Corgi book This Boy Johnson Alan

This is the system operator • Who is using this account? Please identify yourself • Vicky's life is completely normal. Maybe even a little boring • But all that changes when her dad is accused of stealing a million pounds from the bank where he works • Vicky knows for sure that her dad is innocent, and is determined to prove it • Luckily for him, she is a seasoned computer hacker. Using the skills he taught her, she's going to attempt to break the bank's files. Should be simple, right? • But it's a race against time to find the cyber-thief, before they find her

Winner of the Parliamentary Book Award, best memoir by a Parliamentarian, 2016 • From the condemned slums of Southam Street in West London to the corridors of power in Westminster, Alan Johnson’s multi-award-winning autobiography charts an extraordinary journey, almost unimaginable in today’s Britain. This third volume tells of Alan’s early political skirmishes as a trades union leader, where his negotiating skills and charismatic style soon came to the notice of Tony Blair and other senior members of the Labour Party • As a result, Alan was chosen to stand in the constituency of Hull West and Hessle, and entered Parliament as an MP after the landslide election victory for Labour in May 1997. But this is no self-aggrandizing memoir of Westminster politicking and skulduggery

From the moment a young Alan Johnson first twanged the strings of his plastic ‘Tommy Steele’ guitar, he was determined to become a rock star • Alan’s life has always been lived to a musical soundtrack. His earliest memories of the bleak, post-war, pre-rock ’n’ roll west London landscape into which he was born are suffused with the melodies that wafted from the rented Bakelite wireless in the slum where he lived with his frail mother and dauntless sister. His love affair with pop music blossomed alongside the music itself, which exploded into being in the mid-1950s and came to embody the iconoclastic spirit of a new era • In this memoir, Alan looks back at his pursuit of rock stardom through the music that accompanied it – on vinyl, cassette tape or blasting from the stages of the Marquee club in Soho or the Wimbledon Palais; the sounds of Chuck Berry and Lonnie Donegan, of the Yardbirds and Dylan, of Bowie, Elvis Costello and Springsteen

In July 1969, while the Rolling Stones played a free concert in Hyde Park, Alan Johnson and his young family left West London to start a new life. The Britwell Estate in Slough, apparently notorious among the locals, in fact came as a blessed relief after the tensions of Notting Hill, and the local community welcomed them with open arms • Alan had become a postman the previous year, and in order to support his growing family took on every bit of overtime he could, often working twelve-hour shifts six days a week. It was hard work, but not without its compensations – the crafty fag snatched in a country lane, the farmer’s wife offering a hearty breakfast and even the mysterious lady on Glebe Road who appeared daily, topless, at her window as the postman passed by… • Please, Mister Postman paints a vivid picture of England in the 1970s, where no celebration was complete without a Party Seven of Watney’s Red Barrel, smoking was the norm rather than the exception, and Sunday lunchtime was about beer, bingo and cribbage

The weird and wonderful true story of a national treasure in the making • Ben Fogle's life has been action-packed to say the least. He has rowed across the Atlantic, walked to the South Pole, run the Sahara and ice-skated across Sweden. He has encountered isolated tribes in deepest Papua New Guinea, caused a Boeing 747 to dump ?100k of fuel before making an emergency landing in Sao Paolo, and frequently been mistaken for Prince William along the way • So how did a cripplingly shy, geeky, perennially homesick boy end up doing all this? Ben's still not entirely sure himself, but this wonderful book tells his story and will strike a chord with anyone puzzling about life, and how to live it differently • This is a book about defying expectations, conquering fears, battling laziness and, just occasionally, winning

A new suspect for the role of Jack the Ripper - in his own words • This manuscript was found in papers belonging to Hulme Beauman, the creator of the radio series Toytown and Larry the Lamb, by Alan Hicken. It is written by a man called James Carnac and is an account of his life, including the period when he became the murderer known to posterity as ‘Jack the Ripper’. Ultimately it is up to the reader to decide. Is this a piece of fiction? If so it has to be one of the very earliest imaginings of the Ripper case, written in the early years of the twentieth century and a fascinating piece of period writing. However, is it non-fiction? There is information in this book that does not appear to be derived from contemporary newspapers or any other publications and the descriptions of Tottenham in the 1870s, the visits to performances of Jekyll and Hyde, the intricate geography of Whitechapel in 1888 are written with pin-point accuracy

In Britain, Rome's legions are but a distant memory • And Uther Pendragon is dying • Enemies stalk the land • Into this uncertain world a boy is cast - an outsider, plagued by memories of those he's lost • Under the watchful eye of Merlin, the boy begins his journey to manhood. He meets another outcast, Guinevere - wild, proud and beautiful. And he is dazzled by Arthur - a warrior who carries the hopes of the people like a flaming torch in the dark • But these are treacherous times, and the fate of Britain rests on a sword's edge. This young man becomes a lord of war: loved, hated, admired and feared. He is a man forsaken but not forgotten • He is Lancelot

It began with Eragon . . . It ends with Inheritance, book four in the Inheritance Series • Not so very long ago, Eragon - Shadeslayer, Dragon Rider - was nothing more than a poor farm boy, and his dragon, Saphira, only a blue stone in the forest. Now, the fate of an entire civilization rests on their shoulders • Long months of training and battle have brought victories and hope, but they have also brought heartbreaking loss. And still the real battle lies ahead: they must confront King Galbatorix • When they do, they will have to be strong enough to defeat him. And if they can’t, no one can. There will be no second chances • The Rider and his dragon have come farther than anyone dared to hope. But can they topple the evil king and restore justice to Alagaesia? And if so, at what cost? • Featuring spectacular artwork by cult artist John Jude Palencar, this stunning book brings the bestselling Inheritance cycle to a breathtaking conclusion

Betrayed and left for dead high in the Alps, Nick Stone is in trouble. The blood on his hands tells of a head wound he can’t see and his foggy memory confirms it. He knows only one thing for certain – someone, somewhere wants to kill him. And they think they’ve succeeded • Stone wants revenge, but the only person who can help him is a seven year old boy. Not much protection in the pursuit of a gang of faceless men who trade in human misery. But this run-of-the-mill close protection task is about to become Stone’s most personal mission yet • Payback is top of Stone’s agenda. The fuse has been ignited – but who really holds the detonator?

Meet Elle Evans: pretty, popular - and never been kissed • Meet Noah Flynn: badass, volatile - and a total player • When Elle decides to run a kissing booth for the school carnival, she never imagines she'll sit in it – or that her first ever kiss would be with bad boy Noah • From that moment, her life is turned upside down – but is this a romance destined for happiness or heartbreak? • If you love Holly Bourne and John Green, then you will adore The Kissing Booth!

Horrible histories for adults, these gruesome, bizarre and often hilarious medical case histories trace the evolution of modern medicine and the astonishing resilience of human life, both in body and spirit! • · A mysterious epidemic of dental explosions • · A teenage boy who got his wick stuck in a candlestick • · A remarkable woman who, like a human fountain, spurted urine from virtually every orifice • These are just a few of the anecdotal gems that have until now lain undiscovered in medical journals for centuries. This fascinating collection of historical curiosities explores some of the strangest cases that have perplexed doctors across the world • From seventeenth-century Holland to Tsarist Russia, from rural Canada to a whaler in the Pacific, many are monuments to human stupidity - such as the sailor who swallowed dozens of penknives to amuse his shipmates, or the chemistry student who in 1850 arrived at a hospital in New York with his penis trapped inside a bottle, having unwisely decided to relieve himself into a vessel containing highly reactive potassium