History, Nature & Memoir - Winter 2024/25

Here are our history, nature writing, and memoir picks for autumn/winter 2024! Have a browse through to help focus your gift buying for this season, and beyond!

The Golden Road (William Dalrymple)

India is the forgotten heart of the ancient world. For a millennium and a half, India was a confident exporter of its diverse civilisation, creating around it a vast empire of ideas. Indian art, religions, technology, astronomy, music, dance, literature, mathematics and mythology blazed a trail across the world, along a Golden Road that stretched from the Red Sea to the Pacific. William Dalrymple draws from a lifetime of scholarship to highlight India’s oft-forgotten position as the heart of ancient Eurasia.

For the first time, he gives a name to this spread of Indian ideas that transformed the world. From the largest Hindu temple in the world at Angkor Wat to the Buddhism of China, from the trade that helped fund the Roman Empire to the creation of the numerals we use today (including zero), India transformed the culture and technology of its ancient world – and our world today as we know it.
 

The Rest is History Returns (Tom Holland & Dominic Sandbrook)

From the podcast legends who brought you The Rest is History comes The Rest is History Returns! This time Tom Holland and Dominic Sandbrook bring you an alphabetical miscellany, taking on some of history’s best and most bizarre moments. Charge forth against the traitors of the American Revolution, journey through Baghdad to discover the origins of the Arabian Nights and head to Sicily to witness the first face-off between Carthage and Rome.

Along the way you'll find the answers to questions like:
- Who was Jesus’s wife?
- What would it have been like to live-tweet through the eruption of Vesuvius?
- Why did the Romans inspire so much American science fiction?
- Which Mitford sister tried to seduce her girlish crush, Adolf Hitler?
- Who are history's top 10 monkeys?
- Was Henry V’s great-grandfather, Edward III, the biggest ‘lad’ in British history?

But that’s not all – this book also includes puzzles and a pub quiz! So dust off your tricorne hat, grab your lasso and get ready for a rollicking rollercoaster through the past . . .

Life Lessons From Historical Women (Eleanor Morton)

Take a tour of the past and uncover stories of the women whose lives and achievements have shaped our modern world. In Life Lessons from Historical Women, Eleanor Morton celebrates the ordinary women whose decisions and accomplishments in their everyday lives resonate with us today. Taking inspiration from the thriving self-help genre, Morton reasons that the greatest lessons can be taken from the female forebears who have come before - women whose actions inspire purpose, creativity and rebellion...without a side of pseudo psychology and judgement...

Covering the full gamut of the female experience, and women from all corners of history and the globe, Life Lessons from Historical Women includes chapters on 'How To Thrive' with Judith Kerr, 'Think Like an Entrepreneur' with Mary Seacole, and 'How Not to Give a Fuck' with the famous suffragette martyr Emily Davison. Whether it's what we can learn from the first woman to summit Everest or the trailblazing ladies who confirm that pockets have always been must-have in women's clothing, Eleanor writes with humour and a sincere respect for our history, and imparts valuable lessons for the modern female.

Raising Hare (Chloe Dalton)

Imagine you could hold a baby hare and bottle-feed it. Imagine that it lived under your roof and lolloped around your bedroom at night, drumming on the duvet cover when it wanted your attention. Imagine that, over two years later, it still ran in from the fields when you called it and snoozed in your house for hours on end.

This happened to me. When lockdown led busy professional Chloe to leave the city and return to the countryside of her childhood, she never expected to find herself custodian of a newly born hare. Yet when she finds the creature, endangered, alone and no bigger than her palm, she is compelled to give it a chance at survival.

Raising Hare chronicles their journey together and the challenges of caring for the leveret and preparing for its return to the wild. We witness an extraordinary relationship between human and animal, rekindling our sense of awe towards nature and wildlife. This improbable bond of trust serves to remind us that the most remarkable experiences, inspiring the most hope, often arise when we least expect them.

Still Waters & Wild Waves (Angela Harding)

Featuring over 50 original illustrations of dramatic seascapes and reflective rivers, alongside photography of the stunning places that inspired the artwork, Angela Harding's beautiful new book captures the waters that move us.

'A blue-green sketchbook sits at the edge of my studio desk. It is covered in decorative paper that is now frayed and tattered. These marks are evidence of its travels, as far north as Shetland and as far south as the Isles of Scilly. Of days at sea and cycling across moorland. It has sat beside me on beaches and cliff tops, on small island planes and huge ferries, on trains and bicycles. Going to places of old that I have revisited many times, as well as new destinations long lived in my imagination. Some of the pages are stained with Scottish rain and spilt coffees. This sketchbook holds scribbles and memories that tell the tales of still waters and wild waves. Its pages are a record of a printmaker's journey and they are at the heart of this book.'

In this gorgeous book, Angela takes readers with her on her travels across rivers and seas, featuring beautiful paintings and prints, pages from Angela's personal sketchbooks and stunning photos. It is a joyful celebration of water and wildlife across Britain - perfect for art admirers and nature lovers everywhere.

The Place of Tides (James Rebanks)

We are all in need of lights to follow. 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. Years passed. Then, one day, he wrote her a letter, asking if he could return. Bring work clothes, she replied, and good boots, and come quickly: her health was failing. And so he travelled to the edge of the Arctic to witness her last season on the island. This is the story of that season.

It is the story of a unique and ancient landscape, and of the woman who brought it back to life. It traces the pattern of her work from the rough, isolated toil of bitter winter, to the elation of the endless summer light, when the birds leave behind their precious down for gathering, like feathered gold. Slowly, Rebanks begins to understand that this woman and her world are not what he had previously thought. What began as a journey of escape becomes an extraordinary lesson in self-knowledge and forgiveness.

All That Matters (Sir Chris Hoy)

Sir Chris Hoy knows better than most how life can change in the blink of an eye. In elite sport, the margin between victory and defeat is miniscule, and the pressure is immense. Chris has built a glittering sporting career on understanding these moments: how to feel for them, how to cope with them, how to make them count.

Last year, he faced another life-changing moment. He found out that the ache in his shoulder was in fact a tumour, and that he had Stage 4 cancer.

He will be living with this disease for the rest of his life.

In this memoir, Chris shares the next phase of his extraordinary life with exceptional bravery. He looks over the challenges he has faced thus far, and the ways he has taken them on. With his wife Sarra and their young children by his side, he shares how he has used these experiences to find ways to focus on the moments that matter, showing us how to do the same.

Never (Rick Astley)

When 'Never Gonna Give You Up’ propelled Rick Astley into the pop stratosphere, it changed his life forever. Nothing could have prepared the young, unassuming boy from Lancashire for what was in store for him. This is Rick's story – in his own words. At just nineteen, Rick agreed to sign with legendary music producer Pete Waterman – under the wings of music powerhouse Stock Aitken Waterman.

Unpredictable, outlandish adventures followed, giving him a peek into the mechanics of the music industry – all of which would eventually take Rick from the shadows of local bands to international stardom. From platinum-selling albums to worldwide tours, the world was at Rick’s feet. And then, suddenly, at what seemed like the height of fame, it wasn’t.

At twenty-seven, Rick retired himself from the industry that had brought him much success and financial stability. Behind the hits and the glitz and glamour was a young man coming to terms with his new-found fame, the realities of life in the pop-music machine and the pressures of life on the road, not to mention reconciling with his childhood spent between his divorced parents in a volatile family dynamic. Time out of the industry offered Rick room for much-needed reflection and therapy – and unknowingly helped to set the stage for his triumphant return to music.

Balancing nostalgia, fresh perspectives and introspection, with a good dose of northern humour, Never is an intimate look at the man behind the hits – and is a portrait of truth, artistic evolution and the astounding power of contentment.

There and Back: Diaries 1999-2009 (Michael Palin)

A new millennium, and a new chapter for Michael Palin unfolds. With a Hemingway travel project testing his confidence, doubts creeping in about his abilities as a writer, the death of his great friend George Harrison and the last of his children leaving home, the dawn of the twenty-first century sees Michael at his most reflective yet.  Over the next ten years, we watch through Michael's eyes as the world reels from the successive shocks of September 11, the 7/7 bombings and the global financial crash.

With the warmth and gentle empathy that have endeared him to millions of fans over the decades, Michael documents the day-to-day detail of living in a world buffeted by such powerful winds of change. Amidst this turbulence, one thing remains constant: Michael's irrepressible curiosity and thirst for adventure. These diaries follow his life as he comes and goes through the filming of four blockbuster travel documentaries - Hemingway Adventure, Sahara, Himalaya and New Europe - and reaches the peak of his fame as a beloved TV traveller. And five years on from the last of his children flying the nest, Michael embarks on his greatest adventure yet: becoming a besotted grandfather. There and Back is a new window into the world of Michael Palin, one that reveals more than ever the strength and succour he draws from those constant supporting structures in his life: his family, his friendships and, of course, the Pythons.

Hortobiography (Carol Klein)

Carol Klein is one of Britain's best loved horticulturists, and for decades gardening has been at the heart of her extraordinary life. From her childhood adventures in Manchester to her first experiments in plantswomanship at Glebe Cottage, and from training as an artist and a teacher, and then finding an entirely unexpected career as one of Britain’s most beloved television presenters, in this long-awaited memoir Carol tells the story of the people, places and plants that have shaped her life.

Exploring why our relationship with the natural world is so important, and how it brings joy, creativity and good health to our lives, Carol also offers irresistible insights on her favourite flowers and plants, and how to help them flourish. A story of a life lived happily amongst the greenery, this book is the perfect companion for anyone who has sought solace in the natural world.