Sub-titled 'Forty Years of Letters Between Winston Churchill and His Mother', carefully edited and put into their historical context by David Lough. The early letters sent home from boarding school constantly ask his parents for more money and foreshadow Churchill's later financial recklessnesses. His mother Jennie Lady Randolph Churchill corresponded with her young son age six, and in 1921 the year of her death, mother and son were still prolific letter writers. Over those 40 years, Churchill's life saw army service in India, escape from a Boer POW camp, his swift ascent from Conservative MP for Oldham to Liberal First Lord of the Admiralty, resignation in the wake of the debacle of Gallipoli, and eventual return to the Cabinet in 1917. His mother's life by contrast is an extravagant and indolent life of the monied classes touring the houses of aristocratic friends and taking advantage of their hospitality. Her second marriage flounders and she becomes a lonely figure. As Winston joins Asquith's Cabinet and meets his wife-to-be Clementine, Jennie is getting divorced and making faltering attempts to embark on a literary career. Winston's letters back from India, Egypt and the First World War trenches demonstrates his disregard for personal safety. The letters reflect Churchill's emotional, intellectual and political development as confided to his mother as his mentor and charts a mother-son relationship characterised at the outset by young Winston's dependence on Jennie, which is dramatically reversed as her life crumbles towards its end. Brimming with gossip, name-dropping and chutzpah, and populated by a cast of the great and good of late Victorian and Edwardian England, there are very illuminating introductions to each exchange. A beautifully designed and illustrated tome of 610pp with satin pagemarker.

Sub-titled 'The Decline of Macedonian Europe In the Wake of the Wars of the Successors', for Macedon there was not the thousand years of glory that was the extraordinary destiny of the Romans, nor even the 200 years of Persian primacy, only 50 or so years of strife and trauma, ending in a Galatian deluge that threatened the sacred site at Delphi. This was the period during which Cassander and Lysimachus had seemed about to construct durable Europe-based processes of civil government. It had seen the likes of Demetrius Poliorcetes and Pyrrhus of Epirus battling and besieging across Macedonia, Thrace and Greece. So why was it that the Macedonian state virtually created by Philip II and taken to the heights of epochal triumph by his son Alexander the Great had, hardly two generations after his death, become a weaker entity than it had been when the young conqueror had crossed the Hellespont? The story that unfolds explores how the unique character and particular legacy left when Alexander died at Babylon in 323BC at the age of just 32 ensured that his homeland failed to gain the kind of imperial dividend of the world's other great empires. We see the remarkable parallels to the earlier Persian invasions of the Greek world that Alexander had claimed to avenge. 288pp, colour plates and maps.

From the invasion of the Franks and Mongols, this remarkable collection of artifacts and structures tells the story of the conflicts which shaped the nature of the Western World we know today, both in spiritual and geographical terms. Throughout almost the entire Medieval period, the Catholic church sanctioned military campaigns against what it perceived as its enemies. The rise of Islam and its spread across large parts of the Middle East, Asia, North Africa and even the peripheries of Europe saw Muslim warriors seize the Holy Land, occupy Jerusalem and threaten Constantinople. In response, Pope Urban II called for a crusade to retake the Holy Land, the first of nine military campaigns that continued for the next 200 years. Other lesser-known crusades were mounted with the aim of Christianising the more remote regions of northern and north-eastern Europe, as well as against the Cathars in Southern France. The advance of the Ottomans into the Balkans saw further crusades to halt the Muslims in Bosnia and Serbia, the reconquest of Spain from the Muslim Moors, and such diverse theatres of conflict have resulted in an equally diverse number of relics still to be found. Artillery, coats of arms, Crusader-struck coins, the pen boxes of prolific Muslim writers, Yemen and Saladin's bolt holes, camels carrying projectile weapons in Afghanistan, the invention of trebuchets, reliquary caskets decorated with colourful rock crystal, beautifully decorated minbars in the Court of the Mosque, Karak Castle in Jordan, Pisa Cathedral, Europe's oldest active synagogue in Prague, the Bayeux tapestry showing Duke William leading a charge of his Knights, the murder depicted from a 14th century illuminated manuscript and the Great Mosque of Córdoba, we enter a world of emperors, caliphs and sultans. Beautifully written by an acknowledged expert of the period, 100 objects of never seen before. 251 glossy pages, over 200 colour images.

Oliver Cromwell, born a middle-ranking nobody in a declining county family in an obscure part of the country, became the only non-royal ruler of Britain. He organised the only public trial and execution of a king, brutalised parts of the British Isles in an attempt to unite them, changed religious and political life forever, and still divides people today. This book is not a biography of Cromwell but rather follows in his footsteps, both physically and mentally, attempting to work out what was happening in Cromwell's mind as he passed through these physical and political landscapes, always aware of the danger of overreach. The second part of the book considers his reputation after death. Cromwell was both soldier and politician and his actions and ideas still have political and social consequences today. The book begins in Huntingdon in 1599, with the respectable but unimportant Cromwell family living under the shadow of richer relatives. Civil War and Cromwell's controversial successes at Marston Moor, Naseby, Basing House and Worcester transform him into the most powerful person in Britain, and moving him from a modest house in Ely to Hampton Court Palace. Cromwell is involved in the execution of King Charles I outside the Banqueting House, his own coronation in Westminster Hall, and bloody slaughter in Ireland. His death in 1658 does not end the controversy. His enemies take revenge on his corpse and the debate about his legacy begins. 151 page large softback, illus.

Whenever vessels have foundered off the coasts of Britain, there have always been those willing to give their all to save those in peril. But in 1823 Sir William Hillary decided that this admirable but impromptu approach was not enough. He believed that many more lives could be saved by the establishment of a national, organised rescue service and his idea was realised the following year. We read here of the exploits of Harry Blogg of Norfolk, the most decorated life boatman ever and the only one to be awarded three gold medals other than Sir William Hillary himself; the merchant ship spared by a WW2 U-boat 'ace' whose crew were rescued by Paddy Murphy of the County Down Lifeboat later in the war; Lieutenant Parry of the coastguard, the Trafalgar veteran who earned his gold medal rescuing the crew of a French fishing vessel only to be shot during an encounter with smugglers three months later, causing his premature retirement, and Father O'Shea, the Waterford priest who initiated a rescue attempt with a cry of 'Come, boys! Who will help me to man the lifeboat?' And Grace Darling who has a worthy place in any story collection featuring lifeboat heroism. Above all these are human stories using information gleaned from archives, contemporary newspaper accounts and genealogical records. 261pp in large softback, photos.

A masterpiece of paper engineering and for all collectors of pop-up books, here are 20 flaps to lift and giant pop-ups, the first of which is a map of Ancient Egypt in a booklet entitled Africa on the inside front cover. Lift the flap to discover a tomb of treasure where pharaohs were buried in beautifully decorated tombs surrounded by possessions that they might need in the Afterlife. The next double page spread takes us right inside a big pop-up pyramid complete with flap to lift to see the chambers concealed within and mystery spaces where today mini robots have explored and found miniature doors at the ends. We learn that the Sphinx was carved from a single block of stone and is 73m long, about the length of five buses. There is a feature on making a mummy which took about 70 days and each step is described and illustrated and the role of gods and priests. Pull up more flaps as you turn each page, the next one is a spectacular Tutankhamun's Death Mask with an explanation that the Ancient Egyptians believed that the spirits of the dead return to their bodies each night and a face mask gave the spirits a way to recognise their own remains. There is the mummy's journey on the funeral and pull and lift more flaps from the pop-up to find hidden treasure, great and small. With a useful glossary, this is designed for Egyptologists aged 7-70. 16 huge pages, popping out, 24.5 x 32.7cm.
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Which flamboyant king enjoyed wearing pink high heels? Which English Queen had 17 pregnancies but failed to produce an heir? From how Trojan Brutus may have been Britain's first king, the legendary Celtic founder of Bath Bladud who made Britain's first laws, holy wars and Boudicca, find out if Constantine the Great had a British grandfather, Arthur's role in a Somerset zodiac, and if the mystery of Sutton Hoo was this the state funeral of the Anglo Saxon King Redwald. Hadrian's Wall, Scottish monarchy, Alfred the Great, Eadwig the Lustful, Wessex pride, William 'Rufus' gets his comeuppance, uncrowned Queen Matilda mothers the Plantagenet dynasty, Henry II and his turbulent priest, King John, Edward I, Robert the Bruce, Edward III, Richard II, the murky rise of the House of Lancaster, Henry VI more monk than king, did Richard III really deserve his evil image? England's nine-day queen, brave Queen Elizabeth, Charles I and II, Mary distraught at having to marry unattractive William, the Georges and how sober William IV was a welcome relief, Victoria and beyond up to Elizabeth II, every king and queen of England is included, except for the young prince in the tower. 144pp, line art.

Among the bright lights and comfortable surroundings, the hustle and bustle of embarkation and the petty dramas and excitements of exploring a new ship, how many could have foreseen that in a little over 100 hours' time three quarters of their number would be dead and adrift on the freezing Atlantic, and the world's largest moving object - the apotheosis of human engineering achievement, wrought in iron and crewed by master mariners - would like broken up in stone cold pitch darkness 12,000 feet down on the sea bed, never to reach her destination a thousand miles away? It is a story with all the elements of high drama, tragedy, heroism, hubris, humanity and at times grim comedy - at every stage the Titanic's story is a highly sensory tale. Discover which novel predicted the disaster a whole 14 years before the maiden voyage, how a bottle of whiskey saved one of the crew and was a fire burning within the ship the real cause of its downfall? Find the answers to many amazing aspects in this absorbing collection of stories and trivia from stowaways to kidnapping, conspiracy theories and wreckage. The story travels from Belfast, Liverpool, Southampton, America and the characters of Captain Smith, Chief Officer Henry Wilde, John Jacob Astor IV, bedroom steward Henry Etches and stories from steerage to dressing Guggenheim. And stories of the Carpathia to the rescue, Cunard collecting the casualties, the tragic inactivity of the Californian, US and British enquiries, the indomitable Violet Jessop to memorabilia and Titanic in the cinema, it is a story of tragedy, tourism and trade. 144pp, line art.

Native Americans make up less than one per cent of the total US population, but represent half the nation's languages and cultures. Here in one grand sweep is the full story of America's indigenous peoples, their society, culture and religion, everything from the land-based spirituality of their early creation myths, and the late rise of Indian Pride, to the 88 uses to which the Sioux put the flesh and bones of the buffalo, and the practice of berdache (men adopted as women). The book offers a chronological history of Native Americans and their emergence out of the now submerged continent of Beringia, the 'forgotten wars' of the 16th and 17th centuries which wiped many tribes from the East Coast. It finally describes to the last struggles of the Cheyenne and the Comanche. Celebrating these peoples' way of life rather than focusing on the manner of their genocide, it does not ignore uncomfortable facts of the Amerindian past including suspected cannibalism and their part in the decimation of North America's buffalo herds. Some remarkable success stories are now emerging. A compelling account of the truth, tragedy and magic of America's original inhabitants. 571pp in mammoth paperback.

A Spectator Book of the Year, this is sweeping and poetic, tracing the epic paths of wanderers across 12,000 years. Sattin weaves stories of mobile tribes who lived beyond imperial borders and created their own kingdoms and empires - Scythian, Xiongnu, Persian, Hun, Arab, Mongul, Mughal, Ottoman and others. With their embrace of multiculturalism, respect for nature's rhythms, and need for free movement, wandering peoples brought a glorious cultural flourishing to Eurasia, enabling the Renaissance and changing the human story. This is the untold history of civilisation, told through its outsiders, a sweeping narrative reconnecting us with our deepest mythology, unrecorded antiquity, and our natural world. 'He not only describes the nomadic way of life but evokes it in a book of beauty and beguiling rhythm' according to The Times. 'The story begins in the Zagros Mountains, Iran, a young man walking towards me with a stick slung across his shoulder and a flock at his feet...' A page-turning narrative and a brilliant piece of scholarship. 357pp, paperback with line art.