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China in Drag
Approaching the end of his nine year stint as a BBC journalist in Beijing, Michael Bristow decided he wanted to write about the country’s modern history. To assist him he asked for the help of his language teacher, who was born just two years after the communist party came to power in 1949. The changing fortunes of his life have mirrored the ups and downs of his country, which has moved from communist poverty to capitalist wealth in just a single generation. It came as a surprise though, to learn that the teacher was also a cross-dresser. Michael gradually realised that the teacher’s story is the story of modern China.
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How to Think Like a Philosopher
An exploration into the ideas and ways of thinking of some of the world's greatest minds
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The Courage To Be Disliked
he Courage to be Disliked shows you how to unlock the power within yourself to become your best and truest self, change your future and find lasting happiness. Using the theories of Alfred Adler, one of the three giants of 19th century psychology alongside Freud and Jung, the authors explain how we are all free to determine our own future free of the shackles of past experiences, doubts and the expectations of others. It's a philosophy that's profoundly liberating, allowing us to develop the courage to change, and to ignore the limitations that we and those around us can place on ourselves. The result is a book that is both highly accessible and profound in its importance. Millions have already read and benefited from its wisdom. Now that The Courage to be Disliked has been published for the first time in English, so can you.
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The Mammoth Book of The World’s Greatest Chess Gam
The 125 greatest chess games of all time, selected, analysed, re-evaluated and explained by a team of British experts and illustrated with over 1,000 chess diagrams. Join the authors in studying these games, the cream of two centuries of international chess, and develop your own chess-playing skills - whatever your current standard. Instructive points at the end of each game highlight the lessons to be learned.First published in 1998, a second edition of The Mammoth Book of the World's Greatest Chess Games in 2004 included an additional 12 games. This edition includes a further 13 games as well as some significant revisions to the analysis and information regarding other games in earlier editions of the book, facilitated by the use of a variety of chess software.
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Don’t Tell Teacher
For Lizzie Riley, switching her eight-year-old son Tom to the local academy school marks a fresh start, post-divorce. With its excellent reputation and outstanding results, Lizzie knows it’ll be a safe space away from home. But there's something strange happening at school. Parents are forbidden from entering the grounds and inside, there are bars across the classroom windows. Why is Tom coming home exhausted, unable to remember anything about his day? What are the strange marks on his arm? And when Lizzie tries to question the other children, why do they seem afraid to talk? Tom’s new school might seem picture-perfect. But sometimes appearances can be deceiving…
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Jihad: The Ottomans and the Allies
The tragic news of the ISIS-inspired massacres in Europe and countless other locations throughout the Middle East, in conjunction with the failed political coup against Erdogan in Turkey, have raised the spectre of an ideological struggle that is more than a century old. As the West struggles with the consequences and implications of its ‘War on Terror’, parallels with this earlier jihad become manifest. The sprawling Ottoman Empire was at the point of dissolution by November 1914 when she declared a Holy War against the Allied Powers and threw in her lot with Germany. It was a disastrous decision that set in chain a series of cataclysmic events, which culminated in the demise of an ancient regime and the emergence of a modern, secular republic. The first jihad in the Arab world since the Crusades was to continue long after the Armistice of 1918, as the defeated empire faced a triumphalist Greece, supported by Britain, seeking to re-establish hegemony over Anatolia. This caused outrage throughout the Muslim world, threatened British paramountcy in India, and fractured diplomatic relations with close allies and the unity of her empire. Confronted with the indefatigable resistance of one man, Kemal Ataturk, Greek dreams ended in ashes, whilst the stubborn support of Lloyd George for Britain’s ally resulted in his own political extinction. It is a warning from history, including as it does ethnic cleansing, pogroms, regime change and political hubris. It is a story of steely determination and dogged bravery in the face of brazen territorial expansionism. It is also the history of the first modern jihad.
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Redemption - Clone Rebellion Book 7
Earth, 2516 A.D.: The Unified Authority has spread human colonies across the Milky Way, keeping strict order with a powerful military made up almost entirely of clones. But now the clones have formed their own empire, and they aim to keep it... no matter who they must defeat.
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Sedition: The Clone Rebellion Book 8
Earth, A D 2519. Less than a year has passed since the clone military of the Enlisted Man's Empire toppled the government of the Unified Authority. Now the clones rule Earth, but a new enemy has emerged - and set off civil war.
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Betrayal: The Clone Rebellion Book 5
Lt Wayson Harris was born and bred as the ultimate soldier. But he is unique, possessing independence of thought. And when the military brass decide to blame the clones for the decimation of the U A republic, Lt Harris decides to stop being the scapegoat, with all the firepower he can muster.
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Republic: The Clone Rebellion Book 1
Private first-class Wayson Harris was raised among thousands of clones to be the ultimate soldier. But Harris isn't like the other Marines: he has a mind of his own. He figures he's paying for that when his first assignment is the smallest Marine outpost in the whole UA.
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Elite: Clone Rebellion Book 4
2514 AD: An unstoppable alien force is advancing on Earth, wiping out the Unified Authority's colonies one by one. It's up to Wayson Harris, an outlawed model of a clone, and his men to make a last stand on the planet of New Copenhagen, where they must win the battle and the war or lose all.
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The Vanishing Season
A chilling tale of suspense for fans of Julia Heaberlin. Fourteen years ago, teenager Ellery Hathaway was victim number seventeen in the grisly murder spree of serial killer Francis Michael Coben. She was the only one who lived. Now Coben is safely behind bars, and Ellery has a new identity in a sleepy town where bike theft makes the newspapers. But each July for the last three years, locals have been disappearing. Then Ellery receives strange messages hinting that the culprit knows exactly what happened to her all those years ago. When she tries to raise the alarm, no one will listen, and terrified she may be next, Ellery must turn to the one person who might believe her story…
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Bollywood Wives
Zara Das is Bollywood’s hottest actress, stalked by paparazzi wherever she goes. But behind the glamour lies the truth of how she reached the top. Zara’s new film, a Bollywood version of Pride and Prejudice being shot in London, should overcome the scandal that threatens her career - until a dead body is found in her hotel room. Someone is determined to take Zara down - and will stop at nothing to expose her darkest secrets. Zara has spent years running from her past. But now it’s caught up with her… A sexy, gripping novel set in the world of Bollywood, for fans of Jackie Collins and Crazy Rich Asians.
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The Death of All Things Seen
For Norman Price, in the midst of his own crisis, the financial crisis was a distraction signifying there were no longer any essential truths, no longer a beginning, middle, or end to events; a realization that eclipsed, among other things, the passing of his parents. Chicago, 2008. In the wake of cataclysmic events – both personal and international – Norman Price decides it's time for a new existence. But when a couple of bombshells are dropped onto his tentative new path, Norman's New Existence is suddenly threatened by past secrets. Michael Collins takes post 9/11 America as the background for a deeply moving novel about the fragility of humanity.
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I Was a Spy
“The Greatest War Story of All – Takes rank with All Quiet on the Western Front. She fulfilled in every respect the conditions which made the terrible profession of a spy dignified and honourable. Dwelling behind the German line within sound of cannon, she continually obtained and sent information of the highest importance to the British Intelligence Authorities. Her tale is a thrilling one … the main description of her life and intrigues and adventures is undoubtedly authentic. I was unable to stop reading it until 4 a.m.”Winston Churchill 1932With her medical studies cut short by the 1914 German invasion, her house burned down and her father arrested for suspected‘sharpshooting’, it was perhaps unsurprising that the multi-lingual Marthe Mckenna (née Cnockaert, codename ‘Laura’) was recruited by British Intelligence. At the time she worked as a nurse tending the wounds of occupying soldiers, and as a waitress in her parents’ café in the Belgian border town of Roulers. I Was a Spy! is McKenna’s vivid narrative of these breath-taking adventures as she, aided by a gallant band of loyal locals, goes undercover to sabotage enemy phone lines, report suspicious activity or train movements, and even instigate an aerial attack on a planned visit by the Kaiser.This thrilling account goes on to explain how, in 1916, the young nurse was caught by the Germans placing dynamite in a disused sewer tunnel underneath an ammunition dump. She was sentenced to the firing squad and only survived due to the Iron Cross honour received as a result of her earlier medical service . Mckenna was later mentioned by Douglas Haig in British Despatches and was awarded the French and Belgian Orders of the Legion of Honour for her espionage work.
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The Man Who Created the Middle East
At the age of only 36, Sir Mark Sykes was signatory to the Sykes-Picot agreement, one of the most reviled treaties of modern times. A century later, Christopher Sykes’ lively biography of his grandfather reassesses his life and work, and the political instability and violence in the Middle East attributed to it.The Sykes–Picot agreement was drawn by the eponymousBritish and French diplomats in 1916 to determine the divideof the collapsing empire in the event of an allied victory inWorld War I. Excluding Arab involvement, it negated theirearlier guarantee of independence made by the British –and controversy has raged around it ever since.But who was Mark Sykes?A century on, Christopher Simon Sykes reveals new facetsof a misremembered diplomatic giant. Using previouslyundisclosed family letters and cartoons by his grandfather,he delivers a comprehensive and humbling account of the man behind one of the most impactful policies in the Middle East.
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Walking The Himalayas
WINNER OF THE 2016 EDWARD STANFORD ADVENTURE TRAVEL BOOK OF THE YEAR AWARD'Levison Wood has breathed new life into adventure travel.' Michael Palin'Levison Wood is a great adventurer and a wonderful storyteller.' Sir Ranulph Fiennes'Britain's best-loved adventurer... he looks like a man who will stare danger in the face and soak up a lot of pain without complaint.' The TimesFollowing in in the footsteps of the great explorers, WALKING THE HIMALAYAS is Levison Wood's enthralling account of crossing the Himalayas on foot. His journey of discovery along the path of the ancient trade route of the Silk Road to the forgotten kingdom of Bhutan led him beyond the safety of the tourist trail. There lies the real world of the Himalayas, where ex-paratrooper Levison Wood encountered natural disasters, extremists, nomadic goat herders, shamans (and the Dalai Lama) in his 1,700-mile trek across the roof of the world. WALKING THE HIMALAYAS is a tale of courage, stamina and the kindness of strangers that will appeal to the adventurer in us all.
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Studio A – The Bob Dylan Reader
Hailed by Publishers Weekly as "not only the best writing on the ever-changing folk singer, but also some of the best writing about any musician around," Studio A presents Bob Dylan's unique literary legacy in a collection that is quintessentially Dylan: mosaic, offbeat, poetic. This "astutely chosen and intelligently annotated" collection (Time Out London) gathers over fifty articles, poems, essays, speeches, literary criticisms, and interviews; many previously unpublished. Individually, these pieces offer insight into the man and his time, but collectively they reveal the coming-of-age of American cultural criticism in their "sweeping view of both Dylan and the changing times he so eloquently captured in his music" (Publishers Weekly). With Sam Shepard, Bruce Springsteen, Allen Ginsberg, Johnny Cash, Greil Marcus, Joyce Carol Oates, Gary Giddins, Rick Moody, Tom Piazza, Barry Hannah, and Dylan himself on the list of contributors, Studio A is truly "a vital document" (New York Times) for all fans.
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The Best Of Roald Dahl
Twenty tales to curdle your blood and scorch your soul, chosen from Roald Dahl’s bestsellers—Over to You, Someone Like You, Kiss Kiss and Switch Bitch Hypnotized from the first sentence, you will remain spellbound as Roald Dahl unravels his fiendish fictions with their satisfying twist-in-the-tale finales, as he leads you through the dangers of gambling for high stakes over wine, the perils of being a vegetarian and the macabre consequences of a night-time seduction... The Best of Roald Dahl is, quite simply, Roald Dahl at his sinister best.
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Stories Of Trees From India
Why would a tree be called 'Rain Tree'? Why do we never get to see the flowers of a banyan tree? Why does the Ashoka tree bring smiles? The answers to these puzzles and many more are all in this comprehensive book. It not only describes in detail the features of various common trees, but it endeavours, through its amusing stories, to bring about an instant attachment to the trees. Added to this, the etymology of the various scientific names and also the trivia about each tree are sure to deepen the interest of the reader.
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How To Deal With Stress
Straightforward, easy to read and highly practical, How to Deal with Stress puts the reader back in charge of their life and shows how to manage stress calmly and efficiently. Written by two internationally-recognized experts in the field of stress management, the book shows how to identify the underlying causes of stress before setting out a clear plan to manage both the causes of stress and their effects. How to Deal with Stress is crammed with invaluable tips on topics such as time management, exercise, nutrition and relaxation techniques. It offers not just a structured plan to manage stress but is also a practical handbook for both home and office, to dip into for quick advice, should the need arise.