected and introduced by Alex McBride, author of Defending the GuiltyA respectable solicitor in the town of Hay-on-Wye, harried by his troubled wife, slowly and carefully poisons her to death. Pleased with the results, he sees an opportunity for another quick-fix solution and turns his murderous attentions to his business rival... Trapped in a marriage of convenience to an aging man almost thirty years her senior, thirty-eight year-old Alma falls in love with seventeen year-old George, when he answers her advertisement for a 'willing lad' to do the housework. It's the perfect set up - a well-disposed husband and a passionate lover - until George destroys it all by trying to get the husband out of the way...These two classic cases of spousal murder - one chillingly domestic, the other bizarre and touching - took place in 1922 and 1935. In these brilliant reconstructions, they continue to confound our expectations of how murderers are meant to proceed.The legendary Famous Trials series set the benchmark for historical crime writing with its accounts of the most notorious and intriguing criminal trials of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Expertly reconstructed from court transcripts, these often sensational narratives have gripped generations of readers since they first appeared in 1941. In this digital edition, two of the very best Famous Trials have been selected, introduced and further abridged by criminal barrister and author Alex McBride to provide modern readers with the most compelling versions yet of these court-room classics.Alex McBride is a criminal barrister. His book Defending the Guilty: Truth and Lies in the Criminal Courtroom was shortlisted for the 2010 Crime Writers' Association Gold Dagger for Non-Fiction and is available in Penguin. He has written for the Guardian, Independent, Prospect and New Statesman, and has contributed to various BBC programmes, including From Our Own Correspondent.'Expert, authoritative, hilarious - an insider's fearless account of life at the criminal bar'Times Literary Supplement Books of the Year on Defending the GuiltyFamous Trials: Thrill-Killers (Penguin Specials)
By Alex McBride. 2012
From the legendary Famous Trials series of real-life courtroom dramas, two classic murder trials abridged and refreshed as Penguin Specials…
for modern readers, selected and introduced by Alex McBride, author of Defending the GuiltyThomas Cream, erstwhile Sunday school teacher and serial poisoner, has an unsettling air and wonky eye. He also happens to be a doctor, which provides him with ample means and an ideal cover for his murderous activities. His victims are vulnerable young women, whose trust he gains with drinks and trips to the music hall, before offering them pills or swigs from a medicine bottle. A few hours later, they are dying in agony.The Honourable Thomas Ley, meanwhile, has an even better disguise: he's the former Justice Minister for New South Wales and a successful businessman, albeit with a shady past. Rumours abound when a political opponent disappears without trace and a business partner winds up at the bottom of a cliff.Neither killer can help themselves - and this, in the end, leads to their downfall - and both defy our comprehension. Brilliantly reconstructed here, their trials, in 1892 and 1947, reveal a deeply sinister conundrum: by the time you've discovered the secrets in their heart, it's inevitably much too late.The legendary Famous Trials series set the benchmark for historical crime writing with its accounts of the most notorious and intriguing criminal trials of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Expertly reconstructed from court transcripts, these often sensational narratives have gripped generations of readers since they first appeared in 1941. In this digital edition, two of the very best Famous Trials have been selected, introduced and further abridged by criminal barrister and author Alex McBride to provide modern readers with the most compelling versions yet of these court-room classics.Alex McBride is a criminal barrister. His book Defending the Guilty: Truth and Lies in the Criminal Courtroom was shortlisted for the 2010 Crime Writers' Association Gold Dagger for Non-Fiction and is available in Penguin. He has written for the Guardian, Independent, Prospect and New Statesman, and has contributed to various BBC programmes, including From Our Own Correspondent.'Expert, authoritative, hilarious - an insider's fearless account of life at the criminal bar'Times Literary Supplement Books of the Year on Defending the Guilty