Born in 1860s Missouri, nobody expected George Washington Carver to succeed. Slaves were not allowed to be educated. After the Civil War, Carver enrolled in classes and proved to be a star student. He became the first black student at Iowa State Agricultural College and later its first black professor. He went on to the Tuskegee Institute where he specialized in botany (the study of plants) and developed techniques to grow crops better. His work with vegetables, especially peanuts, made hi...

Underworld: n. 1. the part of society comprising those who live by organized crime and immorality. 2. the mythical abode of the dead under the earth.Take a walk on the dark side of the street in this unique exploration of the fears and desires at the heart of the British Empire, from the Regency dandy’s playground to the grim and gothic labyrinths of the Victorian city. Enter a world of gin spinners, sneaksmen and Covent Garden nuns, where bare-knuckled boxers slog it out for dozen...

WHO SAYS HISTORY IS BORING?Jack Vincent used to be famous, part of a rising generation of literary authors that included Dickens, Ainsworth and Thackeray. Now he's a nobody, scratching a living as a freelance journalist writing for a penny a line. Worse, the only job he can get is on a troopship bound for the frontier wars of colonial Africa. Outed as a friend of Dickens at the captain's table, Jack recounts the events that have brought him to this fallen state. It is a journey tha...

In the first of an irregular series of short gothic stories set in East Anglia, an unemployed loner is offered a council flat with a sinister history on the outskirts of a remote village. He cautiously befriends an elderly neighbour who reminds him of his father, but this new-found sense of security proves to be short-lived as the surrounding darkness encroaches…