William Collins Patrick O'Brian. A Very Private Life Tolstoy Nikolai

Swifts live almost entirely in the air. They eat, drink, sleep, mate and gather their nesting materials on the wing, fly thousands of miles across the world, navigating their way around storms, never lighting on tree, cliff or ground, until they return home with the summer • Sarah Gibson has written a fascinating story of discovery, exploring what is known about these mysterious birds, their ancient ancestry and how they have been regarded through history. But the swifts are in real danger: often unintentionally, we are sealing our homes against wildlife of any kind. Cracks, gaps and crevices which for thousands of years have offered nesting space in buildings, are being closed off, while new housing rarely offers entry holes for nesting birds

Growing up in a dilapidated house by the sea where men were forbidden, Sally's childhood world was filled with mystery and intrigue. Hippies trailed through the kitchen looking for God - their leader was Aunt Di, who ruled the house with charismatic force. When Sally's baby brother vanishes from his pram, she becomes suspicious of the activities going on around her. What happened to Baby David and the woman called Poor Sue? And where did all the people singing and wailing prayers in the front room suddenly go? • Disappearing into a world of books and reading, Sally adopts the tried and tested methods of Miss Marple. Taking books for hints and clues, she turns herself into a reading detective. Her discovery of Jane Eyre marks the beginning of a vivid journey through Victorian literature where she also finds the kind, eccentric figure of Charles Dickens' Betsey Trotwood

«Баламут предлагает тост» – продолжение одной из самых известных книг британского писателя и теолога Клайва Стейплза Льюиса. Оригинальное произведение, «Письма Баламута», было оформлено в виде писем старого беса Баламута, опытного искусителя и верного прислужника «всенизшего». Письма были адресованы его племяннику, юному бесу Гнусику, и попали в руки Льюиса тайным путём, который он отказывался рассекречивать. Несмотря на колебания автора, через несколько лет после публикации «Писем» читатель всё же смог добиться от него продолжения • Теперь, в 75-ю годовщину первой публикации «Писем», издательство William Collins представляет новое издание книги «Баламут предлагает тост», включающее также и другие произведения автора • «Баламут предлагает тост», книга выдающегося британского писателя Клайва Стейплза Льюиса, является знаковым произведением для направления популярной теологии

The Infinite Monkey Cage, the legendary BBC Radio 4 programme, brings you this irreverent celebration of scientific marvels. Join us on a hectic leap through the grand and bizarre ideas conjured up by human imagination, from dark matter to consciousness via neutrinos and earthworms • Professor Brian Cox and Robin Ince muse on multifaceted subjects involved in building a universe, with pearls of wisdom from leading scientists and comedians peppered throughout • Covering billions of concepts and conundrums, they tackle everything from the Big Bang to parallel universes, fierce creatures to extraterrestrial life, brain science to artificial intelligence. How to Build a Universe is an illuminating and inspirational celebration of science – sometimes silly, sometimes astounding and very occasionally facetious

Our wild places and wildlife are disappearing at a terrifying rate. This is a story about going in search of the people who are trying to save our birds, as well as confronting the enormity of what losing them would really mean • In this beautiful and thought-provoking blend of nature and travel writing Patrick Galbraith sets off across Britain on a journey that may well be his last chance to see some of our disappearing birds. Along the way, from Orkney to West Wales, from the wildest places to post-industrial towns, he meets a fascinatingly eclectic group of people who in very different ways are on the front line of conservation, tirelessly doing everything they can to save ten species teetering dangerously close to extinction • In Search of One Last Song mixes conservation, folklore, history, and art

Divorced and struggling with deep-rooted mental health problems, Bella Mackie ended her twenties in tears. She could barely find the strength to get off the sofa, let alone piece her life back together. Until one day she did something she had never done of her own free will – she pulled on a pair of trainers and went for a run • That first attempt didn’t last very long. But to her surprise, she was back out there the next day. And the day after that. She began to set herself achievable goals – to run 5k in under 30 minutes, to walk to work every day for a week, to attempt 10 push-ups in a row. Before she knew it, her mood was lifting for the first time in years • In Jog On, Bella explains with hilarious and unfiltered honesty how she used running to battle crippling anxiety and depression, without having to sacrifice her main loves: booze, cigarettes and ice cream

Where are we? Are we alone? Who are we? Why are we here? What is our future? • Human Universe tackles some of the greatest questions that humans have asked to try and understand the very nature of ourselves and the Universe in which we live • Through the endless leaps of human minds, it explores the extraordinary depth of our knowledge today and where our curiosity may lead us in the future. With groundbreaking insight it reveals how time, physics and chemistry came together to create a creature that can wonder at its own existence, blessed with an unquenchable thirst to discover not just where it came from, but how it can think, where it is going and if it is alone

Every night, above our heads, a drama of epic proportions is playing out. Diamond planets, zombie stars, black holes heavier than a billion Suns. The cast of characters is extraordinary, and each one has its own incredible story to tell • We once thought of our Earth as unique, but we have now discovered thousands of alien planets, and that’s barely a fraction of the worlds that are out there. And there are more stars in the Universe than grains of sand on every planet in the Solar System. But amid all this vastness, the Milky Way Galaxy, our Sun and the Earth are home to the only known life in the Universe – at least for now • With a foreword from Professor Brian Cox, and access to all the latest stunning NASA photography, Andrew Cohen takes readers on a voyage of discovery, via the probes and telescopes exploring the outer reaches of our galaxy, revealing how it was formed and how it will inevitably be destroyed by the enigmatic black hole at its heart

In 1976 James Crowden left his career in the British army and travelled to Ladakh in the Northern Himalaya, one of the most remote parts of the world. The Frozen River is his extraordinary account of the time he spent there, living alongside the Zangskari people, before the arrival of roads and mass tourism • James immerses himself in the Zangskari way of life, where meditation and week-long mountain festivals go hand in hand, and silence and solitude are the hallmarks of existence. When butter traders invite James on their journey down the frozen river Leh, he soon realises that this way of living, unchanged for centuries, comes with a very human cost • In lyrical prose, James captures a crucial moment in time for this Himalayan community. A moment in which their Buddhist practices and traditions are in flux, and the economic pull of a world beyond their valley is increasingly difficult to ignore

Introducing the Collins Modern Classics, a series featuring some of the most significant books of recent times, books that shed light on the human experience – classics which will endure for generations to come • What if intelligent life on earth not only evolved on land, but also in the sea? • Other Minds is a bold new story of how nature became aware of itself – a story that largely occurs in the ocean, where animals first appeared. Tracking the mind’s fitful development over millennia, Other Minds explores the incredible evolutionary journey of the cephalopods. What kind of intelligence do they possess? And how did the octopus, a solitary creature with little social life, become so smart? • Heralded as the ‘scuba-diving philosopher’ when Other Minds first published, Peter Godfrey-Smith explores the underwater world and the concept of sentience to trace the question of inner life back to its roots

HarperCollins is proud to present its range of best-loved, essential classics • ‘The woman who first gives life, light, and form to our shadowy conceptions of beauty, fills a void in our spiritual nature that has remained unknown to us till she appeared.’ • One of the earliest works of ‘detective’ fiction with a narrative woven together from multiple characters, Wilkie Collins partly based his infamous novel on a real-life eighteenth century case of abduction and wrongful imprisonment. In 1859, the story caused a sensation with its readers, hooking their attention with the ghostly first scene where the mysterious ‘Woman in White’ Anne Catherick comes across Walter Hartright. Chilling, suspenseful and tense in mood, the novel remains as emotive for its readers today as when it was first published

The third and final updated edition of David Attenborough’s classic Life trilogy. Life on Earth covered evolution, Living Planet , ecology, and now The Trials of Life tackles ethology, the study of how animals behave • ‘This is, quite simply, the best thing I’ve ever done.’ Sir David Attenborough on the TV series, The Trials of Life, upon which this book is based • This is the third and last of Sir David’s great natural history books based on his TV series and competes his survey of the animal world that began with Life on Earth and continues with Living Planet • In Life on Earth, Sir David showed how each group of animals evolved. In Living Planet he looked at the way they have adapted to the whole range of habitats in which they live. Now, in Trials of Life, he completes the story by revealing how animals behave – and why