Two world snooker championships, alcohol, violence, affairs, threats to shoot a team mate, assaults on officials, gambling, lost days with Oliver Reed, illness and bankruptcy.
The man who became revolutionized snooker became one of the biggest names in the country tells all.
The Hurricane is back. Prepare to be caught up in the carnage.
Evander Holyfield is history’s only four-time world heavyweight boxing champion. But this is most admired and beloved athlete did not have an easy journey to the top. Barely able to make it into the heavyweight division and almost always smaller fighter in the ring, Holyfield spent his professional career proving the naysayers wrong.
Britney Spears – the princess of pop – is making a comeback, and there isn’t a person out there who hasn’t heard about it. In this fully up-to-date and authoritative biography, Steve Dennis reveals all there is to know about the much-loved star.
Hitting our radios for the first time in 1998 with ‘…Baby One More Time’, Britney Spears quickly became a pop idol. Now, at just 27 years of age, she has racked up five number one albums, seven top-ten singles and seven sell-out world tours, as well having performed on stage with both Madonna and Michael Jackson. Just a decade after breaking onto to scene, she has become nothing short of a pop legend.
Her private life, however, has not been so easy. In 2004 Britney famously married a childhood friend at The Little White Wedding Chapel in Las Vegas; since then her personal life has seemingly been thrown into turmoil. In the last five years she has had numerous failed relationships and endured a very public divorce and custody battle – all in the full glare of the international media.
Drawing on exclusive interviews with those closest to the superstar, Britney: Inside the Dream is a engrossing portrait of fascinating star. A frank biography, with no detail spared, it reveals the real Britney Spears, like you’ve never known her before.
Provoked by the events of 9/11 and the us reaction, Jakob Arjouni has written a clever and satiric novel focusing on a state intelligence officer and the workings of mass hysteria
This 33-year-old cycling fanatic from Murrayfield in the suburbs of Edinburgh defied the doubters who thought he would struggle when his specialist discipline, the 1km time trial, was dropped from the Olympics, and went on to reinvent himself as a track cycling sprinter and triple Olympic gold medallist in Beijing. His return to these shores sparked unprecedented celebrations and real admiration that here was a role model who was the epitome of all things that are good in sport.
Thelonious ‘Monk’ Ellison is an erudite but seldom-read author who insists on writing obscure literary papers and avant-garde fiction rather than the writing obscure the ‘ghetto prose’ that would buy him commercial success. After witnessing, with horror, the runaway success of the latest novel in the genre, We’s Lives in Da Ghetto, he sits back with a parody called My Pafology (later retitled Fuck) which he submits, to the dismay of his agent, under pseudonym Stagg R. Leigh.
Shaun Goater was signed by Alex Ferguson almost as a political pawn after a Manchester United tour of Bermuda went disastrously wrong. He never made it with United and instead moved on to Rotherham. Undeterred by homesickness and the Yorkshire weather, he became a huge favourite at Millmoor before moving to Bristol City, where his goalscoring exploits endeared him to the fans and caught the eye of Man City manager Joe Royle. He won over the skeptical City following, who had seen him only as a journeyman striker bought to plug a gap. Within a year, he’d become a cult figure and his knack of poaching goals soon gave rise to one of the best modern-day terrace chants ‘Feed the Goat and he will score’. Season after season, the bond between player and supporters grew and his name was etched into City folklore. He was captain for their last match at Maine Road before joining Reading. His career stalled with the Royals when manager Alan Pardew left a few weeks after Goater’s arrival and Steve Coppell took over. He went out on loan to Coventry before Southend United rescued him at the start of their highly successful 2005/06 season. Feed the Goat is the inspirational tale of a universally respected player who refused to give up on his dream.
Sir Alex Ferguson was once asked what it was like to lead a team out at Wembley. ‘Don’t ask me, ask Geoff Chapple’, came the reply, the Manchester United icon handing out the ultimate accolade to one of non-League football’s most revered figures.
‘Terrorism, match-fixing and financial malpractices are not topics that a cricket writer might think of as his bread and butter, but cricket has suffered a traumatic period of late. Many of the pieces here are an examination of the game and where it is heading, and under whose control, as it faces up to the challenge of retaining its traditions in a rapidly changing market place.
In a world dominated by Twitter, where the rush to judgement is so overpowering, the ability to step back from the fray, and to be able to take at least a short time to organize thoughts and opinions, make some calls and hopefully find out a little more, is important’
Kate Copson, born in 1899, is the oldest patient on Ward 3C, Whetstone General Hospital. With her hundredth birthday approaching at the speed of an express train, Kate is engaged in a race against time with a difference: she wants her life to crash into the buffers before she has to listen to the Queen’s telemessage and a rousing chorus of “For She’s a Jolly Good Fellow”, but not before she’s worked out which of her three sons is responsible for the murder of her fourth – or is it fifth? – husband, Graham Eldridge. Confined to bed after suffering a massive stroke, Kate is alert and rational. Although she retains limited power of movement, she feigns paralysis in order that she may, free of distractions, replay the mental video of her life and, she hopes, eliminate two of her sons from suspicion of murder.
I Know This Much – by Gary Kemp, Spandau Ballet’s prime mover – is simply the freshest, most exciting and best-written memoir to arrive for years.
Gary’s story begins in North London, where the Kemp family rented a home with no bathrooms and chickens in the yard. After a couple of failed attempts to kill his brother Martin, his parents gave him a guitar for Christmas.
From schoolyard battles between the Bowie Boys and the Prog Rockers to Mrs Kemp’s firm insistence on net curtains, from acting for the Children’s Film Foundation to manning a fruit and veg stall on Saturdays, Gary brilliantly evokes an upbringing full of love, creativity and optimism.
As the Thatcher years begin, Gary’s account of the outrageous London club scene centred around the Blitz and Billy’s is just sizzling. Out of this glamorous mayhem of kilt-wearing mascara’d peacocks would emerge Spandau Ballet – the band that would define the era, and hold high the victorious standard of the New Romantics.
In August 2008 Jade Goody received the shattering news that she had cervical cancer. She was only 27 years old. But with her usual strength of character, Jade was determined to beat the disease and carry on with life as normal with her two little boys. But in February 2009, Jade received the tragic news that any mother dreads to hear – the cancer had spread and was untreatable. Covering her initial diagnosis while appearing on Celebrity Big Brother in India, their emotional last Christmas as a family, her magical wedding to her partner Jack Tweed and her dying wish to be christened with her boys, Jade’s heart-breaking diary of her final months is set against a backdrop of flashbacks to her difficult early years and her rise to fame in the Big Brother house.
The UNAUTHORIZED edition by Sean Smith gives us an insist into Kates family and how she grew up. It also includes the complete story of their wedding day with photos throughout. the language is unformal and is written in a simple way. … It also includes the complete story of their wedding day with photos throughout.
Robert Lindsay is one of Britain’s best-loved actors, and his diverse career has seen him play everyone from TV’s West London revolutionary Wolfie Smith to starring on Broadway. In this book Robert looks back over his acting career, as well as recalling his childhood, schooling and family life.
Ed’s life was thrown into turmoil when his mother, the centre of his universe, died. Unable to articulate his sorrow and his pain, he became increasingly isolated from his friends and family, and his grief began to manifest itself in bizarre physical affectations. Over time he developed an extreme case of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder.
Thirteen years on, living alone in a basement, Ed was consumed by the idea of stopping time from moving forward.
When Belinda Rathbone, a New York art historian, met eccentric Anglo-Scots bachelor John Ouchterlony it was the start of a story of clashing cultures and crumbling houses. After a whirlwind romance she married the man-and his 400acre estate decrepit mansion in Scotland. In her charming and moving account of their time together she reveals her many discoveries about his strange world- not just the persistence of lino, and family historian ancient and recent, but the value of dead elms, the art of Aga, yoga with the aristocracy and the vitally important business of producing an heir…..
“With each new day in Africa, a gazelle wakes up knowing he must outrun the fastest lion or perish. At the same time, a lion stirs and stretches, knowing he must outrun the fastest gazelle or stave. It is no different for the human race. Whether you consider yourself a gazelle or a lion, you simply have to run faster than others to survive.
‘A little more than two decades after I made my first foray into political life, I stood in Mandela’s former cell in Robben Island. Standing there, I tried to transport myself back to those days when President Mandela was still Prisoner 466/64 – a time when the success of his struggle was by no means a certainty. I tried to imagine Mandela – the legend who had changed history – as Mandela the man who had sacrificed so much for change. Conversations with Myself does the world an extraordinary service in giving us that picture of Mandela the man.’
As one of the world’s fastest bowlers, Michael Holding acquired the haunting nickname ‘Whispering Death’, claiming 249 Test wickets. Despite hanging up his boots in 1989, it remains a fitting description. As a commentator, Holding has delivered his views on cricket in the same manner that he played the games: he speaks softly with a rich Jamaican rhythm and is calculated either in their criticism or compliment.
They were born like everyone else, they lived in similar or worse conditions, they faced in most cases more terrifying challenges but they refused to surrender their dreams, no matter how they were beaten.
They had an intrinsic conviction that they were sent by God to solve human problems. They developed themselves so much they transcend existing records and the world paid them tribute by tagging them Record Breakers… they are not different from you!
Book two of the Quantum Gravity series sees Lila Black drawn into the intoxicatingly dangerous demon realm. Capricious, in love with beauty, demons are best left to themselves. This is not easy when they can’t resist tampering with humans.
Justina Robson’s new series is a joyful melding of science fiction and fantasy brought together in the figure of the dangerously lovely Lila Black, a 21-year-old secret agent who’s had much of her body replaced with weapon-and-armor-heavy intelligent metal and who isn’t sure where her mind ends and her installed AI begins. Lila’s world is one where demons, elves, and elementals live alongside people. And somehow Lila and the other agents of the security agency have to provide security for all and stay alive themselves.
Shane Warne is arguably the greatest leg spin bowler cricket has ever seen. He enjoyed a record-breaking Test career with Australia, leading them to a 5-0 whitewash of England in 2007; a hugely successful period as captain of Hampshire; and before he officially retired he led a team of young hopefuls – the Rajasthan Royals – to win the newly created Indian Premier League in 2008. He is a born winner, whose opinion on cricket matters – not only to the general public but to his fellow players as well. His 2006 Times column about the top 50 Test players of all time broke records for the number of hits on the paper’s website – the public wanted to know his opinion of the players of his era. Now he has retired, he feels the time is right to put his extended thoughts down on paper.
Unspeakable crimes.
Unimaginable motives.
An unstoppable killer.
Forensic investigator Reilly Steel, Quantico-trained and California-born and bred, imagined Dublin to be a far cry from bustling San Francisco, a sleepy backwater where she can lay past ghost to rest and start anew, She’s arrived in Ireland to drag the Irish crime lab into the 21st century, plus keep tabs on her Irish-born father who’s increasingly seeking solace in the bottle after a family strategy.
A brutal serial killer soon puts paid to that. When a young man and woman are found dead in an apartment, the gunshot wounds on their naked bodies suggest a suicide pact, But Reilly’s instincts are screaming that something’s seriously amiss, and as more bodies are discovered, the team soon realizes that a twisted murderer is at work, one who seeks to upset society’s norms in the most sickening way imaginable…
As a player Ian McGeechan won thirty-two caps for Scotland, and was a fixture in the 1974 Lions team widely regarded as the greatest ever. As Coach of Scotland he plotted the legendary Grand Slam victory over England in 1990 in the most famous home international match of all time. He won every honour as a club coach and was appointed Head Coach of the Lions on four separate occasions – no other coach has led more than one Lions tour.
In 2009 his inspired coaching leadership took the Lions to within a whisker of victory against South Africa in a Test series seen as one of the most momentous the Lions have ever played, and in the 2010 new year honours list he was knighted for his services to the sport.
Lion Man is the story of the past, present and future of British rugby, seen through the unique perspective and experiences of the most influential man within the game today.
