Search Results for: true story

‘Absolutely gripping from the word go’ Alexis Conran, Times Radio

‘A convincing insight into the terror and adrenaline rush of war’ Mail on Sunday

Damien Lewis’s new bestseller tells the action-packed, riveting story of the band of mavericks and visionaries who made the SAS. Using hitherto untold stories and new archival sources, Damien Lewis follows one close-knit band of warriors from the SAS foundation through to the Italian landings – chronicling the extraordinary part they played as the tide of the Second World War truly turned in the Allies’ favour.

This is a narrative of wall-to-wall do-or-die action and daring, chronicling the exploits of some of the most highly-decorated soldiers of the twentieth-century.

‘A new book by historian Damien Lewis … who has read through the letters, diaries and reports kept by the Mayne family and conducted interviews with its surviving members over the past ten years’ Danielle Sheridan, Daily Telegraph

‘Read more about the characters as seen in SAS Rogue Heroes in Damien Lewis’s book SAS Brothers In Arms‘ Ed Cullinane, SWNS

‘Damien Lewis, bestselling author, describes the extraordinary bravery of Paddy Mayne and, it seems strange to say, the humanity of Mayne … Brilliant’ Nihal Arthanayake, BBC Radio 5 Live

‘The depth of research is astounding’Belfast Telegraph

‘SMART, EMOTIONAL, INTRIGUING AND COMPELLING – I LOVED IT!’ JILL MANSELL

Dannie Kohan has held true to her meticulously crafted 5-year plan since she understood the concept. On the day that she nails the most important interview of her career and gets engaged to the perfect man, she’s well on her way to fulfilling her life goals.

But that night Dannie falls asleep and dreams of a night five years in the future where she’s engaged to another man. It was just a dream, she tells herself when she wakes, but it felt so real.

Determined to ignore the odd experience, she files it away in the back of her mind. That is, until five years later, when Dannie turns down a street and there, standing on the corner, is the man from her dream…

Perfect for fans of Me Before You and One Day, this heart-breaking story of love, loss and life will have you questioning everything you thought you knew about destiny.
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‘What a clever, beautiful, special book. The writing is stunning, the concept is so original – it just has everything going for it. I loved every page!’ Beth O’Leary, author The Flatshare and The Switch

‘Such a touching, soulful experience’ Goodreads reader

‘In Five Years is a stunningly beautiful, brilliant and insightful love story‘ Goodreads reader

‘Heartbreaking and poignant’ Glamour

‘I loved In Five Years. A beautiful, intelligent story about friendships and love’ Clare Mackintosh, author of After the End

‘Full of twists and turns, this is a heart-breaking yet uplifting story about love and friendship‘ Heat magazine ****

*IF YOU LOVED IN FIVE YEARS, REBECCA’S NEXT HEARTBREAKER EXPIRATION DATES IS AVAILABLE TO PREORDER NOW!*

New York Times bestseller, March 2020

Disease is the true serial killer of human history: the horrors of bubonic plague, cholera, syphilis, smallpox, tuberculosis and the like have claimed more lives and caused more misery than the depredations of warfare, famine and natural disasters combined.

Murderous Contagion tells the compelling and at times unbearably moving story of the devastating impact of diseases on humankind – from the Black Death of the 14th century to the Spanish flu of 1918-19 and the AIDS epidemic of the modern era. In this book Mary Dobson also relates the endeavours of physicians and scientists to understand and identify the causes of diseases and find ways of preventing them.

This is a timely and revelatory work of popular history by a writer whose knowledge of, and enthusiasm for, her subject shines through her every word.

From earliest times, women gained access to leadership in times of conflict and proved themselves equal to the challenge of commanding during war. Women leaders abounded in the ancient world from Ireland to Israel, sometimes through the accident of birth, but often rising to power through naked opportunism and raw courage in the ranks – and it is no accident that women war leaders, like men, are often famous for their strong sexual drive.

Wherever there is war, there has often been a woman at the helm. Later ages frequently wrote these women out of history, but their stories have refused to die. From the legendary leader of the Amazons who fought the greatest of Greek heroes, Achilles, to the Iron Ladies of today, the women of both West and East directing military campaigns and leading their countries in war.

Presenting an array of fascinating and sometimes little known women war leaders, popular author Rosalind Miles and the acclaimed military historian Robin Cross do full justice to the achievements of these women, some of whose amazing stories have so far never been told.

Warrior women include: Penthesilea the Amazons queen, Deborah, Cleopatra VII, Boudicca, Eleanor of Aquitaine, Joan of Arc, Elizabeth I, Grace O’Malley, Deborah Samson, Nadezda Durova, Harriet Tubman, Anna Etheridge, Soldaderas, Flora Sandes, Lily Litvak, Women of the Warsaw Ghetto, Hanna Reitsch, Ruth Werner, Jeanne Holm, Margaret Thatcher, Women in Today’s Armies, Martha McSally and more…

The incredible and heart-breaking true stories of victims of a notorious adoption scandal – inspired by No.1 bestselling novel Before We Were Yours

From the 1920s to 1950, Georgia Tann ran a corrupt baby business at the Tennessee Children’s Home Society in Memphis. She offered up more than 5,000 orphans tailored to the wish lists of eager parents – hiding the fact that many weren’t orphans at all, but stolen sons and daughters of poor families, desperate single mothers, and women told in maternity wards that their babies had died.

In Before and After, many survivors set out to trace their roots and find their birth families. Before and AFter includes moving and shocking accounts of the ways in which adoptees were separated from their first families. Often raised as only children, many have joyfully reunited with siblings in the final decades of their lives. There are stories of first meetings that are all the sweeter and more intense for time missed, and of families from very different social backgrounds reaching out to embrace brothers, sisters, and cousins.

WHAT READERS ARE SAYING ABOUT BEFORE AND AFTER

‘What a truly amazing book’ *****

‘Riveting’ *****

‘Captivating and emotional’ *****

‘A real tear-jerker’ *****

Published in hardback under the title FROM MOTHER TO DAUGHTER.

Whether you’re becoming a mum for the first time or you have children who are growing up faster than you could have ever imagined, motherhood can feel like the most joyful and yet the most daunting of times. But you’re not alone.

From the moment I knew my first baby was a girl I started to plan, hope and dream. I couldn’t wait to experience that special bond, but I wondered how I’d feel about being a working mum, how I’d hold on to the person I am. I also knew that the world has changed so much since I was growing up. What advice, values and role models would help give my daughter the confidence and strength to cope with all that might come her way – and to give her an open mind and warm heart?

This is my journey in motherhood: my experiences, hopes and fears – with my mum’s stories of raising me, a parenting expert’s advice and empowering exercises – to guide you from those first wobbly moments to being a happy, healthy mum and raising children who aren’t afraid to be themselves – and to go for the life they want.

KATIE PIPER
The Things I’d Tell My Child is about motherhood, what you learn as a mother, the things you would tell your daughter and most of all it’s Katie and Diane Piper’s celebration of the incredible power of mother-daughter relationships.

This book is a window into the world of Danny Dyer – and he’s seen more of the world than most so he’s got one or two things to say about it.

Tackling such vital questions as ‘Where have all the old school boozers gone?’ ‘Are there such things as ghosts?’ and ‘Am I middle class?’ Danny shares his unique take on life with characteristic honesty and humour and reveals why it is that:

· What goes around comes around – he learnt the hard way
· You can take the boy out of the East End but you can’t take the East End out of the boy
· Harold Pinter is a diamond geezer
· He told the media training expert to do one
· Science can prove that West Ham are the best football club in the world
· Him and Joanne are like a team – he’s Paul Gascoigne, she’s David Batty
· The human race isn’t evolved enough for Twitter

So, hold on to your titfer, it’s gonna be a bumpy ride!

‘As good an explanation as you will ever read of how the deindustrialisation of the 70s and 80s fuelled Brexit’ The Times

‘Magnificent . . . A fascinating insight into a decade that changed the nature of sport and changed the face of the country’ Rory Smith, Chief Soccer Correspondent, New York Times

Featuring many interviews with sportsmen, managers, miners, musicians, fans and local politicians, this deeply researched and moving investigation casts a new light on an era that read the last rites for the country’s collective culture.

Originally published as Relish, a fully revised and updated edition of the eye-opening story of one woman’s incredible appetite for life: Dame Prue Leith, judge of hit show GREAT BRITISH BAKE OFF, tells all from childhood in South Africa to becoming a DBE.

‘What a terrific tale it is – of a South African girl who could stand the heat and made the kitchen into a remarkable career’ Telegraph

Prue Leith describes herself as greedy in all senses of the word. Cook, caterer, restaurateur, food writer, journalist, novelist, businesswoman, teacher, television presenter, charity worker, lover, wife and mother, she has certainly lived life to the full. Prue came to London in the early 1960s and, not long afterwards, opened Leith’s Restaurant. By the mid-seventies she was a food columnist on the Daily Mail, had published several cookbooks and opened Leith’s School of Food and Wine.

But it wasn’t all work. Prue writes with honesty of her love life, her longing for children, the birth of her son, the adoption of her daughter and much else besides. In this fully revised and updated edition she tells of how she met, fell in love with and married John Playfair as well as her exciting role as a judge on Great British Bake Off, now a hit show in the United States as well as the UK. Prue’s down-to-earth attitude to life and her remarkable energy are an inspiration to women readers everywhere.

Three of the greatest football clubs: Celtic, Liverpool and Manchester United. Their three greatest managers: Jock Stein, Bill Shankly and Matt Busby.

Three men born within a 20-mile radius of each other in the central lowlands of Scotland; forged in mining communities to subsequently shape the course of modern football. From a BAFTA-winning documentary film maker and the people who brought us AMY, I BELIEVE IN MIRACLES and SENNA, this is a book for anyone who loves football and its history.

Fourteen years after fleeing Kenya with her baby daughter, Corinne returned in the summer of 2004 to meet Lketinga and his family again in their village, Barsaloi. Nervous as she was, and uncertain as to how he would react on seeing her again, she found to her relief that she was welcomed unreservedly by all those who remembered her – by Lketinga, who still thought of her as his ‘wife number one’, by his brother, James, now a schoolteacher and especially by Lketinga’s mother, who had looked after Corinne with such care all those years before. Corinne Hofmann revisits an area of a country which she cares about passionately, describing in her immensely readable style the changes she saw after her time away, and once again bringing to life the atmosphere and characters in the Masai village.

Jamaican Usain ‘Lightning’ Bolt is arguably the most celebrated sportsman in the world. From the relative obscurity of being a world-class 200 metres runner and winner of the Athletics World Championship silver medal in 2007, Bolt has elevated himself to iconic stature with his incredible world record runs in the 100 metres and his unbelievable performances at the 2008 Beijing Olympics. He is already being touted as the ‘saviour’ of track and field athletics and has been a fantastic ambassador for Jamaica, the Caribbean and the entire global African diaspora. This 22 year-old promises astonishing feats to come and his performances indicate that he is more than ready to fulfil those promises. Already a track phenomenon at the precocious age of twelve, this uncomplicated country boy leads the new generation of Caribbean stars who chose to stay at home, and train, study and work in familiar climes. His story is an inspiration to all and his instant celebrity shows the power of the media and the importance of the Olympic Games even in today’s crowded sports calendar.

Gertrude Stein and Alice B. Tokas were the talk of pre-war Paris. Photographed by Cecil Beaton and Man Ray, painted by Picasso and written about by Hemingway, they were at the heart of Parisian cultural and literary life.

Alice, convinced that Gertrude was a genius, cooked for her, typed her manuscripts and fought to obtain the fame she was convinced Gertrude was due. Alice said Gertrude was the happiest person she had ever known, and was besotted with her for the many years they were together. They were indomitable, charismatic, and wildly eccentric, driving around in ‘Auntie’, their Ford, with Basket, their cherished poodle. In Gertrude and Alice, award-winning writer Diana Souhami brings these two extraordinary women, and the fascinating world in which they moved, to vivid life.

A homage to a remarkable poet and his world.

‘At The Loch of Green Corrie is more than merely elegant, more than a collection of albeit fascinating insights, laugh-out-loud observations and impressively broad erudition’ – Sunday Herald
‘You could easily make a case that Andrew Greig has the greatest range of any living Scottish writer’ – Scotsman

For many years Andrew Greig saw the poet Norman MacCaig as a father figure. Months before his death, MacCaig’s enigmatic final request to Greig was that he fish for him at the Loch of the Green Corrie; the location, even the real name of his destination was more mysterious still. His search took in days of outdoor living, meetings, and fishing with friends in the remote hill lochs of far North-West Scotland. It led, finally, to the waters of the Green Corrie, which would come to reflect Greig’s own life, his thoughts on poetry, geology and land ownership in the Highlands and the ambiguous roles of whisky, love and male friendship.

At the Loch of the Green Corrie is a richly atmospheric narrative, a celebration of losing and recovering oneself in a unique landscape, the consideration of a particular culture, and a homage to a remarkable poet and his world.

Marcelo Bielsa is one of football’s greatest eccentrics and greatest enigmas. This will be the first English biography of one of football’s most contradictory characters.


He has coached some of the greatest names in world football – Gabriel Batistuta, Carlos Tevez, Javier Mascherano, Juan Sebastian Veron and Ander Herrera. He has been cited as a mentor by Pep Guardiola, Mauricio Pochettino and Diego Simeone.

Yet Marcelo Bielsa remains one of the great enigmas of world football – a fabulously innovative and obsessive coach, who has transformed Leeds United, Marseille and Athletic Bilbao. He also lasted two days at Lazio and led Argentina to their greatest footballing disaster.

Featuring interviews from across South America, Europe and Yorkshire, The Quality of Madness is a comprehensive and compelling biography, tracing Bielsa’s story from growing up as a member of one of Argentina’s most remarkable families to his revival of Leeds.

Bielsa has long been known as ‘El Loco’ – the Madman – and yet as Tim Rich’s revelatory study reveals, there is mercurial method and audacious logic to the madness.

Charly Gaul is a forgotten cycling legend. Once a household name across Europe, the diminutive Luxembourger won the 1958 Tour de France and the Giro d’Italia twice. A unique rider, Gaul was supremely gifted at climbing and resilient even in the foulest weather. His pedalling style was smooth and swift, and he could set an unmatchable metronome rhythm on a mountain climb. ‘Mozart on two wheels,’ was how one contemporary writer described him; another dubbed him ‘The Angel of the Mountains’.

At the end of his cycling career Gaul disappeared, becoming a hermit living in a forest in Luxembourg. What drove Charly Gaul into a recluse’s life? In Angel of the Mountains, Paul Maunder seeks to uncover the truth about Gaul, his psychology and the circumstances of his withdrawal from society. In rediscovering Gaul’s enigmatic life, we find not only an unlikely hero but also a larger truth about the nature of sporting success.

‘Unforgettable’ The Times


‘Grippingly told and brilliantly reported’ Mail on Sunday


‘Startlingly intimate’ Sunday Times


‘Fascinating’ Daily Mail


‘Groundbreaking’ Evening Standard


‘Exceptional and moving’ Spectator


“Hidden Valley Road contains everything: scientific intrigue, meticulous reporting, startling revelations, and, most of all, a profound sense of humanity. It is that rare book that can be read again and again.”
-David Grann, author of Killers of the Flower Moon

One of the New York Times‘ “20 most anticipated books of 2020”: the heartrending story of a mid-century American family with twelve children, six of them diagnosed with schizophrenia, that became science’s great hope in the quest to understand the disease.

“An extraordinary case study and tour de force of reporting.”
-Sylvia Nasar, author of A Beautiful Mind

Don and Mimi Galvin seemed to be living the American dream. After World War II, Don’s work with the Air Force brought them to Colorado, where their twelve children perfectly spanned the baby boom: the oldest born in 1945, the youngest in 1965. In those years, there was an established script for a family like the Galvins – aspiration, hard work, upward mobility, domestic harmony – and they worked hard to play their parts. But behind the scenes was a different story: psychological breakdown, sudden shocking violence, hidden abuse. By the mid-1970s, six of the ten Galvin boys, one after the other, were diagnosed as schizophrenic. How could all this happen to one family?

What took place inside the house on Hidden Valley Road was so extraordinary that the Galvins became one of the first families to be studied by the National Institutes of Mental Health. Their story offers a shadow history of the science of schizophrenia, from the era of institutionalization, lobotomy, and the schizophrenogenic mother, to the search for genetic markers for the disease, always amidst profound disagreements about the nature of the illness itself. And unbeknownst to the Galvins, samples of their DNA informed decades of genetic research that continues today, offering paths to treatment, prediction, and even eradication of the disease for future generations.

With clarity and compassion, bestselling and award-winning author Robert Kolker uncovers one family’s unforgettable legacy of suffering, love and hope.

“This book tore my heart out. It is a revelation-about the history of mental health treatment, about trauma, foremost about family-and a more-than-worthy follow-up to Robert Kolker’s brilliant Lost Girls.”
-Megan Abbott, Edgar Award-winning author of Dare Me and Give Me Your Hand

Perfect for fans of Tanith Lee and Joyce Carol Oates, this extremely dark and disturbing novel by award-winning author Lisa Tuttle is ‘Impossible to forget’ Neil Gaiman.

Be careful what you wish for . . .

As a child, Agnes Grey dreamed of the perfect friend to ease her loneliness: a doll that would talk to her, tell her stories, share her secrets, just like her Aunt Marjorie used to have.

So when she receives an old-fashioned porcelain doll as an adult, painted to look like an old-world gentleman, she’s certain her dreams have come true. But as the line between fantasy and reality begins to blurs, Agnes discovers that every dream has its price and every wish must be paid for . . .

A story about love, family secrets, and a little piece of heaven . . .

In the beautiful village of Vernazza, the Mazzone family have transformed an old convent overlooking the glamorous Italian Riviera into the elegant Lemon Tree Hotel. For Chiara, her daughter Elene and her granddaughter Isabella, the running of their hotel is the driving force in their lives.

One day, two unexpected guests check in. The first, Dante, is a face from Chiara’s past, but what exactly happened between them all those years ago, Elene wonders. Meanwhile, Isabella is preoccupied with the second guest, a mysterious young man who seems to know a lot about the history of the old convent and the people who live there. Isabella is determined to find out his true intentions and discover the secret past of the Lemon Tree Hotel.