A great, rhapsodic, urgent book full of joy, grief, rage and love . . . A must-read' Helen Macdonald, author of H is for HawkNature has many gifts for us, but perhaps the greatest of them all is joy; the intense delight we can take in the natural world, in its beauty, in the wonder it can offer us, in the peace it can provide - feelings stemming ultimately from our own unbreakable links to nature, which mean that we cannot be fully human if we are separate...

You ain't gonna like it: bad grammar's not so bad. - The TimesRemember all those grammar rules from school? No? Most of us don't. Mike McCarthy, renowned corpus linguist and co-author of the 900-page Cambridge Grammar of English answers the awkward questions that regularly bother us about English grammar. In this helpful A-Z field guide, McCarthy tells us what the conventional rules are as well as shows us what people are writing or saying now and...

Draig the black Zaurlock has lived on the earth for three hundred years. He has reached the pinnacle of his devastative magic powers but wants more. He has delved in the black arts and experimented with morphing humans into animals with limited success. Rasita Darilus his apprentice is morphed and cannot be restored. As the black Zaurlock cannot find any means to greater power in the earth he seeks power from the evil one of the underworld who engages him as his agent. Because of this rela...

English Vocabulary: The Basics offers a clear, non-jargonistic introduction to English vocabulary, the way linguists classify and explain it, and the place of vocabulary in our overall picture of the language, and in society. Introducing a range of terminology for discussing vocabulary, the reader is provided with a coherent, structured description of what we know about words and their meanings.Key features of this book include:• Analysis of historical roots of pre...

By the author of Ashes Under Water (Lyons Press), here is one of the great untold stories of World War II. The Hidden Hindenburg at last reveals the cause of aviation’s most famous disaster and the duplicity that kept the truth from coming to light for three generations. Italso finally catches up with a German legend who misled the world about the Hindenburg to bury his own Nazi connections.Drawing on previously unpublished documents from the National Archives in Washington, along ...

The extraordinary story of Richard Whittington, from his arrival in London as a young boy to his death in 1423, against a backdrop of plague, politics and war; turbulence between Crown, City and Commons; and the unrelenting financial demands of Richard II, Henry IV and Henry V, to whom Whittington was mercer, lender and fixer.A man determined to follow his own path, Whittington was a significant figure in London's ceaseless development. As a banker, Collector of the Wool Custom, Ki...

Everyone likes to make money, but the act of selling can be uncomfortable and even stressful. By focusing on helping your customer rather than selling to them, you can overcome your resistance and turn a potential customer into a lifelong relationship. Even those who are timid, frightened and otherwise distressed by the prospect of selling will find these simple, time-tested methods of seasoned sales professionals easy to understand, implement, and even enjoy!

Like a Tree Cut Back weaves a memoir of Michael McCarthy from his boyhood in rural Ireland – overshadowed by an incident that resulted in the death of his brother – to his journey towards priesthood and poetry.Interspersed throughout is a brief history of Carlow College, 19th Century Catholic Ireland's answer to Trinity College, Dublin, and – as McCarthy shows – a training ground for priests, apostles and rebels.Part history, part memoir and part meditation, this o...

English Grammar: The Basics offers a clear, non-jargonistic introduction to English grammar and its place in society. Rather than taking a prescriptive approach, this book helps the reader become aware of the social implications of choices they make to use standard or non-standard (regional/dialect) forms.Readers will consider:• what grammar is and how it fits into the structure of language;• how grammar functions in the school curriculum, the press, broadcasting an...

If we could see it as a whole, if they all arrived in a single flock, say, we would be truly amazed: sixteen million birds. Swallows, martins, swifts, warblers, wagtails, wheatears, cuckoos, chats, nightingales, nightjars, thrushes, pipits and flycatchers pouring into Britain from sub-Saharan Africa.It is one of the enduring wonders of the natural world. Each bird faces the most daunting of journeys -navigating epic distances, dependent on bodily fuel reserves. Yet none can refuse....

Includes over 20 Illustrations.The story of a young fighter pilot from basic training through the end of the war in Europe, this short memoir is a welcome addition to the literature of World War II aviation. It is noteworthy for a number of reasons. It illuminates the world of tactical aviation, which has taken a backseat to stories of strategic bombing and air superiority combat...Perhaps most importantly, it combines the immediacy of contemporary impressions with the reflections p...

Michael McCarthy grew up on a farm in West Cork, Ireland. His first poetry collection Birds' Nests and Other Poems won the Patrick Kavanagh Award. His children's books have been translated into seventeen languages.He works as a priest in North Yorkshire.