Changes

[[Category:New Reviews|History]] __NOTOC__ <!-- Remove -->{{newreviewFrontpage|titleauthor=The Explorer GeneJacqueline Rose|authortitle=Tom CheshireWomen in Dark Times

|genre=HistoryBiography|summary=''The Explorer Gene'' relates the remarkable story of three generations world of the Piccard family, each of whom managed to push unconscious is not the boundaries antagonist of travel and break new frontiers. The grandfatherpolitical life, but its steadfast companion, Auguste Piccard was the first human hidden place or backdrop where any true revolution must begin…'' Women in Dark Times is Jacqueline Rose's homage to enter courageous women throughout history, particularly women of the stratosphere21st, using en experimental balloon of his own invention20th and 19th centuries. His later workHer historical and political backdrop is, designing submarinesthus, enabled his son Jacques to become the first person to descend to the bottom of the infamous Mariana trenchexpansive, setting yet she navigates it with intelligence and an acknowledgment that feminism's lengthy mission is a world record for the deepest dive. Grandson Bertrand became the first person testament to fly around its successes, and not its failures: ''the world in a balloon and now seeks to break new records by means ongoing force of a solar-powered craft that he intends to pilot all the way around the earthfeminism''.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1780720890</amazonuk>1804271713

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Ruth Goodman, Peter Ginn and Tom PinfoldMary McCarthy|title=Tudor Monastery Farm: Life in rural England 500 years agoMemories of a Catholic Girlhood

|genre=HistoryAutobiography|summary=Think of it Mary McCarthy describes herself as time travel. Three professional historians have travelled back some five hundred years to put what theyan 've learned into practice. On a monastery farm they've experienced what it was really like in rural Tudor England. Itamateur architect's a book to accompany the BBC television series but it's still a rich and rewarding experience if - like me - you missed , obsessively digging into the show. There's a wealth of experience between past to piece together the three authors and they write about what they each know best and it's all supplemented by some sumptuous photographs broken mosaic of Bayleaf Farm in west Sussex and the surrounding farmland.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849906920</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|title=High Minds: The Victorians and the Birth of Modern Britain|author=Simon Heffer|rating=4.5|genre=History|summary=Between 1840 and 1880 British her life and society underwent a gradual but major change. Young adults She attributes her ''burning interest in the latter year would have seen a very different country from that in which an earlier generation came past'' to maturity. The land in which povertyher orphanhood, diseaseas she lacked any second-hand memories from her parents, squalor and injustice were endemic, and who died in which the Chartists had agitated for fairer rights for all, had been largely transformed by the modernising factors of social upheaval and industrial change1918 flu epidemic.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847946771</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Anthony Summers|title=Not In Your Lifetime: The Assassination of JFK|rating=4.5|genre=True Crime|summary=Originally published as ''The Kennedy Conspiracy''This memoir chronicles her early years, Anthony Summers has massively revised the text, updated it beginning with the latest evidence and it's been republished as ''Not her orphanhood in Your Lifetime: The Assassination of JFK'' which refers to the statement made by Chief Justice Earl Warren who was asked if the truth about what happened would come out. He said that it wouldMinneapolis, Minnesota, but added where she lived under the rider that ''it might not be in your lifetime'harsh guardianship of her late father's Irish Catholic parents and her abusive Uncle Myers and Aunt Margaret. Fifty years on most of the people directly involved are now deadLater, but the truth has not officially emerged. In fact, it's difficult she moved to avoid the thought that the US government would prefer that it did not see the light of day. Further documents are due Seattle to be released in 2017, but, in the meantime Anthony Summer has examined what is available, investigated on his own behalf live with her maternal grandparents—her grandmother being Jewish and given us this comprehensive bookher grandfather Presbyterian—who provided her with a different kind of upbringing.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0755365429</amazonuk>1804271659

 {{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=1785633457|title=Great Britain's Great WarCharging Around: Exploring the Edges of England by Electric Car|author=Jeremy PaxmanClive Wilkinson

|genre=HistoryTravel|summary=Throughout the nineteenth century, Britain was regularly at war Clive Wilkinson has a history of travelling by unconventional means with one or more overseas nation, be it France, Russia, South Africa or elsewhere. These conflicts generally passed the public by, except a preference for families who had loved ones serving overseasslow travel. When As he neared his eightieth birthday the declaration idea of war against Germany was announced to exploring the crowds in London edges of England in August 1914, it an electric car was assumed that once again most people would not be affectedtotally outrageous. In fact, and that it would probably should be over by Christmas. This was proved wrong on both counts. A weary conflict dragged on a pleasant holiday for four long yearsClive and his wife, and nobody in Britain escaped from the long shadow which Joan, shouldn't it cast.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0670919616</amazonuk>?

 {{newreview|title=The Assassination of the Archduke: Sarajevo 1914 and the Murder That Changed the World|author=Greg King and Sue Woolmans|rating=5|genre=Biography|summary=Possibly no assassination in history can have had such momentous consequences for the history of the world as that of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria and his wife Sophie in Sarajevo, the capital of Bosnia, in June 1914. It was their killing which led directly to the outbreak of the First World War, just six weeks later.Frontpage|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0230759572</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewB09BLBP3P8|title=The First Bohemians: Life and Art in LondonNeville Chamberlain's Golden AgeWar: How Great Britain Opposed Hitler, 1939-1940|author=Vic GatrellFrederic Seager

|summary=It was in the eighteenth century that an area of London consisting of about half a square mile, from Soho Received wisdom and Leicester Square across Covent Garden’s Piazza simplified narrative often lead to Drury Lane, and down misconceptions about history. One such is the scrubbing from Long Acre to the Strand, with Covent Garden at popular imagination of the very centreearly days of World War II from 1939-40, became what has in modern times been recognised known as the world’s first creative ‘bohemia’''Phoney War''. This was where the cream of Britain’s significant artists, actors, poetsWe remember Neville Chamberlain appeasing Hitler, novelistswar breaking out, and dramatists of Churchill coming in to save the age lived day. Very little time is spent on this period in cultural reflections and workedyet, side by side with the city’s chief market tradersas Frederic Seager argues in this book, craftsmen, shopkeepers, rakes, pickpockets and prostitutes. One might say that all human life it was hereof vital significance in how the war played out.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846146771</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=3756228711|title=Inventing the EnemyCDC: Essays on EverythingThe happy years with a spectacular IT 'Phenomena'|author=Umberto EcoHans Bodmer

|summary=Imagine a sumptuous Italian feast in the sunlit-bathed ancient countryside near Milan. Next to you a gentleman talks and eats with furious energy. He tells ''The history of Dante, Cicero, and St Augustine and quotes a multitude of obscure troubadours from the Middle Ages. He repeats himself, gestures flamboyantly, nudges you sharply in the ribs, belches and even breaks wind. His conversation contains nuggets development of information but in the flow IT could fill books of his discourse there is a fondness for iteration and reiterationseveral hundred pages. He throws bones over his shoulder and when he reaches the cheese course - definitely too much information on the mouldy bacteria! When you finally get up things the elderly gentleman has said prompt your imagination. You are better informed, intrigued and prodded to examine his discourse again and again, even if only to challenge what you have heard. Such are the effects of reading Eco’s essays in ''Inventing the Enemy''.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099553945</amazonuk>}}

{{newreview|title=The Crooked Timber Of Humanity|author=Isaiah Berlin|rating=4Author Hans Bodmer is quite right about that.5|genre=History|summary=''The Crooked Timber of Humanity'' is a collection of essays by philosopher Isaiah Berlin, born in Riga, He has chosen totell us about the short, later in lifebut explosive, become an Oxford student and one history of the institution's more notable alumniControl Data Company, continuing to influence the university byCDC, among other things, cofounding Wolfson Collegefor whom he worked. Altogether, the collection presents BerlinIt's observations of Western thought. The history of morals a fascinating tale, told in the West was a mixture of particular interest to Berlin, as well as how these morals informed the more obvious changes in philosophy, literature, culture technological summary and much morewry anecdote.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1845952081</amazonuk>

 {{newreview|title=A Very British Murder: the Story of a National ObsessionFrontpage|author=Lucy Worsley|rating=4.5|genre=True Crime|summary=The British are an illogical race. Short of genocide, murder is the worst, most shocking crime an individual can commit, yet it has become a kind of commodity which over the last years has been endlessly packaged as a mass market entertainment industry. We buy newspapers and magazines with blow-by-blow accounts of dreadful true life cases, we read thrillers, watch TV drama series Jeremy Dronfield and documentaries, and we can take part in murder mystery evenings and weekends at pubs and hotels.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849906343</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewDavid Ziggy Greene|title=1912: The Year the World Discovered Antarctica|author=Chris TurneyFritz and Kurt

|genre=HistoryConfident Readers|summary=If you read those products designed We start with the pair of brothers Fritz and Kurt, and their muckers, doing things any Jewish lad in 1930s Vienna would want to make you a published authordo – kicking things around the empty market place, helping the neighbours, one way being dutiful when it comes to start according the synagogue choir and at a vocational school. Kurt has to so many of make sure the lamps are turned on at their very Orthodox neighbours' each Friday night – the Sabbath preventing them for using anything nearly as mechanical and workmanlike as a light switch. But this is the time just before the Austrian leader is going to look ahead for cave to Hitler's will, and instead of having a pertinent anniversarynational vote to keep the Nazis out, research or know your subject well, and write well invite them in with open arms. ''Kristallnacht'' happened in advance and Vienna just as popularly much as you can on whatever in Germany, as did all the subject isround-ups of Jews. Make no mistakeThese in their turn leave the younger Kurt at home with his mother and sisters anxious to hear word of an evacuation to Britain or the US, however – Chris Turneywhile Fritz and his father are, even if he would appear to have followed that dictum unknown initially to the lasteach other, is no chancer with packed off on the eye same train to Buchenwald and the temporary relevancestone quarry there. And us wondering how the titular event for the adult variant of all this could come about…|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1845952103</amazonuk>024156574X

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Mark WhiteJohn Henry Phillips|title=Kennedy: A Cultural History of an American IconThe Search|rating=45

|summary=During his lifetime John Fitzgerald Kennedy created an image of himself that dazzled and which has largely remained intact despite the steady leakage of information over Archaeology cannot be child's play, when you're scraping in the years which could have been expected dirt looking to tarnishfind what you can find, often knowing there should be something there but not always confident what. It could Archaeology must be argued that - much a fair bit harder when you set out to find some specific thing. This book is a case of the latter, as in our author promises to locate the case topic of Elvis Presley and Princess Diana - death was an excellent career movethe titular search. And he really hasn't made it easy for himself – the search area is a wide one, but Mark White examines the way the image was built uptarget might not exist any more – oh, then maintained and it's underwater, when he cannot dive. Latching on to a particular D- after Day veteran through helping the heroic old man's visit back to France, our author has promised to find the assassination - burnishedlanding craft that delivered him to Normandy, reinforced and protectedthat he was lucky to survive when it sank from beneath him. The secondary aim is to erect a memorial to everyone else aboard, the vast majority of whom perished.Who else would make such promises to someone in their nineties?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1441161864</amazonuk>1472146182

 {{newreviewFrontpage|isbn= B09F4CTKJR|title=Armchair Nation: An intimate history of Britain in front of the TVFlights for Freedom|author=Joe MoranSteven Burgauer

|genre=EntertainmentHistorical Fiction|summary=All It's the later stages of us have World War I and the United States has just entered the conflict. Petrol Petronus is a love-hate affair with television, or ‘the idiot lantern’. Hardly anybody young American who has ever owned a set, or been part of a family which has had one, can envisage life without it. It has been a source of endless entertainment signed up and escape from joined the drudge of everyday life, while at some time it has irritated most of us beyond measure17 Aero Squadron. Love it or loathe itThis company was the first US Aero Squadron to be trained in Canada, it has always been part of the fabric of our existencefirst to be attached to the RAF and the first to be sent into the skies to fight the Germans in active combat. While to a certain extent it But before that can happen, Petrol has been superseded by online services which have supplemented if not overtaken or usurped part of its role, its iconic status is unlikely to disappear for master flying the foreseeable futurenotoriously difficult but majestic Sopwith Camel.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846683912</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=0578761718|title=Anti-Judaism: A The Inspiring History of a Way of ThinkingSpecial Relationship|author=David NirenbergNancy Carver

|summary=Initially The church of St Mary Aldermanbuy had existed in the choice City of title seemed an odd one on account London from at least 1181, when it was first mentioned in records. Sadly, the original church was destroyed in the Great Fire of London in 1666. It was rebuilt in Portland stone from a design by Sir Christopher Wren soon after the more widely used termfire and then survived for centuries until World War II, anti-Semitismwhen it was again ruined by bombs during the Blitz. The distinction is quickly made though, But that unlike wasn't the latterend of its story: after a phenomenal fundraising effort, anti-Judaism does not need real Jews the stones from the church's walls were transported to flourishFulton, but is fuelled by an idea aloneMissouri. In fact this is a core tenet There, in the grounds of Nirenberg’s thesis. Throughout history Westminster College, the idea of ‘Judaism’ is raised church was rebuilt and today serves as an existential spectre in societies where there may be no Jewish members at all. This is a chilling reality, and Nirenberg charts the course of how this came memorial to beWinston Churchill. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1781851131</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=1784385166|title=VictoriaThe Third Reich in 100 Objects: A Material History of Nazi Germany|author=Roger Moorhouse|rating=5|genre=History|summary=What is the first image that comes to mind when you think of the Third Reich? Hitler? A swastika? The Nazi salute? The gate to a concentration camp? None of these are comfortable images but they are emblematic of the Third Reich's Madmen: Revolution fascist regime in all its iniquity. But some objects and Alienationimages from that time may be less familiar to you. In this short volume, Roger Moorhouse has attempted to illustrate the period of the Third Reich through one hundred of its material artefacts. }}{{Frontpage|author=Clive BloomLun Zhang, Adrien Gombeaud, Ameziane and Edward Gauvin (translator)|title=Tiananmen 1989: Our Shattered Hopes

|genre=HistoryGraphic Novels|summary=Despite I never really followed the revisionist work events of a few writers and historians, our prevailing image Tiananmen Square with much attention when it was playing out – someone in the second half of the Victorian age their teens has generally been one of staid conformityother priorities, superiority and stuffiness, during which only a few dissenters put their heads above the parapetyou know. Clive Bloom sums it up rather succinctly on I certainly didn't know of the first page as a ‘monolith weeks of steam protests and class conflict, antimacassars hunger strikes from the students before the massacre and aspidistras’. A page later, he describes the nineteenth century – most birth of which was covered by the Victorian era – as one divided by three groupsTank Man image, namely those who represented I didn't know how the old Georgian decadence, the young Turks eager area had long been a venue for reformpolitical protest, and finally I didn't know more than a group who felt an allegiance to spit about the world of their forebears but were forced to exist people involved on either side. This book is practically flawless in giving a world general browser's context for the whole season of confirming moralism and priggishness. The young Turks, he concludes, ultimately wonprotests back in 1989.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0230313825</amazonuk>1684056993

 {{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=0648684806|title=Inferno DecodedClara Colby: The essential companion to the myths, mysteries and locations of Dan Brown's InfernoInternational Suffragist|author=Michael HaagJohn Holliday

|genre=EntertainmentBiography|summary=Here be spoilersThe path of Clara Dorothy Bewick's life was probably determined when her family emigrated to the USA. At the time she was just three-years-old but because of some childhood ailment, she wasn't allowed to sail with her parents and three brothers. Instead, she remained with her grandparents, who doted on her and saw that she received a good education, both in and out of school. Not so much She was the only child in my reviewthe household and her childhood was glorious. By contrast, but certainly her family had become pioneer farmers in its subjectthe mid-west of the United States and life was hard, a very quickly produced companion guide as Clara was to find out when she and her grandparents eventually went to join the latest [[:Category:Dan Brown|Dan Brown]] blockbusterfamily. It's not so much Clara would only know her mother for a page-by-page guidefew months: she was married for fifteen years, had ten pregnancies, but certainly serves as an educational seven surviving children and intelligent look at died in childbirth not long after Clara arrived. As the background to the biggest-selling book of 2013eldest girl, a heavy burden would fall on Clara and Wisconsin was a rude awakening.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1781251800</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=1783784350|title=The Black CountThis Golden Fleece: Glory, revolution, betrayal and the real Count of Monte CristoA Journey Through Britain's Knitted History|author=Tom ReissEsther Rutter

|summary=While It was December and Esther Rutter was stuck in her office job, writing to people she'd never met and preparing spreadsheets. The job frustrated her and even her knitting did not soothe her mind. January was going to be a time for making changes and she decided that she would travel the novels length and breadth of Alexandre Dumasthe British Isles with occasional forays abroad, like ''The Three Musketeers'' discovering and ''The Count telling the story of Monte Cristowool's history and how it had made and changed the landscape. She', weren't true, they were based d grown up on a real hero sheep farm in Suffolk - Dumas's own father. Born the son of ' a slave and a French nobleman, General Alexandre Dumas would go free-range child on to rise to fame the farm'' - and fortune during the French Revolution, only learned to face racism, betrayalspin, knit and a rivalry with Napoleon Bonaparte which would eventually lead to the virtual disappearance weave from history of this incredible figureher mother and her mother's friend. This was in her blood.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099575132</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=1789017977|title=TutankhamenRonnie and Hilda's CurseRomance: The Developing Towards a New Life after World War II|author=Wendy Williams|rating=4|genre=History |summary=Ronnie Williams was the son of Thomas Henry Williams (known as Harry) and Ethel Wall. There's some doubt as to whether or not they were ever married or even Harry's birthdate: he claimed to have been born in 1863, but he was already many years older than Ethel and he might well have shaved a few years off his age. For a while the family was quite well-to-do but disaster struck in the 1929 Depression and five-year-old Ronnie had to adjust to a very different lifestyle. One thing he did inherit from his father was his need to be well-turned-out and this would stay with him throughout his life. He joined the army at eighteen in 1942.}}{{Frontpage|isbn=1980891117|title=G Engleheart Pinxit 1805: A year in the life of an Egyptian KingGeorge Engleheart|author=Joyce TyldesleyJohn Webley

|genre=HistoryArt|summary=The striking cover George Engleheart was one of 'Tutankhamen’s Curse' certainly has the leading portrait miniaturists of Georgian London, with a way career lasting from the 1770s to the Regency era. He was also one of arresting the reader’s attentionmost prolific, painting nearly 5,000 miniatures altogether (over twenty of them being of King George III). The iconic golden funeral mask peers out from an ink-black background Throughout most of that time he carefully recorded the names of each of his clients, and those heavily-lined Egyptian eyes seem subsequently transcribed them into what is referred to stare eerily into the soul of the beholderas his fee book.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1861971664</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=1789016304|title=War and Love: A Very British Killing: The Death family's testament of Baha Mousaanguish, endurance and devotion in occupied Amsterdam|author=A T WilliamsMelanie Martin

|summary=Almost ten years ago on a Sunday morning back Melanie Martin read about what happened to Dutch Jews in September 2003occupied Amsterdam during World War II and was entranced by what she discovered, British Troops raided a hotel particularly in Basra''The Diary of Ann Frank'' but then realised that her own family's stories were equally fascinating. It was a difficult period in A hundred and seven thousand Jews were deported from the city during the occupationwar years, six months on from the U.S. led invasion. Temperatures but only five thousand survived and Martin could not understand how this could be allowed to happen in a country with liberal values who were more than 50 degrees centigraderesistant to German occupation. Members of Most people believed that the occupation could never happen: even those who thought that the Queen's Lancashire Regiment (QLR) took ten suspects in for questioning from a hotel in Germans might reach the vicinity of insurgent weaponry. The Iraqis city were hoodedconvinced that they would soon be pushed back, plasticuffed, forced into stress positions and subjected that the Amsterdammers would never allow what happened to karate chops and kidney punches by escalate in the British. Other men and officers watchedway that it did, walked by or wondered at but initial protests melted away as the stench that resulted from vicious punishmentorganisers became more circumspect. After 36 hours It's an atrocity on a vast scale but made up of tens of thousands of torture, a 26 year-old hotel receptionist lay dead by asphyxiation. His grossly disfigured body bore 93 individual injuries. There are now in the region of another 250 individuals, men and women, whose families are making legal claims to have been killed in further encounters with British patrols or prison guardstragedies.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099575116</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=1908745819|title=The Shadow King: The Bizarre Afterlife of King Tut's MummySurfacing|author=Jo MarchantKathleen Jamie

|summary=''NowSometimes when people suggest that you read a certain book, if Ithey tell you 'd known'this one has your name on it'<br>'. Mostly we take them at their word, or not, but rarely do we ask them why they thought so unless it turns out that we didn'Theyt like the book. That'd line up just s a rare experience. People who are sensitive to see himhearing a book calling your name, rarely get it wrong. In this case,''<br>''Iwas told why. The blurb speaks of the author considering 'd taken all my money'an older, less tethered sense of herself.'<br>''And bought me a museum Older. Less tethered.That'' These lyrics, taken from s not a popular Steve Martin song, perfectly epitomize a phenomenon first described in the New York Times, February 1923bad description of where I am. The craze came Add to be known as ''Tut-Mania'' and even nowthat my love of the natural world, ninety years later, there is something about of those aspects of the boy-king with the golden mask poetic and lyrical that ignites the imagination are about style not form, and curiosity substance most of each subsequent generationall, about connection. Of course, this book had my name on it. It was written for me. It would have found its way to me eventually. I am pleased to have it fall onto my path so quickly.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0306821338</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=0857058320|title=The Last BattleLord Of All the Dead|author=Stephen HardingJavier Cercas and Anne McLean (translator)|rating=4.5

|summary=May 4, 1945 saw ''Lord Of All the unconditional surrender of all German troops in Germany in Northwest Germany, Dead'' is a journey to uncover the Netherlands, Denmark author's lost ancestor's life and Bavariadeath. Berlin had surrendered two days earlier. A few more areas remained officially at war, but even Cercas is searching for the meaning behind his great uncle's death in the most diehard supporter must have realised Germany had fallenSpanish Civil War. The war was overManuel Mena, to most soldiersCercas' great uncle, although VE day would be delayed for a few more days. But is the most implausible battle of figure who looms large over the second world war was about to beginbook. Had 'He died relatively young whilst fighting for Francisco Franco's forces. Cercas ruminates on why his uncle fought for this dictator. The Last Battle'' been fiction, I would have scoffed question at the unlikely alliance featured in centre of this book as too unbelievable. A final battle played out in isolated Austrian castle was to rescue French VIPs held as honour prisoners. They were is whether it is possible for his great uncle to be protected by the oddest ensemble of soldiers ever known. A ranking member of the S.S., a decorated Wehrmacht officer and his troops, the Austrian resistance and a few American soldiers against a suicidal S.S. troop bent on carrying as many killings as possible before hero whilst having fought for the inevitable endwrong side.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0306822083</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|titleisbn=The Riddle of the Labyrinth0008294011|authortitle=Margalit Fox|rating=5|genre=History|summary=Meet Linear B. It's the name given How to an ancient writing system discovered in 1900, and has stuck ever since then. If you need to know more, it's Lose a linear style of writing, and is linked to Linear A. There, that's that cleared up. But it took an awful long time Country: The 7 Steps from Democracy to clear anything more up – while people knew some things about Linear B, and why and how they got to be holding it in their hands, the actual language it contained, and its meaning, was a truly intellectual challenge. It was five whole decades of obscurity, annoyingly secretive archaeologists and more, between Sir Arthur Evans finding Linear B on copious clay tablets on Crete, and its interpretation. In between those two landmarks was an unsung American heroine, and this book is both an incredibly readable guide to everything regarding Linear B, and a study of her contribution.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1781251320</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewDictatorship|author=Jonathan Dimbleby|title=Destiny in the Desert: The Road to El Alamein - the Battle that Turned the TideEce Temelkuran

|summary=El Alamein is A little while ago a totemic British battle, standing as it does friend asked me if I thought that we were living through what in years to come would be discussed by A level history students when faced with others which turned the tide of our fortunes. The Allies were still smarting from question ''Discuss the effects of Dunkirk and harbouring the knowledge that had Hitler elected factors which led to press his advantage then the situation could have been very different. ..'' Churchill is often quoted as saying I agreed that there were no victories before El Alamein she was right and no defeats afterwards. This isnwasn't true - 'certain whether it seemed was a good or bad thing thatwe didn't know what all ' is generally omitted from the beginning this' was leading to. I think now that I do know. We are in danger of the quote - but losing democracy and whilst it does sum up the fact that the battle turned the tide of 's a flawed system I can'perceptiont think of a better one, particularly as the 'benevolent dictator' is as well rare as the fortunes of war, which was quite an achievement for fighting which took place on land to which none of the major participants had any legitimate claimhen's teeth.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846684455</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=1788037812|title=Ruta's ClosetThe Fraternity of the Estranged: The Fight for Homosexual Rights in England, 1891-1908|author=Keith Morgan with Ruth Kron SigalBrian Anderson|rating=45

|summary=A Holocaust memoir. ThereOriginally passed in 1885, I've said it, and the law that had made homosexual relations a crime remained in one fell swoop I've consigned place for 82 years. But during this book to a niche markettime, and a small – and very much overrestrictions on same-supplied – audiencesex relationships did not go unchallenged. Such Between 1891 and 1908, three books do find it difficult to get their heads above on the parapet nature of homosexuality appeared. They were written by two homosexual men: Edward Carpenter and John Addington Symonds, as well as the heterosexual Havelock Ellis. Exploring the voice within heard, margins of society and it seems they have slowly filled in all studying homosexuality was common on the gaps European Continent, but barely talked about in the available knowledge about UK, so the Holocaust. But that's the point that makes those words sound churlish publications of these men were hugely significant – every life that survived that nightmare has contributing to fill in a gapthe scientific understanding of homosexuality, and account beginning the struggle for those who committed the crimes recognition and those that helped out and rescued a survivorequality, and serve as monument leading to those six million gaps it created. Luckily, mostly on account the milestone legalisation of location, this book certainly does serve to fill in a wider gap same-sex relationships in our perception of WWII than most1967.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1906509263</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=1910593508|title=The Double Cross System Apollo|author=J C MastermanMatt Fitch, Chris Baker and Mike Collins

|summary=This ''Vintage'' re-issue of Masterman's account incredible graphic novel is a love letter to the Moon landings and the passion for the subject drips off every Apollo by Matt Fitch, Chris Baker and Mike Collins. This is a story we know well and because of this, the authors take a few narrative shortcuts knowing that we can fill in the work of blanks. These shortcuts are the Twenty Committee is subtitled only downside to the 'classic account of World War Two Spy-Masters'book. ThatIf you's ve ever read a somewhat misleading tease. The comic book isn't really about adaptation of a film you will be familiar with the spy-masters, very little information is given about those recruiting, turning, running slight feeling that there are scenes missing and protecting the spiesthat dialogue has been trimmed. More information - but again relatively little - This is given about the spies themselvesa graphic novel that could easily have been three times as long and still felt too short.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099578239</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Chris West1786331047|title=First ClassThe Race to Save the Romanovs: A History of Britain in 36 Postage StampsThe Truth Behind the Secret Plans to Rescue Russia's Imperial Family|author=Helen Rappaport

|summary=As a philatelist The basic facts about the deaths of Nicholas and lover Alexandra, some of historywhich were deliberately obscured at the time for various reasons, I approached this book with even more curiosity than usualhave long since been established. The subtitle suggested a very intriguing approachFor the last few months of their lives in Russia the former Tsar and Tsarina, their children and few remaining servants were held in increasingly squalid, humiliating captivity. To prevent them from being rescued, but would it work? I’m glad in July 1918 the revolutionary regime had them all shot and bayoneted to report that it diddeath in circumstances which, once the news was confirmed beyond all doubt, horrified their relatives in Europe.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224095463</amazonuk>

 {{newreview|author=Gavin Mortimer|title=A History of Cricket in 100 Objects|rating=4|genre=Sport|summary=Move on to [[A History of Football in 100 Objects by Gavin Mortimer|A History of Football in 100 ObjectsNewest Home and Family Reviews]] was a brave attempt, but was slightly let down by being a little too clinical. Being a game imbued with passion, the book lacked this which took some of the edge off it. Cricket, whilst inspiring passion amongst devotees, has a slightly more laid back following; one that may work better in this format. That said, being a game that has been played for five centuries, narrowing it down to just 100 objects is no less an undertaking than for football.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846689406</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Polly Morland|title=The Society of Timid Souls: Or, How to be Brave|rating=3.5|genre=Reference|summary='I see no reason why the shy and timid in any community couldn’t get together and help each other.' The above words were uttered in 1943 by a gentleman called Bernard Gabriel. Mr Gabriel was a piano player who founded a unique club, ''The Society of Timid Souls'' that encouraged timid performers and fear-wracked musicians to come in out of the cold 'to play, to criticise and be criticised in order to conquer that old bogey of stage fright.' The method evidently worked, as many a timid soul claimed to be cured by these unorthodox methods and club membership grew considerably in the years that followed.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1781251908</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Paul Strathern|title=The Spirit of Venice: From Marco Polo to Casanova|rating=4|genre=History|summary=There are several ways of telling the history of the republic of Venice, which is generally regarded as the first great economic and naval power of the western world. Strathern has chosen to do so largely through the lives of various famous (and also infamous) people from Marco Polo in the late thirteenth century to what he calls its destruction, 'both political and symbolic', at the hands of Napoleon Bonaparte in 1797. On the whole, the major events such as its wars are covered fairly briefly. An exception, fittingly enough, is made in the case of a chapter on the war which began its decline in the fifteenth century, when it tried to hold Thessalonica against the Ottomans, and sent ships to help defend Constantinople against the Turkish army but found itself heavily defeated in the subsequent lengthy war, as a result of which it lost most of its possessions.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1845951921</amazonuk>}}