Tanjore, 1765. Young Maya plays among the towering granite temples of this ancient city in the heart of southern India. Like her mother before her, she is destined to become a devadasi, a dancer for the temple. She is instructed in dance, the mystical arts & lovemaking. It is expected she will be chosen as a courtesan for the prince himself. But as Maya comes of age, India is on the cusp of change & British dominance has risen to new heights. Far from home, the East India Company is acting like a country in its own right & the British troops are more of a rabble than the King`s army. The prince is losing his power & the city is sliding into war. Maya is forced to flee her ancestral home & heads to the bustling port city of Madras, where East & West collide. In this new home, Maya captivates all who watch her dance, including Thomas Pearce, an ambitious young Englishman who has travelled to India to make his fortune. But their love is forbidden & comes at enormous cost. Weaving together the uneasy meeting of two cultures, The Pagoda Tree is a captivating story of love, loss, fate & exile in 18th-century India. ...

Maya plays among the towering granite temples in the ancient city of Tanjore. Like her mother before her, she is destined to become a devadasi, a dancer for the temple, & her family all expect that the prince himself will choose her as a courtesan. On the day of her initiation, a stranger arrives in town. Walter Sutcliffe, a black-frocked English clergyman, strives to offer moral guidance to the British troops stationed in Tanjore. But he is beset by his own demons. As the British tear apart the princely kingdoms of India, Maya flees her ancestral home & heads to the steamy port city of Madras, where silks & satins are traded, poets vie for patrons, & fortunes are lost & found. When the shrieks of parrots fill the skies at dusk, Maya bows to the earth & starts to dance. Thomas Pearce, an ambitious young Englishman, is entranced from the moment he first sees her. But their love is forbidden & the consequences are devastating. Unfolding amid war & famine, The Pagoda Tree takes us deep into the heart of India as the country struggles under brutal occupation. As cultures collide, Walter Sutcliffe unknowingly plays the decisive card in Maya`s destiny. ...

A fast-paced historical mystery adventure for readers aged 9+ years, with gorgeous Edwardian period detail. Perfect for fans of Chris Riddell`s Goth Girl series, Enid Blyton & Robin Stevens`s Murder Most Unladylike series. When a priceless painting is stolen, our dauntless heroines Sophie & Lil find themselves faced with forgery, trickery & deceit on all sides! Be amazed as the brave duo pit their wits against this perilous puzzle! Marvel at their cunning plan to unmask the villain & prove themselves detectives to be reckoned with
- no matter what dangers lie ahead... It`s their most perilous adventure yet! Praise for The Mystery of the Clockwork Sparrow: ”A wonderful book, with a glorious heroine & a true spirit of adventure.” (Katherine Rundell, author of Rooftoppers). ”A real page-turner, it has murders, spies & gangs of thieves. Thrilling!” (Indiana, aged 10 years, Love Readingfor Kids reviewer). ” Dastardliness on a big scale is uncovered in this well-plotted, evocative novel.” (Nicolette Jones, The Sunday Times). ” It`s a dashing plot, an atmospheric setting & an extensive & imaginative cast. Katherine Woodfine handles it all with aplomb.” (Julia Eccleshare, Guardian). ” An incredible read full of mystery, wonder & adventure... This is now one of my top ten.” (Celeste, age 13 years, Love Reading 4 Kids reviewer). The Mystery of the Painted Dragon is the third book in the Sinclair Mysteries quartet. The other two books are the bestselling The Mystery of the Clockwork Sparrow & The Mystery of the Jewelled Moth. Katherine Woodfine is a true champion of children`s literature. Until 2015 she was Arts Project Manager for Booktrust, where she project-managed the Children`s Laureateship & YALC, the UK`s first Young Adult Literature Convention, curated by Malorie Blackman. She is part of the founding team at Down the Rabbit Hole, a monthly show for Resonance FM discussing children`s literature. She lives in London.
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When I was a little girl, my dad left me & my mum, & he never came back. & you`re supposed to be gutted when that happens. But secretly I preferred it without him, cos it meant I had my mum completely to myself, without having to share her with anyone. & I sort of inherited all the affection she used to give to my dad
- like he`d left it behind for me as a gift, to say sorry for deserting me So says eleven year old Shruti of her broken home in suburban middle Engl&. But hopes of her mother`s affection are in vain: speaking little English, & fluent in only Hindi & Punjabi, Shruti`s mother is lost, & soon falls prey to family pressure to remarry. To find another husband means returning to India & leaving Shruti behind. Meanwhile at school a new arrival, the indomitable Meena, dispenses with Shruti`s bullying problems & transforms her day to day life. Desperate for companionship Shruti latches on to Meena to the point of obsession, following her through high school & on to university. But when Meena invites Shruti to join her on holiday in India, she has no idea how dangerous her obsession will turn out to be... Gabriel Packard`s THE PAINTED OCEAN has been described by Colum Mc Cann `as fearless tour de force. It is a rare achievement
- an emotionally rich work of literature, delivered in the form of a gripping, page-turning story. The depiction of a British Indian childhood & adolescence is utterly compelling, as is the allegorical exploration of the human condition.`

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Egypt, 1912. Amelia Peabody & her dashing archaeologist husb&, Radcliffe Emerson, are once again in danger as they search for a priceless, stolen bust of legendary Queen Nefertiti... Arriving in Cairo for another thrilling excavation season, Amelia is relaxing in her elegant hotel suite when a man with knife protruding from his back staggers into her chamber & utters a single word -` Murder`
- before collapsing on the floor, dead. It soon becomes apparent that someone has saved Amelia from a would-be assassin-someone who is keeping a careful eye on the intrepid archaeologist. & there can be only one answer: the brilliant master of disguise, Sethos. For Amelia, this excavation season will prove to be unforgettable; one where a brilliant criminal will offer his final challenge... & perhaps be unmasked at last.` Think Miss Marple with early feminist gloss crossed with Indiana Jones` The Guardian
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Kitty Fane is the beautiful but shallow wife of Walter, a bacteriologist stationed in Hong Kong. Unsatisfied by her marriage, she starts an affair with charming, attractive & exciting Charles Townsend. But when Walter discovers her deception, he exacts a strange & terrible vengeance: Kitty must accompany him to his new posting in remote mainland China, where a cholera epidemic rages... First published to a storm of protest, ” The Painted Veil” is a classic story of a woman`s spiritual awakening. ...

This work is a wide-ranging study of the visual records of voyages & the artists that made them before the age of the camera. From Patagonia to Peking, the South Seas to the Sahara, western artists have played a vital role in the exposure of unfamiliar lands. From Jacques Le Moyne's paintings of Florida in 1564 to the development of portable cameras in the late-19th century, artists were a habitual feature of explorational, scientific & diplomatic voyages. The works of these travelling artists were at first appreciated more for their scientific value than for artistic merit. By the 18th century, however, painters such as William Hodges began to regard exotic journeys as an alternative to the European Grand Tour. With the 19th-century fashion for Orientalism, adventurous travel & great art were no longer regarded as mutually exclusive. This book looks at the ways in which travelling artists influenced early western attitudes towards distant lands, & examines how far the artists' own vision of these places was distorted, affected by factors as diverse as changing artistic fashions, the demands of colonial propaganda & the frequent need to work from memory. Jacob's text contains many anecdotes relating to the lives of these people. The illustrations form a visual record of the lands visited & include a large number of formerly little-known works. ...

In 1913, an orphan girl boards a steamship bound for Wuhu in South East China. Left in the hands of her soft-hearted but opium-addicted uncle she is delivered to The Hall of Eternal Splendour which, with its painted faces & troubling cries in the night, seems destined to break her spirit. & yet the girl survives & one day hope appears in the unlikely form of a customs inspector, a modest man resistant to the charms of the corrupt world that surrounds him but not to the innocent girl who stands before him. From the crowded rooms of a small-town brothel, heavy with the smoke of opium pipes & the breath of drunken merchants, to the Bohemian hedonism of Paris & the 1930s studios of Shanghai, Jennifer Epstein`s first novel, based on a true story, is an exquisite evocation of a fascinating time & place, with a breathtaking heroine at its heart. ...

“ The Painter of Signs” is R. K. Narayan’s bittersweet novel that is as fresh & charming today as it was when originally published in 1976. It tells the tale of Raman, a conscientious sign-painter, who is trying to lead a rational life; the novel is filled with busy neighborhood life & gossip, the alternating rhythms & sounds of the city from morning until night, & the pungent smells & tantalizing flavors of home cooking, as Narayan portrays everyday life in Malgudi. Wry, funny, & bittersweet, love gets in the way of progress when Raman meets the thrillingly independent Daisy, who wishes to bring birth control to the city of Malgudi. Narayan died aged 94 in 2001, & “ The Painter of Signs” is as good a place as any to delve into the wonderful worlds he created in those years. ...

From Istanbul`s palatial old embassies to its glorious Bosphorus summerhouses, from Ottoman Paris to Ankara`s Art Deco, from rainforest mansions to a mad mosque in the mountains... a diplomat`s wife reveals their secret histories. This book brings together essays by Patricia Daunt written over the past 25 years for Cornucopia Magazine. It concludes with her latest article, on the magnificent ruins of Aphrodisias, newly listed as a World Heritage Site but long one of her greatest loves. The images are by internationally renowned photographers, including Fritz von der Schulenburg, Simon Upton, Cemal Emden & Jean-Marie del Moral. Foreword by John Julius Norwich. ...