Isaac Newton was accorded a semi-divine status in the 18th and 19th centuries, whereby his image linked together religion and science. The real human being behind the demi-god image has tended to be lost. He was a person who took credit from others, and crushed the reputations of those to whom he owed most. This most brilliant of mathematicians could alas...

Nile Wilson first shot to fame in 2014, when he became the only British gymnast to win five gold medals at the European Junior Gymnastics Championships. The same year, he won four medals as a senior in the Commonwealth Games and is the current Commonwealth Champion on the horizontal bar. In 2016, he won bronze at the Rio Olympics and is tipped to win gold...

If you care about what you eat, you should care about how you grow it.

Gardeners can demonstrate that by going beyond organics to veganics - growing without animal inputs - they are a driving force in saving the environment.

This book gives you the tools to grow without harming the planet and animals, and explains why moving beyond organics towards super...

When the thirteen year old Margaret Tudor, eldest daughter of Henry VII and his wife Elizabeth of York, married King James IV of Scotland in a magnificent proxy ceremony held at Richmond Palace in January 1503, no one could have guessed that this pretty, redheaded princess would go on to have a marital career as dramatic and chequered as that of her younger...

For as long as human societies have existed there have always been people who have always transgressed the laws of their respective societies. It seems that whenever new laws are made, certain people find ways to break them.

This book will introduce you to some of the most notorious figures, from all parts of the world, who have committed heinous crimes such...

Elizabeth Branwell was born in Penzance in 1770, a member of a large and influential Cornish family of merchants and property owners. In 1821 her life changed forever when her sister Maria fell dangerously ill. Leaving her comfortable life behind, Elizabeth made the long journey north to a remote moorland village in Yorkshire to nurse her sister. After the...

What did a Victorian lady wear for a walk in the park? How did she style her hair for an evening at the theatre? And what products might she have used to soothe a sunburn or treat an unsightly blemish? Mimi Matthews answers these questions and more as she takes readers on a decade-by-decade journey through Victorian fashion and beauty history.

Women’s...

After dinner at the Wolfs Lair it was Hitlers custom to retire to his private quarters where Hitler and his entourage often listened to gramophone records of Beethoven symphonies, selections from Wagner while Hitler would hold forth with lengthy and rambling monologues touching on a wide variety of subjects. Hitler was invariably joined by Keitel and his...

A simplified explanation of probiotics and what they can do for and to the human body is long overdue. Despite the fact that people use the term probiotics a lot in the media as well as in everyday life there appears to be some confusion as to whether probiotics are something that occurs naturally in a healthy human gut or ‘biome’, something that is added...

Alfred the Great’s daughter defied all expectations of a well-bred Saxon princess. The first Saxon woman ever to rule a kingdom, Aethelflaed, Lady of the Mercians, led her army in battle against Viking invaders. She further broke with convention by arranging for her daughter to succeed her on the throne of Mercia.

To protect her people and enable her kingdom...

Irishman John-Paul Jordan, still only in his thirties, has led an extraordinary life … from the Foreign Legion and security in Iraq to serving his country in Afghanistan for which he was decorated for his leadership and bravery … and on to ‘herding’ journalists on the front line in Libya … and hunting for gold in Afghanistan …

However, once back in Civvy...

Innovator. Tyrant. Consummate showman. Passionate lover of women.

After the death of King Louis XIII in 1643, the French crown went to his first-born son and heir, four-year old Louis XIV. In the extraordinary seventy-two years that followed, Louis le Grand - France’s self-styled ‘Sun King’ - ruled France and its people, leaving his unique and permanent mark...

Wife to Richard, Duke of York, mother to Edward IV and Richard III, and aunt to the famous ‘Kingmaker’, Richard, Earl of Warwick, Cecily Neville was a key player on the political stage of fifteenth-century Britain England.

Mythologically rumoured to have been known as ‘the Rose of Raby’ because of her beauty and her birth at Raby Castle, and as ‘Proud Cis’...

Full with innovative, sculptural and outrageous footwear this book celebrates all shoes from the pump to the platform and the court shoe to the stiletto.

Shoes are no longer regarded just for their practical purpose of protecting the feet as they have now become iconic works of art that would not look out of place displayed in a gallery. Collectable Names...

The world of the circus has a long and colourful history but it was with a man named Philip Astley that the ‘modern’ circus was founded. It was 250 years ago, in April 1768, that Astley pegged out a circular ride on the banks of the river Thames and gave performances of trick riding to a paying audience. Trick riding was nothing new, so what made Astley so...

When Mary Tudor, eldest daughter of Henry VIII, succeeded to the throne of England in 1553 it was with wild rejoicing and a degree of popularity rarely seen on the accession of a British monarch. Yet at her death five years later she was almost universally reviled and hated by her people so much so that she was posthumously awarded the sobriquet Bloody Mary.

...

For 150 years, up and down the country, from large cities to rural areas and the remotest islands and highlands, district nurses have been visiting the sick in their own homes. Here they have provided healthcare, and given moral support and advice to people of all ages the length and breadth of Britain.

Follow the story of how, in the 1860s, the Liverpool...

Which racing motorcycles or sidecar outfits have made the strongest contributions to the Isle of Man TT over the last century? If you had to choose twenty-five individual machines for a fantasy museum, which ones would they be? Matthew Richardson has made his choices, and describes each one in vivid detail in this perceptive and highly illustrated book. He...

When you think about the 1970s, what comes to mind? Flares? Queen? Rocky?

The 1970s was one of the most exciting, innovative and colourful decades of recent history. With major events in music, film and television, the introduction of new technology, and the rising tide of socio-political change, the decade played a key role in British social history.

This...