Historical

Patrice Lumumba (1925-61) is perhaps the most famous leader of the African independence movement. After his execution in 1961, when he had been prime minister of the newly-liberated Congo for only seven months, he became an icon of anti-imperialist...

An "excellent new biography" (Keith Thomas, New York Review of Books) of the wily and formidable prince who unexpectedly became monarch-the most infamous king in British history"An intricately detailed account of Richard's every recorded move on his...

'How refreshing, to read a book about music written for a music lover and not a musicologist. In clear, lucid, entertaining prose, Jane Glover makes those of us who lack musical literacy better understand and appreciate Handel's divinity.' - Donna Leon,...

James Connolly (1868-1916) became a leading Irish socialist and revolutionary, and was one of the leaders of Ireland's rebellion in 1916. As a youth he had served in the British army in Ireland and, seeing how they treated the local population, became...

Shortlisted for the Saltire Society First Book of the Year Award In 2016, Sandy Winterbottom embarked on an epic six-week tall-ship voyage from Uruguay to Antarctica. At the mid-way stop in South Georgia, her pristine image of the Antarctic was...

THE INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER'Beautifully-penned story on the harshness of life and how hope survives' - Sun'Absorbing . . . Marsh writes with a novelistic flair' - Daily Mail From the grimy streets of Acton and Notting Hill to the bright lights of the...

The great Elizabeth Raffald used to be a household name, and her list of accomplishments would make even the highest of achievers feel suddenly impotent. After becoming housekeeper at Arley Hall in Cheshire at age twenty-five, she married and moved to...

Ngugi wa Thiong'o was born the fifth child of his father's third wife, in a family that includes twenty-four children born to four different mothers. He spent his 1930s childhood as the apple of his mother's eye, before attending school to slake what is...

The definitive account of the distinguished economist's formative years. Few twentieth-century figures have been lionized and vilified in such equal measure as Friedrich Hayek-economist, social theorist, leader of the Austrian school of economics,...

This biography of Jack Maurice Nissenthall, written by his daughter, Linda Nissen Samuels, draws heavily on Jack's own writings: The Wizard War, an unpublished autobiographical account of his part in the development of radar before and during WW2 and its...

This biography of Jack Maurice Nissenthall, written by his daughter, Linda Nissen Samuels, draws heavily on Jack's own writings: The Wizard War, an unpublished autobiographical account of his part in the development of radar before and during WW2 and its...

'He who thinks freely for himself, honours all freedom on earth.' Stefan Zweig was already an emigre-driven from a Europe torn apart by brutality and totalitarianism-when he found, in a damp cellar, a copy of Michel de Montaigne's Essais. Montaigne...

In the province of Britannia during AD60. the brutality of the Roman Empire forced catastrophic retaliation by the people. Boudica, Queen of the Iceni, rose in rebellion, joined by thousands of her fellow countrymen. Together they engaged in a deadly...

The clever peasant Arnaud du Tilh had almost persuaded the learned judges at the Parlement of Toulouse when, on a summer's day in 1560, a man swaggered into the court on a wooden leg, denounced Arnaud, and reestablished his claim to the identity,...

James Boswell called him 'the greatest man of any age'. Christian Meier's biography is the definitive modern account of Caesar's life and career, and places him within the wider context of the crisis of the Roman republic. It is a compelling work of...

THE MAKING OF A PRIME MINISTER 'My biography of the year' Michael Crick 'The scariest thing I've read since Silence of the Lambs' Ken Livingstone A brilliant and definitive biography of Boris Johnson, the politician who risked his career to lead the...

THE MAKING OF A PRIME MINISTER 'My biography of the year' Michael Crick 'The scariest thing I've read since Silence of the Lambs' Ken Livingstone A brilliant and definitive biography of Boris Johnson, the politician who risked his career to lead the...

The memoir of Charlotte Delbo, a French writer sent to Auschwitz for her resistance activities against the Nazi occupation of France and the Vichy government"Delbo's exquisite and unflinching account of life and death under Nazi atrocity grows fiercer...

The remarkable story of how Greek-speaking writers and thinkers sustained and developed the intellectual legacy of Classical Greece under the rule of Rome. In 146 BC, Greece yielded to the military might of the Roman Republic; some sixty years later,...

Born in Cloughjordan in Co. Tipperary, MacDonagh was a poet and playwright, an educator and political activist. Appointed to the IRB Military Council he became a member of the Provisional Government of the Irish Republic and was a signatory of the 1916...

The Disturbing Inside Story of Women Who Are Driven to Kill Killer Women are the most disturbing yet compelling of all criminals, representing the very darkest side of humanity and subverting the conventional view of women as the weaker sex. From...

On 24 May 1948, the Empire Windrush sailed from Kingston, Jamaica, to harbour at Tilbury Docks. It carried 1,027 passengers and some stowaways, and more than two thirds of them were West Indies nationals. On 22 June 1948 they disembarked onto the docks,...

Apologies but we at Booksplease don't have a full description for this book.Book InformationISBN 9780486284996Author Frederick DouglassFormat PaperbackPage Count 96Imprint Dover Publications Inc.Publisher Dover Publications Inc.Weight(grams)...

'A stunningly good and surely definitive biography of one of the most fascinating British engineers ever to have lived' JAMES HOLLANDBarnes Wallis became a household name after the hit 1955 film The Dam Busters, in which Michael Redgrave portrayed him as...

The superb, bestselling diaries of Victor Klemperer, a Jew in Dresden who survived the war - hailed as one of the 20th century's most important chronicles.'Compulsive reading' LITERARY REVIEW 'Deeply engrossing' SPECTATOR'Klemperer's diary deserves to...

Henry Tudor, the future Henry VII, has been called the most unlikely King of England. Yet his rise from obscurity was foretold by the bards, and by 1485, the familial bloodbath of the Wars of the Roses left Henry as the sole adult Lancastrian claimant to...

This is a study of the life of Margaret Beaufort, mother of Henry VII and foundress of two Cambridge colleges. It is at once the first biography of Lady Margaret to explore the full range of archival sources, and one of the best-documented studies of any...

Now a major film, this is a dramatic reinterpretation of the life of Mary Queen of Scots by one of the leading historians of this period. Who was the real Mary Queen of Scots? The most enigmatic ruler of England lived...

The execution of King Charles I is one of the well-known facts of British history, and an often-quoted snippet from our past. He lost the civil war and his head. But there is more to Charles than the civil war and his death. To fully appreciate the...

Apologies but we at Booksplease don't have a full description for this book.Book InformationISBN 9781590176658Author Madeline LevineFormat PaperbackPage Count 256Imprint NYRB ClassicsPublisher The New York Review of Books, IncWeight(grams)...

The tragic story of Anne Boleyn has been retold over the centuries, yet two key figures in Anne's life-her father Thomas and brother George- are often relegated to the margins of the history of Henry VIII's turbulent reign. Well before Anne's coronation...

'A fast-moving, entertaining and finely written story' Simon Schama'Masterly ... a remarkable portrait of a brilliant complex and tragic genius' William Dalrymple, Los Angeles TimesGeorge Nathaniel Curzon's controversial life in public service stretched ...

Xi Jinping wants to become the world's most powerful leader. To succeed, he must balance Mao's Little Red Book with the Analects of Confucius, and more. For Xi, the task ahead of China is to preserve the guiding ideology of Marxism, while challenging...

Apologies but we at Booksplease don't have a full description for this book.Book InformationISBN 9781725255364Author Elaine EnnsFormat HardbackPage Count 420Imprint Wipf & Stock PublishersPublisher Wipf & Stock PublishersWeight(grams) 735gDimensions(mm)...

'A marvel of clarity, fluency, and (Morris's favourite word in her final days) kindness.' The Sunday Times 'A measured and elegant biography that Morris aficionados will find fascinating.' The Times The first full account of a truly remarkable life. ...

The amazing tale of a resourceful and unscrupulous early-19th-century American adventurer who forges his own kingdom in the wilds of Afghanistan. In the year 1838, a young adventurer, surrounded by his native troops and mounted on an elephant,...

A vivid double biography of two fearless early medieval queens. 'Brings the Merovingian empire to thrilling, bewildering, horrifying life' Helen Castor 'Restores two half-forgotten and much-mythologized queens to their proper place in medieval...

From being transported by the sound of 'True Love' by Bing Crosby and Grace Kelly on the radio, as a small child living in condemned housing in ungentrified West London in the late 1950s, to going out to work as a postman humming 'Watching the...

With his signature insight and compelling style, Christopher Hibbert explains the extraordinary complexities and contradictions that characterized Benito Mussolini. Mussolini was born on a Sunday afternoon in 1883 in a village in central Italy. On a...

Machiavelli praised his military genius. European royalty sought out his secret elixir against poison. His life inspired Mozart's first opera, while for centuries poets and playwrights recited bloody, romantic tales of his victories, defeats, intrigues,...