Unbound

A Passion for Passion is a love letter to romance fiction. It celebrates the joyful silliness of books that are written to follow the rules.

Alice Fraser has a special place in her heart for the sweeping silliness of romance novels. The journey to reach a believable Happily Ever After can go via an unbelievable rollercoaster of intensity, through wildly entertaining twists and unlikely turns. To celebrate the unparalleled joy this genre can bring to readers and defy its oft maligned status, Alice has created the author, D'Ancey LaGuarde, the ineffably mysterious, outrageously prolific, undisputed regent of the art of romance.

Collecting together excerpts, book cover designs, character sketches and synopses of ‘D'Ancey’s’ most absurdly frivolous and outlandishly whimsical works: from A Knight of Passion to The Dragon Lord's Lady and Luring the Laird to A Cowboy Called Home, this is an exclusive glimpse into the tropes and dreams that rise like perfumed bubbles through the fecund swamp of the romantic mind, and a fulsome challenge to anyone denying the importance of joy purely for its own sake.

This book will be a constant source of solace and encouragement for romance fans worldwide, and the perfect companion to smuggle into your next ball . . .

Twenty Gentle Protest craft projects to help you make a positive difference in our world.

If we want our world to be more beautiful, kind and fair, can we make our activism more beautiful, kind and fair? ‘Gentle Protest’ is a unique methodology of strategic, compassionate and visually intriguing activism using handicrafts as a tool. Since its creation in 2009, the award-winning global Craftivist Collective has helped change laws, policies, hearts and minds around the world as well as expand the view of what activism can be.

Dreams inspire positive action, so stitch a Dream Cloud to hang up at home or work and prompt you to think past a problem to the solution. Sew a Gentle Nudge Label to help keep your conscience sharp and your spirit strong. Craft your own Mini Protest Banner to turn heads and influence change, or fly solidarity’s flag for those suffering as a result of the world’s injustices. Stitch a Handmade Hedgerow to champion one of the solutions to the climate crisis or if you are nervous about protesting in public or if there’s a ban on public rallies where you live, let a doll speak your truth by creating a Toy Protest.

This handbook is for everyone, wherever you are in the world: whether you are a skilled crafter or a burnt-out activist, an introvert, highly sensitive person, or struggling with anxiety or overwhelm. These 20 projects and tools use the slow, soothing and thoughtful process of craft to help channel feelings of sadness, anger or powerlessness into proactive, encouraging effective actions to help make hope possible.

Words from the Hedge is a passionate evocation of the history, beauty and importance of our hedgerows by a craftsman who has been laying hedges for almost three decades and has the scars to prove it.

Hedges are as old as civilisation and as emblematic of the British countryside as chalk streams, hay meadows and oak trees. But unlike woodland and rivers, farmland hedges remain on the periphery of the public consciousness, often going unnoticed and almost always under-appreciated. Wielding his pen as deftly he does a billhook, professional hedgelayer Richard Negus takes us on a journey that reveals these ribbons of thorn and barb are so much more than mere decoration or boundary markers. They are essential for much-needed wildlife recovery. If we don’t get our hedges right, there is little hope for species like the almost-extinct turtledove.

And yet, no hedge is truly 'wild'; each one is a testament to generations of human skill and labour, requiring ongoing maintenance to survive and thrive. But there is a problem: we need more hedgelayers, and this is something Negus is trying to solve.

Introducing a lively band of fellow countrymen and countrywomen along the way, Negus explores everything from the practical complexities of modern farming and land ownership to the challenges faced by conservationists. Written with vigour and humour, as well as rare insight and honesty, Words from the Hedge is a timely exploration of how we can use hedges to make the British countryside a place where nature has a home.

What does the future hold for the evolution of our species?

Prepare to embark on a speculative odyssey in All Tomorrows: an extraordinary exploration of the potentials and pitfalls of human evolution. In this visionary classic, author and artist C. M. Kosemen imagines how life will be shaped by genetic manipulation, alien intervention and the relentless forces of evolutionary change. From the colonisation of Mars to the ultimate destiny of humanity, the future is bound to unfold in unexpected and unsettling ways...

All Tomorrows is a thrilling tale of survival and a breathtaking work of imagination that catalogues the progress of new human species and documents the trials they face on distant worlds. Some will flourish while others fade into oblivion, but the vital essence of humanity persists against all odds.

This print edition of Kosemen’s cult classic features his original illustrations and bonus material including a species commentary, sketchbook excerpts and never-before-seen artwork.

Wild Folk comprises seven richly illustrated fables of transformation and power, summoned from the ancient stones beneath our feet and transformed by word and image into portals between past and future.

These tales from the stones are neither new nor old. They are full of ‘wild folk’, shape-shifting spirits that carry the energy that connects all things. You will meet selkies and silver trout and the black fox, as big as a wolf and so fast and cunning she drives the lord of the manor to madness and oblivion; the woman of flowers who is happier living as an owl; the boy who learns to feel the songs and stories of trees through his skin; Wayland, the smith who can hammer metal to such airy thinness he makes his own wings; and the great white raven, a bird so rare it awakens the king who sleeps beneath the stones of the wild west cliffs of Wales.

This book brings together the words of Jackie Morris and the stained-glass paintings of Tamsin Abbott, but the stories come from both, a true collaboration born out of friendship and hope. These are tales to make you see, listen and most of all feel the wild magic that links stone, tree, fox and star.

‘Wild, anarchic, and wonderfully head-spinning’ Neil Jordan, award-winning film director

A dark theatrical comedy about the vexed and violent relationship between Britain and Ireland, from twice Booker-shortlisted author Patrick McCabe.

It’s the summer of Brexit, and in a seedy hotel room on the South Coast of England, Chenevix Meredith finds his old comrade Henry Plumm murdered in the bathtub. Piecing together their shared history, Meredith looks back at the years they spent in Dublin half a century ago, running a theatrical agency and rubbing shoulders with actors and assassins alike in the swirling smoke of public houses. What their clients didn’t know, is that the flamboyant pair were undercover agents of the British state, posted to identify terrorist networks.

Goldengrove is a deeply immersive, satirical novel in which nothing is as it seems and no one is who they say there are. Steeped in film noir, classic crime and popular culture, McCabe blurs the lines between what’s real and what’s staged in this absurd game of cat and mouse.

'Yet again Patrick McCabe summons the ghost of Flann O'Brien in this wild rollick of a novel . . . Wonderful, shape-shifting stuff' Colum McCann, author of Apeirogon

'Thunderously compelling and downright ecstatic . . . This is nothing less than the work of a genuine master, a must-read’ Billy O’Callaghan, author of Life Sentences

'One hears Joyce and Beckett and Paul Muldoon in the background. Not because there is any borrowing, but because all alike draw from that same dazzling tradition of oral storytelling' Mark Bowles, author of All My Precious Madness

Moving from West Belfast and County Monaghan to the streets of San Francisco, Timothy O’Grady’s exhilarating new novel is an epic portrait of art and war, authenticity and selling out, told through the fates of three men.

Ronan Treanor, Monaghan native and teller of this tale, is a celebrated theorist of post-modern architecture in New York. Paul Crane, single son of a hotel maid in Indiana, turns his mathematical gift into a multi-million-dollar career as an investment banker. And the mysterious Ryan, who drew as a boy in besieged West Belfast, but was swept up in the war against the British and lived a decade of extreme and escalating violence as a sniper. Through him, the war in Ireland and its psychic legacy are brought into close focus in a way rarely seen in contemporary fiction.

Their lives merge and conflict, rise and fall, as one man becomes the undoing of the next. Hauntingly beautiful, lyrical and profound, this is a novel about what happens when you cannot escape your past, featuring drawings and paintings by Anthony Lott.

The Paradox Paradox is a dark sci-fi comedy set hundreds of years in the future. It's also set a fair few years in the past.

Osheen Shupple has been working his entire life to resolve the paradox of a desperate audio message from years ago, one which holds a horrifying secret that will change the course of history. His plan: build a time machine and return to the source of the message. But he can’t do it alone. Fortunately, the universe has supplied a perfect team: an archaeologist serving twenty-eight life sentences, a veterinarian with an identity crisis and no original body parts, a cheating university student, and a famous but very, very dead starship captain.

Together, they will be propelled across the past, and to worlds beyond their timelines, on a temporal treasure-hunt to trace the tragic truth behind whoever Austin Lang turns out to be. But time is not to be trifled with, and every misstep unmasks another layer of chronological chaos. The past can’t be changed – but will there be a future worth saving...?

The Paradox Paradox is a darkly hilarious and compelling ride into the future, the past and various alternate dimensions that arise when powerful masterminds wrestle to control the universe.

love lay down beside me and we wept is Helen Murray Taylor’s lyrical memoir of devastating mental illness.

Helen Murray Taylor was finding her feet as a young doctor and trying to maintain some semblance of a life in the shadow of a punishing schedule when she witnessed a horrific road traffic accident. The impact of this fatal collision caught Helen off guard and had terrible repercussions. Both her career and her mental health took a battering. After a succession of other distressing events left Helen emotionally shattered and seriously depressed, she was admitted to a psychiatric ward and sectioned under the Mental Health Act. At her lowest, she almost succeeded in taking her own life. love lay down beside me and we wept sprang from these difficult times, from Helen’s months on the ward and the psychological upheaval of being restrained against her will, and from the challenge of being a doctor turned patient, but also from the moments of pure comedy and unexpected comradeship that she encountered there.

This is a profoundly moving and masterful account of one woman's physical and psychological breakdown, it's a tribute to the love that supported her through it, and it's an offering to the reader who might find comfort or understanding in this story.

‘Go to Empty Wigs for prose that never ceases to dazzle, for an extended holiday from contemporary pieties and to disgrace yourself with laughter’ Paul Genders, Literary Review

Empty Wigs is a hallucinatory ride through the twentieth century that will cement Jonathan Meades as one of the great imaginative writers of our age.

It moves from bloody Algiers in 1962 to the Welsh Marches in the late nineteenth century, from Lüneburg Heath to suburban southern England. Its characters are damned and doomed. They exert free will so make terrible choices. Their appetites are base. Their lives are without end. They lurch to extremes. From euthanasia to terrorism and political assassination, with secrets and betrayals, great gothic houses and pseudo-scientific experiments, Empty Wigs is a vast compendium of tales from the jungle of existence which show humankind at its most abject.

Many of its stories are bleak, perverse, harrowing. Many are tragically farcical. But the writing is neon-rich, gorgeous and baroque, funny and joyfully offensive. Told through frames within frames, mazes within mazes, colliding narratives and quick changing moods, Empty Wigs is a late modern masterpiece and a return to the novel’s origins.

'Meades finds the mot juste, the striking reference, to complete every brilliant line. Is it all a bit too much? Reader, it is' Stephen Smith, Observer

'A head-spinning turn that can quicken from high farce into deep seriousness, vaulting across time and space' Chris Harvey, Daily Telegraph

A magical, long-forgotten masterpiece, The Romance of William and the Werewolf is the story of two princes who overcame their wicked family to reclaim their inheritance and build a society based on tolerance and equality.

Originally titled William of Palerne, it was first translated from French and then converted into an alliterative Middle English romance by an obscure Gloucestershire scribe in c. 1350. It has never been translated into modern English – until now.

Written over 600 years ago, it is a multi-layered tale of poverty, justice, exile and 'otherness'; its themes of inheritance, the freedom of women, fairness and forgiveness, familial responsibility and social class, speak to us just as clearly today, and challenge us to reflect upon our class-driven politics and the corruption, entitlement and indifference which underlie it.

As with Michael Smith’s other translations – Sir Gawain and the Green Knight and King Arthur’s Death – The Romance of William and the Werewolf will feature a detailed historical introduction, a comprehensive glossary and notes, and Michael’s own rich and beautiful linocut illustrations.

'A powerful manifesto for women who long to walk alone – and safely – in the countryside' Dr. Sharon Blackie, author of If Women Rose Rooted

Why is it radical for women to walk alone in the countryside, when men have been doing so for centuries? The Hard Way is a powerful and illuminating book about addressing this imbalance, reclaiming fearlessness and diving into the history of the landscape from a woman’s point of view.

Setting off to follow the oldest paths in England, the Ridgeway and the Harrow Way, Susannah Walker comes across artillery fire, concern from passing policemen and her own innate fear of lone figures in the distance: a landscape shaped by men, from prehistoric earthworks to today’s army bases.

But along the way, Susannah finds Edwardian feminists, rebellious widows, forgotten writers and artists, as well as all their anonymous sisters who stayed at home throughout history. They become her companions over 135 miles of walking, revealing how much, or how little, has changed for women now.

'An urgent call' Guy Shrubsole, author of Who Owns England?

'A fascinating personal journey' Sophie Pierce, author of The Green Hill

'Thought provoking, rich and interesting' Andrew Ziminski, author of The Stonemason

From Far Around They Saw Us Burn is the eagerly awaited first short story collection from Alice Jolly, one of the most exciting and accomplished voices in British fiction today.

Words begin to lose their meanings, flaking off into air like moths. Friendships cultivated over a lifetime fall apart in testing circumstances. What does the stranger with yellow eyes really want?

The extraordinary range of work gathered here is united by a fascination with how everyday interactions can transform our lives in unpredictable ways. These are stories of lonely people, outcasts and misfits, and the ghosts that inhabit our intimate spaces. The result is a compelling, arresting and, at times, devastating collection – not least in the title story, which was inspired by the tragic true events of the 1943 Cavan orphanage fire.

Written with an exemplary eye for detail and an intimate understanding of the complexities of human nature, Jolly's collection builds up towards the ultimate question: what is revealed of us when we peel away the surfaces, and is it enough?

A bold follow-up to the very popular Damnable Tales: Full of thrillingly chilling tales from Shirley Jackson, M. R. James, William Croft Dickinson and many more

This anthology contains work from both the established masters of Folk Horror, and some more surprising contributors: from Shirley Jackson and M. R. James to E. F. Benson and William Croft Dickinson. Tales Accursed will raise the hairs on your neck and keep you alert to the slightest rustle in the trees: through the chill splendour of moonlit nights come apparitions through the orchard; sea-witches perch on the sharp fangs of rocks as they weave their spells; fir-woods lie unnaturally still with no birdsong, no breeze, nor any undergrowth; and hooded creatures crouch on grey secluded beaches. This book combines ancient horrors from the wilderness with sinister shadows of the landscape to remind us of the settings of our ancestors.

Tales Accursed is a gloriously creepy collection of chilling Folk Horror tales that is both thrilling and unnerving.

The letters that led to Edith Thompson's execution in 1923, collected in print for the first time by the award-winning author of Rex vs Edith Thompson.

A hundred years ago, on the night of 3 October 1922, a thirty-two-year-old clerk named Percy Thompson was stabbed to death as he walked home to his suburban villa in Ilford. With him was his wife, twenty-eight-year-old Edith. His killer was Edith’s lover: Frederick Bywaters, a merchant seaman aged twenty. Bywaters was hanged for murder on 9 January 1923. So too was Edith Thompson.

Despite a lack of any tangible evidence linking her to the murder, Edith found herself condemned by a society steeped in sexism. What sealed her fate were the letters she had penned to her lover, which were interpreted by the law as incitement to murder. These letters are remarkable documents. Charged with the vitality of Edith's voice, they are moving, perplexing, maddening, banal, spectacularly sensual, infused with a stream-of-consciousness immediacy. And they have never been collected in print, until now.

In Au Revoir Now Darlint Laura Thompson – author of the CWA Gold Dagger-shortlisted Rex vs Edith Thompson – gathers the letters together alongside illuminating commentary to tell the remarkable story of a woman ahead of her time and an extraordinary imagination that ultimately led to appalling tragedy.

The beginner’s guide to the Universe— in a cosmic, coffee-table book package, perfect for anyone who wants to brush up on their astronomical ABCs.

Ever wanted to cry out, “What on Earth is a black hole?” but been afraid you’d be shouting into the abyss? Ever wanted to find out how gravity works but never found the book to pull you in? 

DARK is an easily digestible beginner’s guide to the Universe in a handy A to Z format, with entries on everything from Dark Matter and Quantum Physics to NASA and the Zoo Hypothesis.

Includes a number of stunning design elements throughout, including original artworks and bespoke lettering to accompany each of the twenty-six chapters, as well as enlightenin and amusing quotes about space rendered in exquisite typography.

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Queer as Folklore takes readers across centuries and continents to reveal the unsung heroes and villains of storytelling, magic and fantasy. Featuring images from archives, galleries and museums around the world, each chapter investigates the queer history of different mythic and folkloric characters, both old and new.

Leaving no headstone unturned, Sacha Coward will take you on a wild ride through the night from ancient Greece to the main stage of RuPaul’s Drag Race, visiting cross-dressing pirates, radical fairies and the graves of the ‘queerly departed’ along the way. Queer communities have often sought refuge in the shadows, found kinship in the in-between and created safe spaces in underworlds; but these forgotten narratives tell stories of remarkable resilience that deserve to be heard.

Join any Pride march and you are likely to see a glorious display of papier-mâché unicorn heads trailing sequins, drag queens wearing mermaid tails and more fairy wings than you can shake a trident at. But these are not just accessories: they are queer symbols with historic roots.

To truly understand who queer people are today, we must confront the twisted tales of the past and Queer as Folklore is a celebration of queer history like you've never seen it before.

"One delight after another. Told with an open heart, a questing curiosity, and a healthy sense of mischief, Queer as Folklore is essential for every seeker of hidden histories." — PATRICK NESS, author of the 'Chaos Walking' series

"Endlessly informative and leaning hard into the British Isles’ reputation for the off-beat, this is a delight." — Publisher's Weekly

Folklorist Ben Gazur guides you through the dark alleys of British history to uncover how our food habits have been passed down through generations of folklore.

Who was the first person to throw salt over their shoulder? Why do we think carrots can help us see in the dark? When did we start holding village fairs to honour gigantic apple pies? Or start hurling ourselves down hills in pursuit of a wheel of cheese? Gazur investigates the origins of famous food superstitions as well as much more bizarre and lesser-known tales too, from what day the devil urinates on blackberries to how to stop witches using eggshells as escape boats.

Hilarious and fascinating, A Feast of Folklore will introduce you to the gloriously eccentric folk who aren’t often noticed by historians. Here lies a smorgasbord of their dark remedies and deadly delicacies, waiting to be discovered.

"This is a book of life and why we should celebrate our roots before it is too late. Fascinating." — John Connell, bestselling author of The Cow Book

Where Are the Fellows Who Cut the Hay? is an ode to rural life, charting traditions of the past, how they were lost and why we need to reconnect.

Exploring the relationship between everyday items and the communities that make them, Robert Ashton provides a snapshot of twenty-first century England. Where are the people who grow barley, milk cows and produce wool? How have their farming methods become less ethical, sustainable and natural over time? And what are we doing today to reverse that change?

Inspired by George Ewart Evans’s Ask the Fellows Who Cut the Hay, Ashton gives voice to local people and travels rural Suffolk in search for innovation, interweaving his own personal connection to Evans and to the land. Part memoir, part social history, Ashton’s thought-provoking book is a manifesto for why, against all odds, we need to step back in order to progress.

"An earthy and immensely thoughtful book, full of experience and wisdom ...Essential reading for anybody who wants to understand rural life, how we got here, and what we’ve lost." — Patrick Galbraith, author of In Search of One Last Song

"We hear the authentic voices of local people, still in the middle of great forces of transformation. Now we hope these will create more sustainable and progressive futures." — Jules Pretty, author of The East Country

"Informed by a deep familiarity with the county, Ashton reveals how an intimate knowledge of the rural past and present can contribute to shaping a meaningful future." — Professor Gareth Williams, biographer of George Ewart Evans

A practical guide to human rights work and being a good ally, from internet sensation Bilbo the Cat.

‘Bboy’ means ‘boy’ in a very particular form of internet cat-speak. You can pronounce it ‘boy’, ‘buh-boy’ or ‘bee-boy’, whatever makes your heart happiest. 

It’s not always easy to live your life with kindness, but Ellen Murray and her cat Bilbo are doing their best to spread messages of positivity to their followers. As an LGBT+ and disability activist, Ellen’s goal has always been to make love, care and safety a reality for all – but fighting for your own rights or standing as an ally to others can be daunting, intimidating and confusing work.

How to Be a Good Bboy is an accessible guide to understanding what human rights work is all about: how to get involved, navigate the inevitable pitfalls, overcome imposter syndrome and own your vulnerability and power.

It is about Bilbo, and about Ellen. About her work, and about how Bilbo’s online presence is not just an accessory to that work but a way to channel the greater goals of her activism to a wider audience. It is about dignity, respect and justice, and ultimately how to be a very good bboy.

Magic Realms celebrates the incredible art of the brilliant and highly respected fantasy and science fiction artists who, over the years, worked with the Fighting Fantasy authors to bring their interactive adventures to vivid life.

Each artist is profiled along with select examples of their best work – in vibrant full colour, the astonishing detail on display in all its glory. It features the work some of the world’s best fantasy artists including Chris Achilléos, John Blanche, Jim Burns, Les Edwards, Karl Kopinski, Iain McCaig, Martin McKenna, Ian Miller and Russ Nicholson, among others.

Written by Fighting Fantasy co-creator Ian Livingstone and Fighting Fantasy historian Jonathan Green, Magic Realms is a Who’s Who of fantasy art – an absolutely essential collector's item for any Fighting Fantasy fan.

"Unapologetic about the cross-over of cultures, it’s bright, vibrant and dynamic." — Vivek Singh

"Packed full of approachable and inspiring recipes . . . thoroughly modern and highly rewarding." — Ravinder Bhogal

"Every recipe is packed with flavour." — Dan Lepard

Sanjana Feasts is a collection of dazzling recipes of modern Indian diaspora vegetarian and vegan food.

Sanjana Modha’s flavourful and vibrant recipes are rooted in her Indian heritage, East African family background, and Yorkshire childhood. This book showcases the varied ingredients and unique combinations that are authentic to Sanjana’s upbringing, and includes signature dishes such as Ruffled Biryani, Madras Mac and Cheese with Naan Crumbs, Desi-inspired French Bread Pizza and Sticky Toffee Gulab Jamun, as well as delicious Indian classics.

Over the last few years Sanjana has seen a visible shift in the Western understanding of what Indian food is. It’s gone from curry-house creations, to an exploration of regional food, to fusion cuisine and more recently, an appreciation of street food and casual dining. Today, Indian food is a cacophony of all these elements and more, and Sanjana is forging yet another new direction with the food of diasporic communities, and the flavours of a new generation.

Sanjana Feasts will inspire you both to incorporate these delicious recipes into your everyday cooking, and to raise your game in the kitchen with her tips for the classics.

A new translation of the classic English poem that inspired Malory, stunningly illustrated with linocuts by the author.

King Arthur’s Death (commonly referred to as the Alliterative Morte Arthure) is a Middle English poem that was written in Lincolnshire at the end of the fourteenth century. A source work for Malory’s later Morte d’Arthur, it is an epic tale which documents the horrors of war, the loneliness of kingship and the terrible price paid for arrogance.

This magnificent poem tells of the arrival of emissaries from Imperial Rome demanding that Arthur pays his dues as a subject. It is Arthur’s refusal to accept these demands, and the premise of foreign domination, which leads him on a quest to confront his foes and challenge them for command of his lands.

Combining heroic action, probing insight into human frailty and a great attention to contemporary detail, King Arthur’s Death is not only a lesson in effective kingship, it is also an astonishing mirror on our own times, highlighting the folly of letting stubborn dogma drive political decisions.

An unofficial guide to Alien: Isolation, the greatest, scariest horror game ever made.

There aren’t many computer games that can justify an entire book, but for superfans, Alien: Isolation is truly extraordinary and Perfect Organism reveals all there is to know about every aspect of this masterful game.

Discover the rationale and authenticity of the set design and art direction, learn about the alien’s unnerving abilities to second-guess the players and the importance of its unique height, find out more about the importance of the dynamic audio and the use of seventies archive soundbites, as well as the darkly beautiful music. And immerse yourself in the technical brilliance of the level design and the user interface, before reading about the deleted content, and the scenes and features that never made the final cut.

Alien: Isolation is a game of remarkable depth, complexity, and detail, and together with a level-by-level mission guide, this book will answer all of your questions, as well as many you haven’t yet thought to ask!

As Daniel Hardcastle careers towards thirty, he looks back on what has really made him happy in life: the friends, the romances… the video games. Told through encounters with the most remarkable – and the most mind-boggling – games of the last thirty-odd years, Fuck Yeah, Video Games is also a love letter to the greatest hobby in the world.

From God of War to Tomb Raider, Pokémon to The Sims, Daniel relives each game with countless in-jokes, obscure references and his signature wit, as well as intricate, original illustrations by Rebecca Maughan. Alongside this march of merriment are chapters dedicated to the hardware behind the games: a veritable history of Sony, Nintendo, Sega and Atari consoles.

Joyous, absurd, personal and at times sweary, Daniel's memoir is a celebration of the sheer brilliance of video games.

This first ever collection of his personal letters has been meticulously curated, transcribed and annotated by Jamesian scholar Jane Mainley-Piddock to offer an unprecedented and overdue insight into a great and singular mind. Through notoriously illegible handwriting, we learn of James's fear of spiders and his love of cats; his musings on the work of other contemporary authors; and a whole life's thoughts on a host of subjects – which shed light on the man himself: his family, his work, his relationships and preoccupations. 

Essential reading for any fan, *Casting the Runes *brings at last to the fore a writer adored for his fiction who himself has long remained in the shadows.

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Over 60 boxes full of notebooks, research, letters, scripts, jokes, speeches, to-do lists, hard drives and even poems…Welcome to the incredible archive of Douglas Adams.

After his death in 2001, Douglas Adams's papers were loaned to his old Cambridge college, St John's. Reproduced here, in facsimile form and in close association with Adams’s family and literary estate, 42 is a full-colour, large-format hardback that follows Adams career from early collaborations with Graham Chapman to his work on Doctor Who, through the Hitchhiker years, Dirk Gently, his groundbreaking non-fiction book Last Chance to See and his later digital work. Alongside this are details of projects that never came to fruition like a proposed theme park ride and a TV series provisionally entitled The Secret Empire. 

Edited by Kevin Jon Davies, who has worked on a number of Hitchhiker-related projects and had a personal friendship with Adams spanning more than twenty years.

Each of the three journeys sees Shaw walk alone into a Dartmoor forest and wait. What arrive are stories – fragments of myth that he has carried within him for decades: the deep history of Dartmoor itself; the lives of distant family members; Arthurian legend; and tales from India, Persia, Lapland, the Caucasus and Siberia. But these stories and their tellers don’t arrive as the bearers of solace or easy wisdom. As with all quests, Shaw is entering a domain of traps and tests. Bardskull can be read as a fable, as memoir, as auto-fiction or as an attempt to undomesticate myth. It is a magnificent, unclassifiable work of the imagination.

It covers the hardware, software, and social history of the era showing how they're linked through numbers, such as 48K, C90, and 35899. Each entry starts with a number, and by choosing a related number you'll create a unique adventure through the book and into a web of forgotten geek lore and incredible facts. With luck, you'll find a way to arrive at the number used to grant infinite lives in Jet Set Willy!

“An entertaining and eclectic anthology of nature writing by women about the ‘east Atlantic archipelago’ or British isles.… For readers in search of a new take on the genre, this is a great place to start.” — Publishers Weekly

Now in paperback—a landmark gathering of writing, by women, about the natural world.

Women, through the centuries and to present time, writing about the natural world, in this landmark anthology—with pieces gathered from works of fiction, poetry, but also household planners, gardening diaries, recipe books…

For the very first time, this anthology collects together the work of women, over the centuries and up to the present day, who have written about the natural world in Britain, Ireland and the outlying islands of that archipelago. Alongside the traditional forms of the travelog, the walking guide, books on birds, plants and wildlife, Women on Nature embraces alternative modes of seeing and recording that turn the genre on its head.

Katharine Norbury has sifted through the pages of women’s writing to show the multitude of ways in which they have observed the natural world about them, from the fourteenth-century writing of the anchorite nun Julian of Norwich to the seventeenth-century travel journal of Celia Fiennes; from the keen observations of Emily Brontë to a host of brilliant contemporary voices.

Women on Nature presents a groundbreaking vision of the natural world which, in addition to being a rich and scintillating anthology that shines a light on many unjustly overlooked writers, is of unique importance in terms of women’s history and the history of writing about nature.

A full-colour illustrated history of the store that changed gaming for ever, as told by its founders.

Games Workshop, Warhammer, White Dwarf, Citadel Miniatures and Fighting Fantasy are names which trigger powerful memories for millions of people around the world. The cultural impact of Games Workshop and Fighting Fantasy has been remarkable. But how did it all begin? 

Since starting out in 1975 as a part-time mail-order business in a modest third-floor flat in West London, Games Workshop has grown from its humble beginnings to become a FTSE 250 company listed on the London Stock Exchange. From distributing Dungeons & Dragons, to living in the back of a van, to opening Games Workshop stores, to creating Fighting Fantasy, to launching Warhammer, co-founders Ian Livingstone and Steve Jackson tell their remarkable story for the first time. 

Dice Men is the fascinating, never-before-told story of an iconic company which changed the world of tabletop gaming for ever. It's an insight into the rollercoaster first year of Games Workshop and the birth of the industry.

Eileen: The Making of Orwell is the first on this extraordinary woman who has been until now unjustly overlooked. It examines the Blairs' nine year marriage, from a tiny village where they grew vegetables and tended their own goats and chickens, through the dangers of the Spanish Civil War, nursing George in Morocco after a severe bout of tubercular bleeding, narrowly escaping the destruction of their London apartment in World War II, and even adopting a baby boy when it became apparent that they were unable to have their own child. And their partnership produced some of the greatest works in English literature.

“Now,” George told a friend the night he met Eileen O’Shaughnessy, “that’s the kind of girl I would like to marry.” The year before, Eileen had published a futuristic poem called "End of the Century, 1984." Later, George would name his greatest work, 1984, in homage to the memory of Eileen.

What if we responded to death... by throwing a party?

By the time Erica Buist’s father-in-law Chris was discovered, upstairs in his bed, his book resting on his chest, he had been dead for over a week. She searched for answers (the artery-clogging cheeses in his fridge?) and tried to reason with herself (does daughter-in-law even feature in the grief hierarchy?) and eventually landed on an inevitable, uncomfortable truth: everybody dies.

While her husband maintained a semblance of grace and poise, Erica found herself consumed by her grief, descending into a bout of pyjama-clad agoraphobia, stalking friends online to ascertain whether any of them had also dropped dead without warning, unable to extract herself from the spiral of death anxiety… until one day she decided to reclaim control

With Mexico’s Day of the Dead festivities as a starting point, Erica decided to confront death head-on by visiting seven death festivals around the world – one for every day they didn’t find Chris. From Mexico to Nepal, Sicily, Thailand, Madagascar, Japan and finally Indonesia – with a stopover in New Orleans, where the dead outnumber the living ten to one – Erica searched for the answers to both fundamental and unexpected questions around death anxiety.

This Party’s Dead is the account of her journey to understand how other cultures deal with mortal terror, how they move past the knowledge that they’re going to die in order to live happily day-to-day, how they celebrate rather than shy away from the topic of death – and how when this openness and acceptance are passed down through the generations, death suddenly doesn’t seem so scary after all.

Not all games are released equal. The barriers of language and culture can leave our world divided, and this includes the video games that we get the chance to play. Matt Barnes, Dazz Brown and Greg S-C of DidYouKnowGaming? created the YouTube series Region Locked to give people an insight into the weird and wonderful titles that never left their home countries, and now they bring their expertise to you in this book.

Encounter masterpieces you never knew existed from your favourite series and developers, as well as some utterly bizarre creations that seem so outlandish you might wonder how on earth they were released in the first place. The authors explore what it's like to play these games and investigate the fascinating characters behind them to discover why such remarkable creations never enjoyed international exposure.

The book covers games from all eras and a variety of platforms so there’s sure to be something to pique the interest of everyone, from casual gamers to hardcore fans.

Deep underwater lurks a mysterious man-made illness. It has gone by many names over the years —Satan’s disease, diver’s palsy, the chokes—but today, doctors call it decompression sickness. You know it as the bends. That’s the devil British diver Martin Robson faces each time he plunges beneath the surface. 

In the winter of 2012, Robson was part of an expedition to Blue Lake, southern Russia, which sought to find a submerged cave system never seen by the human eye. On the final day of the expedition, as Robson returned from diving deeper into the lake than anyone had before, disaster struck: just seventy-five feet down, he was ambushed by the bends. Robson knew that if he continued up to the surface he would probably die before help arrived. Instead, he sank back into the water, gambling on an underwater practice most doctors believe is a suicidal act. Soon the only hope he had of saving his life would rest in the hands of a dramatic mercy mission organized at the highest levels of the Russian government. 

Between the Devil and the Deep is the first book to tell the terrifying true story of what it feels like to get the bends, taking you inside the body and mind of a man who suffered the unthinkable. Writer Mark Cowan also explores the grimly fascinating history of decompression sickness, the science behind what causes the disease, and the stories of the forgotten divers who pushed the limits of physical endurance to help find a solution.

Why should we adopt animals?

What’s the problem with organic meat?

What are the economics of plant-based foods?

What about honey?

What is the relationship between veganism and feminism?

What is vegansexualism?

Veganism is on the rise. Plant-based foods and cruelty-free products showing no sign of stopping, Think Like a Vegan explores how vegan ethics can be applied to every area of our daily lives.

We all want to live more healthily and ethically.

This book is for anyone interested in veganism, its ideals and what even non-vegans can learn from its practice. Through a personal and often irreverent lens, the authors explore a variety of contemporary topics related to animal use: from the basics of vegan logic to politics, economics, love and other aspects of being human, each chapter draws you into a thought-provoking conversation about your daily ethical decisions.

Thirty years ago Jonathan Meades published a hefty collection of reportorial journalism, essays, criticism, squibs, fictions called Peter Knows What Dick Likes. It quickly acquired cult status. The critic James Woods was moved to write: ‘When journalism is like this, journalism and literature become one.’

This new collection is every bit as rich and every bit as catholic. Hence its title: Pedro and Ricky Come Again. Thirty years older, so no longer boys, but no wiser, and still impervious to good taste and good manners.

From the inexcusability of nationalism and the ubiquitous abuse of the word ‘iconic’, to John Lennon’s shopping lists and the wine they call ‘Black Tower’, the work assembled here demonstrates Meades's unparalleled range and erudition, with pieces on cities, artists, sex, England, concrete, politics and much, much more.

He had been waiting all his life, hoping to hear the hare’s song. . .

The boy and his family are special. While others hunt the hares, his family search for leverets orphaned by the hunt and keep them safe. When the hares begin to move across the land, the boy and his sister know that their greatest challenge has begun. They must follow and watch and wait until the time comes for the old queen to leave and her child to reign in her place.

But others are searching for the golden queen of the hares, a hunter with two hounds, one silver, one black. Can two children, on their own, keep the golden queen safe from the man and his hounds?

"Irresistible . . .  My aviation title of the year." — Rowland White

"Stupendously brilliant . . . Completely addictive." — James Holland

"The most explosive book about aircraft ever." — Jim Moir, aka Vic Reeves

From the terror and exhilaration of First World War dogfighting to the dark arts of modern air combat, here is an enthralling ode to that most brutally exciting of machines: the warplane.

The Hush-Kit Book of Warplanes is a beautifully designed, highly illustrated collection of the very best articles from Hush-Kit – the world’s leading alternative aviation online magazine – combined with a heavy punch of new and exclusive pieces. It contains a wealth of brilliant material, from Top 10 lists and historical deep-dives to interviews with legendary fighter pilots and expert analysis of weapons, tactics and technology.

This knowledge and impeccable research is balanced throughout with the irreverent attitude, wicked satire and sharp eye for the absurdities of the aeronautical world that have made the magazine so popular with its readers. The book itself is also a stunning object, featuring first-rate photography alongside original, specially commissioned artwork. Inside it you will find:

• Interviews with pilots of the F-14 Tomcat, the Mirage, the MiG-25, the English Electric Lightning, the Rafale and the B-52 among others.
• Comprehensive surveys including ‘The Ultimate Biplane Fighters', ‘10 Incredible Cancelled Military Aircraft’ and ‘Aviation Myths You Shouldn’t Believe’.
• Fascinating insights into obscure and overlooked warplanes.
• Unbelievable accounts of the most bizarre moments in aviation history.
• And much, much more.

'ABC', as perfect as anything I've ever witnessed up until that point in my tiny little life. Three minutes of divine delirium.

In 1972, when Robert Elms was thirteen years old, he saw the Jackson 5 play live at the Empire Pool. At some point during the performance, he found himself in a state of otherworldly perfect synchronicity with everything happening around him. This single event would set him off on an endless pursuit for that same height of pleasure.

Since then, Robert has lived his life through live music, from pub rock to jazz funk, punk to country, and everything in between. Each gig is memorable in its own way, and his snapshots of musicians past and present are both evocative and startlingly concise: Tom Waits showboating with an umbrella, Grace Jones vogueing with a mannequin, Amy shimmying shamelessly like a little girl at a wedding, Gil Scott-Heron rapping with a conga drum. 

While in our changed times, Robert notes that we have found new ways of listening – of being part of something special by uniting fans with their favourite performers online – there is not, nor can there ever be, anything quite like the live experience. Live!: Why We Go Out is a memoir and a musing on why experiencing live music really matters.

Malcolm George Galbraith is a large, somewhat clumsy, Scotsman. He’s being forced to leave the woman he loves behind and needs to explain why.

So he leaves her a handwritten note on the kitchen table (well, more a 300-page letter than a note). In it, Malcolm decides to start from the beginning and tell the whole story of his long life, something he’s never dared do before.

Because Malcolm isn’t what he seems: he’s had other names and lived in other places. A lot of other places. As it gathers pace, Malcolm’s story combines tragedy, comedy, mystery, a touch of leprosy, several murders, a massacre, a ritual sacrifice, an insane tyrant, two great romances, a landslide, a fire, and a talking fish.

“Her boy was born with eyes the colour of chestnuts, skin as soft as butter and his hair was coppice-copper bright. He was well-loved by both his mother and his father and they named him Johnnie…”

Folk tales take us beyond our own boundaries into unknown lands. Yet within these adventures, riddles and enchantments we find our common ground and shared humanity. 

In this illustrated edition, Lost & Found is Elizabeth Garner’s own retelling of fifteen treasured folk tales that have nurtured, sustained, terrified and enthralled her in equal measure. Some of the stories are taken from the books of her childhood, some are remembered, and others she has discovered in her reading over the years.

Adorned with engraver Phoebe Connolly's beautiful woodcut illustrations, this collection includes stories such as “The Riddle of the Crossroads,” “The Twisted Oak.” “The Wits of the Whetstone” and many more.

A new approach to foraging

Roger Phillips is the legendary godfather of foraging. Drawing upon decades of experience, his knowledge of wild food is unrivalled and in this richly illustrated book he shares some of his most recently gathered wisdom, collected from around the world.

Roger reveals the edible and therapeutic secrets of our fields, woodlands and flower beds, and suggests tips for sourcing delicious morsels growing throughout the countryside and in our gardens. He also describes the native habitat and history of many fascinating plants and fungi, both common and unusual: from the camas bulbs eaten by the Native Americans of the Pacific Northwest, to the Italian and Spanish favourite, Caesar’s amanita; from hostas, the familiar garden foliage consumed as a succulent vegetable in Japan, to the newly popular Australian citrus fruits.

The Worldwide Forager is divided into four sections: mushrooms and fungi; flowers, leaves and herbs; fruit and nuts; and roots and tubers, and Roger uses each one to provide a wide range of ideas for making your meals more colourful, delicious and sustainable.

It is about topography and time. Chalk and flint and marsh. The coming and going of the sea, Neolithic farmers and the razzle-dazzle of weary coastal towns. It is as much about the ghost of a mammoth as it is the scream of a jet fighter, heading east.

Each image is a still from a film – a film that is under constant production inside Maxim Peter Griffin’s skull. Griffin’s art is about taking somewhere and looking at it over and over so that with each looking it becomes strange and new. As well as being a testament to the isolated beauty of Lincolnshire itself, Field Notes is an extraordinary account of what it is like to be present in, to fully inhabit, a place.

The Green Hill collects these letters alongside Sophie’s account of the years following Felix’s death, into which she weaves poignant memories of his life. What results is a deeply moving, beautifully captured record of how – amid the rivers and rocks of Dartmoor, and in the sea off the South Devon coast – Sophie was able to hold on to and nurture her bond with Felix, both in her mind and through a physical engagement with the landscape: actively mourning, rather than grieving. 

This book is a celebration of the natural world and the role it plays in our lives and relationships, as well as an examination of how beauty and the passing seasons can help us contend with our own mortality. Above all, The Green Hill is one woman’s story of navigating through trauma and loss, and towards a fragile, complicated kind of joy.

In this long overdue and affectionate salute, celebrated comedy historian Robert Ross pays tribute to some of the finest, funniest and most fascinating names in comedy from both sides of the Atlantic. Monty Python’s Terry Jones wrote the foreword.

With the passionate input of such comics as Tim Brooke-Taylor, Hattie Hayridge, Roy Hudd, Michael Palin, Ross Noble, Chris Addison and Bernard Cribbins, Ross honours these legends of humor who, for a variety of reasons, didn't quite reach the heady heights of stardom or, once they had, couldn't cope with the pressures.

Whether it is a favorite from the distant smoke- and ale-stained world of the Music Hall like the great George Robey, or the downbeat poetry of Hovis Presley, who dropped disenchanted bombs on the late 1990s, Forgotten Heroes of Comedy will finally elevate them to the Hall of Fame where they belong. Forgotten, no longer.