By Any Means is the tale of Charley Boorman’s 20, 000-mile adventure from his home town in County Wicklow, Ireland to Wollongong in Australia, through 25 countries, by any mode of transport to hand
- including a motorcycle in a monsoon! Charley’s incredible journey offers him the chance to meet people & learn firsthand what it’s like to live in many different parts of the world. En-route he drives a lorry through Iran, sets up his own bus service in Turkey, takes a slow boat down the Mekong, & a very fast one through Borneo to deliver vaccines for UNICEF.
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*LONGLISTED FOR THE CWA ENDEAVOUR HISTORICAL DAGGER AWARD 2017*LONDON 1885
- A woman`s body is discovered on Edgware Road. Ten
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Elizabeth Smart`s passionate fictional account of her intense love-affair with the poet George Barker, described by Angela Carter as ` Like MADAME BOVARY blasted by lightening.. .A masterpiece`. One day, while browsing in a London bookshop, Elizabeth Smart chanced upon a slim volume of poetry by George Barker
- & fell passionately in love with him through the printed word. Eventually they communicated directly &, as a result of Barker`s impecunious circumstances, Elizabeth Smart flew both him & his wife from Japan, where he was teaching, to join her in the United States. Thus began one of the most extraordinary, intense & ultimately tragic love affairs of our time. They never married but Elizabeth bore George Barker four children & their relationship provided the impassioned inspiration for one of the most moving & immediate chronicles of a love affair ever written
- By Grand Central Station I Sat Down & Wept. Originally published in 1945, this remarkable book is now widely identified as a classic work of poetic prose which, more than six decades later, has retained all of its searing poignancy, beauty & power of impact.

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A delightfully discursive, Bill Bryson-esque & personal journey through the groves & the thickets of the English language, by our foremost scholar of the history & structure of the English language. David Crystal has been described (by the Times Higher Education Supplement) as a sort of `latter day Dr Johnson`, a populist linguist who has promoted the study of the English language in an academic & broadcasting career that has so far spanned 40 years & nearly 100 books. Now he has written an engaging travel book of more general appeal. Inspired by W. G. Sebald`s ` The Rings of Saturn` & by Bill Bryson`s books, he has combined personal reflections, historical allusions & traveller observations to create a mesmerising (and entertaining) narrative account of his encounters with the English language & its speakers throughout the world
- from Bangor to Bombay & from Stratford to San Francisco. ` By Hook or by Crook` is an attempt to capture the exploratory, seductive, teasing, tantalising nature of language study. As such, it will appeal to the ever-growing market who like to be entertained as well as instructed.
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A delightfully discursive, Bill Bryson-esque & personal journey through the groves & the thickets of the English language, by our foremost scholar of the history & structure of the English language. David Crystal has been described (by the Times Higher Education Supplement) as a sort of 'latter day Dr Johnson', a populist linguist who has promoted the study of the English language in an academic & broadcasting career that has so far spanned 40 years & nearly 100 books. Now, in his first book for Harper Press, he has written an engaging travel book of more general appeal. Inspired by W. G. Sebald's ' The Rings of Saturn' & by Bill Bryson's books, he has combined personal reflections, historical allusions & traveller observations to create a mesmerising (and entertaining) narrative account of his encounters with the English language & its speakers throughout the world -- from Bangor to Bombay & from Stratford to San Francisco. ' By Hook or by Crook' is an attempt to capture the exploratory, seductive, teasing, tantalising nature of language study. As such, it will appeal to the ever -- growing market who like to be entertained as well as instructed. ...

By Its Cover is the much anticipated twenty-third instalment in Donna Leon`s bestselling crime series, where Commissario Brunetti is better than ever as he addresses questions of worth & value alongside his ever-faithful team of Ispettore Vianello & Signorina Elettra. When several valuable antiquarian books go missing from a prestigious library in the heart of Venice, Commissario Brunetti is immediately called to the scene. The staff suspect an American researcher has stolen them, but for Brunetti something doesn`t quite add up. Taking on the case, the Commissario begins to seek information about some of the library`s regulars, such as the ex-priest Franchini, a passionate reader of ancient Christian literature, & Contessa Morosini-Albani, the library`s chief donor, & comes to the conclusion that the thief could not have acted alone. However, when Franchini is found murdered in his home, the case takes a more sinister turn & soon Brunetti finds himself submerged in the dark secrets of the black market of antiquarian books. Alongside his ever-faithful team of Ispettore Vianello & Signorina Elettra, he delves into the pages of Franchini`s past & into the mind of a book thief in order to uncover the terrible truth. ...

In By Night in Chile, during the course of a single night, Fatherr Sebastian Urrutia Lacroix, a Chilean priest, who is a member of Opus Dei, a literary critic & a mediocre poet, relives some of the crucial events of his life. He believes he is dying & in his feverish delirium various characters, both real & imaginary, appear to him as icy monsters, as if in sequences from a horror film. Thus we are given glimpses of the great poet Pablo Neruda, the German writer Ernst Junger, General Pinochet, whom Father Lacroix instructs in Marxist doctrine, as well as various members of the Chilean intelligentsia whose lives, during a period of political turbulence, have touched upon his. ...

By Night The Mountain Burns recounts the narrator`s childhood on a remote island off the West African coast, living with his mysterious grandfather, several mothers & no fathers. We learn of a dark chapter in the island`s history: a bush fire destroys the crops, then hundreds perish in a cholera outbreak. Superstition dominates: now the islanders must sacrifice their possessions to the enraged ocean god. What of their lives will they manage to save? Whitmanesque in its lyrical evocation of the isl&, Avila Laurel`s writing builds quietly, through the oral rhythms of traditional storytelling, into gripping drama worthy of an Achebe or a Garcia Marquez. ...

By Steppe, Desert, & Ocean is nothing less than the story of how humans first started building the globalized world we know today. Set on a huge continental stage, from Europe to China, it is a tale covering over 10, 000 years, from the origins of farming around 9000 BC to the expansion of the Mongols in the thirteenth century AD. An unashamedly `big history`, it charts the development of European, Near Eastern, & Chinese civilizations & the growing links between them by way of the Indian Ocean, the silk Roads, & the great steppe corridor (which crucially allowed horse riders to travel from Mongolia to the Great Hungarian Plain within a year). Along the way, it is also the story of the rise & fall of empires, the development of maritime trade, & the shattering impact of predatory nomads on their urban neighbours. Above all, as this immense historical panorama unfolds, we begin to see in clearer focus those basic underlying factors
- the acquisitive nature of humanity, the differing environments in which people live, & the dislocating effect of even slight climatic variation
- which have driven change throughout the ages, & which help us better understand our world today.

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In 1897 the Victorian novelist George Gissing undertook a brief but eventful journey in southern Italy. His itinerary took him from Naples to Reggio di Calabria, via Paola, Cosenza, Crotone & Squillace, through the area once known as Magna Graecia. Meditating on the vestiges of Greco-Roman civilization, Gissing visited tombs & temples, museums & cathedrals, in search of the imprint of antiquity & ”that old world which was the imaginative delight of my boyhood.” The result was By the Ionian Sea, first published in 1901. Gissing`s journey by boat, train, & carriage revealed not just the ruined glories of a classical past, but also the hardships of rural life in turn-of-the-century rural Italy. Meeting poverty-stricken peasants & corrupt local officials, he endured discomfort, danger & illness in a remote & little visited corner of Europe. Yet throughout he appreciated the warmth & generosity shown to him by local people, curious about this solitary stranger. By turns lyrical & melancholic, Gissing`s masterpiece of travel writing alternates between light & dark, life & death, Paganism & Christianity. Looking at Italy in both its classical & contemporary

Dimensions, By the Ionian Sea celebrates Calabria`s rich cultural past & beautiful landscapes while providing a candid account of the region`s hardship & poverty. More than a century after its first publication, this is the first critical edition of the book in English.

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