Great Britain

On the evening of 26th November 1703, a cyclone from the north Atlantic hammered into southern Britain at over seventy miles an hour, claiming the lives of over 8,000 people. Eyewitnesses reported seeing cows left stranded in the branches of trees and...

This is a book about a poet, about a poem, about a city, and about a world at a point of change. More than a work of literary criticism or literary biography, it is a record of why and how we create and respond to great poetry. This is a book...

Sixteen Stoke City legends tell the stories behind their favourite ever games for the club - enabling Potters fans of all ages to relive these magic moments through the eyes and emotions of the men who were there, playing their hearts out for the...

A highly original study that examines the central role played by women as mediums, healers, and believers during the golden age of spiritualism in the late Victorian era, The Darkened Room is more than a meditation on women mediums-it's an exploration of...

The Victorian Age saw the transformation of the madhouse into the asylum into the mental hospital; of the mad-doctor into the alienist into the psychiatrist; and of the madman (and madwoman) into the mental patient. In Andrew Scull's edited collection...

In medieval and early modern Britain, people would refer to their local district as their 'country', a term now largely forgotten but still used up until the First World War. Core groups of families that remained rooted in these 'countries', often...

A not-for-the-squeamish journey back through the centuries to urban England, where the streets are crowded, noisy, filthy, and reeking of smoke and decay Modern city-dwellers suffer their share of unpleasant experiences-traffic jams, noisy neighbors,...

Fully illustrated with beautiful photographs, this special commemorative book by royal biographer Brian Hoey - who had the privilege of meeting Diana on several occasions - pays tribute to the life of this remarkable young woman. Diana, Princess of...

The Peak District is a vital place with landscapes of great beauty from wild moorlands to walled fields around picturesque villages. There are few places in the world where such a rich history is visible in one relatively small but varied landscape. ...

In early 1302 a violent serial killer lurks in the city of London, slitting the throats of prostitutes.And when Lady Somerville, one of the Sisters of St Martha, is murdered in the same barbaric fashion, her death is closely followed by that of Father...

By the beginning of the 1980s, British Rail's fleet of diesel shunters was in decline, this being caused by a rapid loss of freight traffic across the country as well as the modernisation of passenger train operations, both resulting in a reduced need...

Northumbria was one of the great kingdoms of Britain in the Dark Ages, enduring longer than the Roman Empire. Yet it has been all but forgotten. This book puts Northumbria back in its rightful place, at the heart of British history. From the impregnable...

More extraordinary but true stories from London's history. In this fascinating follow-up to his bestselling London's Strangest Tales, Tom Quinn makes a further foray into the weirder side of the capital, bringing us a...

George Mikes has written many successful books on a variety of interesting subjects, but one so successful as those on the subject most central to his own experience: his adopted country. The first of these came out in 1946: the ever famous "How to be an...

England, says Matthew Engel, is the most complicated place in the world. And, as he travels through each of the historic English counties, he discovers that's just the start of it. Every county is fascinating, the product of a millennium or more of...

NUMBER ONE EVENING STANDARD BESTSELLERBOOK OF THE YEAR - DAILY TELEGRAPH'Exceptional. A blueprint for productive, sophisticated espionage in the age of Islamist terror' Daily TelegraphSpying has changed. In this era of email intercepts and drone...

Mary Ann Nichols, Annie Chapman, Elizabeth Stride, Catherine Eddowes and Mary Jane Kelly are inextricably linked in history. Their names might not be instantly recognisable, and the identity of their murderer may have eluded detectives and historians...

Called an uneasy peace, the twenty years between the wars were a time of turmoil - Britain saw a general strike and the worst economic crisis in its history, armed rebellion in Ireland and open revolt in India, a Prime Minister's resignation and the...

A major new account of Britain's military strategy between 1914-1945, including the two world wars and everything between The First and Second World Wars were separated by a mere two decades, making the period 1914-1945 an unprecedentedly intense and...

Not For Turning is the first volume of Charles Moore's authorized biography of Margaret Thatcher, the longest serving Prime Minister of the twentieth century and one of the most influential political figures of the postwar era.Charles Moore's biography...

Richard III, King of England from 1483 to 1485, made good laws that still protect ordinary people today. Yet history concentrates on the fictional hunchback as depicted by Shakespeare: the wicked uncle who stole the throne and killed his nephews in the...

LANCASTER CASTLE is one of Britain's major historic monuments. For over 900 years it has dominated the hilltop looking out over the river Lune and the city of Lancaster. Owned by Her Majesty the Queen in her role as Duke of Lancaster, the castle has a...

'He had brought nothing but trouble to the navy: how would he fare as King?'Known as the 'Sailor King', William IV was sent to join the navy by his father to discipline him, but instead became notorious for his calamitous years of service, his debts...

The Great Wood of Caledon - the historic native forest of Highland Scotland - has a reputation as potent and misleading as the wolves that ruled it. The popular image is of an impassable, sun-snuffing shroud, a Highlandswide jungle infested by wolf,...

Part of his trilogy on Scottish history, T. M. Devine's To the Ends of the Earth is a compelling account of the Scots as a 'global people', charting their forgotten role in the building of the modern world. The Scots are one of the world's greatest...

BOOK 12 OF THE LADYBIRD EXPERT HISTORY OF THE SECOND WORLD WAR, FROM AWARD-WINNING HISTORIAN JAMES HOLLANDFeaturing stunning illustrations from Keith Burns, bringing the story to life in vivid detailWhy did Japan decide to attack at Pearl Harbour?What...

Gin Glorious Gin is a vibrant cultural history of London seen through the prism of its most iconic drink. Leading the reader through the underbelly of the Georgian city via the Gin Craze, detouring through the Empire (with a G&T in hand), to the...

The British were at the forefront of railway development for the first fifty years of the nineteenth century. Railway Empire tells the story of how the British gave railways to the world, not only in the empire, but also in other countries outside areas...

The University of Oxford offers 800 years of history: its 39 colleges are inextricably linked with the daily life of a busy city with beautiful buildings, cobbled lanes, and turrets and spires. Fully revised for 2019, and with a map to guide visitors,...

The story of the Peterloo massacre, a defining moment in the history of British democracy, told with passion and authority. 'Excellent' Zadie Smith 'Fast-paced and full of fascinating detail' Tim Clayton 'A superb account of one of the defining...

An updated edition of Ben Pimlott's classic biography of the Queen: 'There is no better biography of Elizabeth II.' PETER HENNESSY, Independent on Sunday 'A magisterial biography and the only one that seriously deals with her constitutional...

In 1922 Winston Churchill prepared to defend his parliamentary seat of Dundee in the General Election. He had represented the city since 1908, enjoyed a majority of more than 15,000 and, after five previous victories, confidently described it as a 'life...

Includes a new foreword by the author and a preface by Douglas Hofstadter.Alan Turing was the extraordinary Cambridge mathematician who masterminded the cracking of the German Enigma ciphers and transformed the Second World War. But his vision went far...

'A gripping, heart-breaking account of the famine winter of 1847' - Rosemary Goring, The Herald Longlisted for the Highland Book Prize When Scotland's 1846 potato crop was wiped out by blight, the country was plunged into crisis. In the Hebrides...

A compelling history of British imperial culture, showing how it was adopted and subverted by colonial subjects around the world As the British Empire expanded across the globe, it exported more than troops and goods. In every colony, imperial...

The loss of the great fenlands of eastern England is the greatest single removal of ecology in our history. So thorough was the process that most visitors to the regions, or even people living there, have little idea of what has gone. For many, the...

The elaborately carved Hilton of Cadboll stone, the house-shaped Monymusk Reliquary and the sumptuously decorated Hunterston brooch (all on view in the National Museum of Scotland) are evidence of the sophistication of Scottish craftsmen in the time AD...

________________________For decades, John Humphrys has been at the beating heart of the BBC's news division.From the 9 O'Clock News desk to his marathon 32-year stint on the Today Programme, Humphrys has had a remarkable career as a journalist, steering...

Columba And All That is a real-life adventure packed with historical facts about the legendary Celtic saint. Join Columba as he leaves his home in Ireland for the undiscovered country of Scotland. Witness magic and miracles as Columba confronts the Loch...

The Illustrated Police News cost just a penny, providing an affordable illustrated roundup of `all the startling events of the week' from its first issue published on 20th February 1864. Promising to educate the people with fantastic features such as...