William Collins The British Are Coming. The War for America 1775 -1777 Atkinson Rick

The sinking of the White Ship in 1120 is one of the greatest disasters England has ever suffered. In one catastrophic night, the king’s heir and the flower of Anglo-Norman society were drowned and the future of the crown was thrown violently off course • In a riveting narrative, Charles Spencer follows the story from the Norman Conquest through to the decades that would become known as the Anarchy: a civil war of untold violence that saw families turn in on each other with English and Norman barons, rebellious Welsh princes and the Scottish king all playing a part in a desperate game of thrones. All because of the loss of one vessel – the White Ship – the medieval Titanic

After nearly three decades reporting conflict from all over the world for the BBC, Fergal Keane has gone home to Ireland to tell a story that lies at the root of his fascination with war. It is a family story of war and love, and how the ghosts of the past return to shape the present • Wounds is a powerful memoir about Irish people who found themselves caught up in the revolution that followed the 1916 Rising, and in the pitiless violence of civil war in north Kerry after the British left in 1922 • It is the story of Keane’s grandmother Hannah Purtill, her brother Mick and his friend Con Brosnan, and how they and their neighbours took up guns to fight the British Empire and create an independent Ireland. And it is the story of another Irishman, Tobias O’Sullivan, who fought against them as a policeman because he believed it was his duty to uphold the law of his country

In January 2003, 28-year-old GCHQ translator Katharine Gun received an email from the US National Security Agency that would turn her world upside down. The message requested Katharine’s assistance in co-ordinating an illegal US-UK spy operation which would secure UN authorisation for the Iraq invasion. Horrified, she decided to leak the information to the British press • Katharine’s decision would change her life forever, as she was arrested under the Official Secrets Act whilst becoming a cause celebre for political activists. The Spy Who Tried to Stop a War is the definitive account of a whistleblower case that reads like a thriller, and will ask you the same question that was asked of Katharine that cold January day – where do your true loyalties lie?

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

Eddy Merckx. Fausto Coppi. Jacques Anquetil. Bernard Hinault. Beryl Burton. Marianne Vos • Since the first road race in May 1869, revealed here for the very first time, cycle road racing has been dominated by iconic cyclists who redefined endurance and fortitude. The battles facing these cyclists are not fought over just one race, but an annual series beginning with the Spring Classics and culminating in the three great tours – the Giro d’Italia, Vuelta a Espana and the Tour de France – before the cyclists retire to lick their wounds and start on another winter of training • How were the great races founded and developed? How have the great riders stamped their authority on them through the ages? Truly international in scope, looking at road racing in North and Latin America, Australia, Africa and Asia, as well as continental Europe, The Call of the Road is essential reading for anyone who is interested in the history, tactics or personalities of cycle road racing

Do tough times create tougher people? Can humanity handle the power of it's weapons without destroying itself? Will human technology ever peak or regress? And why, since the dawn of time, has it always seemed as though death and destruction are waiting just around the corner? • Combining his trademark thrilling, expansive storytelling with rigorous history and thought experiment, Dan Carlin connects past with future to explore the tipping points of collapsing civilisations - from the plague to nuclear war • Looking across every brush with apocalypse, crisis and collapse, this book also weighs, knowing all we do about human patterns, whether our world is likely to become a ruin for future archaeologists to dig up and explore

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

From one of our greatest science writers, this biography of a beech-and-bluebell wood through diverse moods and changing seasons combines stunning natural history with the ancient history of the countryside to tell the full story of the British landscape • Guided by his abiding love of nature and a lifetime of scientific expertise, Richard Fortey takes us on a journey through ecosystems and time. The Wood for the Trees is the story of humankind meeting nature, an homage to the mesmerising interactions between flora, fauna and fungi • Discover the lives of animals and plants; the passage of seasons; visits by fellow enthusiasts; the play of light between branches; the influence of geology; and how woodland has shaped history, architecture, and industry

A story of poverty, generosity and worlds colliding in modern Britain • When Covid-19 hit the UK and lockdown was declared, Mike Matthews wondered how his four-star hotel would survive. Then the council called. The British government had launched a programme called ‘ Everyone In ’ and 33 rough sleepers – many of whom had spent decades on the street – needed beds.The Prince Rupert Hotel would go on to welcome well over 100 people from this community, offering them shelter, good food and a comfy bed during the pandemic • This is the story of how that luxury hotel spent months locked down with their new guests, many of them traumatised, addicts or suffering from mental illness. As a world-leading foreign correspondent turning her attention to her own country for the first time, Christina Lamb chronicles how extreme situations were handled and how shocking losses were suffered, how romances emerged between guests and how people grappled with their pasts together

"Катастрофа. Европа вступает в войну 1914" - это авторитетная хроника бедствия, постигшего Европу в 1914 году, когда континент перешел от очарования эдвардианской эпохи к трагедии тотальной войны • В 1914 году Европа погрузилась в первый ужасный акт самосожжения 20-го века - то, что тогда называлось Великой войной. Накануне его столетнего юбилея Макс Гастингс стремится объяснить, как возник конфликт и что выпало на долю миллионов мужчин и женщин в первые месяцы противостояния • Книга на английском языке • The Amazon History Book of the Year 2013 is a magisterial chronicle of the calamity that befell Europe in 1914 as the continent shifted from the glamour of the Edwardian era to the tragedy of total war • In 1914, Europe plunged into the 20th century's first terrible act of self-immolation - what was then called The Great War

When the Titanic sank, so did the Edwardian age that created it. In this brilliantly original history, Gareth Russell recasts a tragedy we think we know to explore an era of seismic change • With new research and previously unseen first-hand accounts, Gareth Russell peers through the most famous portholes in the world to follow six travellers. Amongst them, a Jewish-American immigrant, an American movie star, a member of the British nobility, and a titan of industry. Setting these lives against that of the Titanic, Russell investigates social class, technological advancement, political turmoil and pioneering ambition in an age that swang between folly and brilliance, hubris and triumph • A dramatic history of human endeavour told through extraordinary, diverse personalities, The Ship of Dreams dispels myth to revive the story of a ship that was to become symbolic of its own doomed era

Rising a kilometre out of the storm-scoured waters around Scotland’s Isle of Skye is a dark battlement of pinnacles and ridgelines: the Cuillin • Plagued by ferocious weather and built from rock that tears skin and confounds compasses, a crossing of the Cuillin is the toughest mountaineering expedition in the British Isles. But the traverse is only part of its lure. Hewn from the innards of an ancient volcano, this mountain range stands like a crown on an island drenched in intrigue. While nineteenth-century climbers flocked to the Alps, the ridge lay untrodden and unyielding. When a generation of mountaineers did come, they found a remarkable prize: the last peaks of Britain to be climbed – peaks that would be named after those who climbed them