An intellectual thriller set in the Oxford of the 1660s, a time of great ferment - intellectual, religious and political. The action takes place around the suspicious death of Robert Grove, a Fellow of New College.
On a warm summer night in 1974, six teenagers play at being cool. They smoke pot, drink vodka, share their dreams and vow always to be interesting. Decades later, aspiring actress Jules has resigned herself to a more practical occupation; Cathy has stopped dancing; Jonah has laid down his guitar and Goodman has disappeared.
For George Mallory as for all of his generation, death was but 'a frail barrier that men crossed, smiling and gallant, every day'. As climbers they accepted a degree of risk unimaginable before the war. What mattered now was how one lived, and the moments of being alive.
Who were the ancient Greeks? They gave us democracy, philosophy, poetry, rational science, the joke. But what was it that enabled them to achieve so much? This indispensable introduction unveils a civilization of incomparable richness and a people of astounding complexity.
An elderly, proud black farmer, Lucas Beauchamp, is wrongfully arrested for the murder of a white man. The lynch mob are baying for his blood. His sole hope lies with a young white boy, bent on repaying an old favour, who with the help of Lucas's cynical lawyer will work to find the truth and hatch a risky plot to prove his innocence.
Covers a range of topics on which the author has written and lectured over the years. This book explores lost islands, mythical realms, and the medieval world in the process - to a disquisition on the theme that runs through his novel, "The Prague Cemetery".
A fashion model with everything is disfigured in a road "accident" and goes from being the beautiful centre of attention to being a monster, so hideous that no one will acknowledge she exists. She then has to learn that reinventing herself means erasing her past and making up something better.
Features a catwalk model who has everything: a boyfriend, a career, and a loyal best friend. But when a sudden motor 'accident' leaves her disfigured and incapable of speech, she goes from being the beautiful centre of attention to being an invisible monster, so hideous that no one will acknowledge she exists.