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Houdini & Conan Doyle

Ebook: November 15, 2011
Hardback: October 25, 2012
Paperback: October 20, 2011

Houdini & Conan Doyle

Christopher Sandford

Category: Memoir & Biography,

In the early 20th century, in the English-speaking world, Arthur Conan Doyle and Harry Houdini were two of the most feted and famous men alive. And their relationship is extraordinary: As strange as it may seem Arthur Conan Doyle, the creator of the ultra-rational detective Sherlock Holmes, was a believer in Spiritualism. He came to his belief, that one could communicate with the dead, after his son was killed in World War I, and became an expert in the field.

Harry Houdini, the world’s foremost magician, was a friend of Conan Doyle’s, but was sceptical of his belief in the supernatural. Houdini took every opportunity to use his knowledge of illusion to expose psychics who he thought were fakes, particularly incensed by their exploitation of grief and insecurity. Based on original research, this sensational dual biography of two popular geniuses conjures up the early 20th century and the fame, personality and competing beliefs.

Reviews

  • 'A magnificently rich tale' Guardian

  • 'Astonishing... two great men who went from friendship to enmity in a battle over the after-life' Express

  • 'This is a fascinating journey into a pair of extraordinary lives' We Love This Book

The Thief at the End of the World

Ebook: March 23, 2010
Paperback: August 21, 2009

The Thief at the End of the World

Joe Jackson

Category: Memoir & Biography,

In 1876, a man named Henry Wickham smuggled seventy thousand rubber tree seeds out of the rain forests of Brazil and delivered them to Victorian England’s most prestigious scientists at Kew Gardens. Those seeds, planted around the world in England’s colonial outposts, gave rise to the great rubber boom of the early twentieth century – an explosion of entrepreneurial and scientific industry that would change the world. The story of how Wickham got his hands on those seeds – a sought-after prize for which many suffered and died – is the stuff of legend. In this lively account of obsession, greed, bravery and betrayal, author and journalist Joe Jackson brings to life a classic Victorian fortune-hunter and the empire that fueled, then abandoned, him. ‘The Thief at the End of the World’ is a thrilling true story of reckless courage and ambition.

Reviews

  • 'Jackson is a gifted storyteller... [he] elegantly weaves Wickham's tribulations into the broader context of the empire' Sunday Times

  • 'The dark story of the fascinating, nearly forgotten Henry Wickham, a tragic adventurer who could have come straight from the pages of Joseph Conrad... a fabulous story' Los Angeles Times Book Review

  • 'Wickham had a colourful life, and Jackson tells it very well... an evocative narrative underpinned with sound scholarship' Independent

  • 'Finely researched and unexpectedly absorbing... [Jackson's] enthusiasm for his unlikely subject proves infectious' Telegraph

  • 'Joe Jackson's strong investigative and story-telling skills conjure up the colour and characters of Wickham's meandering path through the British colonies and beyond' Nature

The Bonjour Effect

Ebook: July 14, 2017
Hardback: July 28, 2016
Paperback: July 13, 2017

The Bonjour Effect

Jean-Benoit Nadeau, Julie Barlow

Category: Memoir & Biography,

After more than a decade of travelling throughout France one important lesson eluded married couple Julie and Jean-Benoit: how to communicate comfortably with the French, even when you speak their language?

In The Bonjour Effect, they chronicle the lessons they learned after returning to France to live, for a year, with their twin daughters. They offer up all the lessons they learned and explain, in a book as fizzy as a bottle of the finest champagne, the most important aspect of all: the French don’t communicate, they converse.

To converse in French, one must understand that conversation runs on a set of rules that go to the heart of French culture. Why do the French like talking about "the decline of France"? Why does broaching a subject like money end all discussion? Why do the French become so aroused debating the merits and qualities of their own language? Through encounters with school principals, city hall civil servants, old friends and business acquaintances, Julie and Jean-Benoit explain why, culturally and historically, conversation with the French is not about communicating or being nice. It’s about being interesting.

After reading The Bonjour Effect, even someone with a basic understanding of French will be able to hold their own the next time they step into a bistro on the Left Bank.

Reviews

  • 'This book confirms what the English have suspected for many years, that French is not so much a language as a dance, a ritual, a code to be cracked. The Bonjour Effect cracks it' David Boyle, author of How to be English

  • 'An indispensable linguistic roadmap. A highly enjoyable romp through French culture and its language, written with wit and aplomb' Debra Ollivier, author Entre Nous: A Woman's Guide to Finding Her Inner French Girl

  • 'Whether you're an expat in France, or simply dream of living there one day, The Bonjour Effect is a helpful resource to cracking the arcane cultural code. Engaging and often funny, filled with examples drawn from the authors' experiences, this is a guide to the most essential of French arts: conversation' Ann Mah, author of Mastering the Art of French Eating

  • 'Whether 'bonjour' is the beginning or the end of your French vocabulary, you'll find something fascinating, surprising, or just plain fou on nearly every page. Before reading this invaluable codebook to French language and culture, I feared that I'd somehow insulted every French waiter, shopkeeper, and clerk between Paris and Nice. Now I know I did, but at least I know why!' William Alexander, author of Flirting with French

  • 'The ability to speak French doesn't mean you know how to have a conversation in French in France. Journalists Julie Barlow and Jean-Benoit Nadeau break down the 'rules' of French conversation in their new book The Bonjour Effect' CBC

  • 'A lively and informative description of the country's cultural habits...' Lysiane Gagnon, The Globe and Mail

  • 'Julie Barlow and Jean-Benoît Nadeau unravel the mysteries of French conversation. They take readers beyond what the French are actually saying to explain what it is they really mean' Shannon Broderick, Gonomad.com

  • 'Very funny' Rudy Maxa's World with the Careys

  • 'Packed with fascinating insights' 49th Shelf

The Napoleon Complex

Ebook: August 25, 2016
Paperback: August 25, 2016

The Napoleon Complex

E.M. Davey

Reporter Jake Wosley has seen things he never thought possible. His life changed forever after discovering classified documents showing Churchill’s curious obsession with the ancient Etruscan civilisation. Now he’s hiding out in Thailand, trying to put the past behind him. But when a mysterious letter arrives containing cryptic references to Napoleon Bonaparte, Jake is drawn back in to a centuries-old conspiracy. 

The trail leads through the Middle East, Europe and Africa to a Victorian secret that could remake the world. Will Jake crack the Napoleon complex? And can he keep one step ahead of Washington and MI6 who want this ancient lore for their own devices? 

Reviews

  • 'Extraordinary... one of the most intelligent historical thrillers I've read in a long time' Dean Crawford, author of the bestselling Covenant, Immortal and Apocalypse

  • 'A clever and compelling tale of intrigue and deception... riveting action and excellent historical research weave together to produce a gripping adventure' Rob Jones, author of Valhalla Gold

Harlem Hellfighters

Ebook: January 29, 2015
Paperback: January 29, 2015

Harlem Hellfighters

Max Brooks, Caanan White (illustrator)

A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

In 1919, the 369th infantry regiment – the Harlem Hellfighters as the Germans called them – marched home triumphantly from World War I. They had spent more time in combat than any other American unit, never losing a foot of ground to the enemy and winning countless decorations. Though they returned home from the trenches of France as heroes, this overlooked that the African American unit faced tremendous discrimination, even from their own government.

Based on true events and featuring artwork from acclaimed illustrator Caanan White, The Harlem Hellfighters delivers an action-packed and powerful story of how a group of exceptional individuals showed extraordinary courage, honour and heart in the face of terrible prejudice and in the midst of the unprecedented horrors of the Great War.

Reviews

  • 'The Harlem Hellfighters brings to life a long forgotten piece of American history. Bravo, Max Brooks, bravo' Spike Lee

Dead Men

Ebook: March 1, 2012
Paperback: March 15, 2012

Dead Men

Richard Pierce

Category: Historical Fiction,

‘Fascinating.’ Telegraph

Birdie Bowers is a woman with a dead man’s name. Her parents had been fascinated by Henry ‘Birdie’ Bowers, one of Captain Scott’s companions on his ill-fated polar expedition. A hundred years after the death of Bowers and Scott, she sets out to discover what really happened to them… The discovery of Captain Scott’s body in the Antarctic in November 1912 started a global obsession with him as a man and an explorer. But one mystery remains – why did he and his companions spend their last ten days in a tent only 11 miles from the safety of a depot that promised food and shelter?

Dead Men tells the story of two paths. One is a tragic journey of exploration on the world’s coldest continent, the other charts a present-day relationship and the redemptive power of love.

Reviews

  • 'Describes the peculiar pull of the tragedy of Robert Falcon Scott… fascinating' Telegraph

  • 'An expertly told story that captures the detail and spirit of Antarctic adventure, then and now' Sir Ranulph Fiennes

Closure Limited

Ebook: March 1, 2012
Paperback: February 16, 2012

Closure Limited

Max Brooks

Written in his trademark style, these tales combine horror, drama, and socio-political commentary to explore the aftermath of the zombie apocalypse. Stories range from a company staffed by human survivors, offering gory revenge on their former zombie attackers, to a vampire who realises too late that he will have nothing left to drink as zombies wipe out his human blood supply.

Reviews

  • 'Brooks infuses his writing with such precise detail and authenticity, one wonders if he knows something we don't' Simon Pegg

  • 'When the zombie apocalypse arrives, we'll be at Max Brooks house... As a horror story, its exciting. As a parable, it's terrifying' Empire Magazine (praise for World War Z)

  • 'A welcome continuation to the world that Max Brooks created, and subsequently destroyed, in his previous fictional outings. Brooks writes with an intelligence and poise that elevates his work above the rest of the genre. Brooks shows incredible knowledge of a wide variety of topics, including geography, military procedures and socio-political factors, throughout his work. The level of care and detail he puts into settings and characters make for stories that are nothing short of compelling and, perhaps even better, are entirely convincing. If George A. Romero is revered as the king of zombie films then Max Brooks must surely be dubbed the king of zombie fiction' This Is Horror

The Devil’s Guide to Hollywood

Ebook: February 11, 2010
Paperback: June 18, 2009

The Devil’s Guide to Hollywood

Joe Eszterhas

Category: History,

Joe Eszterhas has written some of Hollywood’s biggest hits Basic InstinctFlashdance and walked away with some of the largest writing cheques in the industry’s history. In The Devil’s Guide to Hollywood he reveals everything he knows about the movies the players, the personalities, the legends and screenwriting itself, revealing all that has inspired, amused and enraged him in Hollywood since his career began.

Hilarious, colourful but also practical, this is required reading for anyone who s ever thought of writing for the screen, and for anyone who wants the inside story on the organised insanity of the movie business.

Reviews

  • 'Punchy, belligerent... hilarious' Guardian

  • 'Accessible, perceptive, passionate and funny, delivered in the author's characteristic no-holds-barred, visceral, profanity-strewn prose... An indispensable addition to the library of anyone interested in screenwriting or Hollywood folklore' Sunday Times

  • 'Addictive... shockingly indiscreet' Metro

  • 'Leaves no bridge unburned... Pithy and pompous, funny and bitter... hard to put down' Total Film

  • 'Brimming with great quotations' Toby Young

  • 'Eszterhas is evidently a master of the game... a writer who has sold his scripts but not his soul' Sunday Express

  • 'He is without shame, and it is this utter shamelessness that makes his book such rollicking fun... stuffed full of raunchy gossip' Mail on Sunday, Book of the Week

  • 'An amusing and scandal-packed guide to making yourself Hollywood's highest-paid screenwriter... As a peek though a broken window into the mind of one of history's most successful screenwriters, and a guide to getting ahead, it's in a class of its own' Empire

Beautiful Fools

Ebook: May 23, 2013
Paperback: May 22, 2014

Beautiful Fools

R Clifton Spargo

Category: Historical Fiction,

Beautiful Fools reimagines the relationship between F. Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald; a lyrical portrayal of an intense romance that ultimately destroyed them. Their standing as one of America’s most debonair couples is tarnished by alcoholism, debt and Zelda’s increasing instability. But they endure, both unaware that Scott’s sudden death will soon end their love story once and for all. Spargo gives us a touching vision of the Fitzgeralds’ marriage and the man who penned The Great Gatsby.

Reviews

  • 'This is historical fiction at its best. Evocative, wistful, suffused with a sense of loss and longing' TLS

  • 'A work of genuine literary talent Spargos characters transcend reality and become rich and fictional, and the novel, in the forms paradoxical brilliance speaks truth through invention. Spargo's Fitzgeralds come alive' Spectator

  • 'Beautiful Fools is a poignant, heart-wrenching, and tender portrayal of a couple who desperately try to hang on to a doomed love' Historical Novel Reviews

Iris and the Friends

Ebook: August 6, 1999

Iris and the Friends

John Bayley

Category: Memoir & Biography,

Novelist and thinker Iris Murdoch died on 8 February 1999 after living for three years with Alzheimer’s disease. Her husband, novelist and academic John Bayley, had previously written movingly of the impact of her illness in Iris: A Memoir. Iris and the Friends tells of the final year of Murdoch’s life, when she was visited more by her own imaginary "friends" than by the exigencies of real life. It brings the story through Bayley’s increasingly precarious hold on present reality, to his own breakdown, Murdoch’s final happy weeks in a home for the terminally ill and finally her quiet death. Although ostensibly a sequel, it is more an exploration of Bayley’s new friends: the memories that were sparked off precisely as Murdoch lost her own–of his childhood, army years, first loves and, of course, their marriage. But there are other "friends". At one point Bayley writes: "The old Eng. Lit. again. I taught it for nearly fifty years and feel detached from it now." Yet literature emerges here as the one remaining constant in his life. Scarcely two pages go by without a reference, almost involuntary, to Hardy, Coleridge, Austen, Shakespeare, Dostoevsky, Thurber, James, Lawrence, Woolf or Murdoch. Sometimes Iris appears to respond to the shared literary in-jokes, but more often the pair become "two animals pushing together, nudging and grooming each other, grunting together as they bask in a mutual doze."

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