Showing 1–12 of 65 resultsSorted by latest
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£30.00
‘The Achilles Trap’ untangles the people, ploys of power and geopolitics that led to America’s disastrous war with Iraq and details America’s fundamental miscalculations during its ruinous, decades-long relationship with Saddam Hussein. Beginning with Saddam’s rise to power in 1979 and the birth of Iraq’s secret nuclear weapons programme, Steve Coll traces Saddam’s motives through understanding his inner circle. He brings to life the diplomats, scientists, family members and generals who had no choice but to defer to their leader – a leader directly responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Iraqis, as well as the torture or imprisonment of many more. This was a man whose reasoning was impossible to reduce to a simple explanation, and the CIA and successive presidential administrations failed to grasp critical nuances in his paranoia, resentments and inconsistencies.
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£11.99
Charles de Gaulle, saviour of France’s honour in 1940 and founder of the Fifth Republic, was a man and leader of deep contradictions. A conservative and a Catholic from a monarchist family, he restored democracy on his return to France in 1944, bringing the Communists into his government. An imperialist, he oversaw the final stages of France’s withdrawal from its last colonies in the 1960s. As a soldier, he spent much of his career in opposition to France’s military establishment. Yet, as Julian Jackson shows, it was precisely because of these contradictons that De Gaulle was able to reconcile so many of the conflicting strands in French politics. In 1958, and in response to a coup by the French military in Algeria, De Gaulle introduced a new political systemm the Fifth Republic, ushering in a period of stability that has held to the present day.
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£25.00
Charles Wheeler, the BBC’s longest-serving foreign correspondent, was one of Britain’s greatest news reporters. For more than four decades, he reported for radio & television from most of the world’s trouble spots. Present at many of the key episodes of the 20th century, he had a knack of being in the right place at the right time. It was typical of Charles that he ran towards the sound of the gunshot while the crowd was running in the opposite direction. Wheeler’s skill & sense of judgement made him one of the most authoritative reporters of his generation. But what was it like to have been witness to the events that shaped our modern world? In this book – part memoir, part history, part reflection – his daughter, Shirin Wheeler, examines her father’s journalistic legacy & brings her personal knowledge to bear on the project.
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£22.00
In this extraordinary book, with unparalleled candour, Paul McCartney recounts his life and art through the prism of 154 songs from all stages of his career – from his earliest boyhood compositions through the legendary decade of The Beatles, to Wings and his solo albums to the present. Arranged alphabetically to provide a kaleidoscopic rather than chronological account, it establishes definitive texts of the songs’ lyrics for the first time and describes the circumstances in which they were written, the people and places that inspired them, and what he thinks of them now. Presented with this is a treasure trove of material from McCartney’s personal archive – drafts, letters, photographs – never seen before, which make this also a unique visual record of one of the greatest songwriters of all time.
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£26.00
‘A major book that will enlighten the layman and guide the statesman or geopolitical student’ DR. HENRY KISSINGER
Two leading authorities – a bestselling historian and the outstanding battlefield commander and strategist of our time – collaborate on a landmark examination of war since 1945.
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£12.99
As the sun set slowly on the British Empire in the years after the Second World War, the nation’s stately homes were in crisis. Tottering under the weight of rising taxes and a growing sense that they had no place in twentieth-century Britain, hundreds of ancestral piles were dismantled and demolished. Perhaps even more surprising was the fact that so many of these great houses survived, as dukes and duchesses clung desperately to their ancestral seats and tenants’ balls gave way to rock concerts, safari parks and day trippers. From the Rolling Stones rocking Longleat to Christine Keeler rocking Cliveden, ‘Noble Ambitions’ takes us on a lively tour of these crumbling halls of power, as a rakish, raffish, aristocratic Swinging London collided with traditional rural values.
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£16.00
A diary following a year at Parsonage Farm, a mixed farm in Devon, close to Dartmoor. The book documented a way of life unchanged for centuries, but which was already remote to most people. Morpurgo reveals the daily hardships and rewards of such a life. Ted Hughes, Morpurgo’s near neighbour and friend, wrote a poem for each month of the year in this unique collaboration. The book is illustrated with the photographs of James Ravilious from the Beaford Archive. It has a new introduction by the prize-winning author Katherine Rundell, and is published for Michael Morpurgo’s eightieth birthday.
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£30.00
How much can change in less than two and a half years? In the case of Britain in the Sixties, the answer is: almost everything. From the seismic coming of the Beatles to a sex scandal that rocked the Tory government to the arrival at No 10 of Harold Wilson, a prime minister utterly different from his Old Etonian predecessors. ‘A Northern Wind’ brings to vivid life the period between October 1962 and February 1965. Drawing upon an unparalleled array of diaries, newspapers and first-hand recollections, Kynaston’s masterful storytelling refreshes familiar events – the Cuban Missile Crisis, the Big Freeze, the assassination of JFK, the funeral of Winston Churchill – while revealing in all their variety the experiences of the people living through this history.
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£10.99
A landmark journey along the full length of the old Iron Curtain – from the Arctic Circle to Turkey’s eastern border – tracing the history of the Cold War and meeting the people who live with its legacy.
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£16.99
Sprawling across a quarter of the world’s land mass and claiming nearly 500 colonial subjects, Britain’s empire was the largest empire in human history. For many, it epitomised our nation’s cultural superiority, but what legacy have we delivered to the world? Spanning more than 200 years of history, Caroline Elkins reveals evolutionary and racialised doctrines that espoused an unrelenting deployment of violence to secure and preserve British imperial interests. She outlines how ideological foundations of violence were rooted in Victorian calls for punishing indigenous peoples who resisted subjugation, and how over time, this treatment became increasingly institutionalised.
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£12.99
Using previously restricted materials, Nicklaus Thomas-Symonds examines one of the most influential and successful politicians of the late 20th century, exploring Wilson’s rise to power via Clement Attlee’s post-war government, his relationship to Nye Bevan, whom he eventually replaced in the Shadow Cabinet, the close workings of his own inner circle, and the issues surrounding the first European Referendum. His biography considers previously overlooked aspects of Wilson’s life, such as the mysterious circumstances of his voluntary resignation and legacy in social reform. The book will offer a timely consideration of the advancement of social justice issues under Wilson’s government: homosexuality was decriminalised, abortion legalised and capital punishment abolished.
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£25.00
Queen Elizabeth II was Britain’s longest-reigning monarch. This intimate, personal biography tells the story of her life, reign and times, from a perspective unlike any other. Gyles Brandreth writes the Queen’s tale candidly with grace and sensitivity from the view of someone who met her, talked with her and kept a record of those conversations. Brandreth knew the Queen’s husband well and knows the new King and Queen Consort. Told with authority, humour and moving honesty from a totally unique viewpoint, this is the biography of a woman who represented not only her people but stood as an emblem of fortitude and resilience. Updated to include exclusive material about Charles III’s coronation.
