George Smiley is one of the most brilliantly realised characters in British fiction. Bespectacled, tubby, eternally middle-aged and deceptively ordinary, he has a mind like a steel trap and is said to possess ‘the cunning of Satan and the conscience of a virgin’. It is 1962: the height of the Cold War and only months after the building of the Berlin Wall. Alec Leamas is a hard-working, hard-drinking British intelligence officer whose East Berlin network is in tatters. His agents are either...

It has been 70 years since the ‘Iron Curtain’ was drawn around the Western-occupied sectors of Berlin by the Soviet Union.Having occupied Berlin three years earlier, Russian forces managed to enforce a blockade on the city in June 1948, preventing the Western Allies access by road, rail or canal. Effectively condemning the people of Berlin to starve, Russia refused to lift the blockade until the Deutsche Mark was withdrawn from West Berlin.Forced to find an...

It was published in 1942, before the war impacted book production. Forester came up with the premise for the book while he was at home in the Berkeley hills, minding his two boys while his wife Kathleen was away. The younger of the two, 8 year old George, went on a hunger strike; he refused to eat. Forester made up the stories to tell during dinnertime, but would only tell them if George would eat. If George stopped eating, Forester stopped talking mid-sentence. By the time Kathleen return...

Public policy is made of language. Whether in written or oral form, argument is central to all parts of the policy process. As simple as this insight appears, its implications for policy analysis and planning are profound. Drawing from recent work on language and argumentation and referring to such theorists as Wittgenstein, Habermas, Toulmin, and Foucault, these essays explore the interplay of language, action, and power in both the practice and the theory of policy-making.The cont...

Early in 2020, naturist fiction author P. Z. Walker had the idea for a collection of mystery stories to be called "Murder in the Nudist Colony," deliberately using the antiquated term "nudist colony" for a slightly retro, humorous touch. On social media platforms, mostly Twitter, other folks associated with the fine network of naturist authors chimed in. Ted Bun put together the call for submissions, Robert Longpré set up the page to share documents as well as the ISBN, Fabien Barabé desig...

This edited volume with open access discusses all aspects of uncertainty in climate change research, with a unique emphasis on decision making under uncertainty and the assessment of various uncertainties in the landscape of decision making. By analyzing uncertainty through the lens of decision making, the book seeks to understand and assess the various uncertainties inherent in climate change research, including uncertainties in economic impacts, human health and vulnerability, fluctuatio...

Early in 2020, naturist fiction author P. Z. Walker had the idea for a collection of mystery stories to be called "Murder in the Nudist Colony," deliberately using the antiquated term "nudist colony" for a slightly retro, humorous touch. I put together the call for submissions, posted it on Twitter and they came. Writers, some established naturist fiction authors, some imaginative non-naturists and some new writers came forward. Robert Longpré set up the structure to share documents as wel...

The challenge was to write a short story for a charity anthology to be called Adventures Without Clothes - 20 people rose to the challenge!The guidelines were as follows: "Your story can be set anywhere in this world or any other you wish to create. Some of the people on this adventure must be without clothing for all or part of the undertaking. You should seek to include some elements of either quest, journey or rescue and some physical risk or danger for your protagonists. Gender...

The nude romance collection of this and any other year!Seventeen writers, eighteen stories, all with a common objective: portraying a romance at a naturist venue somewhere in the modern, Western world. Young love, love between seniors, love twixt people who have just met, the rekindling of old loves, laments for loves lost. They are all included.Naturist fiction is a relatively new genre where social nudism and casual nudity play a significant role in plot, charact...

The Naturist Fiction Collaborative's fifth collection of short stories set in assorted naturist settings. Following on from Murder in The Nudist Colony, Romance In The Nudist Colony, and Adventures Without Clothes, to be published to support the work of Médecins Sans Frontières. The charity also known as Doctors Without BordersOnce again, we announced the forthcoming publication on social media and the stories streamed in.Some from confirmed writersSome were returnees ...

George Smiley is one of the most brilliantly realised characters in British fiction. Bespectacled, tubby, eternally middle-aged and deceptively ordinary, he has a mind like a steel trap and is said to possess ‘the cunning of Satan and the conscience of a virgin’. When a Russian émigré is found murdered on Hampstead Heath, Smiley is called out of retirement to exorcise some Cold War ghosts from his clandestine past. What follows is Smiley the human being at his most vulnerable and Smiley th...

This novel from lauded and bestselling author John le Carré follows Barley Blair, a British publisher, who finds himself unexpectedly entangled in Cold War espionage.