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[[Category:New Reviews|History]] __NOTOC__ <!-- Remove -->{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Jason Quinn and Naresh KumarJacqueline Rose|title=World War Two: Against the Rising Sun (Campfire Graphic Novels)Women in Dark Times|rating=4.5|genre=Children's Non-Fiction Biography|summary=World War Two – so often a lesson subject for our primary school children, even after all this time. Nazis, Soviets, Pearl Harbor – but wait. That last wasn't just 'The world of the clarion call to unconscious is not the Americans to join in with antagonist of political life, but its steadfast companion, the rest of our Allies – it was a mere episode hidden place or backdrop where any true revolution must begin…'' Women in a fuller story – the half Dark Times is Jacqueline Rose's homage to courageous women throughout history, particularly women of the war that was never seen by those in Europe21st, beyond the fact the British Empire was certainly changed forever20th and 19th centuries. The War in the Pacific Her historical and political backdrop is something I was certainly never taught much about in school, at any age. And herethus, expansive, yet she navigates it with intelligence and an acknowledgment that feminism's lengthy mission is a graphic novel version testament to its successes, and not its failures: ''the ongoing force of the tale from a publisher in India that can serve at last as a salutary lessonfeminism''.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>9381182051</amazonuk>1804271713

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Lewis Helfand and Lalit Kumar SharmaMary McCarthy|title=World War Two: Under the Shadow Memories of the Swastika (Campfire Graphic Novels)a Catholic Girlhood

|genre=Children's Non-FictionAutobiography|summary=One Mary McCarthy describes herself as an ''amateur architect'', obsessively digging into the past to piece together the broken mosaic of her life. She attributes her ''burning interest in the most common subjects at primary schoolpast'' to her orphanhood, getting on for three generations since it happenedas she lacked any second-hand memories from her parents, is of course World War Twowho died in the 1918 flu epidemic. It has This memoir chronicles her early years, beginning with her orphanhood in Minneapolis, Minnesota, where she lived under the impact that sixty million dead people deserve – but only if itharsh guardianship of her late father's taught correctlyIrish Catholic parents and her abusive Uncle Myers and Aunt Margaret. One of the ways Later, she moved to present it is this book, which comes from a slightly surprising place – an Indian publisher completely new Seattle to me – but succeeds in live with her maternal grandparents—her grandmother being remarkably competent, complete Jewish and really quite readableher grandfather Presbyterian—who provided her with a different kind of upbringing.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>9381182140</amazonuk>1804271659

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Stacy Schiff1785633457|title= The WitchesCharging Around: Salem 1692Exploring the Edges of England by Electric Car|author=Clive Wilkinson|rating= 5|genre= HistoryTravel|summary= Like most people I know Clive Wilkinson has a history of travelling by unconventional means with a preference for slow travel. As he neared his eightieth birthday the story idea of Salem through exploring the very particular lens edges of _The Crucible_. That particular lens was the very current witch-hunt that England in an electric car was going on at the timenot totally outrageous. Arthur Miller's play is rightly seen as an allegory of the McCarthyism in 1950s America – but having read Schiff's more academic approach to the source taleIn fact, itshould be a pleasant holiday for Clive and his wife, Joan, shouldn's easy to see that Miller's drama is much more about the hunting down of the 'red menace' than about what might have happened in New England two hundred and fifty years earlier.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>147460224X</amazonuk>t it?

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Roger MoorhouseB09BLBP3P8|title=The DevilsNeville Chamberlain' Alliances War: How Great Britain Opposed Hitler's Pact with Stalin, 1939-19411940|author=Frederic Seager|rating=34.5

|summary=Before WWII started, you didn't really have peace. Tensions had hardly settled down since the Great War, and there had been conflicts several times since, particularly in what would become the Theatre of War in eastern Europe. Nazi Germany and the Soviet regime were already at loggerheads, with the former supporting Japanese aggression in eastern Asia. They were bedfellows in evil, but very much on opposing sides. But with things stirring like never before under Hitler's expansionist activities, Received wisdom and despite numerous instances of this side talking simplified narrative often lead to that potential enemy misconceptions about the other, Nazi and Communist seemed to be firm foeshistory. Both had publicly been denouncing One such is the other – scrubbing from the Soviets deeming Nazis one side popular imagination of the same corruptearly days of World War II from 1939-40, capitalist coin known as us Brits, the Hitlerites already equating Communism with Jewry. But from under that period when the sides were ''pouring buckets of shit on each otherPhoney War's heads'' (sorry for the language. We remember Neville Chamberlain appeasing Hitler, but it’s me quoting Stalinwar breaking out, believe it or not) came an extraordinary Pact – one of a handful in fact, that deemed Germany and Russia non-aggressors and collaborators, - just Churchill coming in time for them to share Poland between themselvessave the day. The initial document was shortVery little time is spent on this period in cultural reflections and yet, but had an impact to affect 50 million people thenas Frederic Seager argues in this book, and many millions now – and yet it's hardly been was of vital significance in how the subject of a full look before nowwar played out.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099571897</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Hugh Bicheno3756228711|title=Battle RoyalCDC: The Wars of Lancaster and York, 1450-1464 (Wars of the Roses Book 1)happy years with a spectacular IT 'Phenomena'|author=Hans Bodmer|rating=4.5

|summary=Lancastrian Henry VI ''The history of the development of IT could fill books of several hundred pages.'' Author Hans Bodmer is an ailing kingquite right about that. Politically his popularity waivers as He has chosen to tell us about the short, but explosive, history of the Control Data Company, CDC, for whom he spends English money on apparently fruitless wars worked. It's a fascinating tale, told in a mixture of technological summary and wry anecdote. }}{{Frontpage|author=Jeremy Dronfield and David Ziggy Greene|title=Fritz and Kurt|rating=4|genre=Confident Readers|summary=We start with the pair of brothers Fritz and Kurt, and their muckers, doing things any Jewish lad in France 1930s Vienna would want to do – kicking things around the empty market place, helping the neighbours, being dutiful when it comes to the synagogue choir and physically his poor mental health translates at a vocational school. Kurt has to make sure the lamps are turned on at their very Orthodox neighbours' each Friday night – the Sabbath preventing them for using anything nearly as unreliability mechanical and physical weaknessworkmanlike as a light switch. His queenBut this is the time just before the Austrian leader is going to cave to Hitler's will, Marguerite dand instead of having a national vote to keep the Nazis out, invite them in with open arms. 'Anjou is determined to shore up any shortfall for 'Kristallnacht'' happened in Vienna just as much as in Germany, as did all the sake round-ups of Jews. These in their turn leave the country younger Kurt at home with his mother and her children but sisters anxious to hear word of an evacuation to Britain or the House of York has US, while Fritz and his father are, unknown initially to each other ideas, packed off on the same train to Buchenwald and the stone quarry there. And so begins bloody (and rather fascinating) civil war…us wondering how the titular event for the adult variant of all this could come about…|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1781859655</amazonuk>024156574X

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author= Benedict RogersJohn Henry Phillips|title= Burma: A Nation at the CrossroadsThe Search|rating= 3.5|genre= History|summary= Benedict Rogers Archaeology cannot be child's play, when you're scraping in the dirt looking to find what you can find, often knowing there should be something there but not always confident what. Archaeology must be a fair bit harder when you set out to find some specific thing. This book is a human rights activist and journalist with an expert insight into Burmacase of the latter, gathered first-hand on journeys as our author promises to regions off locate the topic of the beaten tracktitular search. Burma And he really hasn't made it easy for himself – the search area is a country under wide one, the iron rule of target might not exist any more – oh, and it's underwater, when he cannot dive. Latching on to a succession of military regimesparticular D-Day veteran through helping the heroic old man's visit back to France, our author has promised to find the landing craft that delivered him to Normandy, struggling with over half and that he was lucky to survive when it sank from beneath him. The secondary aim is to erect a century of sufferingmemorial to everyone else aboard, much unknown to the wider international audiencevast majority of whom perished.Who else would make such promises to someone in their nineties?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1846044464</amazonuk>1472146182

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Allan MetcalfB09F4CTKJR|title=From Skedaddle to Selfie: Words of the GenerationFlights for Freedom|author= Steven Burgauer|rating=34.5|genre=TriviaHistorical Fiction|summary=It's the later stages of World War I have to go a roundabout way to introducing this book, so bear with me. It stems partly from dictionaries and the etymology of United States has just entered the language we use, but more so if anything from conflict. Petrol Petronus is a different couple of books, young American who has signed up and their ideas of generationsjoined the 17 Aero Squadron. The authors of those posited This company was the idea that all those archetypical generations – the Baby Boomers, the Millennials, and those before, first US Aero Squadron to be trained in between and since – have their own cyclical patternCanada, and the history of humanity has been and will first to be formed by attached to the interplay of just four different kinds, running (with only one exception) in regular order. I don't really hold much store by that, RAF and I certainly didn't know we'd started one since the Millennials – who first to be sent into the skies to fight the heck decides such things, for one? ''Somebody must have put out an order'', as someone here says of something elseGermans in active combat. But in the same way as generations get defined by collective persons unknownbefore that can happen, so do words – and those words are certainly a clue Petrol has to what was important, predominant and of course spoken in each decademaster flying the notoriously difficult but majestic Sopwith Camel.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>019992712X</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Stephen Halliday0578761718|title=Cathedrals and Abbeys (Amazing and Extraordinary Facts)The Inspiring History of a Special Relationship|author=Nancy Carver

|summary=What makes a cathedral? It's not automatically the principal The church of anywhere that is made a city – St Davids is a village Mary Aldermanbuy had existed in the City of 2London from at least 1181,000 people, and wasn't always a city, but always had a cathedralwhen it was first mentioned in records. Sadly, as did Chelmsford. It's not the seat original church was destroyed in the Great Fire of a bishop – Glasgow has the building but not the person, and hasn't had a bishop since 1690London in 1666. It's not was rebuilt in Portland stone from a minster – that's something completely different, design by Sir Christopher Wren soon after the fire and if you can understand the sign in the delightful Beverley Minster describing the differencethen survived for centuries until World War II, that I saw only when it was again ruined by bombs during the other month, you're a better man I, Gunga DinBlitz. Luckily this book doesnBut that wasn't touch on minsters much, and we can understand abbeysthe end of its story: after a phenomenal fundraising effort, so it's only the vast majority of this book that is saddled with stones from the definition problem. Itchurch's clearly not a real problemwalls were transported to Fulton, and those it does have are by-passableMissouri. There, for this successfully defines a cathedral as somewhere in the grounds of major importanceWestminster College, fine trivia the church was rebuilt and greatly worthy of our attentiontoday serves as a memorial to Winston Churchill.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1910821047</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Dominic Pearce1784385166|title= Henrietta MariaThe Third Reich in 100 Objects: A Material History of Nazi Germany|author=Roger Moorhouse|rating= 4.5|genre= History|summary=The phrase 'tragic Queen' What is an often overused one, but the French princess who became first image that comes to mind when you think of the second Stuart Queen Consort 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 Britain surely has as strong a claim as any to the titleThird Reich's fascist regime in all its iniquity. In British history she was unique in But some objects and images from that she not only lived time may be less familiar to see her husband defeated in civil waryou. In this short volume, but also sentenced Roger Moorhouse has attempted to death and in effect judicially murderedillustrate the period of the Third Reich through one hundred of its material artefacts.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1445645475</amazonuk> 

{{newreviewFrontpage|author= Zoe Bramley|title= The Shakespeare Trail|rating= 4|genre= Trivia|summary= It has been 400 years since William ShakespeareLun Zhang, the man heralded as the greatest writer in the English languageAdrien Gombeaud, Ameziane and England's national poet, died. Shakespeare has made a profound mark on our culture and heritage, yet many aspects of his life remain in the shadows, and many places throughout England have forgotten their association with him. Here, Zoe Bramley takes the reader on a journey through hundreds of places associated with Shakespeare – many whose connections will come as a surprise to most. Filled with intriguing titbits of information about Shakespeare, Elizabethan England, and the places that she talks about, this is no mere travel guide. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1445646846</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author= Stephen HallidayEdward Gauvin (translator)|title=London (Amazing and Extraordinary Facts)Tiananmen 1989: Our Shattered Hopes

|genre=TriviaGraphic Novels|summary= What makes a city? Is I never really followed the events of Tiananmen Square with much attention when it was playing out – someone in the materials, such as the very London Stone itself, second half of mythological repute, that their teens has moved around several timesother priorities, and now forms part of a WH Smithyou know. I certainly didn's branch? (This has nothing, t know of course, on Temple Bar, which has also been known to walk.) Is it the people – the butchers [[Jack the Ripper: CSI: Whitechapel by John Bennett weeks of protests and Paul Begg|(Jack hunger strikes from the Ripper)]], students before the bakers (or whoever set fire to the entire city from Pudding Lane) massacre and the candlestick makers? Is it birth of the infrastructureTank Man image, from I didn't know how the Underground, whose one-time boss got area had long been a medal from Stalin venue for his successpolitical protest, to and I didn't know more than a spit about the London Bridge itself, that people involved on either side. This book is practically flawless in its own wanderlust means itgiving a general browser's highly unlikely the Thames will freeze again? However you define a city, London certainly has a lot going context for it as regards weird and wonderful, and the trivial yet fascinating. And, luckily for us, so has this bookwhole season of protests back in 1989.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1910821020</amazonuk>1684056993

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Stephen Halliday0648684806|title=London Underground (Amazing and Extraordinary Facts)Clara Colby: The International Suffragist|author=John Holliday

|genre=TravelBiography|summary= From initial worries about smuttyThe 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, enclosed air 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 pungent smell to decades of human hair good education, both in and engine grease causing escalator fires; from just a few lines connecting London termini to major jaunts out into Metro-land for of school. She was the only child in the suburbia-bound commuters; household and from a few religious-minded if financially dodgy her childhood was glorious. By contrast, her family had become pioneer investment managers to Crossrail; farmers in the history mid-west of the world's most extensive underground system (even United States and life was hard, as Clara was to find out when a majority is actually above ground) is fascinating she and her grandparents eventually went to manyjoin the family. This book is Clara would only know her mother for a repository of much that is entirely trivialfew months: she was married for fifteen years, had ten pregnancies, seven surviving children and died in childbirth not long after Clara arrived. As the eldest girl, but is also pretty much thoroughly interestinga heavy burden would fall on Clara and Wisconsin was a rude awakening.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1910821039</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Julian Holland1783784350|title=Railways (Amazing and Extraordinary Facts)This Golden Fleece: A Journey Through Britain's Knitted History|author=Esther Rutter|rating=35|genre=TravelHistory|summary=How It was December and Esther Rutter was stuck in her office job, writing to people she'd never met and when preparing spreadsheets. The job frustrated her and even her knitting did Laurel not soothe her mind. January was going to be a time for making changes and Hardy replace she decided that she would travel the Duke length and breadth of York (George VI)? They reopened the RomneyBritish Isles with occasional forays abroad, Hythe discovering and Dymchurch Railway when peacetime resumed, at whose launch telling the latter story of wool's history and how it had officiated before made and changed the Warlandscape. WhatShe's the worst that can happen when you travel internationally and arrive d grown up on a London goods train with no further destination documents? Well, if yousheep farm in Suffolk - ''re an unidentifiable Peruvian mummy you can get buried as an unknown corpse before a free-range child on the invoice turns up farm'' - and learned to prove you were wanted in Belgium. After so many miles and so much dramaspin, it's no surprise odd facts knit and fun trivia derive weave from our countryher mother and her mother's trainsfriend. This book is designed to be an ideal source of quick articles and fun mini-essays for use was in the smallest room.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1910821004</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author= Paddy Hayes|title= Queen of Spies|rating= 4.5|genre= History|summary= Paddy Hayes has created an extensive account of the life and career of an extraordinary female spy. Daphne Park has faced sexism, brutality and betrayal. She has bravely stood against terror, charmed diplomats and navigated her way through the then alien Soviet Russiablood. Hers is an incredible life, one that brings the nail-biting and seat teetering that we expect from a spy story.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0715650432</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Joanne Parker1789017977|title=Britannia Obscura: Mapping BritainRonnie and Hilda's Hidden LandscapesRomance: Towards a New Life after World War II|author=Wendy Williams

|summary=What shape do you assume Britain to be? Ronnie Williams was the son of Thomas Henry Williams (known as Harry) and Ethel Wall. If you merely go by the current map, youThere're holding yourself ransom by the secessionists wanting devolution, and changes s some doubt as to the boundaries within Britain, but doesnwhether or not they were ever married or even Harry't the place go beyond that outline on the page? Remember, it used s birthdate: he claimed to be connected to mainland Europehave been born in 1863, but he was already many years older than Ethel and once we'd sorthe might well have shaved a few years off his age. For a while the family was quite well-ofto-settled into one kingdom on our shores [[Divorced, Beheaded, Died...: The History of Britain's Kings do but disaster struck in the 1929 Depression and Queens in Bitefive-year-Sized Chunks by Kevin Flude|the people in charge]] were also ruling over parts of Franceold Ronnie had to adjust to a very different lifestyle. And of course – the twoOne thing he did inherit from his father was his need to be well-turned-dimensional plan of the British Isles is nowhere near the real story, for we have many coastal waters, we have airspace, out and we have a large subterranean territorythis would stay with him throughout his life. You can definitely throw away He joined the imagined space of Britain, for the reality is far granderarmy at eighteen in 1942.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1784700002</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Suzannah Lipscomb1980891117|title= The King is DeadG Engleheart Pinxit 1805: A year in the life of George Engleheart|author=John Webley|rating= 4.5|genre= HistoryArt|summary= Shortly before his death in January 1547, King Henry VIII's last will and testament George Engleheart was readone of the leading portrait miniaturists of Georgian London, stamped and sealedwith a career lasting from the 1770s to the Regency era. It has remained He was also one of the most intriguing and contested documents in British historyprolific, painting nearly 5,000 miniatures altogether (over twenty of them being of King George III). This book examines it from every angle, and analyses Throughout most of that time he carefully recorded the background against the last days names of each of the King's life his clients, and the events which followedsubsequently transcribed them into what is referred to as his fee book.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1784081922</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Ian Mortimer1789016304|title= Human RaceWar and Love: 10 Centuries of Change on Earth|rating=4|genre= History|summary= We are an astonishing species. Over the past millennium of plagues and exploration, revolution and scientific discovery, women's rights and technological advances, human society has changed beyond recognition. Best known for his ''Time Traveller's Guide'' history books, Ian Mortimer here gives the reader a whistle-stop tour through ten centuries. ''Human Race'' contains the lunar leaps and lightbulb moments that, for better or worse, have sent humanity swerving down a path that no-one could have predicted. The question here is which of the last ten centuries saw the greatest change in human history?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099593386</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author= Catherine Hewitt|title= The Mistress of Paris|rating= 4|genre= Biography|summary= Born into poverty, no-one could have guessed that the girl who would one day be known as Valtesse de la Bigne would have achieved greatness. This is the tale of her rise to wealth and power – starting in a dress shop as a thirteen year old, but fast becoming a courtesan who would be fought over by some of the greatest men of her time. A woman who kept an air of mystery about many details of her life, Catherine Hewitt nevertheless paints an incredible story around the gaps, and this proves to be both a full and intriguing biography, and a fascinating portrait of the time period. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848319266</amazonuk>}}{{newreview|author= Mary Beard|title= SPQR A History of Ancient Rome|rating= 4.5|genre= History|summary=How do we know what really happened at any moment in history? At best we make educated guesses based on (often conflicting) evidence. The most striking aspect of Mary Beardfamily's new examination of Roman history is how far she goes to see all sides and all possible explanations testament of events. For exampleanguish, were the emperors Nero endurance and Caligula mad or simply the victims of their successors' smear campaign? What's behind all that nonsense about the city of Rome being founded by twin boys suckled by wolves? This is a book that explodes some of the myths and presents alternative answers. Mary Beard analyses the evidence to shed new light on how a small community grew to become an empire. Military force was important, but other threads devotion in the weave (such as social mobility and the effect of extending citizenship to many of the conquered) made the Roman experience unique. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846683807</amazonuk>}}{{newreviewoccupied Amsterdam|author=Despina Stratigakos|title=Hitler at HomeMelanie Martin

|summary=Melanie Martin read about what happened to Dutch Jews in occupied Amsterdam during World War II and was entranced by what she discovered, particularly in ''Please do not make Hitler look good.The Diary of Ann Frank'' Words to live by but then realised that the author of this volume received from her mother, a Kefalonian who knew Nazi abuse when she saw itown family's stories were equally fascinating. Rest assured that A hundred and seven thousand Jews were deported from the city during the book does not do thatwar years, but it certainly provides a much fresher, more eloquent only five thousand survived and interesting look at certain aspects of his life, and introduces us Martin could not understand how this could be allowed to someone else from the Nazi times – Gerdy Troost, happen in a country with liberal values who might as well be summarised as Hitler's interior designerwere resistant to German occupation. In picking apart Most people believed that the entire life of Troost, occupation could never happen: even those who thought that the nature of her work and how Germans might reach the buildings and décor she surrounded Hitler in became a part of his propaganda, we get a refreshingly new yet authoritative bookcity were convinced that they would soon be pushed back, that for those with an interest the Amsterdammers would never allow what happened to escalate in this side of our recent history will easily be considered one of, if not theway that it did, best book of but initial protests melted away as the yearorganisers became more circumspect. The person who does come out with the laurels worn highest is our authorIt's an atrocity on a vast scale but made up of tens of thousands of individual tragedies.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>030018381X</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Elizabeth Norton1908745819|title= The Temptation Of Elizabeth Tudor|rating= 4.5|genre= Biography|summary= Life, or rather survival, in Tudor England was a precarious business. Being close to the crown was anything but a guarantee of safety, as the fate of two of King Henry VIII's Queen's amply demonstrated. His second daughter Elizabeth led a charmed life and went on to reign as Queen for over forty years, but she too had some narrow escapes when her liberty if not her very existence was under threat.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1784081728</amazonuk>}}{{newreviewSurfacing|author=Alison Maloney|title=Life Below Stairs: True Lives of Edwardian ServantsKathleen Jamie

|summary=Life in Edwardian times is currently Sometimes when people suggest that you read a popular subjectcertain book, thanks in no small part to they tell you ''this one has your name on it''. Mostly we take them at their word, or not, but rarely do we ask them why they thought so unless it turns out thatwe didn't like the book. That' period drama currently showing its final series on ITVs a rare experience. People who are sensitive to hearing a book calling your name, rarely get it wrong. In this case, I was told why. The blurb speaks of the author considering ''Life Below Stairsan older, less tethered sense of herself.'' examines Older. Less tethered. That's not a bad description of where I am. Add to that my love of the subject in greater detailnatural world, looking at documents of those aspects of the poetic and memoirs from the time to discover what life was really like for those in service. We learn lyrical that are about the strict hierarchy in the household style not form, and the duties expected substance most of each individualall, about connection. We see how much each member of staff Of course, this book had my name on it. It was paid and how workers were hired (and in many cases, fired) from their positionswritten for me. It would have found its way to me eventually. Welcome I am pleased to a slice of Edwardian life, served up with a delicious mix of period illustrations and newspaper clippings|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1782434356</amazonuk>have it fall onto my path so quickly.

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Lucy Adlington0857058320|title= Stitches in Time: The Story of Lord Of All the Clothes We Wear Dead|author=Javier Cercas and Anne McLean (translator)

|genre= History|summary=''Stitches in TimeLord Of All the Dead'' is a lively history of clothingjourney to uncover the author's lost ancestor's life and death. Riffling through Cercas is searching for the wardrobes of years gone by, costume historian Lucy Adlington reveals the stories underneath the clothes we wear meaning behind his great uncle's death in this tour of the history of fashion, ranging from ancient times to the present daySpanish Civil War. With beautiful illustrations and full colour photographsManuel Mena, Cercas''Stitches in Time'' great uncle, is a reminder of how the way we dress is inextricably bound up with considerations of aesthetics, sex, gender, class and lifestyle – and offers figure who looms large over the reader book. He died relatively young whilst fighting for Francisco Franco's forces. Cercas ruminates on why his uncle fought for this dictator. The question at the chance centre of this book is whether it is possible for his great uncle to appreciate be a hero whilst having fought for the extraordinary qualities of the clothing we wear, and the rich history it has ledwrong side. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847947263</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Jeffrey James0008294011|title= Edward IVHow to Lose a Country: Glorious Son of YorkThe 7 Steps from Democracy to Dictatorship|author=Ece Temelkuran|rating= 4.5|genre= History|summary= Medieval EnglandA little while ago a 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 the question 's own game of thrones, The Wars of 'Discuss the Roses, was at the centre of a turbulent agefactors which led to... '' In retrospect much of the history of medieval England, between the Norman conquest I agreed that she was right and the advent of the Tudors, seems to have been wasn't certain whether it was a chronicle of instability often verging on and sometimes erupting into rebellion good or civil warbad thing that we didn't know what all 'this' was leading to. The fifteenth-century conflicts between the houses of Lancaster and York, lasting intermittently for thirty years, were more protracted and even more brutal than the rest, with several fierce battles and sudden changes of fortune for the two rival families, both descended from King Edward IIII think now that I do know. The rise, fall We are in danger of losing democracy and rise again whilst it's a flawed system I can't think of King Edward IV was a constant theme of better one, particularly as the wars'benevolent dictator' is as rare as hen's teeth.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1445646218</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Dan Jones1788037812|title= Realm DividedThe Fraternity of the Estranged: A Year The Fight for Homosexual Rights in the Life of Plantagenet England, 1891-1908|author=Brian Anderson|rating= 4.5|genre= History|summary= 1215 has gone down Originally passed in history as 1885, the year of Magna Cartalaw that had made homosexual relations a crime remained in place for 82 years. But during this time, restrictions on same-sex relationships did not go unchallenged. Between 1891 and 1908, three books on the result nature of King homosexuality appeared. They were written by two homosexual men: Edward Carpenter and John's increasingly discontented barons attempts to exert control over their wayward and stubborn monarchAddington Symonds, as well as the heterosexual Havelock Ellis. John had succeeded to Exploring the throne margins of England in 1199, at society and studying homosexuality was common on the end of an often turbulent century. His father, Henry IIEuropean Continent, had succeeded but barely talked about in restoring the authority of UK, so the crown after almost twenty years publications of civil war between the supporters of two rival claimants these men were hugely significant – contributing to the kingdom. He had inherited a challenging set on both sides scientific understanding of the Channelhomosexuality, and within four years had been driven out of most of beginning the French onesstruggle for recognition and equality, notably leading to the duchy milestone legalisation of Normandysame-sex relationships in 1967. Posterity would bestow on him the unflattering nicknames 'John Softsword' and later 'John Lackland'.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1781858829</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Keith Jeffery1910593508|title=1916: A Global HistoryApollo|author=Matt Fitch, Chris Baker and Mike Collins|rating= 4.5|genre= History|summary=1916 was This incredible graphic novel is a pivotal year in modern history. It witnessed love letter to the Easter Rising in Dublin, Moon landings and the battles of Verdun and passion for the Sommesubject drips off every Apollo by Matt Fitch, Chris Baker and the election of Woodrow Wilson as American PresidentMike Collins. These, This is a story we know well and several other events described in because of this book in detail, were later seen as crucial staging points the authors take a few narrative shortcuts knowing that we can fill in the course blanks. These shortcuts are the only downside to the book. If you've ever read a comic book adaptation of a film you will be familiar with the First World Warslight feeling that there are scenes missing and that dialogue has been trimmed. This is a graphic novel that could easily have been three times as long and still felt too short.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1408834308</amazonuk>

{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn= Gary Cox1786331047|title= Deep ThoughtThe Race to Save the Romanovs: 42 Fantastic Quotes that Define Philosophy |rating= 4.5|genre= History|summary= Who really knows what ''Cogito ergo sum'' means? Yes, you may know that Descartes said it, and that it translates as 'I think, therefore I am', but what was it The Truth Behind the French philosopher was trying Secret Plans to say about human existence when he said this most quotable and definitive phrase? And, for that matter, ''where'' did he say it? Was it in the seventeenth century or the eighteenth? If these are the sort of question that keep you awake at night, then Gary CoxRescue Russia's ''Deep Thought: 42 Fantastic Quotes that Define Philosophy'' will be a welcome addition to your library. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1472567269</amazonuk>}}{{newreviewImperial Family|author=Kevin Flude|title=Divorced, Beheaded, Died...: The History of Britain's Kings and Queens in Bite-Sized ChunksHelen Rappaport|rating=4.5

|summary=History lives. Proof The basic facts about the deaths of that sweeping statement can be had in this bookNicholas and Alexandra, and in the fact that while it only reached the grand old age some of six, it has had which were deliberately obscured at the dust brushed off it and has been reprinted – and while the present royal incumbent it ends its main narrative with has not changedtime for various reasons, other things havelong since been established. This has quietly been updated to include For the reburial last few months of Richard III their lives in LeicesterRussia the former Tsar and Tsarina, their children and seems to have been rereleased at a perfectly apposite timefew remaining servants were held in increasingly squalid, humiliating captivity. To prevent them from being rescued, as only in July 1918 the week before I write these words the Queen has surpassed revolutionary regime had them all those who came before her as our longest serving ruler. Such details may be trivia to some – especially those of us of a more royalist bent – shot and important facts bayoneted to others. The perfect balance of that coupling – trivia and detail – is what makes this book so worthwhiledeath in circumstances which, once the news was confirmed beyond all doubt, horrified their relatives in Europe.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1782434631</amazonuk>