Showing titles in Cultural & Regional

'An unforgettable and moving portrait of working-class alienation ... I read it in one sitting' JAMES REBANKS 'Utterly compelling. I couldn't put this down! It picks you up and takes you on a journey that will leave you changed' REBECCA SMITH A BOOKSELLER BOOK OF THE MONTH --- I'm England till I...

Tracing his ancestory through six generations - slaves and freedmen, farmers and blacksmiths, lawyers and architects - back to Africa, Alex Haley discovered a sixteen-year-old youth, Kunta Kinte. It was this young man, who had been torn from his homeland and and in torment and anguish brought to the slave markets of the New World, who held the key to Haley's deep and distant past.

Beginning with his final departure from Neverland, Untouchable takes listeners through Jackson's final four years, as he shuttled from California to the Middle East, Ireland, Asia, the East Coast, and Las Vegas, planning to recapture his wealth and reputation with a comeback album and a series of 50 mega-concerts, for which he was rehearsing until the day before his death. Sullivan has never-before-reported information about Jackson's business dealings and the pedophilia allegations that irreparably marked his reputation, and he had exclusive access to inner-circle figures.

On May 8, 2006, Congolese finance graduate Guy Goma turns up for a job interview at the BBC when his world suddenly explodes. Mistaken for a technology expert whose name was also Guy (and who was waiting in a different reception area), he’s ushered into a TV studio and interviewed live on air.

*** THE INSTANT TOP TEN BESTSELLER *** HIGHLY COMMENDED FOR THE 2025 WAINWRIGHT PRIZE FOR NATURE WRITING SHORTLISTED FOR THE RICHARD JEFFERIES AWARD Paul Lamb is a hedgelayer. He lives in his wagon and works to the rhythm of the seasons, a way of life that has almost vanished. From the end of...

The unabridged, downloadable audiobook edition of Charles Dickens: A Life, the major new biography from the highly acclaimed Claire Tomalin, published for the 200th anniversary of his birth. Charles Dickens was a phenomenon: a demonicly hardworking journalist, the father of ten children, a...

This audiobook is narrated by an AI Voice. The Bogs of Tipperary A short story from a winter on the Loony Line, Ireland, 1990 — buses, caravans, bender tents, and horses holding their ground against the rain, the mud, and the cold. The Bogs of Tipperary follows a community of Travellers and...

Brought to you by Penguin. Leo Varadkar shares his fascinating experience as Irish prime minister at a time of much change and turbulence, in this remarkably honest memoir. Leo Varadkar was an unlikely Taoiseach – the youngest on taking office in 2017, the first Taoiseach to be gay, and the...

THE INSTANT SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER THE LONG-AWAITED SEQUEL TO WILD SWANS, THE MULTI-MILLION COPY INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLING SENSATION A Book of the Year in The Times; Daily Telegraph; Financial Times and Waterstones 'A must-read … magnificent’ DAILY TELEGRAPH ***** 'Beautiful and moving'...

Ian Fleming's greatest creation, James Bond, has had an enormous impact on our culture. What Bond represents about ideas of masculinity, the British national psyche, and global politics has shifted over time, as has the interpretation of the life of his author. But Fleming himself was more mysterious and subtle than anything he wrote. Nicholas Shakespeare is one of the most gifted biographers working today and his unprecedented access to the Fleming archives and his nose for a story make this a fresh and eye-opening picture of a man who lived his life in the shadow of his famous creation.

The British comedian of Nigerian heritage and co-executive producer and writer of the CBS hit series Bob Hearts Abishola chronicles her odyssey to get to America and break into Hollywood in this lively and humorous memoir. According to family superstition, Gina Yashere was born to fulfil the...

In 1978, the bloody conflict in Northern Ireland, known as The Troubles, had reached a boiling point. Hundreds of members of the Irish Republican Army, determined to drive the hated British out of the province—killing soldiers and police, detonating bombs, while arming themselves with firearms and explosives—had been arrested and incarcerated in the notorious British prison known as the Maze.

'The definitive telling of the life of a West Indian hero' Sir Clive Lloyd The brilliant all-rounder Frank Worrell had to wait until 1960 to become the first permanent Black captain of the West Indies cricket team, denied for a decade by the elitism, insularity and racism of Caribbean...

Only the scathing wit and searching intelligence of Jessica Mitford could turn an exposé of the American funeral industry into a book that is at once deadly serious and side-splittingly funny. When first published in 1963, this landmark of investigative journalism became a runaway bestseller...

Richard Pryor journeys from his childhood in a family that worked in whore-houses and bars, through to his years in Hollywood - the money, the women, the drugs - and the diagnosis of multiple sclerosis.

Achieving a hit in every decade since the 1950s, Cliff Richard stands alone in pop history. Coming of age in 1950s London, he began his music career at Soho's legendary 2i's Cafe, and now he's approaching his 80th birthday with record sales of over 250 million and counting. Cliff looks back on his humble upbringing and how he went on to fulfil his wildest dreams by becoming a pop star and even a film star. He talks about finding Christianity, reflects on the ups and downs of life in the public eye and reveals how the false allegations against him changed his life forever.

In 2021, the world of cooking lost a legendary figure. Albert Roux, together with his brother Michel, transformed the way we eat, cook and appreciate food in this country. It is no exaggeration to say that most of what makes our current culinary landscape so vibrant began with these two brothers and their groundbreaking restaurant, Le Gavroche. Albert's memoir takes us from his childhood in wartime France, where the ever-looming presence of the German troops made it a challenge for his mother to keep the family fed, right up to the almost instant success of Le Gavroche

Appel: A Canadian in the French Foreign Legion is the first-hand account of the author’s six years as a professional soldier during the 1990s, and his experience in the Legion's elite Groupe des Commandos Parachutistes (GCP). Joel Struthers recounts the dangers and demands of military life, from the rigours of recruitment and operational training in the rugged mountains of France, to face-to-face combat in the grasslands of some of Africa’s most troubled nations.

Born in West Africa in the early 1950s, Somé was kidnapped at age four by a French Jesuit missionary to be trained as a priest, for the next 15 years enduring the harsh regimen of a seminary where his native language and tribal traditions were systematically suppressed. At age 20 he escaped, but when he returned to his Dugara people in Upper Volta (now Burkina Faso) they rejected him as an outsider. To reconnect with his native culture, Somé underwent a month-long initiation into shamanism.

Provocative, inspiring, and unflinchingly honest, My Grandfather's Son is the story of one of America's most remarkable and controversial leaders, Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, told in his own words. Thomas speaks out, revealing the pieces of his life he holds dear, detailing the...