Changes

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Mark GriffithsEdward W Said|title=The Lotus Quest|rating=4|genre=Travel|summary=Mark Griffiths is one of Britain's leading plant experts. I know this because his brief biog in the front of The Lotus Quest tells me so; just as it tells me that he is the editor of The New Royal Horticultural Society Dictionary of Gardening 'the largest work on horticulture ever published'. His prior works list includes five other plant book credits, three Representations of them for the RHS. I shall take all of this on trust, since attempts to find out more about the author and his background through the usual internet search mechanisms has failed miserably. He remains as elusive as the sacred flower that is the subject of this latest work: the lotus.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184595100X</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Archie Brown|title=The Rise and Fall of CommunismIntellectual

|genre=HistoryPolitics and Society|summary=Edward Said's ''A source Representations of hope for a radiant future or…the greatest threat on the face of the earthIntellectual'. Whichever of these descriptions you would apply to Communism you will find Archie Brown's detailed and largely objective study enlightening and engrossing. On one level, this is less a chronological description strict theory of how what intellectuals are and more a political force grew to dominate a third passionate argument for what they should be. Said clearly rejects the comfortable image of the world's population then virtually disappeared within intellectual as a period of less than detached expert speaking only to other specialists. Instead, he insists on the intellectual as a centurypublic figure, often awkward, abrasive, and unpopular, who speaks truth to power even when it is inconvenient or risky.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1845950674</amazonuk>1804272248

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=John WelshmanJacqueline Rose|title=Churchill's Children: The Evacuee Experience Women in Wartime Britain Dark Times

|summary='You have to learn to be hard men, to accept sacrifice without ever succumbing'. Such did Hitler say at The world of the Nuremberg Nazi Party rallies in the 1930s. He probably did unconscious is not have in mind playing in goal at a FA Cup final with a broken neck, such is the lifetime antagonist of difference between the two references. But that lifetimepolitical life, as packed and varied as it wasbut its steadfast companion, is in the pages of this ever-interesting and swiftly-devoured book.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224082884</amazonuk>}}hidden place or backdrop where any true revolution must begin…''

{{newreview|author=Chris Skidmore|title=Death and the Virgin: ElizabethWomen in Dark Times is Jacqueline Rose's homage to courageous women throughout history, Dudley and the Mysterious Fate particularly women of Amy Robsart |rating=4.5|genre=Biography|summary=When Elizabeth I ascended the throne in November 155821st, everyone's dominant concern was the matter of her taking an appropriate husband 20th and securing the succession19th centuries. The man most likely to become her husband was Robert DudleyHer historical and political backdrop is, thus, expansive, whom yet she made her Master of the Horse navigates it with intelligence and entrusted with considerable responsibility for her coronation festivities. The fact an acknowledgment that he was already married feminism's lengthy mission is a testament to Amy Robsart did little to quell its successes, and not its failures: ''the speculation, especially since she was believed to be dying ongoing force of breast cancerfeminism''.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0297846507</amazonuk>1804271713

{{newreviewFrontpage|author=R A ScottiMary McCarthy|title=The Lost Mona LisaMemories of a Catholic Girlhood|rating=4.5|genre=HistoryAutobiography|summary=One of the few things I remember from those writersMary McCarthy describes herself as an ''amateur architect'' courses and advice books – and I can hear from here you wished I remembered more of them – was the merit in being aware of anniversaries, especially in your area of expertise, and having obsessively digging into the ability past to sell articles concerning historical events linked into centenaries, modern comparisons, and so onpiece together the broken mosaic of her life. Well, here is She attributes her ''burning interest in the book equivalent, and although itpast's early – it's looking back on the summer of 1911 – this stands to her orphanhood, as quality enough to deny she lacked any latecomers shelf roomsecond-hand memories from her parents, who died in the 1918 flu epidemic.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0553818309</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Greg Grandin|title=Fordlandia: The Rise and Fall of Henry Ford's Forgotten Jungle City|rating=4.5|genre=History|summary=In 1927This memoir chronicles her early years, the Ford Motor company bought a huge tract of land beginning with her orphanhood in BrazilMinneapolis, for Minnesota, where she lived under the purpose harsh guardianship of the company growing its own rubber for use in making its cars. They planted rubber trees her late father's Irish Catholic parents and built a factory her abusive Uncle Myers and housesAunt Margaret. Later, and a number of top managers from the company were posted she moved to Fordlandia Seattle to run the operation. Huge amounts of money were pumped into Fordlandia, live with her maternal grandparents—her grandmother being Jewish and Ford made great claims for their plans. However, the project was her grandfather Presbyterian—who provided her with a spectacular failure, and it lasted less than twenty years.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848311478</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Dominique Lapierre|title=A Rainbow in the Night |rating=4.5|genre=Politics and Society|summary=A book integrating otherwise piecemeal news stories picked up over the past forty years into a coherent explanation is always welcome. This book explores South Africa's history and development, from the earliest Dutch arrivals in 1652 to the first racially integrated elections in 1994different kind of upbringing.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0306818477</amazonuk>1804271659

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Doug Stewart1785633457|title=The Boy Who Would Be ShakespeareCharging Around: Exploring the Edges of England by Electric Car|author=Clive Wilkinson

|genre=HistoryTravel|summary=In the late 18th century, keen to impress the Shakespeare-obsessed father who paid him little attention, 19 year old William Henry Ireland forged Clive Wilkinson has a couple history of Elizabethan documents to show himtravelling by unconventional means with a preference for slow travel. With the older man completely taken in, As he neared his child then pretended he'd found a trunk full of lost artefacts belonging to eightieth birthday the Bard – love letters to Anne Hathaway, a declaration idea of his Protestant faith, exploring the manuscript edges of King Lear, and even entirely new plays. Ireland fooled England in an electric car was not only his father, but also many of the prominent Londoners of the time, including Robert Southey, James Boswell, and the future William IVtotally outrageous.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0306818310</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Jim Krane|title=Dubai: The Story of the World's Fastest City|rating=4.5|genre=History|summary=In the 1950's, Dubai contained just a few thousand inhabitants scraping a living. By 1985fact, it had grown, but Sheikh Mohammed was still laughed at when he said that he wanted to make it should be a popular destination pleasant holiday for tourists. With the addition of artificial islandsClive and his wife, Joan, the worldshouldn's tallest building, an indoor ski slope, and much more, t it's now one of the world's foremost cities - but as headlines showed last year, the stellar growth may have been extremely costly, in terms of finances, environmental problems, and the quality of life for some of its inhabitants.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848870094</amazonuk>?

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Frances Stonor SaundersB09BLBP3P8|title=The Woman Who Shot MussoliniNeville Chamberlain's War: How Great Britain Opposed Hitler, 1939-1940|author=Frederic Seager

|summary=Most British titled families Received wisdom and simplified narrative often lead to misconceptions about history. One such is the scrubbing from the popular imagination of the 19th and 20th centuries have produced their fair share early days of rebelsWorld War II from 1939-40, known as the ''Phoney War''. Yet few came as close We remember Neville Chamberlain appeasing Hitler, war breaking out, and Churchill coming in to changing save the course of European history day. Very little time is spent on this period in cultural reflections and yet, as the Honourable Violet GibsonFrederic Seager argues in this book, one of eight children it was of Baron Ashbourne, a Protestant Anglo-Irish peer and MP vital significance in Disraeli's government during how the 1870swar played out.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0571239773</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Josephine Wilkinson3756228711|title=CDC: The Early Loves of Anne Boleyn|rating=3.5|genre=History|summary=Before her marriage to King Henry VIII, Anne Boleyn had already been courted by three suitors, any of whom might have become her husband - and possibly saved her from her eventual end on the scaffold. The first was her Irish cousin James Butler, later Earl of Ormond, whom she was at one time intended to marry in order to settle a family dispute over the title and estates of the Earldom of Ormond. After their marriage negotiations came to an end in the face of legal obstacles, she became betrothed to Henry Percy, heir to the Duke of Northumberland. With happy years with a little help from the scheming Cardinal Wolsey, the Duke, who had little time for his son, insisted that any idea of marriage between them should be dismissed forthwith. Soon after this the poet Thomas Wyatt became enamoured of her, but by this time there was fierce competition from his sovereign, and her destiny was sealed.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848684304</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewspectacular IT 'Phenomena'|author=Caroline Moorehead |title=Dancing to the Precipice : Lucie De La Tour Du Pin and the French RevolutionHans Bodmer

|summary=Two hundred years ago, with ''The history of the fall development of the monarchy and the Napoleonic wars, France underwent one cataclysmic change after another. There were many who witnessed and experienced the volatile age at first hand, but few left a more detailed record than the subject IT could fill books of this biography, Lucie-Henriette Dillon, Marquise Marchioness de La Tour du Pinseveral hundred pages.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099490528</amazonuk>}}''

{{newreview|author=John Van der Kiste|title=William and Mary: Heroes of the Glorious Revolution|rating=4Author Hans Bodmer is quite right about that.5|genre=Biography|summary=At school I remember spending a lot of time on He has chosen to tell us about the Tudors and the early Stuarts – obviously great favourites short, but explosive, history of the history teacher and then galloping unceremoniously through the intervening years until we reached another Control Data Company, CDC, for whom he worked. It''meaningful'' period – the Victorian era. The importance of William and Mary was completely overlooked s a fascinating tale, told in favour of a quick mention mixture of the fact that William wasn't in direct line of succession to the throne technological summary and Mary had never wanted to marry him in the first place. Their successor, Queen Anne I remember simply as 'tables'wry anecdote.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>075094577X</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=James Delgado|title=Kamikaze: History's Greatest Naval Disaster|rating=4.5|genre=History|summary=When Mongol leader, Khubilai Khan, achieved what his Grandfather Genghis had failed to do in conquering China, he inherited the world's largest and most sophisticated navy. However, in attempting to utilise this to expand his empire further to Java, Vietnam and mainly Japan, he lost the entire armada in a few short years. New marine archeological evidence from Japan, ironically with the site discovered in the 1990s in the construction of new defences from the weather, has raised questions on the traditional view that the defeat of the two Japanese invasion forces of 1274 and particlularly 1281 were solely due to the intervention of the weather Jeremy Dronfield and what Japanese culture claim was a Kamikaze (or ''divine wind'') summoned by the Gods.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099532581</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=David BaldwinZiggy Greene|title=The Kingmaker's Sisters: Six Powerful Women in the Wars of the RosesFritz and Kurt

|genre=BiographyConfident Readers|summary=Due to We start with the small amount pair of surviving personal sourcesbrothers Fritz and Kurt, and their muckers, doing things any book which purports Jewish lad in 1930s Vienna would want to do – kicking things around the empty market place, helping the neighbours, being dutiful when it comes to be the synagogue choir and at a biography of 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 mechanical and workmanlike as a 15-century subject light switch. But this is the time just before the Austrian leader is almost inevitably going to be more a cave to Hitler'life s will, and times' than instead of having a lifenational vote to keep the Nazis out, invite them in with open arms. In ''Kristallnacht'' happened in Vienna just as much as in Germany, as did all the case round-ups of women who were Jews. These in their turn leave the younger Kurt at home with his mother and sisters but not sovereigns anxious to hear word of an evacuation to Britain or consorts themselvesthe US, while Fritz and his father are, unknown initially to each other, packed off on the lack same train to Buchenwald and the stone quarry there. And us wondering how the titular event for the adult variant of data will be even more acute.all this could come about…|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0750950765</amazonuk>024156574X

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Paul StrathernJohn Henry Phillips|title=The Artist, The Philosopher and The WarriorSearch|rating=3.5

|summary=The interaction between three very differentArchaeology 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 say contrasting, personalities find some specific thing. This book is a case of the Renaissance period sets the scene for what latter, as our author promises to be an intriguing titlelocate the topic of the titular search. In 1502 And he really hasn't made it easy for himself – the paths of Cesare Borgiasearch area is a wide one, notorious son of the equally infamous Pope Alexander VItarget might not exist any more – oh, Niccolò Machiavelliand it's underwater, when he cannot dive. Latching on to a particular D-Day veteran through helping the intellectual and diplomatheroic old man's visit back to France, our author has promised to find the landing craft that delivered him to Normandy, and Leonardo da Vincithat he was lucky to survive when it sank from beneath him. The secondary aim is to erect a memorial to everyone else aboard, at the time best known as a military engineer though remembered today primarily as a great artist, were destined vast majority of whom perished. Who else would make such promises to cross.someone in their nineties?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1845951212</amazonuk>1472146182

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Timothy W RybackB09F4CTKJR|title=Hitler's Private Library: The Books That Shaped His LifeFlights for Freedom|author= Steven Burgauer

|genre=HistoryHistorical Fiction|summary=As It's the fictional schoolboy hero Nigel Molesworth might have said, 'any fule kno' that Adolf Hitler was notorious for burning books. Nevertheless he was also an avid collector later stages of World War I and passionate reader, as around 1200 surviving volumes once in his possession now in the Rare Book Division of United States has just entered the Library of Congress, and conflict. Petrol Petronus is a smaller quantity in Brown University, Rhode Island, demonstrate. Among them were world literature classics, such as 'Robinson Crusoe', 'Uncle Tom's Cabin', young American who has signed up and 'Gulliver's Travels'joined the 17 Aero Squadron. He also owned an edition of This company was the collected works of Shakespearefirst US Aero Squadron to be trained in Canada, in hand-tooled Moroccan leather with a gold-embossed eagle flanked by his initials on the spine. The Bard, he once said, was greatly superior first to be attached to Goethe and Schiller.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099532174</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Druin Burch|title=Taking the Medicine|rating=5|genre=Popular Science|summary=In 1898, Burch points out that a new drug was developed RAF and marketed for the treatment of tuberculosis by Bayer & Co. TB is such an ancient enemy of man that there is apparently evidence of an earlier strain first to be found sent into the skies to fight the Germans in Egyptian mummiesactive combat. The German firm had discovered a chemical But before that seemed to work wellcan happen, and patients and indeed their own staff, who were tested seemed Petrol has to respond well - it was named Heroin - and its addictive effects were at first missedmaster flying the notoriously difficult but majestic Sopwith Camel.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1845951506</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Sian Rees0578761718|title=Sweet Water and Bitter: The Ships That Stopped the Slave TradeInspiring History of a Special Relationship|author=Nancy Carver

|summary=The Act for church of St Mary Aldermanbuy had existed in the Abolition City of London from at least 1181, when it was first mentioned in records. Sadly, the Slave Trade original church was passed destroyed in Britain the Great Fire of London in March 1807, and the last legal British slave ship left Africa seven months later1666. Other countries were slow to follow suit. Everyone It was rebuilt in Britain knew there would be resistancePortland stone from a design by Sir Christopher Wren soon after the fire and then survived for centuries until World War II, and when it was again ruined by bombs during the abolitionist Granville Sharpe purchased land in Sierra Leone to Blitz. But that wasn'repatriatet the end of its story: after a phenomenal fundraising effort, the stones from the church' freed slavess walls were transported to Fulton, Ottobah CugoanaMissouri. There, a former slave living in Londonthe grounds of Westminster College, asked if it the church was possible for 'rebuilt and today serves as a fountain memorial to send forth both sweet water and bitterWinston Churchill.' Could the slave trade, he wondered, be abolished from West Africa - when West Africa was its source?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1845951174</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=John Grimson1784385166|title=The Isle of ManThird Reich in 100 Objects: Portrait A Material History of a NationNazi Germany|author=Roger Moorhouse

|summary=To many What is the first image that comes to mind when you think of us, the Isle 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 Man is probably best known for the Tynwald, the annual TT motorcycle races, Third Reich's fascist regime in all its iniquity. But some objects and as a holiday resort. I must admit that my knowledge of it extended little further than images from that, and therefore found this book invaluabletime may be less familiar to you. In these 550 pagesthis short volume, profusely illustrated with photographs and maps, I imagine that few if any questions on Roger Moorhouse has attempted to illustrate the subject are left unanswered. John Grimson has lived there for nearly forty years, and as well as working with several period of the island's local authorities, was active as a long-distance runner and cyclist until his early seventiesThird Reich through one hundred of its material artefacts.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0709081030</amazonuk> 

 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Thomas AsbridgeLun Zhang, Adrien Gombeaud, Ameziane and Edward Gauvin (translator)|title=The CrusadesTiananmen 1989: The War for the Holy LandOur Shattered Hopes

|genre=HistoryGraphic Novels|summary=The word 'Crusades' I never really followed the events of Tiananmen Square with much attention when it was playing out – someone in the second half of their teens has been misappropriated and often used in various other contexts over the passing yearspriorities, you know. In their original meaning they were a series I certainly didn't know of holy wars during the medieval era between weeks of protests and hunger strikes from the Christian and Muslim world, fighting for dominion over students before the Holy Land between 1095 massacre and 1291 as the defenders birth of western civilization formed expeditions travelling across the face of Tank Man image, I didn't know how the known world from Europearea had long been a venue for political protest, their sole aim being to conquer and defend an isolated swathe I didn't know more than a spit about the people involved on either side. This book is practically flawless in giving a general browser's context for the whole season of territory centred on Jerusalemprotests back in 1989.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0743268601</amazonuk>1684056993

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=John Van der Kiste0648684806|title=Sons, Servants and StatesmenClara Colby: The Men in Queen Victoria's LifeInternational Suffragist|author=John Holliday|rating=4.5

|summary=Like The path of Clara Dorothy Bewick's life was probably determined when her family emigrated to the first Elizabeth more books than are strictly necessary have been written about Queen Victoria, USA. At the time she was just three-years-old but John Van der Kiste has taken the unusual step because of using the men in some childhood ailment, she wasn't allowed to sail with her life to illuminate some dark corners which might other wise have parents and three brothers. Instead, she remained unexploredwith her grandparents, who doted on her and saw that she received a good education, both in and out of school. Of course She was the most famous man only child in the household and her lifechildhood was glorious. By contrast, husband her family had become pioneer farmers in the mid-west of the United States and Prince Consort Albert isn't 'sonlife was hard, servant or statesman' as promised by Clara was to find out when she and her grandparents eventually went to join the title of the bookfamily. Clara would only know her mother for a few months: she was married for fifteen years, had ten pregnancies, but he established a trendseven surviving children and died in childbirth not long after Clara arrived. VictoriaAs the eldest girl, often regarded as a difficult woman to please, heavy burden would always have a man in her life who would, to fall on Clara and Wisconsin was a greater or lesser extent, dominate herrude awakening.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0750937882</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Andrew Marr1783784350|title=The Making of Modern This Golden Fleece: A Journey Through Britain: From Queen Victoria to V.E. Day's Knitted History|author=Esther Rutter|rating=4.5

|summary=This bookIt 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 BBC TV series which complements itlength and breadth of the British Isles with occasional forays abroad, must confirm Andrew Marrdiscovering and telling the story of wool's status as one of history and how it had made and changed the most entertaining and compulsive historianlandscape. She'd grown up on a sheep farm in Suffolk -cum'' a free-presenters working today. His previous project, range child on postwar Britain, was hard the farm'' - and learned to faultspin, knit and anyone who enjoyed that will certainly relish thisweave from her mother and her mother's friend. This was in her blood.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0230709427</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|isbn=1789017977|authortitle=Patrick Casey Ronnie and Richard I HaleHilda's Romance: Towards a New Life after World War II|titleauthor=For College, Club & Country - A History of Clifton Rugby Football ClubWendy Williams

|summary=Clifton Rugby Football Club can proudly trace its history back to the very emergence of Ronnie Williams was the sport son of rugby unionThomas Henry Williams (known as Harry) and Ethel Wall. Founded in September 1872, the same year that William Webb Ellis, who is reputed There's some doubt as to whether or not they were ever married or even Harry's birthdate: he claimed to have been the rebellious Rugby schoolboy who first ran with the ballborn in 1863, diedbut he was already many years older than Ethel and he might well have shaved a few years off his age. In reality, it is highly likely that For a while the family was quite well-to-do but disaster struck in the Webb Ellis story is something of 1929 Depression and five-year-old Ronnie had to adjust to a spin job on behalf of Rugby School, although it very different lifestyle. One thing he did mean that Rugby School inherit from his father was able his need to impose its rules on be well-turned-out and this would stay with him throughout his life. He joined the game army at a time when most public schools had their own rules for playing versions of the gameeighteen in 1942.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1904312756</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Peter Gay1980891117|title=ModernismG Engleheart Pinxit 1805: The Lure A year in the life of Heresy - From Baudelaire to Beckett and BeyondGeorge Engleheart|author=John Webley|rating=4.5|genre=HistoryArt|summary=It is impossible not to be impressed by George Engleheart was one of the sheer scope of cultural historian Peter Gay's 2007 study leading portrait miniaturists of ModernismGeorgian London, newly released in this paperback editionwith a career lasting from the 1770s to the Regency era. He notes in was also one of the introduction most prolific, painting nearly 5,000 miniatures altogether (over twenty of them being of King George III). Throughout most of that it is not a 'comprehensive history' but rather 'a study time he carefully recorded the names of each of its rise, triumphshis clients, and decline'. What is remarkable though, subsequently transcribed them into what is the attempt referred to include the whole gamut of artistic fields in this coherent studyas his fee book.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099441969</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=John Van der Kiste1789016304|title=Jonathan WildWar and Love: Conman A family's testament of anguish, endurance and Cutpursedevotion in occupied Amsterdam|author=Melanie Martin|rating=45

|summary=Born towards the end of the seventeenth century Jonathan Wild was Melanie Martin read about what happened to become the eighteenth century's most famous criminal, plying his trade Dutch Jews in a rather curious fashion. He occupied Amsterdam during World War II and was born entranced by what she discovered, particularly in Wolverhampton ''The Diary of parents described as Ann Frank''mean but honest'then realised that her own family's stories were equally fascinating. A hundred and seven thousand Jews were deported from the city during the war years, 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 resistant to German occupation. It seems likely Most people believed that the occupation could never happen: even those who thought that the Germans might reach the city were convinced that they would soon be pushed back, that he first travelled the Amsterdammers would never allow what happened to London escalate in the way that it did, but initial protests melted away as the servant of a lawyer where he was eventually to settle, leaving his wife and child to fend for themselvesorganisers became more circumspect. It was whilst serving 's an atrocity on a term vast scale but made up of imprisonment in Wood Street Compter that he mixed with the cream tens of London's criminal underclass and learned the rudiments thousands of his tradeindividual tragedies.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848682190</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Bonnie Greer1908745819|title=Obama MusicSurfacing|author=Kathleen Jamie|rating=35

|summary=This is an interesting Sometimes when people suggest that you reada certain book, 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 Iit turns out that we didn'm missing something, the focus of t like the book seems . That's a little difficult rare experience. People who are sensitive to grasphearing a book calling your name, rarely get it wrong. In this case, I was told why. It's best if I start with The blurb speaks of the authorconsidering 's intentions as set out in her Prologue'an older, less tethered sense of herself. '' It is Older. Less tethered. That's not a mixture bad description of tales where I am. Add to that my love of her own life growing up on the South Sidenatural world, she writes, interspersed with stories of those aspects of the poetic and observations lyrical that are about Obama, linking it with the musicstyle not form, musicians and music scenesubstance most of all, past and present, including hip hop, country, classical, and rock'n'rollabout connection. All of theseOf course, she notes, were heard this book had my name on the President's Inauguration Dayit. To them she adds the blues, gospel, soul and jazz of the South Side, when the people began It was written for me. It would have found its way to build the great institutions and great solidarity that enabled him me eventually. I am pleased to become the most powerful man on the planethave it fall onto my path so quickly.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1906558248</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Ian Mortimer0857058320|title=1415: Henry V's Year of GloryLord Of All the Dead|author=Javier Cercas and Anne McLean (translator)|rating=54

|summary=The medieval, in fact time-honoured, view of King Henry V as one of England''Lord Of All the Dead'' is a journey to uncover the author's lost ancestor's greatest heroes was propagated though not originated by Shakespeare, life and again more recently to some extent by Olivierdeath. Cercas is searching for the meaning behind his great uncle's portrayal death in filmthe Spanish Civil War. At least one historian has called him Manuel Mena, Cercas'great uncle, is the figure who looms large over the 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 centre of this book is whether it is possible for his great uncle to be a hero whilst having fought for the greatest man that ever ruled England''wrong side.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224079921</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Toby Lester0008294011|title=The Fourth Part of the WorldHow to Lose a Country: The Epic Story of History's Greatest Map7 Steps from Democracy to Dictatorship|author=Ece Temelkuran

|summary=In 2003 A little while ago a map was bought for $10 million, 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 highest price ever paid publicly for a historical document, by question ''Discuss the Library of Congress, where it is now on permanent public displayfactors which led to... '' No ordinary map, I agreed that she was right and wasn't certain whether it was a good or bad thing that we didn't know what all 'this is sometimes described as America's birth certificatewas leading to. It is the sole survivor of a thousand copies printed early in the 16th century, and was discovered by accident in some archives in a German castle in 1901I think now that I do know. The sale We are in danger of losing democracy and story behind whilst it intrigued Toby Lester so much that he was inspired to discover more's a flawed system I can't think of a better one, and this book particularly as the 'benevolent dictator' is the resultas rare as hen's teeth.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1861978030</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jenifer Roberts1788037812|title=The Madness Fraternity of Queen Mariathe Estranged: The Remarkable Life of Maria I of PortugalFight for Homosexual Rights in England, 1891-1908|author=Brian Anderson|rating=4.5|genre=BiographyHistory|summary=Born Originally passed in 1734 in Lisbon1885, at the law 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 richest nature of homosexuality appeared. They were written by two homosexual men: Edward Carpenter and most opulent city in EuropeJohn Addington Symonds, Maria as well as the heterosexual Havelock Ellis. Exploring the margins of society and studying homosexuality was destined to become common on the first female monarch in Portuguese history. Married to her uncle Infante PedroEuropean Continent, seventeen years her senior, she had six children (outliving all but one of them), and became Queen barely talked about in 1777. A conscientious womanthe UK, she had so the misfortune publications of these men were hugely significant – contributing to be born in during the 'age scientific understanding of reason'homosexuality, when church and state were vying beginning the struggle for supremacy. Instinctively a supporter of the old religionrecognition and equality, with a humanitarian approach leading to state affairs, she was no Queen Elizabeth, no Catherine the Great, and wore her crown rather reluctantlymilestone legalisation of same-sex relationships in 1967.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>095455891X</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Steven M Gillon1910593508|title=The Kennedy Assassination: 24 Hours AfterApollo|author=Matt Fitch, Chris Baker and Mike Collins|rating=4.5

|summary=The assassination of President Kennedy came at This incredible graphic novel is a pivotal moment in my life love letter to the Moon landings and the passion for more than forty years I've read most of what has been written about the eventsubject drips off every Apollo by Matt Fitch, Chris Baker and Mike Collins. It's been This is a story we know well and because of variable qualitythis, but the books fed authors take a few narrative shortcuts knowing that we can fill in the blanks. These shortcuts are the curiosity of people entranced by only downside to the charismatic young President who died so publiclybook. IIf you'd come to ve ever read a comic book adaptation of a film you will be familiar with the point of wondering if slight feeling that there was anything new to be said, but Stephen Gillom are scenes missing and that dialogue has looked at what happened from an unusual been trimmed. This is a graphic novel that could easily have been three times as long and largely overlooked angle – the first twenty four hours of Lyndon Johnson's Presidencystill felt too short.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>046501870X</amazonuk>

 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Stella Tillyard 1786331047|title=A Royal AffairThe Race to Save the Romanovs: George III and His Troublesome Siblings|rating=4|genre=Biography|summary=King George III was not The Truth Behind the luckiest of English sovereigns. America, and then his sons, in that order, gave him no end of grief, and the last few years of his life were clouded by madness. It is thus often overlooked that, before these troubles arose to haunt this most conscientious monarch, he also had a thankless task in trying Secret Plans to control his siblings.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099428563</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewRescue Russia's Imperial Family|author=Andy Beckett |title=When the Lights Went Out: Britain in the SeventiesHelen Rappaport

|summary=Having grown up during The basic facts about the era deaths of Nicholas and followed the major news stories in Alexandra, some of which were deliberately obscured at the papers as they happened, I was fascinated to find everything (welltime for various reasons, nearly everything) in the 500-page narrative that comprises this bookhave long since been established. It was quite a rocky ride from For the election last few months of Edward Heath their lives in June 1970 through Russia the three-day week, record British inflation former Tsar and the IMF rescueTsarina, industrial disputes their children and picket battles at Saltley and Grunwickfew remaining servants were held in increasingly squalid, the Gay Liberation Front and the stirrings of the green movementhumiliating captivity. To prevent them from being rescued, in July 1918 the rise of Arthur Scargill, revolutionary regime had them all shot and the discovery of North Sea oil. Then there was the survival of James Callaghan's minority administration despite the odds, and thanks largely bayoneted to his adroit handling of the situation death in keeping both Tony Benn and the Lib-Lab pact on boardcircumstances which, followed by once the winter of discontentnews was confirmed beyond all doubt, culminating horrified their relatives in Thatcher at No 10Europe.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>057122136X</amazonuk>