Penguin Books Ltd strana 22 z 35

*PRE-ORDER NOW! A DELIGHTFULLY TWISTY NEW MURDER MYSTERY, PERFECT FOR COSY CRIME FANS AND DOG LOVERS EVERYWHERE*They''ve got a lot of leads...but can they collar a killer?When Charlie Boardman and his beloved Staffy, Ruby, stumble across a corpse in the woods, the sleepy coastal town of Framstone is rocked by the discovery that the local pub landlord has been murdered.Charlie and his fellow dogwalkers take it upon themselves to try and sniff out any clues that might help the local police with their investigation.But what begins as idle speculation and gossip quickly becomes something more sinister, when Charlie starts receiving anonymous threats warning him off the case.Then, a second body washes up on the beach…Can Charlie hunt down a killer, before he becomes the next victim?

From the acclaimed author of The Pursuit of Glory and Frederick the Great, a riotous biography of the charismatic ruler of 18th-century Poland and Saxony - and his catastrophic reign.''It''s been a superb year for history but Augustus the Strong ranks up there with the very very best! I cant recommend it strongly enough'' - Simon Sebag-Montefiore''The wonderful story of one of the worst monarchs in European history, told with enormous wit and scholarship by a supremely talented historian. If you have the slightest interest in Germans, Poles, porcelain, jewels, the Enlightenment, military disasters or the pleasures of fox-tossing, then this is the book for you'' - Dominic Sandbrook*Shortlisted for the Elizabeth Longford Prize for Historical Biography 2025*Augustus is one of the great what-ifs of the 18th century. He could have turned the accident of ruling two major realms into the basis for a powerful European state – a bulwark against the Russians and a block on Prussian expansion. Alas, there was no opportunity Augustus did not waste and no decision he did not get wrong. By the time of his death Poland was fatally damaged and would subsequently disappear as an independent state until the 20th century.Tim Blanning’s wonderfully entertaining and original new book is a study in failed statecraft, showing how a ruler can shape history as much by incompetence as brilliance. Augustus’s posthumous sobriquet ‘The Strong’ referred not to any political accomplishment, but to his legendary physical strength and sexual athleticism.Yet he was also one of the great creative artists of the age, combining driving energy, exquisite taste and apparently boundless resources to master-mind the creation of peerless Dresden, the baroque jewel of jewels. Augustus the Strong brilliantly evokes this time of opulence and excess, decadence and folly.

The ending of the slave trade and abolition of slavery by European powers during the 19th century is generally told as the work of enlightened liberals fighting against entrenched slaving interests in Africa, the Caribbean, and European capitals. Sudhir Hazareesingh here turns this narrative on its head, showing how the enslaved resisted their oppressors from the earliest years of the Atlantic slave trade in the 16th century until the abolition of slavery in the United States in 1865, and how this opposition was the driving force for change.Daring To Be Free portrays the struggle for liberation from the perspective of the enslaved, wherever possible in their own words. It shines a light on the lives of revolutionaries like Toussaint Louverture, José Antonio Aponte, Nat Turner, and the pregnant rebel Solitude; freed writers of narrative accounts like Frederick Douglass and Ottobah Cugoano; and the countless maroons, insurgents and conspirators whose acts of defiance destabilised the slave order in the colonies and galvanized the movement for abolition in France, Britain, and the United States. Hazareesingh gives particular emphasis to the powerful roles of women as campaigners, disruptors and warriors.Drawing on written archives and oral history, as well as a rich body of secondary sources, the book traces the networks of cooperation that connected runaway settlements, covert rebellions and organized uprisings from Haiti, Jamaica, Brazil and Cuba to Mauritius and the United States. It shows us how the struggle for liberty was shaped not only by western Enlightenment ideals but by the spiritual, martial, and religious influences from the lives of the enslaved in Africa before the Middle Passage – and by the inspiring example of Haiti, the first successful anticolonial revolution and the first independent black state, which echoed down the 19th century.Daring To Be Free reshapes our understanding of Atlantic slavery by portraying how enslaved lives were defined not by their dehumanisation at the hands of colonialists and slavers but by their own resilience, solidarity, and commitment to freedom. It also examines the afterlife of the slave trade in contemporary discussions about the legacy of slavery and possibilities for redress, reparations, and memorial in our own time.

Set in the turbulent decade of the 1940s, The Women''s Courtyard provides an inverted perspective on the Partition. Mastur’s novel gives expression to the preoccupations of the women in the courtyard, fighting different battles with loud voices. The novel follows a Muslim girl, Aliya, and her family, about and around the climax of the Independence struggle. While the national struggle rages on the street, Aliya, Aunty and the residents of the courtyard are tethered hopelessly to their own problems of life and death. The Women’s Courtyard is an experience in suffocation. Within the strict religious and social framework of a rigid Muslim family, there is a purdah between Aliya and the rest of the world.

'As gritty and hard-driving a thriller as you'll find . . . The action never stops, the language sings and stings' Washington Post Clement Mansell knows how easy it is to get away with murder. The crazed killer is back on the Detroit streets - thanks to some nifty courtroom moves by his lawyer - and this time he's feeling invincible enough to execute a crooked Motown judge. Homicide Detective Raymond Cruz thinks the 'Oklahoma Wildman' crossed the line long before this latest outrage, and he's determined to see that the psycho does not slip through the legal system's loopholes a second time. But that means a good cop is going to have to play somewhat fast and loose with the rules - in order to manoeuvre Mansell into a showdown that he won't be walking away from.

From the multi-award winning creator of BROADCHURCH and showrunner of DOCTOR WHO, get ready for the most exciting crime fiction debut of 2025...“A masterclass whodunnit” Gillian McAllister “Everything I love in a crime novel” Jennie Godfrey “As unputdownable as you''d expect from the writer of Broadchurch” Jenny Colgan****** When Nicola Bridge moves back to Dorset after years as a CID detective in the big city, the last thing she expects is for the picturesque village of Fleetcombe to become a grisly crime scene. Jim Tiernan, landlord of the White Hart pub, has been found dead, the body staged with macabre relish on an isolated country road. As soon as she starts asking questions, Nicola realises everyone in the village has something to hide. Frankie, the hairdresser who isn’t a skilled enough actor to conceal they’re lying about the night of the murder. Eddie, the delivery driver whose heart starts racing every time he drives past the crime scene. Deakins, the embittered farmer still living in the shadow of a supposedly murderous ancestor. And even the little girl, hidden at the top of the playground slide, who’s watching them all. Whispers. Rumours. Lies. But Nicola knows that somewhere among them, a killer is hiding in plain sight. Because sometimes the smallest villages hide the darkest secrets...

*PRE-ORDER NOW! THE TWIST-A-MINUTE NEW THRILLER FROM LIA MIDDLETON THAT ASKS HOW WELL YOU REALLY KNOW THE PERSON YOU''RE MARRIED TO...*FRANK has been found not guilty of a terrible crime. But, moments after arriving home from the trial, he is killed.HARRY was Frank’s defence lawyer. He knew everything about his client. Or at least, he thought he did. So how did he react when he found out the truth?PIERA is Harry’s wife. Harry doesn’t know about her connection to Frank. But could it have driven her to murder?ONE MARRIAGE. ONE LIE. TWO SIDES TO THE STORY…

''Perfection of character is this: to live each day as if it were your last, without frenzy, without apathy, without pretence.''This collection presents the greatest works by the three major Stoic philosophers, in beautiful hardback editions designed by Coralie Bickford-Smith. Meditations, written by the Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius to provide personal consolation, is one of the most influential works of philosophy of all time. Seneca''s Letters to a Stoic upholds the ideals of Stoicism - the wisdom of the self-possessed person immune to life''s setbacks - while valuing friendship and courage. And in his Discourses, Epictetus argues that happiness lies in learning to perceive exactly what is in our power to change and what is not. Together, these works offer a complete education in Stoicism.

PRE-ORDER THE HOTTEST ROMANCE OF THE YEAR! It’s a love story, will she ever say yes…Renee Feldman would rather be anywhere other than a family friend’s wedding, introducing herself as a “film school drop-out”—until she runs into Lola Gray, her childhood neighbour who''s become a major pop sensation. Lola Gray just wants to get through her sister’s wedding. It''s been a year since her secret relationship imploded, simultaneously breaking Lola''s heart and cancelling the album of love songs she''d written. If Lola doesn''t release new music soon, she''ll become irrelevant.When Lola sees Renee, she knows what she needs to clear her head. Lola''s teenage crush on Renee secretly inspired her debut album. One night with Renee will put the past behind her and cure her writer’s block. But one night turns into much more Lola’s team urgently needs a new director for her documentary Renee is the only answer.As Lola and Renee reconnect, they can’t deny their feelings for each other. When Renee suggests they tell that story in the documentary, Lola agrees, although it means coming out. But neither Renee or Lola realize how hard it will be to tell their love story, in an industry that sets a narrative of its own…Perfect for fans of RED, WHITE & ROYAL BLUE, Ali Hazelwood and Emily Henry!Tropes: Enemies-to-loversForced proximity Fake datingSapphic romanceSmall town to big city Celebrity romance

The author of The Ruin of All Witches returns with a gripping, vividly told journey of rediscovery, uncovering his uncle’s past as a soldier, prisoner, fugitive and partisan in World War Two Italy Malcolm Gaskill knew two things about his great-uncle Ralph’s wartime adventures: he’d been a prisoner in Italy, and he’d cut his way out of a train with a knife and fork. Apart from that, he’d faded into family folklore, lost to view. Until, one hot afternoon in an English country garden, a chance conversation set Gaskill on his uncle’s trail…What Ralph really did in the war was, he discovers, even more extraordinary than the exaggerations of family myth. From last-ditch fighting in the Libyan desert and incarceration in a Puglian prisoner-of-war camp, to desperate, dramatic escapes and the assuming of an entirely new identity among the peasants and partisans of the Italian alps, Gaskill traces a life transformed by conflict, while lifting the curtain on a long-forgotten episode of the Second World War.Yet The Glass Mountain is about more than war: it’s a haunting exploration of what it means to encounter the past, and how we remember, forget and recover it. As he follows his uncle’s path through dusty archives and the landscapes, towns and villages of present-day Italy, Gaskill finds himself confronted by questions that go to the heart of how we think about the people who came before us: Why do stories matter? How much of the past can ever be true?

**The unmissable new mystery in the bestselling, record-breaking Thursday Murder Club series by Richard Osman**-----Who''s got time to think about murder when there''s a wedding to plan?It’s been a quiet year for the Thursday Murder Club. Joyce is busy with table plans and first dances. Elizabeth is grieving. Ron is dealing with family troubles, and Ibrahim is still providing therapy to his favourite criminal.But when Elizabeth meets a wedding guest who’s in trouble, kidnap and death are hot on their heels once more. A villain wants access to an uncrackable code, and will stop at nothing to get it. Plunged back into action once more, can the gang solve the puzzle and a murder in time?Available for pre-order now!-----Praise for Richard Osman and the Thursday Murder Club series‘Brilliantly suspenseful’ JEFFERY DEAVER‘Deplorably good’ IAN RANKIN‘Funny, clever, compelling’ HARLAN COBEN‘I smiled a million times’ MARIAN KEYES‘Warm, wise and witty’ VAL MCDERMID‘Osman just gets better’ SHARI LAPENA''The thing that shines through in Osman’s writing is that he really likes people and revels in all their foibles and eccentricities . . . a delightful read'' OBSERVER‘The rightful king of crime’ i PAPER

''One of the most insightful books I’ve read about what makes us human and how we understand each other'' Bill GatesSteven Pinker, one of the world''s greatest thinkers and bestselling author of Enlightenment Now, The Better Angels of Our Nature and The Language Instinct, reveals the power and perils of thinking alike As a cognitive scientist, the ultimate subject of Steven Pinker’s fascination is how we think about each other’s thoughts, ad infinitum. It sounds impossible, but Steven Pinker shows that we do it all the time. This awareness, which we experience as something that is public or “out there,” is called common knowledge, and it has a momentous impact on our social, political, and economic lives.Common knowledge, Pinker shows, can make sense of many of life’s enigmas: financial bubbles and crashes, revolutions that come out of nowhere, the posturing and pretence of diplomacy, the eruption of social media shaming mobs and academic cancel culture, the awkwardness of a first date. But people also go to great lengths to avoid common knowledge—to ensure that even if everyone knows something, they can’t know that everyone else knows they know it. And so we get rituals like benign hypocrisy, veiled bribes and threats, sexual innuendo, and pretending not to see the elephant in the room.In exploring the paradoxes of human behaviour, When Everyone Knows that Everyone Knows… invites us to understand the ways we try to get into each other’s heads, and the harmonies, hypocrisies, and outrages that result.

The Bible observes that God made humanity ‘for a while a little lower than the angels’. If humans are that close to angels, does the difference lie in human sexuality and what we do with it? In a single lifetime, Christianity or historically Christian societies have witnessed one of the most extraordinary about-turns in attitudes to sex and gender in human history, bringing liberation for some and fury and fear for others.This book by Oxford''s Emeritus Professor of the History of the Church seeks to calm fears and encourage understanding through telling a 3000-year-long tale of Christians encountering sex, gender and the family, with noises off from their sacred texts. It beckons us to pay attention to the sheer glorious complexity and contradictions in the history of Christianity, an epic of ordinary and extraordinary Christians trying to make sense of themselves and of humanity’s deepest desires, fears and hopes.

Sheldon Soleskin should be having a horrible day. Even though he’s been unexpectedly transferred to a new school right before the holidays, has only one day to set up his new classroom, and just discovered his twin sister''s been hiding an invitation to his ex-boyfriend’s Christmas Eve wedding, he’s still ready to take on the world with a smile on his face and a skip in his step.Theo Berenson just wants to be left alone to his custodial duties. But when the chipper new first-grade teacher needs help moving furniture the Sunday after Thanksgiving, he''s forced to do something he detests. Help. To make matters worse, Theo''s overbearing parents are coming for Hanukah in a few weeks, and he''s told them he has a boyfriend. Except he doesn''t. Because who would want to date an oaf like Theo?Working together, these opposites discover they might be able to help each other out. Agreeing to be each other’s dates, they become friends as they practice for their upcoming events. But when all the rehearsing starts feeling a little too real, and both men''s pasts come roaring back to haunt them, will they be able to pull off the ultimate holiday masquerade?

Isaac Bell returns for another thrilling mission in a new book from the Grand Master of Adventure, Clive Cussler - pre-order your copy now!Charismatic, handsome, and fiercely loyal, Isaac Bell is a no-nonsense private detective at the Van Dorn Detective Agency. Travelling all over early 20th century America in pursuit of justice for his clients, chasing down a steam train in a sports automobile is all in a day’s work for Bell. And while he’s on the trail of thieves, killers, and sometimes much worse, he’ll have to use his every last wit to stay ahead of those he seeks, and to stay alive . . .Praise for Clive Cussler:''The Adventure King'' Sunday Express''Just about the best in the business'' New York Post''Cussler is hard to beat'' Daily Mail

Leo Varadkar shares his fascinating experience as Irish prime minister at a time of much change and turbulence, in this remarkably honest memoir.Leo Varadkar was an unlikely Taoiseach – the youngest on taking office in 2017, the first Taoiseach to be gay, and the first person of colour to be Taoiseach.Equally unlikely was his decision to bow out of politics in his mid-forties. Now, liberated from the constraints of office, he tells his fascinating story with characteristic courage and candour, and provides a unique insight into the formation and evolution of a senior politician.In Speaking My Mind Leo Varadkar shares his pride in helping to bring about transformational changes, such as marriage equality. He describes experiences that only a prime minister could have – speaking frankly to Pope Francis on the legacy of church abuses, connecting with Barack Obama about both being the ‘tall, dark guy with the funny name’, navigating challenges such as the pandemic and the fallout from Brexit. And he writes honestly about the costs that go with the immense privilege of holding high office.Speaking My Mind is a revealing, intimate and important memoir from a singular public figure.