This is a song for Stoke: a fanfare for one of the great cities of the world`s first industrial revolution; a lament for the bottle kilns & pot banks, the terraces & mansions that were thrown up or carefully planned to house a global industry & then torn down in the 1960s; & the ballad of a remarkable city
- how she was born, how she grew & behaved as a big, bold grown up & how she crumbled as she grew old but, surprisingly, never died. This is not a guide book but an invitation to explore & discover a (deeply flawed) treasure trove Matthew Rice`s detailed
- & often funny
- architectural watercolours are the basis of this book, but those bones are fleshed out with a narrative of the place: the towering figures of the eighteenth century, Wedgwood, Spode & Brindley; the geological underpinning of coal & clay that fixed its position; the trade with America with cargos mapping the great marches west across the prairies of the New World; the reports of unspeakable humanitarian horrors that sent a thrilling shudder through the drawing rooms of Victorian Britain & the changes those reports brought about; & the sad decline & mismanagements that all but destroyed the city after the second World War. The foreword is written by Matthew`s wife Emma Bridgewater, whose first visit to Stoke twenty five years ago inspired her to start a business that still employs over one hundred people in a Victorian factory in the heart of the city.


...

Since the days of conquistador Hernan Cortes, rumours have circulated about a lost city of immense wealth hidden deep in the Honduran interior. Indigenous tribes speak of ancestors who fled there to escape the Spanish invaders, & warn the legendary city is cursed: to enter it is a death sentence. They call it the Lost City of the Monkey God. In 1940, swashbuckling journalist Theodore Morde returned from the rainforest with hundreds of artifacts & an electrifying story of having found the City
- but then committed suicide without revealing its location. Three quarters of a century later, bestselling author Doug Preston joined a team of scientists on a groundbreaking new quest. In 2012 he climbed aboard a single-engine plane carrying a highly advanced, classified technology that could map the terrain under the densest rainforest canopy. In an unexplored valley ringed by steep mountains, that flight revealed the unmistakable image of a sprawling metropolis, tantalizing evidence of not just an undiscovered city but a lost civilization. To confirm the discovery, Preston & the team battled torrential rains, quickmud, plagues of insects, jaguars, & deadly snakes. They emerged from the jungle with proof of the legend...and the curse. They had contracted a horrifying, incurable & sometimes lethal disease. Suspenseful & shocking, filled with history, adventure & dramatic twists of fortune, THE LOST CITY OF THE MONKEY GOD is the absolutely true, eyewitness account of one of the great discoveries of the twenty-first century.
...

Since the days of conquistador Hernan Cortes, rumours have circulated about a lost city of immense wealth hidden deep in the Honduran interior. Indigenous tribes speak of ancestors who fled there to escape the Spanish invaders, & warn the legendary city is cursed: to enter it is a death sentence. They call it the Lost City of the Monkey God. In 1940, swashbuckling journalist Theodore Morde returned from the rainforest with hundreds of artefacts & an electrifying story of having found the City
- but then committed suicide without revealing its location. Three quarters of a century later, bestselling author Doug Preston joined a team of scientists on a groundbreaking new quest. In 2012 he climbed aboard a single-engine plane carrying a highly advanced, classified technology that could map the terrain under the densest rainforest canopy. In an unexplored valley ringed by steep mountains, that flight revealed the unmistakable image of a sprawling metropolis, tantalizing evidence of not just an undiscovered city but a lost civilization. To confirm the discovery, Preston & the team battled torrential rains, quickmud, plagues of insects, jaguars, & deadly snakes. They emerged from the jungle with proof of the legend...and the curse. They had contracted a horrifying, incurable & sometimes lethal disease. Suspenseful & shocking, filled with history, adventure & dramatic twists of fortune, The Lost City of the Monkey God is the absolutely true, eyewitness account of one of the great discoveries of the twenty-first century.
...

The story of Colonel Percy Harrison Fawcett, the inspiration behind Conan Doyle`s The Lost World Fawcett was among the last of a legendary breed of British explorers. For years he explored the Amazon & came to believe that its jungle concealed a large, complex civilization, like El Dorado. Obsessed with its discovery, he christened it the City of Z. In 1925, Fawcett headed into the wilderness with his son Jack, vowing to make history. They vanished without a trace. For the next eighty years, hordes of explorers plunged into the jungle, trying to find evidence of Fawcett`s party or Z. Some died from disease & starvation; others simply disappeared. In this spellbinding true tale of lethal obsession, David Grann retraces the footsteps of Fawcett & his followers as he unravels one of the greatest mysteries of exploration. ...

David Grann’s “ The Lost City of Z” is the kind of book that brings to mind the adventures of Indiana Jones himself – except here it’s all true. Colonel Percy Harrison Fawcett, the inspiration behind Conan Doyle’s “ The Lost World”, was among the last of a great generation of British Explorers. For years he travelled the Amazon & came to believe its jungle concealed a large, complex civilisation, akin to El Dorado; obsessed with its discovery, he christened it the City of Z. In 1925, Fawcett headed into the wilderness with his son Jack, vowing to make history. He vanished without a trace. For the next eighty years, many explorers plunged into the jungle trying to find evidence of Fawcett’s party, & even Z itself. Some died from disease & starvation; others simply disappeared. In this extraordinary true tale of obsession & exploration, Grann retraces the footsteps of Fawcett & his many followers as he unravels one of the greatest mysteries of exploration. ...

Soon to be a major film starring Robert Pattinson, Charlie Hunnam & Sienna Miller. Colonel Percy Harrison Fawcett, the inspiration behind Conan Doyle`s novel The Lost World, was among the last of a legendary breed of British explorers. For years he explored the Amazon & came to believe that its jungle concealed a large, complex civilization, like El Dorado. Obsessed with its discovery, he christened it the City of Z. In 1925, Fawcett headed into the wilderness with his son Jack, vowing to make history. They vanished without a trace. For the next eighty years, hordes of explorers plunged into the jungle, trying to find evidence of Fawcett`s party or Z. Some died from disease & starvation; others simply disappeared. In this spellbinding true tale of lethal obsession, David Grann retraces the footsteps of Fawcett & his followers as he unravels one of the greatest mysteries of exploration. ...

The Lost Continent is the book that launched the career of one of the funniest & most successful travel writers working today
-
...

In THE LOST CONTINENT BBC Europe Editor Gavin Hewitt tells the story of a flawed dream, a noble vision that turned dangerous, & which led Europe into its gravest crisis since World War Two
- a crisis for which it was totally unprepared. A pillar of the post-war European dream was a shared currency, & with it came easy money, seducing some countries into a wild spending binge. After the financial crash in the United States, Europe caught the cold & was left with a debt crisis that came to threaten the entire European project. THE LOST CONTINENT is rich in anecdote, weaving together the stories of ordinary people with the high politics & drama of Europe in crisis to give an unparalleled & vivid portrait of a massive shift in modern history. It

Includes:: interviews with top officials & insiders, & dramatic accounts of key meetings. Gavin Hewitt`s THE LOST CONTINENT is a clear-eyed book by a distinguished & well-connected journalist which tells the astonishing story of how we got here & where we might be headed.


...

`I come from Des Moines. Somebody had to` &, as soon as Bill Bryson was old enough, he left. Des Moines couldn`t hold him, but it did lure him back. After ten years in Engl&, he returned to the land of his youth, & drove almost 14, 000 miles in search of a mythical small town called Amalgam, the kind of trim & sunny place where the films of his youth were set. Instead, his search led him to Anywhere, USA; a lookalike strip of gas stations, motels & hamburger outlets populated by lookalike people with a penchant for synthetic fibres. He discovered a continent that was doubly lost; lost to itself because blighted by greed, pollution, mobile homes & television; lost to him because he had become a stranger in his own l&. Bryson`s acclaimed first success, The Lost Continent is a classic of travel literature
- hilariously, stomach-achingly, funny, yet tinged with heartache
- & the book that first staked Bill Bryson`s claim as the most beloved writer of his generation.

...

In the spring of 1892, Frank G. Lenz, a gallant young accountant from a modest German American family, set forth from his unhappy home in Pittsburgh to circle the globe atop a new `safety` bicycle with inflatable tyres (the forerunner of today`s road bike). He brought along a large wooden camera & arranged to send regular reports to his sponsor, Outing magazine, effectively making him a harbinger of the great bicycle boom that was about to explode with stunning social & industrial repercussions. Two years, fourteen thousand miles & many adventures later, after crossing the United States, Japan, China, Burma, India & Persia, just as he was about to enter Europe for the home stretch, Lenz vanished. His presumed murder in Asiatic Turkey jolted the American public & became an international cause celebre. The Lost Cyclist recounts, for the first time ever, the short but remarkable life of Lenz & the heroic efforts of another American `globe girdler`, William L. Sachtleben, who was sent by Outing to unravel Lenz`s mysterious death in Turkey
- all set against the horrifying backdrop of the Hamidian massacres.
...