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Transworld Publishers
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Things like crowns had a troublesome effect on clever folks; it was best to leave all the reigning to the kind of people whose eyebrows met in the middle. Three witches gathered on a lonely heath. A king cruelly murdered, his throne usurped by his ambitious cousin. A child heir and the crown of the kingdom, both missing. The omens are not auspicious for the new incumbent, for whom ascending this tainted throne is a more complicated affair than you might imagine, particularly when the blood on your hands just won't wash off and you're facing a future with knives in it... |
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It's September 1919: twenty-one-year-old Tristan Sadler takes a train from London to Norwich to deliver some letters to Marian Bancroft. Tristan fought alongside Marian's brother Will during the Great War, but in 1917 Will laid down his guns on the battlefield, declared himself a conscientious objector and was shot as a traitor, an act which has brought shame and dishonour on the Bancroft family. But the letters are not the real reason for Tristan's visit. He holds a secret deep in his soul: one that he is desperate to unburden himself of to Marian, if he can only find the courage. As he recalls his friendship with Will, from the training ground at Aldershot to the trenches of Northern France, he speaks of how the intensity of their friendship brought him both happiness and self-discovery as well as despair and pain. The Absolutist is a novel that examines the events of the Great War from the perspective of two young soldiers, both struggling with the complexity of their emotions and the confusion of their friendship. |
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Between Uberwald and Whale Bay, the Octarine Grass Country and the Widdershins Ocean, lies the most exciting and dangerous terrain in all Discworld. This is a map of Lancre, where Granny Weatherwax, Nanny Ogg, and Magrat Garlick live. |
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Berlin 1920 Two babies are born. Two brothers. United and indivisible, sharing everything. Twins in all but blood. As Germany marches into its Nazi Armageddon, the ties of family, friendship and love are tested to the very limits of endurance. And the brothers are faced with an unimaginable choice... Which one of them will survive? Ben Elton's most personal novel to date, Two Brothers transports the reader to the time of history's darkest hour. |
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After building an empire that has made her a legend in business, Olivia spends months each year planning a lavish holiday for everyone in her family to enjoy. This summer she has arranged a dream trip on a luxurious yacht in the Mediterranean, which she hopes will be the most memorable of all. More than anything, she hopes to express her love and her regret at all the important times she missed during her children's early years. But her younger daughter, Cassie, a hip London music producer, refuses the invitation altogether as she does every year. Liz, her older daughter, is preoccupied with a chance to recapture her dream of being a writer and is terrified of failure, again. And her sons John and Phillip work for her, for better or worse, with wives who wish they didn't. Immersed in the splendour of the Riviera, this should be a summer to remember, but old resentments die hard, and Olivia is still running the business full-time. As each of these individuals confront the past and the challenges of the present and future, they also learn to accept the enduring, unconditional love of their family — and a mother who is strong enough to take more than her fair share of the blame, and loving enough to accept them as they really are. The question is: can they do the same for her? |
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Stephen Hawking is one of the most brilliant cosmologists of our time, and author of the 10 million copy bestselling A Brief History of Time, one of the iconic books of its generation. Now, for the first time, he tells the story of his own life in his own words, in a book expanded from a lecture of the same name. When you are faced with an early death, writes Stephen Hawking, it makes you realize that life is worth living and that there are lots of things you want to do. From his post-war childhood in London through his undergraduate years at Oxford, Hawking was smart but (according to him) undistinguished, not even the brightest child of his brilliant, eccentric parents. A great lover of jokes and bets, he made an art of doing as little work as possible. All that changed, however, when Hawking received a diagnosis of Lou Gehrig's disease, or ALS, at the age of twenty-one, and began his transformation into the (still fun-loving) explorer and explainer of the universe that we know today. Written with wit, humility, and warmth, My Brief History gives us a candid examination of a life well-lived, including insight into his marriages and family life as well as a portrait of his intellectual evolution. The result is an unprecedented glimpse inside the mind of one of the most world-changing people of our time. |
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A collection of short fiction from Terry Pratchett, spanning the whole of his writing career from schooldays to Discworld and the present day. In the four decades since his first book appeared in print, Terry Pratchett has become one of the world's best-selling and best-loved authors. Here for the first time are his short stories and other short-form fiction collected into one volume. A Blink of the Screen charts the course of Pratchett's long writing career: from his schooldays through to his first writing job on the Bucks Free Press, and the origins of his debut novel, The Carpet People; and on again to the dizzy mastery of the phenomenally successful Discworld series. Here are characters both familiar and yet to be discovered; abandoned worlds and others still expanding; adventure, chickens, death, disco and, actually, some quite disturbing ideas about Christmas, all of it shot through with Terry's inimitable brand of humour. With an introduction by Booker Prize-winning author A.S. Byatt, illustrations by the late Josh Kirby and drawings by the author himself, this is a book to treasure. |
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The place is St Oswald's, an old and long-established boys' grammar school in the north of England. A new year has just begun, and for the staff and boys of the school, a wind of unwelcome change is blowing. Suits, paperwork and Information Technology rule the world and Roy Straitley, Latin master, eccentric, and veteran of St Oswald's, is finally — reluctantly — contemplating retirement. But beneath the little rivalries, petty disputes and everyday crises of the school, a darker undercurrent stirs. And a bitter grudge, hidden and carefully nurtured for thirteen years, is about to erupt. Who is Mole, the mysterious insider, whose cruel practical jokes are gradually escalating towards violence — and perhaps, murder? And how can an old and half-forgotten scandal become the stone that brings down a giant? |
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In this funny, moving memoir, Danielle Steel tells the story of how she met a dog the size of a mouse, with a personality that could light up an entire room. From Minnie's arrival at home in San Francisco to clothes shopping jaunts in Paris, her adventures provide the perfect backdrop for a heartfelt look at the magic that dogs bring to our lives, and how they become part of the family. We meet Steel's childhood pug, James, and Elmer, the basset hound who was steadfast at her side in her struggling days as a young writer, Sweet Pea-unveiled in a Tiffany box for a dog-loving husband-and all those lucky dogs who shared a household of nine children, other canines, and one pot-bellied pig. As she reflects on the beloved pets who have brought joy, and sometimes chaos, to her home through the years, Steel also shares her thoughts on the trials and tribulations of bringing a new dog into a household, the challenges of housebreaking and compatibility, the losses we feel forever. Filled with colorful characters (human and otherwise), delightful photographs, practical wisdom drawn from long experience, and brimming with warmth and insight on every page, Pure Joy is a love letter to this special relationship — and one of the most charming books yet from the incomparable Danielle Steel. |
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Deep beneath the English Channel, a small army of vicious terrorists has seized control of the Eurostar to Paris, taken 400 hostages at gunpoint — and declared war on a government that has more than its own fair share of secrets to keep. One man stands in their way. An off-duty SAS soldier is hiding somewhere inside the train. Alone and injured, he's the only chance the passengers and crew have of getting out alive. Meet Andy McNab's explosive new creation, Sergeant Tom Buckingham, as he unleashes a whirlwind of intrigue and retribution in his attempt to stop the terrorists and save everyone on board — including Delphine, the beautiful woman he loves. Hurtling us at breakneck speed between the Regiment's crack assault teams, Whitehall's corridors of power and the heart of the Eurotunnel action, Red Notice is McNab at his devastatingly authentic, pulse pounding best. Red Notice: You have been warned... |
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This could be the most astonishing whodunnit you are ever likely to read. As good as Mark Haddon's The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time... and with more twists and coils than a hangman's noose. 'The dead can't speak to us', Professor Madoc had said. That was a lie. Because the body Patrick Fort is examining in anatomy class is trying to tell him all kinds of things. Life is already strange enough for the obsessive Patrick without having to solve a possible murder. Especially when no one believes a crime has even taken place. Now he must stay out of danger long enough to unravel the mystery — while he dissects his own evidence. But as Patrick learns one truth from a dead man, he discovers there have been many other lies rather closer to home... |
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Jack Reacher is alone, the way he likes it. He watches a man cross a New York street and drive away in a Mercedes. The car contains $1 million of ransom money. Reacher's job is to make sure it all turns out right — money paid, family safely returned. But Reacher is in the middle of a nasty little war where nothing is simple. What started on a busy New York street explodes three thousand miles away, in the sleepy English countryside. Reacher's going to have to do this one the hard way. |
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When a scientist is found brutally murdered, Harvard professor Robert Langdon is asked to identify the mysterious symbol seared onto the dead man's chest. Realising it must be the work of the Illuminati — an ancient secret brotherhood sworn against Catholicism — the race is on to prevent a tragedy. |
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Bill is a dedicated young lawyer working in New York. He leaves everything he trained for to follow his dream to become a minister in rural Wyoming. Jenny, his fashion stylist wife, leaves the milieu and life she loves to join him. The certainty they share is that their destinies are linked forever. Fast forward thirty-eigh. |
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Can you commit the perfect crime? Pilgrim is the codename for a man who doesn't exist. The adopted son of a wealthy American family, he once headed up a secret espionage unit for US intelligence. Before he disappeared into anonymous retirement, he wrote the definitive book on forensic criminal investigation. But that book will come back to haunt him. It will help NYPD detective Ben Bradley track him down. And it will take him to a rundown New York hotel room where the body of a woman is found facedown in a bath of acid, her features erased, her teeth missing, her fingerprints gone. It is a textbook murder — and Pilgrim wrote the book. What begins as an unusual and challenging investigation will become a terrifying race-against-time to save America from oblivion. Pilgrim will have to make a journey from a public beheading in Mecca to a deserted ruins on the Turkish coast via a Nazi death camp in Alsace and the barren wilderness of the Hindu Kush in search of the faceless man who would commit an appalling act of mass murder in the name of his God. |
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After an epic and interrupted journey all the way from the snows of South Dakota, Jack Reacher has finally made it to Virginia. His destination: a sturdy stone building a short bus ride from Washington DC, the headquarters of his old unit, the 110th MP. It was the closest thing to a home he ever had. Why? |
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Born to parents who were enthusiastic naturalists, and linked through his wider family to a clutch of accomplished scientists, the author was bound to have biology in his genes. But what were the influences that shaped his life? This book tells his personal journey. |
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Margaret Thatcher is one of the most iconic politicians of the twentieth century. With the possible exception of Winston Churchill, no other Prime Minister has had such an impact on modern British history. Like it or not, her radical social and economic policies have made Britain the country it is today. Without Margaret Thatcher there could have been no New Labour, no Tony Blair and no David Cameron. Now Robin Harris, for many years Thatcher's speechwriter, trusted adviser and the draftsman of two volumes of her autobiography, has written the defining book about this indomitable woman. He tells her extraordinary life story, from humble beginnings above her father's grocer's shop in Grantham, her early days as one of the first women in Westminster who became known as 'Thatcher milk-snatcher' during her days in the Ministry for Education and then as Prime Minister. We follow her through the 'Winter of Discontent', the tribulations of the miners' strike and the Falklands War. And Harris writes a stunning account of her exit from power and tells of her life after number 10. |
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This is the winner of the Costa Novel Award. What if you had the chance to live your life again and again, until you finally got it right? During a snowstorm in England in 1910, a baby is born and dies before she can take her first breath. During a snowstorm in England in 1910, the same baby is born and lives to tell the tale. What if there were second chances? And third chances? In fact an infinite number of chances to live your life? Would you eventually be able to save the world from its own inevitable destiny? And would you even want to? Life After Life follows Ursula Todd as she lives through the turbulent events of the last century again and again. With wit and compassion, Kate Atkinson finds warmth even in life's bleakest moments, and shows an extraordinary ability to evoke the past. Here she is at her most profound and inventive, in a novel that celebrates the best and worst of ourselves. |
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What makes a restaurant hot? Whose name do you need to drop to get a table? Why is one place booked solid for the next nine months while somewhere equally delicious is as empty and inhospitable as the Gobi desert? Welcome to the restaurant business, where the hours are punishing, the conditions are brutal and the Chef's Special has been languishing at the back of the fridge for the past three days. This is an industry plagued with obsessives. Why else do some chefs drive themselves crazy in pursuit of elusive Michelin stars, when in reality all they're doing is 'making someone else's tea'? Nothing is left to chance: the lighting, the temperature or even the cut of the salmon fillet. There's even a spot of psychology behind the menu. What do they want you to order? What makes them the most money? And why should you really hold back on those side dishes? In Restaurant Babylon, Imogen Edwards-Jones and her anonymous industry insider lift the lid on all the tricks of the food trade and what really makes this GBP90 billion a year industry tick. So please do sit down, pour yourself some heavily marked-up wine and make yourself comfortable (although we'll need that table back by 8.3 0 sharp). |
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