Paula Byrne is the author the bestselling biographies ‘Perdita’, ‘Mad World’, ‘The Real Jane Austen’, ‘Belle’ and ‘Kick’. She is founder and chief executive of ReLit, the Bibliotherapy Foundation, a charity devoted to the mental health benefits of reading. She is married to Sir Jonathan Bate and lives in Oxford.

“You have the luck of Croesus on stilts (as my Auntie Vi would have said) if you’ve had the sort of career, ups and downs, warts and all that I have in that wondrous little corner of show business called musical theatre.” One of the most successful and distinguished artists of our time, Andrew Lloyd Webber has reigned over the musical theatre world for nearly five decades. The winner of numerous awards, including multiple Tonys and an Oscar, Lloyd Webber has enchanted millions worldwide with his music and numerous hit shows, including Jesus Christ Superstar, Evita, Cats, The Phantom of the Opera―Broadway’s longest running show―and most recently, School of Rock. In Unmasked, written in his own inimitable, quirky voice, the revered, award-winning composer takes stock of his achievements, the twists of fate and circumstance which brought him both success and disappointment, and the passions that inspire and sustain him. The son of a music professor and a piano teacher, Lloyd Webber reveals his artistic influences, from his idols Rodgers and Hammerstein and the perfection of South Pacific’s ‘Some Enchanted Evening,’ to the pop and rock music of the 1960s and Puccini’s Tosca, to P. G. Wodehouse and T. S. Eliot. Lloyd Webber recalls his bohemian London youth, reminiscing about the happiest place of his childhood, his homemade Harrington Pavilion―a make-believe world of musical theatre in which he created his earliest entertainments. A record of several exciting and turbulent decades of British and American musical theatre and the transformation of popular music itself, Unmasked is ultimately a chronicle of artistic creation. Lloyd Webber looks back at the development of some of his most famous works and illuminates his collaborations with luminaries such as Tim Rice, Robert Stigwood, Harold Prince, Cameron Mackintosh, and Trevor Nunn. Taking us behind the scenes of his productions, Lloyd Webber reveals fascinating details about each show, including the rich cast of characters involved with making them, and the creative and logistical challenges and artistic political battles that ensued. Lloyd Webber shares his recollections of the works that have become cultural touchstones for generations of fans: writings songs for a school production that would become his first hit, Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat; finding the coterie of performers for his classic rock opera Jesus Christ Superstar; developing his first mega-hit, Evita, which would win seven Tonys Awards, including Best Musical; staking his reputation and fortune on the groundbreaking Cats; and making history with the dazzling The Phantom of the Opera. Reflecting a life that included many passions (from architecture to Turkish Swimming Cats), full of witty and revealing anecdotes, and featuring cameo appearances by numerous celebrities―Elaine Paige, Sarah Brightman, David Frost, Julie Covington, Judi Dench, Richard Branson, A.R. Rahman, Mandy Patinkin, Patti LuPone, Richard Rodgers, Norman Jewison, Milos Forman, Plácido Domingo, Barbra Streisand, Michael Crawford, Gillian Lynne, Betty Buckley, and more―Unmasked at last reveals the true face of the extraordinary man beneath the storied legend.

What pushed Blunt, Burgess, Cairncross, Maclean and Philby into Soviet hands? With access to recently released papers and other neglected documents, this sharp analysis of the intelligence world examines how and why these men and others betrayed their country and what this cost Britain and its allies. Enemies Within is a new history of the influence of Moscow on Britain told through the stories of those who chose to spy for the Soviet Union. It also challenges entrenched assumptions about abused trust, corruption and Establishment cover-ups that began with the Cambridge Five and the disappearance of Guy Burgess and Donald Maclean on the night boat to Saint-Malo in 1951. In a book that is as intellectually thrilling as it is entertaining and illuminating, Richard Davenport-Hines traces the bonds between individuals, networks and organisations over generations to offer a study of character, both individual and institutional. At its core lie the operative traits of boarding schools, the universities of Oxford and Cambridge, the Intelligence Division, Foreign Office, MI5, MI6 and Moscow Centre. Davenport-Hines tells many stories of espionage, counter-espionage and treachery. With its vast cope, ambition and scholarship, Enemies Within charts how the undermining of authority, the rejection of expertise and the suspicion of educational advantages began, and how these have transformed the social and political temper of modern Britain.

A brilliant study of a brilliant woman' LUCY WORSLEY History has forgotten Caroline of Ansbach, yet in her lifetime she was compared frequently to Elizabeth I and considered by some as ‘the cleverest queen consort Britain ever had’. The intellectual superior of her buffoonish husband George II, Caroline is credited with hastening the Enlightenment to Britain through her sponsorship of red-hot debates about science, religion, philosophy and the nature of the universe. Encouraged by Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, she championed inoculation; inspired by her friends Leibniz and Samuel Clarke, she mugged up on Newtonian physics; she embraced a salon culture which promoted developments in music, literature and garden design; she was a regular theatre-goer who loved the opera, gambling and dancing. Her intimates marvelled at the breadth of her interests. She was, said Lord Egmont, ‘curious in everything’. Caroline acted as Regent four times while her husband returned to Hanover, and during those periods she possessed authority over all domestic matters. No subsequent royal woman has exercised power on such a scale. So why has history forgotten this extraordinary queen? In this magnificent biography, the first for over seventy years, Matthew Dennison seeks to reverse this neglect. The First Iron Lady uncovers the complexities of Caroline’s multifaceted life: the child of a minor German princeling who, through intelligence, determination and a dash of sex appeal, rose to occupy one of the great positions of the world and did so with distinction, élan and a degree of cynical realism. It is a remarkable portrait of an eighteenth-century woman of great political astuteness and ambition, a radical icon of female power.

Cruel To Be Kind is the true story of Max, aged 6. He is fostered by Cathy while his mother is in hospital with complications from type 2 diabetes. Fostering Max gets off to a bad start when his mother, Caz, complains and threatens Cathy even before Max has moved in. Cathy and her family are shocked when they first meet Max. But his social worker isn’t the only one in denial; his whole family are too.

Adrian has a unique gift for understanding drivers and racing cars. He is ultra competitive but never forgets to have fun. An immensely likeable man.' Damon Hill The world’s foremost designer in Formula One, Adrian Newey OBE is arguably one of Britain’s greatest engineers and this is his fascinating, powerful memoir. How to Build a Car explores the story of Adrian’s unrivalled 35-year career in Formula One through the prism of the cars he has designed, the drivers he has worked alongside and the races in which he’s been involved. A true engineering genius, even in adolescence Adrian’s thoughts naturally emerged in shape and form – he began sketching his own car designs at the age of 12 and took a welding course in his school summer holidays. From his early career in IndyCar racing and on to his unparalleled success in Formula One, we learn in comprehensive, engaging and highly entertaining detail how a car actually works. Adrian has designed for the likes of Mario Andretti, Nigel Mansell, Alain Prost, Damon Hill, David Coulthard, Mika Hakkinen, Mark Webber and Sebastian Vettel, always with a shark-like purity of purpose: to make the car go faster. And while his career has been marked by unbelievable triumphs, there have also been deep tragedies; most notably Ayrton Senna’s death during his time at Williams in 1994. Beautifully illustrated with never-before-seen drawings, How to Build a Car encapsulates, through Adrian’s remarkable life story, precisely what makes Formula One so thrilling – its potential for the total synchronicity of man and machine, the perfect combination of style, efficiency and speed.

In this remarkable and candid memoir the former Archbishop of Canterbury recalls his life and his spiritual quest; this is the first time in history that an Archbishop of Canterbury has written his autobiography.

A raw, intensely personal memoir of spiritual exploration from one of the world’s great commentators on religion.

The moving true story of a little girl with Asperger syndrome, controlled and abused by the one person she called her friend. Taylor had always struggled to make friends – she felt ‘different’. Taylor never knew her father and her mother wasn’t around much. She just didn’t understand people, and was alone and scared much of the time. That was until, aged just 11, an older married man called Tom befriended her. She loved having someone who would talk to her, listen to her, a protector. But when he moved away a few months later she was easy prey to the gang of drug dealers and petty criminals who groomed and abused her, using her as a form of currency to appease their debtors and amuse their friends. Increasingly isolated and desperate, it began to look as though the pattern of Taylor's life had been set – until she started to fight back, determined to build a safe future for herself, however long it took.

The true story of 2 year-old Anna, abandoned by her natural parents, left alone in a neglected orphanage. Elaine and Ian had travelled half way round the world to adopt little Anna. She couldn’t have been more wanted, loved and cherished. So why was she now in foster care and living with me? It didn’t make sense. Until I learned what had happened. … Dressed only in nappies and ragged T-shirts the children were incarcerated in their cots. Their large eyes stared out blankly from emaciated faces. Some were obviously disabled, others not, but all were badly undernourished. Flies circled around the broken ceiling fans and buzzed against the grids covering the windows. The only toys were a few balls and a handful of building bricks, but no child played with them. The silence was deafening and unnatural. Not one of the thirty or so infants cried, let alone spoke.

It’s 1983 and best friends Vicky and Lucy swear that they will always be there for each other, that they’ll never let anyone come between them. But fast forward 4 years and life on the Canterbury Estate has gotten very messy.

‘Gripping … so powerfully emotional that at times I had to put it down to wipe my eyes’ Mail on Sunday ‘How do you say thank you to someone for giving you their heart? It is the greatest gift a person can ever give.’ Marc is a promising young footballers of 15, growing up in Scotland. A few hundred miles away in England, Martin is a fun-loving 16-year-old. Both are enjoying their summers when they are suddenly struck down by debilitating illnesses. Within days, the boys are close to death. Although their paths have never crossed, their fortunes are about to be bound in the most extraordinary, intimate way. One of them will die and in doing so, he will save the other’s life. This is a deeply powerful and dramatic story. It is extremely rare for the family of a donor to have any personal contact with the recipient of their loved one’s organ. Yet remarkably, the mothers of these two boys meet and become friends, enabling the extraordinary, bittersweet moment in which a mother who has lost her son meets the boy he saved. Reaching out and placing her palm flat against his chest, she feels the heart of her son beating away inside another. Her boy, the boy who gave his heart away.

This is the true story of C.S. Lewis – one of the greatest writers of the 20th-century – whose books for children and adults have become much loved classics. Part of the story of C.S. Lewis has been made famous through the film ‘Shadowlands’. Here this fascinating man’s entire life story is told by those who knew him personally. C.S. Lewis was born in Belfast in 1898 and was sent to England for a public school education with his elder brother, Warren. Lewis exhibited a genius for imagination and perception from his earliest years. Brought up in a Christian household, Lewis lost his faith in his teenage years but was to regain it, with reluctance, as a fellow at Magdalen College, Oxford. His faith subsequently influenced his writings. He became a vigorous champion of the Christian faith through classics such as ‘Mere Christianity’ and through his BBC broadcasts. His ‘Chronicles of Narnia’ became children’s classics and he was deluged with correspondence from his young readers. In his latter years he unexpectedly fell deeply in love with a divorced American, Joy Greshem, and married her, only to suffer the devastation of her death a few years later. C.S. Lewis died in 1963 at his home in Oxford. During his lifetime C.S. Lewis suggested to his friend, Roger Lancelyn Green, who was a fellow English scholar, that he would undertake his biography one day. After Lewis’s death in 1963 Lancelyn Green and Walter Hooper were approached by several of Lewis’s friends to write the biography. Warren Lewis, brother to Jack, contributed a great deal to the writing. The authors had at their disposal a vast collection of letters and diaries, as well as the recollections of many surviving family members and friends. Walter Hooper has enhanced the original text with additional material to provide a new, expanded edition which all C.S. Lewis fans will be keen to own.

At the age of only 36, Sir Mark Sykes was signatory to the Sykes-Picot agreement, one of the most reviled treaties of modern times. A century later, Christopher Sykes’ lively biography of his grandfather reassesses his life and work, and the political instability and violence in the Middle East attributed to it. The Sykes–Picot agreement was drawn by the eponymous British and French diplomats in 1916 to determine the divide of the collapsing empire in the event of an allied victory in World War I. Excluding Arab involvement, it negated their earlier guarantee of independence made by the British – and controversy has raged around it ever since. But who was Mark Sykes? A century on, Christopher Simon Sykes reveals new facets of a misremembered diplomatic giant. Using previously undisclosed family letters and cartoons by his grandfather, he delivers a comprehensive and humbling account of the man behind one of the most impactful policies in the Middle East.

Here for the first time is the full horror and madness of sharing a house, told by someone who’s been there. Birmingham pulls no punches: from dead rats in the kitchen to tent-dwelling lodgers in the living room, you’ll run for the safety of living alone. ‘A rat died in the living room at King Street and we didn’t know. There was at least six inches of compacted rubbish between our feet and the floor. Old Ratty must have crawled in there and died of pleasure. A visitor uncovered him while groping around for a beer.’ Tales of debauchery, drugs, flatmates from hell and nasty things lurking in the kitchen sink abound in Rolling Stone journalist John Birmingham’s hilarious account of sharing houses in Melbourne and Brisbane. He Died with a Felafel in His Hand makes Withnail & I look like a lesson in clean living.

The truth behind the spectacular rise and fall of a pop legend in his own words. For three years the Goss twins, Luke and Matt, had the world at their feet. Their records ripped to the top of the charts, they filled concert halls and were mobbed wherever they went. Their fall was as fast and spectacular as their rise. From being pop’s golden boys they became the band that everyone loved to hate, amidst spectacular rumours of bankruptcy and media manipulation. What went wrong? In this compelling book Luke Goss tells the whole incredible story, including: ? The million-point contract that left the band broke. ? The ‘weird unreality’ of going from unknown to superstar almost overnight. ? So-called ‘friends’ who turned their backs as soon as the bubble burst. It’s a cautionary tale for anyone aspiring to pop stardom, it is a saga of hurt and heartache, and, above all, it is a tribute to the family and friends – including Matt – who have stood by him through those frenetic years. It is, as Luke says, the laying to rest of a nightmare.

‘If you find the subject of food to be both vexing and transfixing, you’ll love What She Ate’ Elle Dorothy Wordsworth believed that feeding her poet brother, William, gooseberry tarts was her part to play in a literary movement. Cockney chef Rosa Lewis became a favourite of King Edward VII, who loved her signature dish of whole truffles boiled in Champagne. Eleanor Roosevelt dished up Eggs Mexican – a concoction of rice, fried eggs, and bananas – in the White House. Eva Braun treated herself to Champagne and cake in the bunker before killing herself, alongside Adolf Hitler. Barbara Pym's novels overflow with enjoyment of everyday meals – of frozen fish fingers and Chablis – in midcentury England. Cosmopolitan editor Helen Gurley Brown's idea of “having it all” meant having almost nothing on the plate except a supersized portion of diet gelatin. In the irresistible What She Ate, Laura Shapiro examines the plates, recipe books and shopping trolleys of these six extraordinary women, casting a new light on each of their lives – revealing love and rage, desire and denial, need and pleasure.

Experienced foster carer, Rosie Lewis, takes on the heart-breaking case of Megan, a baby born with a drug addiction and a cleft palate. Addicted to drugs from birth because of her mother’s substance abuse during pregnancy, new-born Megan is taken into Rosie’s loving care. Rosie is supposed to help Megan find her new permanent home, but it turns out that Megan has already found her ‘forever mummy’ in Rosie. Rosie grows incredibly attached to Megan and applies to adopt her, but the system refuses her in favour of a young couple and Rosie is devastated. Against all her instincts, Rosie does her job and prepares Megan for her new ‘forever family’, but everything about Megan leaving feels wrong. When Rosie learns a few months later that Megan’s adoption has broken down, she is saddened but also filled with hope – will this little girl be allowed to return to her true ‘forever home’?

A frank and witty memoir of life at the Bar and on the Bench, from former High Court Judge The Hon. Sir Harry Ognall. For many years, Harry Ognall enjoyed a formidable reputation as an advocate at the criminal Bar. As counsel, and later as judge, he was involved in numerous high-profile trials, both in Britain and abroad. Among many cases as a QC, he prosecuted Peter Sutcliffe, the so-called ‘Yorkshire Ripper’. He successfully defended six officers of the Air Force of Zimbabwe at their trial in Harare, where they faced a charge of treasonable sabotage. As a judge, he presided over the trial of Colin Stagg (the alleged ‘Wimbledon Common murderer’), the trial arising from the Lyme Bay canoe tragedy and the trial for the first time in the United Kingdom of a doctor’s alleged involvement in euthanasia. Thoughtful and provocative, Sir Harry has advice for the aspiring young advocate, and invests this penetrating memoir with warmth, humour and understanding. His frank portrait of a lifetime in the criminal law offers unique perspectives on some of the most notorious cases of the twentieth century, as well as fascinating insights into a colourful professional life and the burdens and responsibilities that come with the privilege of high judicial office.

First published in 2005 and now available as an ebook. Des Lynam’s autobiography gives a frank and opinionated insight into the man behind the myth. Des Lynam is one of Britain's best-loved and most successful personalities. Famously guarded about his private life, Des will attempt to set the record straight and talk about the ladies in his life, his childhood days in Ireland, as well as his early marriage and life in 70s London. Des takes us through his 30 years at the BBC from a reporter on local radio to the drama of his top-secret move to ITV which was front page news on every national newspaper. The World Cups, the Olympic Games including his reporting of the Israeli shootings in Munich. Following Muhammad Ali to his fights in Zaire, Malaysia and the USA. The Grand National that never was, the IRA threatened race. The programmes he turned down, the ones he wished he had! Des offers a candid account of life behind the scenes at the national broadcaster, the people he has met, the triumphs, the disasters. In the unique role of top presenter on both main channels, he tells of his 5 years at ITV, his reasons for going there and why his decision was justified but in other ways disastrous.

Originally published in 1997 and now available as an ebook. It has not been possible to include the illustrations in the electronic edition. Perhaps the bravest and most inspiring actor of his generation, Harvey Keitel has made his menacing presence felt in some of the greatest cult movies ever, from Scorsese's Mean Streets and Taxi Driver to Tarantino's Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction. With over fifty films to his name, a dozen of them since 1992, Keitel is one of the most ubiquitous and sought-after actors in Hollywood. Yet unlike so many of his contemporaries, he constantly surprises with daring and risk-taking performances in ground-breaking films such as Bad Lieutenant, The Last Temptation of Christ, The Piano and Smoke. Since his tough childhood in Brooklyn, Keitel's life has been a dramatic and unconventional as his screen roles. 'Harvey Keitel: The Art of Darkness 'tells, for the first time, the story of the rollercoaster career and turbulent personal life of this most powerful performer.