This Reader's Guide analyses the critical history of two of Hardy's major tragic novels, from the time of their publication to the present. Simon Avery traces the changing critical fortunes of the texts and explores the diverse range of interpretations produced by different theoretical approaches.

Sex, Time and Place extensively widens the scope of what we might mean by 'queer London studies'. Incorporating multidisciplinary perspectives – including social history, cultural geography, visual culture, literary representation, ethnography and social studies – this collection asks new questions, widens debates and opens new subject terrain.Featuring essays from an international range of established scholars and emergent voices, the collection is a timely contribution t...

As Pogo once said "We have met the enemy and he is us." The tsunami of cheap credit that rolled across the planet between 2002 and 2008 was more than a simple financial phenomenon: it was temptation offering entire societies the chance to reveal aspects of their characters they could not normally afford to indulge. Icelanders wanted to stop fishing and become investment bankers. The Greeks wanted to turn their country into a pi�ata stuffed with cash and allow as many citizens as possible t...

**Winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award for Nonfiction • Nominated for the National Book Award for NonfictionFrom the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Ghost Wars and The Achilles Trap, the epic and enthralling story of America's intelligence, military, and diplomatic efforts to defeat Al Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan and Pakistan since 9/11**Prior to 9/11, the United States had been carrying out small-scale covert operations in Afghanista...

"A beautifully written and very lively study of Russia that argues that the political order created by Vladimir Putin is stagnating" ( Financial Times).From Kaliningrad on the Baltic to the Russian Far East, journalist Ben Judah has traveled throughout Russia and the former Soviet republics, conducting extensive interviews with President Vladimir Putin's friends, foes, and colleagues, government officials, business tycoons, mobsters, and ordinary Russian c...

The enchanting true story of Stephenie Meyer, the Queen of Twilight. On 2 June, 2003, Stephenie Meyer had a dream that would change her life forever. She dreamt of a young girl and her sparkling vampire lover lying in a field, and that dream became Twilight. Now, her vampire romance novels have become a publishing phenomenon, selling over 70 million books worldwide, and have been translated into 37 difference languages.

After the war McNeile left the army and continued writing, although he changed from war stories to thrillers. In 1920 he published Bulldog Drummond, whose eponymous hero became his best-known creation. The character was based on McNeile himself, on his friend Gerard Fairlie and on English gentlemen generally.McNeile interspersed his Drummond work with other novels and story collections that included two characters who appeared as protagonists in their own works, Jim Maitland and Ro...

The Picture of Dorian Gray, the only novel by Oscar Wilde, was first published in 1890. A substantially revised and expanded edition was published in April 1891. For the new edition, Wilde revised the content of the novel's existing chapters, divided the final chapter into two chapters, and created six entirely new additional chapters. Whereas the original edition of the novel contains 13 chapters, the revised edition of the novel contains 20 chapters.The novel tel...

A year after the disappearance and commencement of the international search for Malaysia Airlines Flight 370, no sign of the plane has been found-no debris, no bodies, no sign of the much-talked-about black box. Richard Belzer, George Noory, and David Wayne want to know why.Scrutinizing the theories the media and politicians claim are the most likely” reasons the plane crashed, Belzer, Noory, and Wayne argue that if a year after a huge Boeing 777 has gone missing, and there’s stil...

Award-winning author Alexander Stille has been called "one of the best English-language writers on Italy" by the New York Times Book Review, and in The Sack of Rome he sets out to answer the question: What happens when vast wealth, a virtual media monopoly, and acute shamelessness combine in one man? Many are the crimes of Silvio Berlusconi, Stille argues, and, with deft analysis, he weaves them into a single mesmerizing chronicle—an epic saga of rank criminality, cronyis...

“[A] lucid and thoughtful book… In a spirit of reconciliation, Crane proposes to paint a more accurate picture of religion for his fellow unbelievers.” —James Ryerson, New York Times Book ReviewContemporary debate about religion seems to be going nowhere. Atheists persist with their arguments, many plausible and some unanswerable, but these make no impact on religious believers. Defenders of religion find atheists equally unwilling to cede ground. The ...

The 60s, A Very Peculiar History' is a nostalgic celebration of those gloriously giddy years. Filled with fascinating trivia and quirky facts about the Swinging Sixties, David Arscott uniquely explores what made the sixties so different and how the decade has influenced the world today. From a timeline of pivotal historical world events to examining London, 'a city steeped in tradition, seized by change and liberated by affluence', as well as memorable fashions, food, film and music of the...