The Stormy Petrel


Book Description




Stormy Petrel


Book Description

font size="+1"A gripping, nail-biting adventure set in Scotland, from the original queen of romantic suspense/font size font size="+1"Total heaven. I'd rather read her than most other authors' Harriet Evans/font size When Rose Fenemore takes a desperately needed holiday to an isolated cottage on the Scottish island of Moila she doesn't expect much in the way of adventure - just a few quiet weeks of writing, walking and bird-watching. And then, late one night during a wild storm, two young men appear in her doorway, seeking shelter from the wind and rain. Neither man is quite who he claims, and the question of who to trust will put Rose in grave peril . . . Praise for Mary Stewart: 'Mary Stewart is magic' New York Times 'One of the great British storytellers of the 20th century' Independent 'She set the benchmark for pace, suspense and romance - with a great dollop of escapism as the icing' Elizabeth Buchan 'Mary Stewart's writing is illuminated by her evident affection for the Western Scottish landscape . . . a rattling good yarn' Sunday Telegraph Reader reviews of Stormy Petrel: 'Mary Stewart! What an author! . . . The plot has enough twists and turns to keep you guessing, and the writing is a joy' 'She truly is one of the best romantic suspense writers, if not the best' 'Like consuming really rich chocolate you don't want it to end . . . She has the gift and has been sharing it with her readers generously. She still has magic' 'Mary Stewart specialises in novels which have you alternately holding your breath as to what might happen, or chuckling to yourself'




A Stormy Petrel: The Life and Times of John Pope Hennessy


Book Description

Many words have been used to describe John Pope Hennessy, the former governor of Hong Kong. “Controversial” is perhaps the briefest way to outline his character. Yet we may be guilty of ascribing modern ideas to our understanding of characters of the past. An Irish Catholic raised during the age of empire and rising nationalism, a devout Tory and Disraeli follower, a believer in both the benefits of empire and a patron of local talent in his postings, it is easy to view Pope Hennessy as a man of contradictions. This volume traces Pope Hennessy’s history from his early beginnings in famine Ireland to his attempts to rise through the ranks in London. It goes on to cover his early postings to Labuan, West Africa, and, of course, Hong Kong, as well as his final days with his family. His actions and his personality are laid bare for readers fo form their own opinions of one of Hong Kong’s most enigmatic governors. “As to Sir J. P. Hennessy, the less said the better. His acts speak powerfully enough. The centre of his world was he himself. But with all the crowd of dark and bright powers that were wrestling within him, he could not help doing some good…” - Dr Ernst Johann Eitel, Missionary, sinologist, and John Pope Hennessy’s private secretary







Every Penguin in the World


Book Description

A husband and wife travel the globe to see all 18 penguin species in this “celebration of these delightful birds and a call for their conversation” that offers “joy, love, and hope for penguins and the world” (Dr. Jane Goodall). Every Penguin in the World tracks author-photographer Charles Bergman’s forays around the southern hemisphere—from the Galapagos to South Africa to the Antarctic—in his quest to see all 18 species of penguins in the world. The sections of the book are organized around themes of adventure, science and conservation, and pilgrimage—in which stories of each penguin species will be touched upon. This endearing and thought-provoking book beautifully combines narrative and photography to capture the plight and the experience of penguins worldwide. The author and his wife developed a passion after seeing their first penguin species and have since spent years traveling far and wide to see each variety of penguin in its natural habitat. Both a love letter and a call to action, Every Penguin in the World is a joyful ode to adventure, conservation, and the beautiful penguins that capture our hearts. “It's SO good! [...] Chuck Bergman’s writing, photography, and vulnerability is so kick-ass!” —Brené Brown, New York Times–bestselling author of Dare to Lead




Thornyhold


Book Description

'A comfortable chair and a Mary Stewart: total heaven. I'd rather read her than most other authors.' Harriet Evans The rambling house called Thornyhold is like something out of a fairy tale. Left to Gilly Ramsey by the cousin whose occasional visits brightened her childhood, the cottage, set deep in a wild wood, has come just in time to save her from a bleak future. With its reputation for magic and its resident black cat, Thornyhold offers Gilly more than just a new home. It offers her a chance to start over. The old house, with it tufts of rosy houseleek and the spreading gilt of the lichens, was beautiful. Even the prisoning hedges were beautiful, protective with their rusty thorns, their bastions of holly and juniper, and at the corners, like towers, their thick columns of yews. 'Mary Stewart is magic' New York Times 'One of the great British storytellers of the 20th century' Independent




The Black Riders


Book Description

The Black Riders is the first in a series featuring Dick, a preteen orphan who gets caught up in a rebellion against the succession to the crown in a European kingdom run on medieval lines and guarded by the legendary Black Riders with Count Jasper in charge. Humour, loyalty and adventure become mixed as the story progresses and Dick is captured.




Brilliant


Book Description

This “superb history” of artificial light traces the evolution of society—“invariably fascinating and often original . . . [it] amply lives up to its title” (Publishers Weekly, starred review). In Brilliant, Jane Brox explores humankind’s ever-changing relationship to artificial light, from the stone lamps of the Pleistocene to the LEDs embedded in fabrics of the future. More than a survey of technological development, this sweeping history reveals how artificial light changed our world, and how those social and cultural changes in turn led to the pursuit of more ways of spreading, maintaining, and controlling light. Brox plumbs the class implications of light—who had it, who didn’t—through the centuries when crude lamps and tallow candles constricted waking hours. She identifies the pursuit of whale oil as the first time the need for light thrust us toward an environmental tipping point. Only decades later, gas street lights opened up the evening hours to leisure, which changed the ways we live and sleep and the world’s ecosystems. Edison’s bulbs produced a light that seemed to its users all but divorced from human effort or cost. And yet, as Brox’s informative portrait of our current grid system shows, the cost is ever with us. Brilliant is infused with human voices, startling insights, and timely questions about how our future lives will be shaped by light




The Storm-petrels


Book Description

The first definitive work on the European Storm-petrel and its relatives, by one of the world's leading experts on the species. Imagine a bird as small as a sparrow, which lives most of its life on the open ocean yet can survive for decades. It walks on water, and migrates half way around the world, returning to remote islands to breed underground, often in the same rock crevice each year. At night it lays an enormous egg, feeding its chick until the nestling weighs more than both parents put together. It seems to have little fear of humans, but was itself feared by ancient seafarers. This might sound like the stuff of legend but is actually the description of a real creature, the storm-petrel: walker on water, global wanderer, climate sentinel and open-ocean survivor. In this beautifully written monograph, Rob Thomas explores the remarkable life of the European Storm-petrel, comparing and contrasting its behaviour and ecology across its range, and with the other storm-petrels of the world. We learn about their evolution, taxonomy, migration and adaptations to a life in the harsh open ocean, while also discovering what these enigmatic seabirds are revealing about what humans are doing to our planet. Illustrated with 150 photographs, and including the author's personal anecdotes and observations, Storm-petrels highlights some of the most exciting recent research findings and sets a trajectory for future discoveries.




The Good People


Book Description

Two women see something uncanny in the skies over west London in the summer of 1989. It's the summer of 1989, a time of global flux just before the collapse of the Berlin wall and of South Africa's apartheid; a time of signs and portents… Two women see something uncanny in the skies over west London. Maeve, the wife of the local vicar, finds she has lost nearly an hour of her life. In search of this lost time, she uncovers the memory of an encounter with aliens and, worse, a mysterious event from her childhood in Ireland, which she finally redeems in the underworld of an IRA-connected pub… Her husband Alistair has his own nightmare: preparations for the visit of an African bishop and his entourage for a Christian conference, whose left-wing agenda is threatened by the attendance of a famous and enigmatic nun… Meanwhile, Heather's sighting comes as a revelation that leads her, like a questing Grail knight, through strange ordeals, from a menacing cult to an alternate reality; from a mental hospital to, finally, an encounter with her own hidden depths. A companion volume to the author's critically lauded Daimonic Reality, a classic nonfiction study of otherworld journeys, The Good People is a modern fairy tale that dramatizes with wit the interweaving of revelation and delusion, the natural and the supernatural, worldliness and sanctity—ultimately suggesting that our humdrum lives are shadowed by the alien dimension of myth.