Novedades

Christianity is the most enduring and influential legacy of the ancient world, and its emergence the single most transformative development in Western history. Even the increasing number in the West today who have abandoned the faith of their forebears, and dismiss all religion as pointless superstition, remain recognisably its heirs. Seen close-up, the division between a sceptic and a believer may seem unbridgeable.

In 1919, in Newfoundland, four teams of aviators came from Britain to compete in "the Big Hop": an audacious race to be the first to fly, nonstop, across the Atlantic Ocean. One pair of competitors was forced to abandon the journey halfway, and two pairs never made it into the air. Only one team, after a death-defying sixteen-hour flight, made it to Ireland.

On November 29, 1943, as the Allies’ primary leaders met in Tehran, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt described to Soviet leader Joseph Stalin his idea for the organization that would become the United Nations. The American president suggested that the active arm of the organization be “the Four Policemen”: the U.S., USSR, UK, and China. Stalin agreed with much of the framework in principle, but asserted that China likely would not possess the strength after the war to assist.

Christianity in England is in decline. Congregations are dwindling and ever fewer young people believe. Should we merely shrug our shoulders and accept this as inevitable and even healthy, or is something important being lost? Bijan Omrani argues that this decline is the most momentous change to occur in English history. He shows how a religion that has been part of our national story for over 1700 years was instrumental in the creation and development of the English nation, its codes of law and morality, and its structures of government and kingship.

Marking the 250th anniversary of Jane Austen's birth, What Matters in Jane Austen? solves the mysteries of Austen’s fictional world. Jane Austen’s novels have been a staple of the English canon since the nineteenth century. Yet critics of the time did not appreciate the true complexity of her work. Nothing, John Mullan argues, is accidental or coincidental in Austen. As Austen herself said, she wrote for readers who have "a great deal of ingenuity themselves."

One afternoon many years ago, James Rebanks met an old woman on a remote Norwegian island. She lived and worked alone on a tiny rocky outcrop, caring for wild Eider ducks and gathering their down. Hers was a centuries-old trade that had once made men and women rich but had long been in decline. Still, somehow, she seemed to be hanging on. Back at home, Rebanks couldn’t stop thinking about the woman on the rocks. She was fierce and otherworldly—and yet strangely familiar.

Discover the architectural soul of one of the world's greatest cities through this passionate and provocative guide to London's most significant structures. London is a living museum of architecture, where Roman walls stand beside glass skyscrapers, where medieval churches neighbor modernist towers, and where each era has left its distinctive mark on the urban landscape. In this comprehensive and beautifully crafted guide, Anglotopia takes you on an extraordinary journey through nearly 2,000 years of building, revealing the stories, innovations, and cultural significance behind 101 of ...

Ambitious and talented people flocked to court of George II and Queen Caroline in search of power and prestige, but Kensington Palace was also a gilded cage. Successful courtiers needed level heads and cold hearts; their secrets were never safe. Among them, a Vice Chamberlain with many vices, a Maid of Honour with a secret marriage, a pushy painter, an alcoholic equerry, a Wild Boy, a penniless poet, a dwarf comedian, two mysterious turbaned Turks and any number of discarded royal mistresses.

"Shadows of Empire – Understanding Britain’s Global Legacy and Its Modern Implications" takes listeners on a thought-provoking journey through the intricate and enduring consequences of the British Empire. This comprehensive exploration, rooted in conversations with individuals from Britain and former British colonies, offers fresh perspectives on the empire's impact on our world. The book's author, with a unique background that spans both the UK and former colonies, provides a balanced and objective analysis of historical events.

‘Intolerance has been the curse of our country.’ Putting Ireland on trial, Jim Larkin’s verdict was damning and resolute. His words resound, shuddering towards the present day where class division and workers’ rights disputes make headlines with swelling frequency. In this pioneering collection, an exemplary list of contributors registers the radical momentum within Dublin in 1913, its effects internationally, and its paramount example in shaping political activism within Ireland to this day. The narrative of the beleaguered yet dignified workers who stood up to the greed of their ...

Since the Brexit referendum of 2016, extraordinary uncertainty has hung over the future of the Union between Great Britain and Northern Ireland, creating a crisis for the unionist community. A referendum that began on the question of sovereignty quickly degenerated into cries of betrayal over a redrawn border in the Irish Sea, and has led to unionists becoming more insular again, resurrecting ethnic and nationalist notions of what constitutes the Union. In A People Under Siege, historian Aaron Edwards, a native of Belfast, explores the profound challenges facing the community and, in the ...

After the fall of France in June 1940, all that stood between Adolf Hitler and total victory was a narrow stretch of water and the defiance of the British people. Desperate for allies, Winston Churchill did everything he could to bring the United States into the conflict, drive the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany apart, and persuade neutral countries to resist German domination. By early 1942, after the German invasion of Russia and the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, the British-Soviet-American alliance was in place.

The destruction of Pan Am Flight 103 over the Scottish town of Lockerbie in December 1988 was the largest attack on Britain since World War Two. 259 passengers and 11 townsfolk of Lockerbie were murdered. Libyan Abdelbaset al-Megrahi was convicted of the crime. He maintained his innocence until his death in 2012.

The first of its kind, Three Weeks in July provides the definitive narrative on the harrowing events of 7th July 2005 and the aftermath, where chaos, confusion and terror reigned on the streets of London. A true-crime investigation woven together with high-politics and seminal history, the book will intricately explore the untold accounts of the Met’s and Government’s response to 7/7, and their desperate attempts to prevent a possible second wave.

Former Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt's World Power is a thought-provoking book about our place in the world in the century ahead. Looking back at his time as this country's global ambassador, he asks: is Britain a minor player, marginalized by our departure from the EU and dwarfed by the rise of new economies? Or is there a major role for us to play in a rapidly changing international order? If it is the latter, what is the evidence that we were capable of doing that beyond a nostalgic desire for influence and patriotic tub-thumping?

A history of the Royal Navy’s FAA since 1945, featuring a survey of the aircraft flown, the conflicts fought, and the daily life of those in service. The RAF’s continuing role in the projection of air power in the defence of the United Kingdom and its overseas interests since the end of the Second World War is well known. However, the same cannot always be said about the Royal Navy’s Fleet Air Arm (FAA).

Was principled gentleman Winston Churchill also the master of nasty tactics? You bet he was! Winston Churchill had done it all. In the British Army, he had fought in India and Egypt, been under fire, and returned it; he'd killed the enemy. In the Boer War, Churchill was captured, put in a PoW camp, and escaped, surviving behind enemy lines for weeks. He'd invented tanks, floating harbors, grenade launchers; turns out Germans did the worst thing possible... they’d attacked Britain and made Churchill mad. With his back to the wall in 1940, & Nazi invasion imminent, not only did Churchill ...

Doctor John Lewis was a remarkable man. Possessed of great warmth, wit and, above all a humanity which informs every word in this extraordinary account of Jersey life during the German Occupation, he served the island community with unfailing resourcefulness and not a little courage for five long and stressful years. However, despite the awfulness of the time, Dr Lewis infuses his account of it with an irrepressible joie de vivre which is utterly delightful. It is an uplifting story of winning against the odds, by turns hysterically funny and then unbearably sad. Above all it has an ...

Des Powell left school with no qualifications and little in the way of formal education. At nineteen he signed up to join the Parachute Regiment. Famously, the Paras is home to the UK military's second-toughest training regime after the SAS. Des Powell knows all about both. In fact, Des knows SAS selection better than anyone because he's done it twice. In SAS: Trial by Fire he tells the story of those gruelling tests: how Para training turned him into a soldier but, more crucially, how the SAS process turned him into a member of the elite.

The dangerous waters around the Channel Islands have been testing ships to destruction for centuries, and shipwrecks have always been an integral feature of island life. Following on from their previous collaboration, The Wreck of the Stella, the authors seek to fill a gap in island studies. Shipwrecks of the Channel Islands recounts for the first time in detail the stories of twenty-two major shipwrecks dating from Roman times to the present day. Bringing together detailed historical research and diving expertise, the authors tell the fascinating stories of each vessel, describing the ...