Cavendish - the Duchess of Newcastle - was attached to the exiled court of Henrietta Maria when she published her amazing proto-sci-fi novel, The Blazing World. A clever and subtle debut bio... read more
Our former Prime Minister considers Hillsborough, Grenfell and many parliamentary scandals, arguing that time and again those in power have served their own interests or those of the organi... read more
A multi-generational story of the remarkable Swedish family who made their fortune in Russia (founding the Russian oil industry) and then moved back to Sweden in 1917.
From New Jersey she went to Iran, where she abandoned her PhD on Jane Austen while fleeing the 1979 Revolution; then China and Saudi Arabia, before settling in Venice. There she began lookin... read more
Johan Jakob Astor left Germany for a flute-making business in London in the late C18th, and then moved to New York where he dealt in pianos, opium, furs and real estate: what glistered was i... read more
An account by a London financier of her family in Japan over the last 150 years. The huge changes they have navigated are described with sympathy and careful research.
Mozart was taken to Italy three times by his father in his early and mid-teens; already astonishingly accomplished as a thirteen-year-old, he drank in Italian opera like a thirsty man findin... read more
Fleming's own ideal of the 'complete man' is the source for the subtitle. NS has left no stone unturned in pursuit of a 'complete' portrait in writing this immense and engaging biography.
Born in 1833, Watt was a servant from the age of nine; later, she sold her husband's catch from door to door. After the death of most of her male relatives at sea, she was cared for in the C... read more
The author's investigation of her family's history and her own identity was sparked by the arrival of an anonymous postcard bearing four names that arrived over forty years after those four ... read more
He was Churchill's secretary and edited the work of Somerset Maugham and Sassoon; his proteg?s included Rupert Brooke, Robert Graves, Mark Gertler, Stanley Spencer and many others.
Prominent in both Thatcher and Major's cabinets, the author is a shrewd observer of the corridors of power, with their surprising chicanes and U-turns.
A Pulitzer Prize-winner's essays on musical greats who flourished again later in life: Leonard Cohen, Aretha Franklin, Patti Smith and many more. These are judicious and vivid portraits, som... read more
The subject's death released the official biographer from the prohibition against writing about Le Carr?'s private life. Hence this second book from Sisman. Not to be confused with Suleika D... read more
An account of Edward VIII that looks at early drafts of the abdicated King's own writings, and counterbalances the recent tabloid view of him as a traitor.
Ambassador for Henry VIII, Lord Protector of Edward VI, queen-maker and marriage broker for Mary, Paget continued to wield influence at Elizabeth I's court. He kept his head - by a whisker -... read more
From the publishers of Luncheon magazine, a chic collection of stories, reminiscences and recipes grounded in HC's childhood in Ireland and his time in the Basque country and France, with Pe... read more
An exceptional memoir of growing up in northern Germany in the 1930s and of the slide into war. The historian and novelist is warm and humorous as well as observant and meticulous. An unnerv... read more