Vintage books Voodoo Histories. How Conspiracy Theory Has Shaped Modern History Aaronovitch David

How have feelings come to shape the world around us? Why has politics become so fractious and warlike? What might the future hold? • In this bold and compelling exploration of our new political reality, William Davies reveals how feelings have come to reshape our world. Drawing on history, philosophy, psychology and economics, Nervous States is an essential guide to the turbulent times we are living through

They gave us democracy, philosophy, poetry, rational science, the joke. They built the Parthenon and the Library of Alexandria. They wrote the timeless myths of Odysseus and Oedipus, and the histories of Leonidas’s three hundred Spartans and Alexander the Great • But who were the ancient Greeks? And what was it that enabled them to achieve so much? • Here, Edith Hall gives us a revelatory way of viewing this geographically scattered people, visiting different communities at various key moments during twenty centuries of ancient history • Identifying ten unique traits central to the widespread ancient Greeks, Hall unveils a civilization of incomparable richness and a people of astounding complexity – and explains how they made us who we are today

If the world as we know it ended tomorrow, how would you survive? • A nuclear war, viral pandemic or asteroid strike. The world as we know it has ended. You and the other survivors must start again. What knowledge would you need to start rebuilding civilisation from scratch? • How do you grow food, generate power, prepare medicines, or get metal out of rocks? Could you avert another Dark Ages, or take shortcuts to accelerate redevelopment? Living in the modern world, we have become disconnected from the basic processes and key fundamentals of science that sustain our lives • Ingenious and groundbreaking, The Knowledge explains everything you need to know about everything, revolutionising your understanding of the world

In this hugely powerful book, Karen Armstrong argues that it isn't enough to change our behaviour to avert environmental catastrophe - we must rekindle our spiritual bond with the natural world. From gratitude and compassion to sacrifice and non-violence, Armstrong draws themes from the world's religious traditions to offer practical steps to reconnect you with nature • Speaking to anyone interested in our relationship with nature, worried about environmental destruction, or searching for new actions to save our planet, Sacred Nature will uncover the most profound connections between humans and the natural world

Empire explains why there are millions of Britons living worldwide • Empire explains Brexit and the feeling that we are exceptional • Empire explains our distrust of cleverness • Empire explains Britain's particular brand of racism • Strangely hidden from view, the British Empire remains a subject of both shame and glorification. In his bestselling book, Sathnam Sanghera shows how our imperial past is everywhere: from how we live and think to the foundation of the NHS and even our response to the COVID-19 crisis • At a time of great division, when we are arguing about what it means to be British, Empireland is a groundbreaking revelation - a much-needed and enlightening portrait of contemporary British society, shining a light on everything that usually gets left unsaid

With a death toll of between 50 and 100 million people and a global reach, the Spanish flu of 1918-1920 was the greatest human disaster, not only of the twentieth century, but possibly in all of recorded history. And yet, in our popular conception it exists largely as a footnote to World War I • In Pale Rider, Laura Spinney recounts the story of an overlooked pandemic, tracing it from Alaska to Brazil, from Persia to Spain, and from South Africa to Odessa. She shows how the pandemic was shaped by the interaction of a virus and the humans it encountered; and how this devastating natural experiment put both the ingenuity and the vulnerability of humans to the test • Laura Spinney demonstrates that the Spanish flu was as significant - if not more so - as two world wars in shaping the modern world; in disrupting, and often permanently altering, global politics, race relations, family structures, and thinking across medicine, religion and the arts

An explosive and revelatory account about the British lobbying industry and how it affects us all at every level of our lives • Q. What's worth ?2,000,000,000, answers to no-one and operates out of public sight? • A. Britain's influence industry • The corporate takeover of democracy is no conspiracy theory - it's happening, and it affects every aspect of our lives: the food we eat, the places we live, the temperature of our planet, how we spend our money and how our money is spent for us. And much more • A Quiet Word shows just how effectively the voice of public interest is being drowned out by the word in the ear from the professional persuaders of the lobbying industry. And if you've never heard about them, that's because the most effective lobbying goes unnoticed

Celebrating the finest works of the Harlem Renaissance, one of the most important Black arts movements in modern history • 'Why not? She's just as a good as the rest, and you know what they say, "the blacker the berry, the sweeter the juice"' • Growing up, Emma Lou Morgan stuck out - her skin was the darkest in every room, even within her own home. With the encouragement of her uncle, Emma flees smalltown Idaho firstly to study in Los Angeles before travelling to Harlem. Though she enjoys the glamour of attending the theatre and the buzz of cabaret, every excursion is tinged with the fear of discrimination. Even in big cities, Emma cannot escape the bigotry of colourism, but can she change how it makes her feel about herself? • The Blacker the Berry is an arrestingly vivid portrayal of how very deeply every facet of prejudice runs

Discover the classic, Man Booker Prize shortlisted novel from one of India's finest ever writers • To the family living in the shabby, dusty house in Delhi, Tara's visit brings a sharp reminder of life outside tradition. For Bim, coping endlessly with their problems, there is a renewal of the old jealousies for, unlike her sister, she has failed to escape • Looking at both the cruelty and the beauty of family life and the harshness of India's modern history, Clear Light of Day brilliantly evokes the painful process of confronting and healing old wounds

'Elegant and enjoyable...a thoughtful exploration of the twin delights of the piano and the Parisian life' Express on Sunday • T. E. Carhart, an American living in Paris, is intrigued by a piano repair shop hidden down a street near his apartment. When he finally gains admittance to the secretive world of the atelier, he finds himself in an enormous glass-roofed workshop filled with dozens of pianos. His love affair with this most magical of instruments and its music is reawakened • Packed with delicate cameos of Parisians and reflections on how pianos work and their glorious history, The Piano Shop on the Left Bank is an atmospheric and absorbing journey to an older way of life

Discover a powerful collection of the hardships, hairbreadth escapes, and mortal struggles of enslaved people seeking freedom: These are the true stories of the Underground Railroad • A secret network of safe houses, committees and guides that stretched well below the Mason-Dixon Line into the brutal slave states of the American South, the Underground Railroad remains one of the most impressive and well-organised resistance movements in modern history. It facilitated the escape of over 30,000 slave 'passengers' through America and into Canada during its peak years of 1850-60, and, in total, an estimated 100,000 slaves found their freedom through the network • Abridged from William Still's The Underground Railroad Records - an epic historical document that chronicles the first-hand stories of American slaves who escaped to freedom via the Underground Railroad - Passengers tells of the secret methods, risks and covert sacrifices that were made to liberate so many from slavery

Celebrating the finest works of the Harlem Renaissance, one of the most important Black arts movements in modern history • 'White peoples maybe mistreats you an' hates you, but when you hates 'em back, you's de one what's hurted, 'cause hate makes yo' heart ugly - that's all it does' • Sandy's in the fifth grade when he's forced to sit on the back row away from his white classmates and denied entry to a new amusement park. His grandmother, who is raising him alongside his mother and aunt, tells him that love is the only thing to make room for in his heart. But it's Sandy's discovery of literature that inspires him to continue his education and make sense of the unjust world he inhabits in the debut novel from one of the foremost pioneers of the Harlem Renaissance