Maritime History & Piracy

'An acerbic, compelling and always accessible account of how opium corrupted the world' TLS'The writing is sublime, the research thorough, the eye for story superb' Sunday TelegraphWhen Amitav Ghosh began the research for his monumental cycle of novels...

A Guardian, Financial Times, New Statesman, The Rest is Politics and Waterstones Highlight for 2024 'Quinn has done a lot more than reinvent the wheel. What we have here is a truly encyclopaedic and monumental account of the ancient world' THE TIMES 'A...

In the 200 years since it was founded, the RNLI has saved more than 144,000 lives. It all began with a meeting in London in 1824 to act on a proposal by Sir William Hillary: the formation of a National Institution for the Preservation of Life from...

'An exceptional book. Sailing Alone belongs on the very small shelf of the true classics of the sea' Peter Nichols, author of Sea Change and A Voyage for Madmen'Colourful and inventive' The TimesSailing on a boat by yourself out at sea and out of sight...

THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER & THE TIMES HISTORY BOOK OF 2021 'Astonishing and compelling' Bernard Cornwell 'This superb book is like a classical symphony, perfectly composed and exquisitely performed' THE TIMES Books of the Year ...

I ran out on the deck and then I could see ice. It was a veritable sea of ice and the boat was rocking over it. I should say that parts of the iceberg were eighty feet high, but it had been broken into sections, probably by our ship. There fell on the...

'Masterful and entrancing - this is big history at its best.' Professor Alice Roberts, author of Ancestors'A real-life Indiana Jones takes readers on a dive through these underwater museums, revealing the sunken secrets of the past' The Times'Fascinating...

Pirates have long captured peoples’ imaginations with images of cutlass-wielding swashbucklers, eye-patches and buried treasure. But what was life really like on a pirate ship? Piracy was a risky, sometimes deadly occupation, and strict orders were...

In April 1951, the disappearance of HM submarine Affray knocked news of the Korean War and Festival of Britain from the front pages. Affray had put to sea on a routine peacetime simulated war patrol in the English Channel. She radioed her last position...

Out of print for many years, this is a brand new edition of the definitive companion to the acclaimed Aubrey-Maturin series of novels, written by the author himself. What was daily life in Nelson's navy really like,...

THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER. An inventive biography of one of the most famous ships of all time - an alluring combination of history, adventure and science. 'HISTORY BOOK OF THE YEAR' Christopher Hart, Sunday Times From Johnson's Dictionary to...

WINNER OF THE WOLFSON HISTORY PRIZE 2020A SUNDAY TIMES, FINANCIAL TIMES, THE TIMES AND BBC HISTORY MAGAZINE BOOK OF THE YEARFor most of human history, the seas and oceans have been the main means of long-distance trade and communication between peoples -...

What were pirates really like? How much, if any, of the piratical stereotype - of a dashingly handsome man with an eye-patch, peg-leg and a parrot on his shoulder - is based on the documented fact.In this revealing and highly original study David...

Apologies but we at Booksplease don't have a full description for this book.Book InformationISBN 9780995502864Author Richard LarnFormat HardbackPage Count 170Imprint Mabecron Books LtdPublisher Mabecron Books Ltd

Maritime workers occupy a central place in global labour history. This new and compelling account from Australia, shows seafaring and waterside unions engaged in a shared history of activism for legally regulated wages and safe liveable conditions for...

Sea shanties are enjoying a huge resurgence in recent months, and given their history and purpose, it is hardly surprising. Composed and performed by sailors on sailing ships to ensure the rhythmic operation of the hauling and heaving that was a mainstay...

'A wonderfully quirky history' SUNDAY TIMES'The perfect read while you wait for your summer holiday to begin' MAIL ON SUNDAY'Quippy anecdotes are woven with historical reference and geographical context to give full colour' IRISH TIMESA bulwark against...

"FASCINATING . . . Dramatic and timely." -New York Times Book Review, Editors' ChoiceIn this grand and thrilling narrative, the author of the 200,000-copy paperback bestseller Over the Edge of the World reveals the singular adventures of Sir Francis...

The Titanic. The Britannic. The Olympic. They are some of the most famous ships in history, but for the wrong reasons. The Olympic Class liners were conceived as the largest, grandest ships ever to set sail. Of the three ships built, the first only...

Today travellers by land, sea and air take accurate navigation for granted but it was not always thus. The author, a highly experienced sailor, sets out to record the development of navigational techniques from the earliest time, five millenniums ago...

Apologies but we at Booksplease don't have a full description for this book.Book InformationISBN 9781916190894Author Kevin JacksonFormat PaperbackPage Count 128Imprint TSBPublisher Can of Worms Press

'The authors are to be congratulated on a book which merits usage in the national curriculum.' - International Journal of Nautical ArchaeologyThe raising of the Tudor warship Mary Rose in 1982 has made her one of the most famous ships in history, though...

A facsimile edition of a classic source for the history of piracy, as used by Robert Louis Stevenson in the writing of Treasure Island. Captain Charles Johnson's General History of Pirates was one of the best-selling books of 1724, when it was first...

One of the most eminent historians of our age investigates the extraordinary success of five small maritime states "A superb survey of the perennial opportunities and risks in what Herman Melville called 'the watery part of the world.'"-William Anthony...

'Engaging, absorbing and crammed with marvellous stories, Finding Endurance is a tale about exploring the cold, told with much warmth.' MICK HERRON'Beautiful, thrilling, heroic and kind, a ripping yarn' CLAIRE ROBERTSON, AUTHOR OF THE SPIRAL...

Apologies but we at Booksplease don't have a full description for this book.Book InformationISBN 9781837731060Author Darrel Bristow-BoveyFormat PaperbackPage Count 272Imprint Icon BooksPublisher Icon BooksWeight(grams) 385g

Launched in 1914, two years after the ill-fated voyage of her sister ship, RMS Titanic, the Britannic was intended to be superior to her tragic twin in every way. But war intervened and in 1915 she was requisitioned as a hospital ship. Just one year...

It started on a summer afternoon in 1795 when a young man named Daniel McGinnis found what appeared to be an old site on an island off the Acadian coast, a coastline fabled for the skullduggery of pirates. The notorious Captain Kidd was rumored to have...

Shrouded by myth and hidden by Hollywood, the real pirates of the Caribbean come to life in this collection of essays edited by David Head. Twelve scholars of piracy show why pirates thrived in the New World seas of seventeenth- and eighteenth-century...

"[A] rollicking narrative . . . Superb"--Ben Wilson, Times A brilliant telling of the history of the common seaman in the age of sail, and his role in Britain's trade, exploration, and warfare British maritime history in the age of sail is...

An examination of one of the most famous ships of all time, from a refreshingly different angle. Compiled from authentic period sources with nostalgic illustrations. Launched in May 1911, the triple-screw steamer Titanic was the pride of the White...

A Sunday Times Book of the Year 'Three and a half millennia of British Maritime history, from the Middle Bronze Age to the early 20th century ... This book is written with passion and sympathy. It will live with me for a very long time' Francis Pryor,...

The Dive is a thrilling narrative nonfiction in the tradition of The Perfect Storm and Apollo 13. They were out of their depth, out of breath, and out of time. It was 1973. Two men were trapped in a crippled submarine...

Highly illustrated with colour images and specially commissioned maps throughout, this is a unique exploration of the pirate world. Often romanticised in print and on the silver screen, real-life pirates were a brutal menace that plagued the high seas...

At the height of the Second World War this small pocket-book was issued to all ratings on board ships of the Royal Navy. In straight period prose it outlines all the basic expressions and tasks a seaman needed to know to perform his duties efficiently...

An updated and expanded edition to celebrate the 150th anniversary of this iconic ship. The narrative spans her construction at Dumbarton in 1869; her famous tea voyages as well as those with other cargoes; her career under a Portuguese flag; her...

A brilliant telling of the history of the common seaman in the age of sail, and his role in Britain's trade, exploration, and warfare"No other book resurrects the wooden world of Jack Tar in such captivating and voluminous detail."-Roger Ekirch, Wall...

Much has been written about Titanic, the British passenger liner that sank on her maiden voyage after a collision with an iceberg in 1912; however, until now little mention has been made about the intricate world of the ship's complement, which comprised...

Apologies but we at Booksplease don't have a full description for this book.Book InformationISBN 9781399014182Author Glynn ChristianFormat HardbackPage Count 200Imprint Pen and Sword HistoryPublisher Pen and Sword HistoryWeight(grams) 152g

Apologies but we at Booksplease don't have a full description for this book.Book InformationISBN 9780593329375Author Daniel StoneFormat HardbackPage Count 336Imprint Dutton / SignetPublisher Penguin Putnam Inc