When George Alagiah was dropped off at a Hampshire boarding school as a child back in 1967 he was confronted with an extreme version of the private struggle faced by all immigrants
- the battle to leave the past behind & fit into a new culture. His arrival in Britain coincided with the unhappy intrusion of race into politics. A key part of the ensuing fight against racism was the concept of multiculturalism. But in a closely argued & forthright chapter, Alagiah suggests that, far from improving the prospects for some immigrants, multiculturalism may be an impediment to integration. All too often these are the poor & isolated communities who most need the help of the state to break out of what is fast becoming a version of ghetto life. Above all, this book is a tender & evocative portrayal of the immigrant experience. Alagiah brings colour & life to a subject that is too often reduced to screaming tabloid headlines, & sheds light on the controversial question of British identity.
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A young refugee`s story of terror, love & survival. Melissa Fleming`s tale of a young Syrian woman`s search for peace & safety is a book written for our times. Fleming captures the unremitting fear, the crushing despair, & the glint of hope for a better life that drive families to risk everything & sail the treacherous seas. On every page, loss & hope tangle. On every page, the human toll of the worst humanitarian crisis of our time is painfully, heartbreakingly brought home. This is an emotional read, at times painful, but it is above all a poignant tribute to hope, to resilience, & to the capacity for grace & generosity that dwells deep in the human heart (Khaled Hosseini, bestselling author of The Kite Runner) ...

This is the story of Doaa, an ordinary girl from a village in Syria, who in 2015 became one of five hundred people crammed on to a fishing boat setting sail for Europe. The boat was deliberately capsized, & of those five hundred people, eleven survived; they were rescued four days after the boat sank. Doaa was one of them
- her fiancee Bassem, with whom she had fled, was not; he drowned in front of her. Melissa Fleming, the Chief Spokesperson for the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, heard about Doaa & the death of 489 of her fellow refugees on the day she was pulled out of the water. She decided to fly to Crete to meet this extraordinary girl, who had rescued a toddler when she was nearly dead herself. They struck an instant bond, & Melissa saw in Doaa the story of the war in Syria embodied by one young woman. She has decided to tell Doaa`s story
- the dangers she fled, & the journey she risked to escape the conflagration in her homel&. Doaa is the face of the millions of mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, daughters & sons who risk everything as they try to escape war, violence & death. Doaa`s story will revolutionize how we see the thousands of people who die every year in search of a home. It will squarely face one of the greatest moral questions of our age: will we let more people die in boats & trucks, or will we find a way to help them?

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This collection of historic horrid happenings from across the country demonstrates that Christmas is not necessarily a time of peace, joy & goodwill to all men. Festive tragedies include the avalanche in Lewes, which destroyed several cottages in 1836, killing eight of the occupants & injuring many more, & the fall of a chimney in Bradford in 1882, which claimed fifty-four lives. There are fatal rail crashes in Oxfordshire, Bedfordshire, Cheshire, Cumbria & Scotland; freak weather conditions & devastating fires, such as the Christmas Eve fire in Glasgow that cost the lives of four firemen in 1927. The holiday season has witnessed a plethora of almost unbelievable accidents, such as the amateur mechanic who died with his head stuck in a car engine, the footballer who leaped into a quarry to retrieve a lost ball, & the Christmas party guest who fell down a flight of stairs & broke his neck. Among the chilling crimes featured here is that of Nottinghamshire man Edward Kesteven, who killed his wife on Christmas Day 1894, & the murder of Thirza Kelly in Norfolk by a local teenager on Christmas Eve 1900. Full of merry madness & hearty heartache, A Horrid History of Christmas will make you want to bypass the festivities altogether! ...

Maggie wants a house with lots of light. I need one with character. & what we do have in common doesn`t help either
- we`re both
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`A work of great comic power qualified with firm & unsentimental compassion.`
- Anthony Burgess A House for Mr Biswas is V. S.
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Born the `wrong way` & thrust into a world that greeted him with little more than a bad omen, Mohun Biswas has spent his forty-six years of life striving for independence. But his determined efforts have met only with calamity. Shuttled from one residence to another after the drowning of his father, for which he is inadvertently responsible, Mr Biswas yearns for a place he can call home. He marries into the domineering Tulsi family, on whom he becomes indignantly dependent, but rebels & takes on a succession of occupations in an arduous struggle to weaken their hold over him & purchase a house of his own. Heartrending & darkly comic, A House for Mr Biswas has been hailed as one of the twentieth century`s finest novels & this triumph of resilience, persistence & dignity masterfully evokes a man`s quest for autonomy against the backdrop of post-colonial Trinidad. ...

A House in Corfu is the story of one of the most beautiful places on earth, still astonishingly unspoilt, on the west coast of Corfu. In the early 1960s, Emma Tennant`s parents, on a cruise, spotted a magical bay & decided to build a house there. This book is the story of that house, Rovinia, set in 42 hectares of land above the bay where legend has it Ulysses was shipwrecked & found by Nausicaa, daughter of King Alcinous. It is also the story of the people who have been at Rovinia since the feast in the grove at the time of putting on the roof
- Maria, a miraculous cook & the presiding spirit of the house, & her husband Thodoros
- & of the inhabitants of the local village, high on the hill above the bay. Full of colour & contrast, A House in Corfu shows the huge changes in island life since the time of the building of the house, & celebrates, equally, the joy of belonging to a timeless world; the world of vine, olive & sea.

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When Suzanna Clarke & her husband bought a dilapidated house in the Moroccan town of Fez, their friends thought they were mad. Located in a maze of donkey-trod alleyways, the house
- a traditional riad
- was beautiful but in desperate need of repair. Walls were in danger of collapse, the plumbing non-existent. While neither Suzanna nor her husband spoke Arabic, & had only a smattering of French, they were determined to restore the building to its original splendour, using only traditional craftsmen & handmade materials. But they soon found that trying to do business in Fez was like being transported back several centuries in time & so began the remarkable experience that veered between frustration, hilarity & moments of pure exhilaration. But restoring the riad was only part of their immersion in the rich & colourful life of this ancient city.”A House in Fez” is a journey into Moroccan culture, revealing its day-to-day rhythms, its customs & festivals; its history, Islam, & Sufi rituals; the lore of djinns & spirits; the vibrant life-filled market places & the irresistible Moroccan cuisine. And above all, into the lives of the people
- warm, friendly, & hospitable. Beautifully descriptive & infused with an extraordinary sense of place, this is a compelling account of one couple`s adventures in ancient Morocco.


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Near Mount Etna in Sicily lies Casa Cuseni, a beautiful house built in golden stone
- & the home which Daphne Phelps was astonished
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