The Killing of Butterfly Joe by Rhidian Brook

Hurtling across 1980s America, this wildly original story is full of characters you’ll never forget...The Killing of Butterfly Joe is the dazzling new novel from the award-winning, bestselling author of The Aftermath (soon to be a major movie). 

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The Killing of Butterfly Joe by Rhidian Brook
Picador / hardback & Ebook / fiction / 8 March 2018 / £14.99

‘I killed Joe once, in a manner of speaking. But not twice. Not in the way you mean.’

Young Welshman, Llew Jones, wants to see America, have an experience and write about it. After an encounter with the charismatic, illusive, infuriating ‘Butterfly Joe’ and his freakish family, he gets his wish. He’s soon hurtling across 1980’s America, having an adventure whilst hoping to pull-off a life-changing deal. But it’s a road that leads to trouble and sees Llew thrown in jail. Now he has to give his side of the story if he’s ever going to get free.

Part neo-gothic thriller, part existential road trip, part morality tale, The Killing of Butterfly Joe is a wildly original story full of characters you’ll never forget. An epic tale of friendship, desire and the search for freedom and self-definition. It’s about participating in the Great American Dream – ‘the one that takes you from rags to riches via pitches’ – whatever the consequences. 

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About the author

Rhidian Brook is an award-winning writer of fiction, television drama and film. His first novel, The Testimony of Taliesin Jones, won several prizes including the Somerset Maugham Award. His short stories have appeared in numerous publications, including the Paris Review and have been broadcast on BBC Radio 4. He is also a regular contributor to 'Thought For The Day'. His 2013 novel, The Aftermath, was translated into more than twenty languages and has been made into a movie, staring Keira Knightley, that is set for release in 2018. He once had a job selling butterflies in glass cases.

@RhidianBrook #TheKillingofButterflyJoe

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‘Superb…. masterly.’ - Mail on Sunday, on The Aftermarth

‘Profoundly moving, beautifully written.’ – Independent, on The Aftermath

‘Superb.’ – Guardian, on The Aftermath

‘Terrific. … Richly atmospheric.’ - Sunday Telegraph, on The Aftermath

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Because We Are Bad - OCD and a Girl Lost in Thought by Lily Bailey

'An intense heart-rending rollercoaster of a book’ Will Black, author

‘Extremely compelling’ The Guardian

‘Though Bailey’s intention in writing the memoir is a serious one, her lively style and black humour make it, at times, a laugh-out-loud read.’ The Irish Time

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Because We Are Bad - OCD and a Girl Lost in Thought by Lily Bailey | Canbury Press / memoir / paperback / 15 March 2018 / £7.99

As a child, Lily Bailey knew she was bad. By the age of 13, she had killed someone with a thought, spread untold disease, and ogled the bodies of other children. Only by performing an exhausting series of secret routines could she correct her wrongdoing. But it was never enough. She had a severe case of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, and it ruled her life.

Raw and funny, heart-breaking and uplifting, Because We Are Bad reveals with humour, grace and searing honesty what it’s like to live with an almost intolerable burden of obsession.

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About the author

Lily Bailey

Lily Bailey is 24 and a model and writer. She became a journalist in London in 2012, editing a news site and writing features and fashion articles for local publications including the Richmond Magazine and the Kingston Magazine. She also currently works as a support worker for people with disabilities.

As a child and teenager Lily suffered from severe Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD). She has worked closely with both OCD Action and OCD UK to help others in similar situations. Because We Are Bad is her first book and relates to her experience with OCD.

Lily is available for interview, to write pieces and for events.

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The Almighty Dollar by Dharshini David

The Almighty Dollar: Follow the Incredible Journey of a Single Dollar to See How the Global Economy Really Works | By Dharshini David | Elliott & Thompson / hardback / non-fiction / 22.2.18 / £16.99

The dollar is the lifeblood of globalisation: China holds billions in reserve for good reason. Greenbacks, singles, bucks or dead presidents, call them what you will, $1.2 trillion worth are floating around right now – and half the dollars in circulation are actually outside of the USA.

But what is really happening as these billions of dollars go around the world every day? By following $1 from a shopping trip in suburban Texas, via China’s Central Bank, Nigerian railroads, the oil fields of Iraq and beyond, The Almighty Dollar answers questions such as:

• Why is China the world’s biggest manufacturer – and the US its biggest customer?
• Is free trade really a good thing?
• Why would a government spend millions building a bridge in a different country?

In lively and entertaining prose Dharshini David lays bare these complex interrelationships through the simple story of one dollar as it moves through the opaque international system. This is essential reading that gets to the heart of how our new globalised world really works.

In addition, Dharshini can discuss:

• Economic facts of Brexit - and the implications for our own fortunes
• The causes and solutions to the gender pay gap
• Women in business
• Debunking markets and financial instruments
• Inequality and the generation gap – why the over 60s are better off, but it’s a terrible time to be under 30

Dharshini David is an economist and broadcaster. From 2009 she fronted Sky News’ daily financial coverage from the heart of the City, as well as co-presenting the channel’s flagship Sky News Tonight programme.

Before joining Sky, Dharshini advised Tesco’s board on broadcast media. Prior to that, she was the face of the BBC’s Wall Street coverage in New York, from where she presented a daily business show, and covered business, economics and consumer issues in London across the BBC, from the BBC1 Ten O’Clock News to Panorama and Radio 4’s Today programme. Dharshini was recruited by the BBC while working on HSBC Investment Bank’s trading floor as its UK Economist. This is her first book

Twitter: @DharshiniDavid
Website: www.dharshinidavid.co.uk
Hashtag: #TheAlmightyDollarBook

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Beneath the Water by Sarah Painter

Beneath the Water by Sarah Painter
Published in paperback by Lake Union (an imprint of Amazon Publishing) | 8 February 2018 | £4.99 / audio book - £13.38

Munro House is the new start Stella needs. But it will also draw her back to a dark past…

Devastated by a broken engagement, Stella Jackson leaves her old life behind for a new start in rural Scotland. But when she arrives in the remote coastal village of Arisaig, nothing is what she expected.

At the edge of Arisaig sits Munro House; grand, imposing and said to be cursed by a string of tragic deaths. No less intriguing is its eccentric and handsome young owner, Jamie Munro, who hires Stella as his assistant while he pursues a seemingly impossible aim. Working through the great house’s archives, Stella soon finds herself drawn in by a cache of increasingly erratic letters from a young Victorian woman about her husband, Dr James Lockhart, a man whose single-minded ambition has strange parallels with Jamie’s.

Just as Stella begins developing feelings for Jamie, she discovers that the connection between the Lockharts and the Munros could have sinister repercussions for them both. She’s finally found the life she wants to live - but is it all an illusion?

About Sarah Painter

Sarah Painter writes novels which sometimes have historical elements or touches of magic, but always have an emotional core. Her debut novel, The Language of Spells, became a Kindle bestseller and was followed by a sequel, The Secrets of Ghosts. Her last book, In the Light of What We See, was also a bestseller and a Kindle First pick. 

Sarah hosts a podcast about writing (and interviews other authors and creative-types) at www.worriedwriter.com. She lives in rural Scotland with her children, husband, and a grey tabby called Zelda Kitzgerald. She has a Masters in Creative Writing from St Andrews, drinks too much tea, loves the work of Joss Whedon, and is the proud owner of a writing shed.

www.sarah-painter.com / @SarahRPainter / #BeneaththeWater

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Talking points:

• Anxiety and self-doubt – how Sarah overcame anxiety and self-doubt to pursue her ambitions
• Psychological impact of childhood heart surgery - and the decision to marry and have children early as a result
• Helping other writers through the 'Worried Writer' podcast, book, and website to overcome fear, self-doubt and procrastination
• James Young Simpson - the amazing 19th century Scottish obstetrician, who has captivated Sarah's imagination

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The 4 Pillar Plan - How to Eat, Sleep, Relax and Move Your Way to a Longer, Healthier Life by Dr Rangan Chatterjee

“Rangan’s easy, common sense plan can help everyone live a happier, calmer life”

— Jamie Oliver

“Rangan is revolutionising the way we think about health, he will make you feel better than you have in years.”

— Amelia Freer

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The 4 Pillar Plan by Dr Rangan Chatterjee

The 4 Pillar Plan - How to Eat, Sleep, Relax and Move Your Way to a Longer, Healthier Life by Dr Rangan Chatterjee | Published by Penguin Life, 4th January 2018, trade pb, £16.99

A simple, accessible and inspiring guide to good health from the star of the BBC One series Doctor in the House.

In The 4 Pillar Plan, Dr Rangan Chatterjee presents us with an incredibly simple framework for taking control of our health. He divides health into four pillars: diet, rest, sleep and movement. By making small, easily achievable changes in each of these key areas you can find and maintain good health - and avoid illness. You don't need to excel at any one pillar; what matters is the balance across all the things you do, from :

• Having an electronic 'sabbath' once a week
• Aiming for 12 hours every day without food
• Exposing yourself to sunlight first thing each morning

Based on cutting edge research and his own experience as a GP, and featuring fascinating case studies from real patients, The 4 Pillar Plan is an inspiring, easy-to-follow and practical guide to good health.

Dr. Rangan Chatterjee is a pioneer in the emerging field of progressive medicine and is changing the way that we look at illness. He is known for finding the root cause of people's problems by taking a 360 degree approach to health, which was highlighted in the first two series’ of his ground-breaking BBC One TV show, Doctor in the House, that gained him much acclaim from both the public and doctors.

Chatterjee is the resident doctor on BBC Breakfast and has given an inspirational TEDx talk on making diseases disappear. He writes for The Huffington Post, Mind Body Green and has a monthly column on lifestyle medicine in Top Sante. He regularly lectures on his subject at events and conferences around the world.

More information about Dr Rangan Chatterjee is available here: https://www.drchatterjee.com/

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The Homecoming by Rosie Howard

A major new series for fans of Katie Fforde, Veronica Henry, Carole Matthews and Jill Mansell

A heart-warming and witty new series that combines a cosy Sussex setting, relationship drama and a cast of endearing characters.

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The Homecoming (Havenbury 1) by Rosie Howard | Published in hardback by Allison & Busby on 15 February 2018 | £19.99

The Homecoming by Rosie Howard

Maddy fled the idyllic market town of Havenbury Magna three years ago, the scene of a traumatic incident she revisits most clearly in her dreams. Even so, when she is called back to help at the Havenbury Arms when her godfather Patrick suffers a heart attack, she is unprepared for the welter of emotions her return provokes.

Psychologist and ex-army officer Ben is sure he can help Maddy to resolve her fears, until he finds himself falling for her, and struggling with a recently uncovered family secret of which Maddy is blissfully unaware.

Then Maddy's mother, Helen, arrives and Patrick himself must confront a few uncomfortable truths about his history and the pub’s future.

The Homecoming is page-turning escapism at its best, and the start of an exciting new series.

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Author biography

With a father in the forces and the diplomatic corps, Rosie Howard spent much of her childhood in UK boarding schools, joining her parents in exotic destinations during holidays. After obtaining a degree in music she pursued a career in public relations, campaigning, political lobbying and freelance journalism but realized her preference for making things up and switched to writing novels instead. She lives in a West Sussex village with her husband and two children in a cottage with roses around the door.

rosiehoward.com / @RosieHowardBook

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Talking points

• Home / interiors – Rosie lives in a beautiful little cottage which she and her husband renovated themselves (photos available)
• Family - raising a teenage daughter, a son with special needs, caring for elderly parents
• Commenting on disability rights, equality for women, working women and access to childcare
• Rural pub closures and community solutions – beer ties, pubs being sold off for housing, which features in the novel
• Childhood spent in boarding schools – learning to be tough and resourceful

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1984: India’s Guilty Secret by Pav Singh

When 8,000 citizens in the world's largest democracy are murdered in a government- orchestrated genocidal massacre in just four days, how is it possible for the guilty to evade justice? This shocking exposé of a true-life Orwellian plot of nightmarish proportions reveals how they did it.

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1984: India’s Guilty Secret by Pav Singh | Kashi House / non-fiction / tpb / £12.99 / 1 November 2017

In November 1984, the ruling elite of the world's largest democracy conspired to murder thousands of their country's citizens in genocidal massacres reminiscent of Nazi-era Germany while the world watched on. Over four days, armed mobs brutally and systematically butchered, torched and raped members of the minority Sikh community living in Delhi and elsewhere. The sheer scale of the killings exceeded the combined civilian death tolls of the conflict in Northern Ireland, Tiananmen Square and 9/11. In Delhi alone 3,000 people were killed. The full extent of what took place has yet to be fully acknowledged.

This definitive account based on harrowing victim testimonies and official accounts reveals how the largest mass crime against humanity in India's modern history was perpetrated by politicians and covered up with the help of the police, judiciary and media. The failings of Western governments - who turned a blind eye to the atrocities for fear of losing trade contracts worth billions - are also exposed.

• This is the first book to expose the chilling events of November 1984, the Indian government's 33- year cover-up and the moral indifference of Thatcher cabinet.
• Reveals for the first time the high-level conspiracy at the heart of the Indian establishment by connecting the lower level actors to senior politicians, high-ranking policemen, judges and ultimately, to the Gandhi family itself
• A powerful and compelling account exposing the dark underbelly of a key global and economic powerhouse - hailed as ‘a timely reminder of India's shameful inability to account for that explosion of racial and religious hatred’ in Delhi and elsewhere in November 1984 (Geoffrey Robertson QC)
• Includes an analysis of the previously unrecognised issue of mass genocidal rape against women and the killing of children: 'long overdue in coming since there is far too little writing on 1984' (Dr Uma Chakravarti, Indian historian & feminist).

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About Pav Singh

Pav Singh was born in Leeds, England, the son of Punjabi immigrants. He has been instrumental in campaigning on the issues surrounding the 1984 massacres. In 2004, he spent a year in India researching the full extent of the pogroms and the subsequent cover-up. He met with survivors and witnessed the political fall-out and protests following the release of the flawed Nanavati Report into the killings. His research led to the pivotal and authoritative report 1984 Sikhs' Kristallnacht, which was first released in the UK Parliament in 2005 and substantially expanded in 2009. In his role as a community advocate at the Wiener (Holocaust) Library for the Study of the Holocaust and Genocide, London, he curated the exhibition 'The 1984 Anti-Sikh Pogroms Remembered' in 2014 with Delhi-based photographer Gauri Gill.

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Love And Other Consolation Prizes by Jamie Ford

From the internationally bestselling and prize-winning author of Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet comes a moving novel with astonishing scope.

“Ford’s boundless compassion for the human spirit, in all its strengths andweaknesses, makes him one of our most unique and compelling storytellers”

— Helen Simonson, author of Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand

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Allison & Busby / £14.99 / Hardback / Fiction / 12 September 2017

1909, Seattle. At the World’s Fair a half-Chinese boy called Ernest Young is raffled off as a prize. He ends up working in a brothel in Seattle’s famed Red Light District and falls in love with Maisie, the daughter of a flamboyant madam, and Fahn, a karayukisan, a Japanese maid sold into servitude.

On the eve of the new World’s Fair in 1962, Ernest looks back on the past, the memories he made with his beloved wife while his daughter, a reporter, begins to unravel their tragic past.

Jamie Ford is the great-grandson of pioneer Min Chung, who emigrated from China to San Francisco in 1865, where he adopted the Western name “Ford”. Jamie grew up in Seattle and worked as an art director and creative director, before becoming a full-time writer.  He now lives in Montana with his wife and children. 

For more information please visit www.jamieford.com. Twitter: @JamieFord

Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet spent two years on the New York Times Bestseller list.  It has been translated into 29 languages. Jamie Ford is currently writing the screenplay.

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American War by Omar El Akkad

“‘American War’ creates as haunting a post-apocalyptic universe as Cormac McCarthy did in ‘The Road’, and as devastating a look at the fallout that national events have on an American family as Philip Roth did in ‘The Plot Against America’...El Akkad has written a novel that not only maps the harrowing effects of violence on one woman and her family, but also becomes a disturbing parable about the ruinous consequences of war on ordinary civilians.”

— Michiko Kakutani, New York Times

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Hardback fiction / 7th September 2017 / £14.99 / 9781509852192

An audacious and powerful debut novel: a second American Civil War, a devastating plague, and one family caught deep in the middle – a story that asks what might happen if America were to turn its most devastating policies and deadly weapons upon itself.

Sarat Chestnut, born in Louisiana, is only six when the Second American Civil War breaks out in 2074. But even she knows that oil is outlawed, that Louisiana is half underwater, that unmanned drones fill the sky. And when her father is killed and her family is forced into Camp Patience for displaced persons, she quickly begins to be shaped by her particular time and place until, finally, through the influence of a mysterious functionary, she is turned into a deadly instrument of war. Telling her story is her nephew, Benjamin Chestnut, born during war – part of the Miraculous Generation – now an old man confronting the dark secret of his past, his family’s role in the conflict and, in particular, that of his aunt, a woman who saved his life while destroying untold others

Omar El Akkad is an award-winning journalist and author who has travelled around the world to cover many of the most important news stories of the last decade. His reporting includes dispatches from the NATO-led war in Afghanistan, the military trials at Guantanamo Bay, the Arab Spring revolution in Egypt and the Black Lives Matter movement in Ferguson, Missouri. He is a recipient of a National Newspaper Award for investigative reporting and the Goff Penny Memorial Prize for Young Journalists, as well as three National Magazine Award honorable mentions. He lives in Portland, Oregon.

More information: Omarelakkad.com / facebook.com/omar.akkad / twitter.com/omarelakkad

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Selected international praise

‘Whether read as a cautionary tale of partisanship run amok, an allegory of past conflicts or a study of the psychology of war, American War is a deeply unsettling novel. The only comfort the story offers is that it’s a work of fiction. For the time being, anyway.’  Justin Cronin, The New York Times

‘El Akkad’s formidable talent is to offer up a stinging rebuke of the distance with which the United States sometimes views current disasters, which are always happening somewhere else. Not this time.’ LA Times

‘Follow the tributaries of today’s political combat a few decades into the future and you might arrive at something as terrifying as Omar El Akkad’s debut novel, American War . . . El Akkad demonstrates a profound understanding of the corrosive culture of civil war.’ The Washington Post

‘A gripping plot and an elegiac narrative tone.’ Boston Globe

‘El Akkad’s debut novel transports us to a terrifyingly plausible future... Part family chronicle, part apocalyptic fable, American War is a vivid narrative of a country collapsing in on itself, where political loyalties hardly matter given the ferocity of both sides and the unrelenting violence that swallows whole bloodlines and erodes any capacity for mercy or reason. This is a very dark read; El Akkad creates a world all too familiar in its grisly realism’ Publishers Weekly

‘El Akkad has created a brilliantly well-crafted, profoundly shattering saga of one family’s suffering…American War is a gripping, unsparing, and essential novel for dangerously contentious times.’ Booklist

‘El Akkad’s astounding, gripping and eerily believable novel . . . masterful. Both the story and the writing are lucid, succinct, powerful and persuasive.’ Toronto The Globe and Mail

‘A dystopian vision . . . cannily imagined . . . But above all, El Akkad’s novel is an allegory about present-day military occupation’ Kirkus Reviews

 ‘A plausible, terrifying chronicle of the fracture and subsequent annihilation of the US… A thrillingly complex adventure that moves from the American south to Alaska and on to the Middle East and North Africa… At its heart and most movingly, the novel also becomes a coming-of-age narrative about how easily a curious child faced with horror and powerlessness can transform into a weapon intent on obliteration. As we learn at the end of the prologue, “This isn’t a story about war. It’s about ruin”’ The Australian

'The book that I found the most haunting this year. . . The premise is harrowing, the prose is stark and beautiful, the plotting is impeccable, and there’s something utterly heartbreaking in El Akkad’s subtle rendition of the ways in which war shapes the human soul.' Emily St John Mandel in The Millions

‘American War is a thought experiment in the form of a dystopian novel . . . The dramatic narrative takes us through the key events in Sarat’s life, while intercutting excerpts from various documentary sources that give us background and insight into the bigger political picture. A detailed world is constructed . . . American War asks us to imagine the uncomfortable.’ The Toronto Star

‘Omar El Akkad’s urgent debut transmutes our society’s current dysfunction into a terrifying yet eerily recognizable future, where contemporary global and local conflicts have wreaked havoc on American soil. The threads between today and that future are his masterfully shaped characters. Their resilience, savagery, and humanity serve both as a portrait of who we are but also what we might very well become.’ Elliot Ackerman, author of Dark at the Crossing

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The Art of Winnie-the-Pooh: How E. H. Shepard Illustrated an Icon, by James Campbell

The Art of Winnie-the-Pooh: How E. H. Shepard Illustrated an Icon
By James Campbell. Foreword by Minette Shepard (Illustrated By E. H. Shepard)
Michael O'Mara Books | 7 September 2017 | Hardback | £25

Presenting over 125 full colour images – including never-before-published sketches, finished artwork, personal family photographs and memorabilia – this is the perfect gift for those of us who grew up loving Winnie-the-Pooh.

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Winnie-the-Pooh and his friends from the Hundred Acre Wood are some of the world’s most beloved characters in children’s literature.

But before they appeared in many millions of books and in nearly fifty languages, they started life in the 1920s as the product of a unique collaboration between A. A. Milne and E. H Shepard; author and illustrator wove images and text together in a way that was utterly original for the time. For Shepard, it was a process that he relished, creating artwork for new editions right up until his death in 1976 at the age of ninety-six.

In this beautifully presented, full-colour volume, readers will not only discover the story behind this remarkable partnership, but also follow the evolution of Shepard’s work, from those first tentative sketches through to the illustrations we know and love, and even on to the characters’ later incarnations at Disney.

• Includes never-before-published sketch-work from the Winnie-the-Pooh books, including the first ever drawing of Pooh Bear
• Tells the story of Shepard and Milne’s unique collaboration
• Beautifully packaged and in full colour throughout, with over 125 images, including sketches, finished artwork, photographs and memorabilia
• With a Foreword by Minette Shepard, E. H. Shepard’s granddaughter

James Campbell has worked for a number of sustainability and environmental organisations for over twenty years. He is married to E. H. Shepard's great- granddaughter and has had responsibility for the oversight of E. H. Shepard's artistic and literary estate since 2010. He currently lives in Oxford.  He is available for interview, to write pieces and to give talks and presentations

 “Winnie-the-Pooh: Exploring A Classic” runs at the V&A from 16 Dec ’17 – 8 April ‘18

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Thanks to Style Factory for their assistance with this project.

I Found My Tribe by Ruth Fitzmaurice

I FOUND MY TRIBE by Ruth Fitzmaurice
Chatto & Windus / 6 July 2017 / £14.99 / HB / Memoir

Ruth Fitzmaurice has two extraordinary families.

She has her husband Simon, a filmmaker with advanced Motor Neurone Disease who can only communicate with his eyes via a computer. Together they have five children under the age of 10, as well as Pappy, a cantankerous Basset Hound. They are kept afloat by relentless army of nurses and carers that flows through their house in Greystones, on the East Coast of Ireland.

And then there is Ruth’s other family - her Tribe of amazing women. Amidst the chaos and the pain that rules their lives, The Tragic Wives Swimming Club congregate together - in summer and winter, on golden afternoons and by the light of the moon - on the sea steps at Women’s Cove. Day after day, they throw themselves into the freezing Irish sea. In that moment, they are free. Later, they will share a thermos of tea, teeth chattering, hands shaking, ready to take on the world once more.

An invocation to all of us to love as hard as we can, and live even harder, I Found My Tribe is an urgent and uplifting letter to a husband, family, friends, the natural world and the brightness of life.

RUTH FITZMAURICE was born in 1976 and grew up in Co. Louth, Ireland. She was a radio researcher and producer when she married film director and writer, Simon, in 2004 and had three children. In 2008, Simon was diagnosed with Motor Neurone Disease and given three years to live. Simon went into respiratory failure in 2010 and was accidentally placed on a ventilator during an emergency procedure. He decided, against medical advice, to keep the ventilator; Ruth and Simon went on to have twins in 2012. In January 2016, Ruth wrote her first piece for the Irish Times about family life and a new passion, sea swimming. She lives in Greystones, Co. Wicklow, with Simon, their five children Jack, Raife, Arden, Sadie, Hunter, a dog, a cat and a team of nurses and carers. 

Ruth will be in the UK on publication and available for interviews and events.

#MyTribe

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Psyched Up: How the Science of Mental Preparation Can Help You Succeed by Daniel McGinn

Portfolio Penguin | Trade Paperback | 08 June 2017 | £14.99
Also available as an eBook

McGinn turns conventional wisdom on its head with science-based techniques, producing the first ever book to specifically tackle mental preparation.

What's the difference between succeeding and failing in life's big moments?

In Psyched Up, Harvard Business Review Editor Daniel McGinn explains why mental preparation is the key to mastering any challenge. Examining the latest scientific research into the smartest ways to deal with a flood of adrenaline, increase focus, minimize negative thoughts, and optimize emotions, Psyched Up teaches you what do in the last few minutes before a major event.

From focusing on improving your mood instead of over-rehearsing to employing motivating mantras rather than giving in to superstitious rituals, McGinn reveals essential tactics for remaining calm and collected when it matters most.

Drawing on interviews with high-performing professionals such as retired General Stanley McChrystal, NASCAR champion driver Jimmie Johnson and legendary tennis coach Nick Bollettieri, McGinn illustrates how to develop a personal psyching up routine and reveals why introverts and extroverts might employ different methods.

About the author

Daniel McGinn is an editor at Harvard Business Review. His writing has appeared in Wired, Inc., the Boston Globe Magazine and Newsweek. He lives in suburban Boston with his family.

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Hunch: Turn Your Everyday Insights into the Next Big Thing by Bernadette Jiwa

Portfolio Penguin | Paperback | 01 June 2017 |  £9.99
Also available as an eBook

In a world where the smallest insight can spark a breakthrough idea, intuition is more valuable than ever.

What do the Dyson vacuum cleaner, GoPro camera, Starbucks, Instagram, Facebook, and Lululemon yoga pants have in common? Every one of them was the result not of data-driven analytics or corporate brainstorming sessions, but a hunch - the intuitive understanding of a deep, unmet need, informed by insight and foresight.

In Hunch, bestselling author and business advisor Bernadette Jiwa shows how anyone can uncover the kind of insights that become breakthrough ideas. Combining hands-on exercises with inspiring stories of the killer hunches that brought us ideas like the first reusable coffee cup and the beloved Spanx brand, Hunch is a guide to cultivating your intuitive powers, a roadmap to getting from insights to ideas that fly.

‘This brilliant little book is sure to inspire the next new meaningful product or company’
Ivy Ross, VP Design, Google

‘Hunch helps you to tap into those often overlooked yet valuable qualities that will unlock your most brilliant and boldest ideas’ - Chip Conley, Strategic Advisor, AirBnB

‘After reading this book you'll pay attention to the world in a completely new way and have the tools to create your own vision for the future’ - Antonio Zea, Senior Director, Under Armour

About the author

Bernadette Jiwa is a recognized global authority on the role of story in business, innovation and marketing and the author of five bestselling books on marketing and brand storytelling. She advises, consults and speaks to entrepreneurs and business leaders who want to build meaningful brands. Her work takes her from Sydney to New York (and everywhere in between). Born in Dublin, Ireland, Bernadette now lives in Melbourne, Australia.

Bernadette will be in the UK on 1st and 2nd June and available for interview. The website for the book is at http://hunch.how/

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Defectors by Joseph Kanon

From the bestselling author of Leaving Berlin and Istanbul Passage comes a thrilling and richly imagined novel about an American defector in Moscow during the Cold War.

'Kanon is fast approaching the complexity and relevance not just of le Carré and Greene but even of Orwell' New York Times

'Sensational! No one writes period fiction with the same style and suspense – not to mention substance – as Joseph Kanon' Scott Turow

'The perfect combination of intrigue and accurate history brought to life' Alan Furst

'Magnificent' Minette Walters

'Joseph Kanon owns this corner of the literary landscape and it's a joy to see him reassert his title with such emphatic authority' Lee Child

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Published in hardback by Simon & Schuster on 1 June 2017 at £14.99

Moscow, 1961. Stalin has been dead for eight years. With the launch of Sputnik, the Soviet Union's international prestige is at an all-time high.

View fullsize

Former CIA agent Francis ‘Frank’ Weeks, the most notorious of the defectors to the Soviet Union, is about to publish his memoirs, and what he reveals is reportedly going to send shock waves through the West.

Weeks' defection in the early 50s shook Washington to its core – he had been a beloved member of the OSS and then the CIA, one of the bright young men who'd come out of the war ready to take an early lead in the new American century. His betrayal rippled through the State Department, prompting frantic searches for moles and forcing the resignation of Simon, Frank's brother and best friend.

When a Soviet agency approaches Simon, now a publisher in New York City, with a controversial proposition to publish his brother's memoirs, he knows that there's no way the US government will approve the publication of a book clearly intended as propaganda for the KGB. Yet he finds the offer irresistible since it will finally give him the chance to learn why his brother chose to betray his country. But what he discovers in Moscow is far more than he ever imagined...

Joseph Kanon is the Edgar Award–winning author of Leaving Berlin, Istanbul Passage, Stardust, Alibi, The Prodigal Spy, Los Alamos, and The Good German, which was made into a major motion picture starring George Clooney and Cate Blanchett. He lives in New York City. Visit him online at JosephKanon.com / @JosephKanon.

#thedefectors

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The One by John Marrs

Finding your perfect match has never been easier.  Or more dangerous…

A page-turning psychological thriller with a difference, this is a truly unique novel which is guaranteed to keep you on the edge of your seat. 

Film and TV rights have been optioned by Urban Myth films.

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Del Rey / paperback original / 4th May 2017 £7.99. Also available as an e-book.

One simple mouth swab is all it takes.  One tiny DNA test to find your perfect partner – the one you’re genetically made for. 

A decade after scientists discover everyone has a gene they share with just one person, millions have taken the test, desperate to find true love.  Now, five more people meet their match.  But even soul mates have secrets. And some are more shocking – and deadlier – than others…

The One shares stories from the perspectives of these five individuals in this unputdownable novel with a most intriguing premise.

• "A compelling, dark read that gets you thinking." Sun
• "A fantastic read if you enjoy an unpredictable story with twists and turns." ***** OK!
• "Looking for a thrilling read? Then look no further." TV Extra Magazine, Sunday Star
• "A thrilling eBook!" ***** Sunday Express  

John Marrs is a freelance journalist based in London, who has spent the last 20 years interviewing celebrities from the world of television, film and music for national newspapers and magazines. He has written for publications including The Guardian's Guide and Guardian Online; OK! Magazine; Total Film; Empire; Q; GT; The Independent; Star; Reveal; Company and Daily Star.  His debut novel The Wronged Sons, was released in 2013 and in May 2015, he released his second book, Welcome To Wherever You Are. The One was initially self-published as an e-book in July 2016 under the title A Thousand Small Explosions.

#MatchYourDNA @johnmarrs1

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Sevastopol’s Wars: Crimea from Potemkin to Putin by Mungo Melvin

Published in hardback by Osprey Publishing on 20 April 2017 at £30

From award-winning historian Mungo Melvin, the first book to cover the full history of Russia's historic Crimean naval citadel, from its founding in 1783 through to the current tensions that threaten the region’s peace and stability.

Founded by Catherine the Great, the maritime city of Sevastopol has been fought over for centuries. Crucial battles of the Crimean War were fought on the hills surrounding the city, and the memory of this stalwart defence inspired those who fought the Germans during the Second World War. Twice the city has faced complete obliteration yet twice it has risen, phoenix-like, from the ashes. Rebuilt from scratch during the Cold War, it remains a formidable bastion of Russian military power.

In this ground-breaking volume, award-winning author Mungo Melvin explores how Sevastopol became a crucible of three major conflicts – the Crimean War, the Russian Civil War and the Second World War – witnessing the death and destruction of countless soldiers, sailors and civilians yet creating the indomitable 'spirit of Sevastopol'.  By weaving together historical accounts, first-hand interviews, detailed operational reports and expert battle analysis, Melvin creates a rich tapestry of history, brought further to life through 16 colour maps and over 80 pictures.

Talking Points

• The significance of both Crimea and Sevastopol to Russia since 1783, and why they were re-annexed in 2014 at the expense of Ukraine.
• The background to the tensions surrounding Russia, Ukraine, Crimea and the West.
• The close bonds between the Crimea generally and Sevastopol specifically to the Russian people – explaining why the Russian action was widely welcomed by local inhabitants in 2014.
• A deeply researched study of the operational and tactical methods used by Russian and Soviet forces during the 19th and 20th centuries, and most recently in 2014.
• Russian author Leo Tolstoy and his service as a junior artillery officer during the Crimean War.  (Sevastopol’s Wars includes fascinating excerpts from his vivid accounts of the city under siege in 1854–55, Sevastopol Sketches.)

About Major General Mungo Melvin

Major General Mungo Melvin CB OBE is the author of award-winning Manstein: Hitler's Greatest General (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2010). He is a retired senior Army officer - commissioned into the Royal Engineers in 1975, he saw operational service in Northern Ireland, the Middle East and the Balkans. During the latter part of his 37-year career he specialised in strategic analysis and professional military education and doctrine, becoming one of the British Army's leading thinkers and writers. Mungo Melvin is president of the British Commission for Military History, and is currently advising the British Army on the First World War centenary commemorations. He is a senior associate fellow of the Royal United Services Institute and a senior visiting research fellow of the Department of War Studies of King's College London. He lectures widely on strategy and military history in both the public and commercial sectors.  For more information about Major General Mungo Melvin please visit www.mungomelvin.com.

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Bright Shiny Things by Barbara Nadel (Hakim & Arnold 5)

Allison & Busby / hardback / 20 April 2017 / £19.99 / crime fiction

A friend from the past asks for private investigator Lee Arnold’s help in tracing his son.  Fayyad al’Barri was last thought to be in Syria having embraced radical Islam, but a cryptic message has prompted his family to believe Fayyad has had a change of heart and is searching for a way back home. With fellow investigator Mumtaz Hakim’s help, they might be able to establish contact.

From the bright lights of the Western world, to shady boxing clubs and murky online jihadist recruitment, and while violence erupts close to home, Mumtaz and Lee are on an unknown path into the mind of a terrorist, journeying closer to danger than they ever imagined.

Part crime procedural, part thriller, part psychological mystery Bright Shiny Things is a page-turning read and a fascinating insight into radicalisation, ISIS and the East End of London.

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Praise for the Hakim & Arnold series

‘A gutsy tale, well grounded in local colour’ The Times

‘Bleak, brutal and timely’ Financial Times

‘Compelling.’ The Sunday Telegraph

‘This series has brilliantly established itself and this latest is another masterpiece.’ Crimesquad 

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About Barbara Nadel

Born in the East End of London, Barbara Nadel has a degree in psychology and prior to becoming a full-time author she worked in psychiatric institutions and in the community with people experiencing mental health problems.

Barbara won the CWA Silver Dagger for Deadly Web, part of her Inspector Ikmen series.  She is available for interviews, events and to write articles.

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The Wanderers by Meg Howrey

'Phenomenal. The Wanderers explores the dangers and necessities of venturing away from the familiar and finding home in the unknown. Howrey's expansive vision left me awestruck' - Ruth Ozeki, author of A Tale for the Time Being

‘The Wanderers is a wonderful exploration of space, trust, and what it means to be a conscious creature, finely-tuned and funny from the first page to the last. I loved getting lost in Meg Howrey's off-kilter world of astronauts and their simulated fantasies.’ - Jonathan Lee, author of High Dive

Station Eleven meets The Martian in this brilliantly inventive novel about three astronauts training for the first-ever mission to Mars, an experience that will push the boundary between real and unreal, test their relationships, and leave each of them—and their families—changed forever.

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Scribner (Simon & Schuster) / 6 April 2017 / £12.99 / HB / Fiction

As they look to the stars, what are they missing back home?

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In four years Prime Space will put the first humans on Mars. Helen Kane, Yoshi Tanaka, and Sergei Kuznetsov must prove they’re the crew for the job by spending seventeen months in the most realistic simulation every created

Helen is an experienced astronaut with a NASA position and a struggling grown-up daughter who needs her but when, at the age of fifty-three, she is offered a place on the training programme for the first crewed mission to Mars, she cannot refuse a last chance to walk among the stars.

Her fellow astronauts are Sergei, a gruff Russian whose teenage sons are less mysterious to him than they’d like to think; and Yoshi, kind and focused, whose exhaustive carefulness has led him ever further from his wife.

The three will be enclosed for months in a tiny spacecraft, while outside their loved ones negotiate life on Earth. How far will the wanderers travel in the pursuit of endeavour, and what will it be like to come home?

The Wanderers is a brilliant, witty and sharply observed novel from an exciting new voice.

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“‘An expansive tale of the costs of human ambition, The Wanderers is unquestionably the work of a brilliant writer at the height of her powers.’”

— J. Ryan Stradal, author of Kitchens of the Great Midwest

“‘The Wanderers is a stealthily brilliant novel… simple, gorgeous, and profoundly moving.’”

— Peter Nichols, author of The Rocks and A Voyage for Madmen

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Meg Howrey is a novelist and a former professional dancer and actor. Her non-fiction writing has been published in Vogue, and she is the author of two previous novels Blind Sight and Cranes Dance. The Wanderers is her UK debut.  She lives in Los Angeles.

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The Tartan Turban: In Search Of Alexander Gardner by John Keay

In this compelling investigative biography, bestselling author of India: A History, John Keay, takes readers on a quest from the American West to the Asian East to unravel the greatest enigma in the history of travel.  Alexander Gardner – a 19th-century Scots-American traveller, adventurer and mercenary – lived a life many found too outrageous to believe and using a wealth of original material and compelling new evidence, Keay uncovers the truth about a character seemingly from the ‘Flashman’ stories.

“Among the many gripping tales of travel and exploration the tale of Alexander Gardner is surely one of the most extraordinary. Master storyteller John Keay deftly sifts truth from myth-making to uncover fascinating new evidence, revealing an amazing tale worthy of Kipling or Flashman of a life lived further out on the edge than most could even imagine.”

— Michael Wood

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HB ǀ £25.00 ǀ 9781911271000 ǀ 16 February 2017 ǀ Kashi House (distributed by Allison and Busby)

Like the travels of Marco Polo, those of Alexander Gardner clip the white line between credible adventure and creative invention. Either he is the nineteenth century’s most intrepid traveller or its most egregious fantasist, or a bit of both. Contemporaries generally believed him; posterity became more sceptical. And as with Polo, the investigation of Gardner’s story enlarged man’s understanding of the world and upped the pace of scientific and political exploration.

For before more reputable explorers notched up their own discoveries in innermost Asia, this lone Scots-American had roamed the deserts of Turkestan, ridden round the world’s most fearsome knot of mountains and fought in Afghanistan ‘for the good cause of right against wrong’. From the Caspian to Tibet and from Kandahar to Kashgar, Gardner had seen it all. At the time, the 1820s, no other outsider had managed anything remotely comparable. When word of his feats filtered out, geographers were agog.

Historians were more intrigued by what followed. After thirteen years as a white-man-gone-native in Central Asia, Gardner re-emerged as a colonel of artillery in the employ of India’s last great native empire. He witnessed the death throes of that Sikh empire at close quarters and, sparing no gruesome detail, recorded his own part in the bloodshed (the very same featuring as the exploits of ‘Alick’ Gardner in the ‘Flashman’ series).

Fame finally caught up with him during his long retirement in Kashmir. Dressed in tartan yet still living as a native, he mystified visiting dignitaries and found a ready audience for the tales of his adventurous past - including saving the city of Lahore in 1841 by singlehandedly killing 300 invaders. But one mystery he certainly took to the grave: the whereabouts of his accumulated fortune has still to be discovered. 

JOHN KEAY has been a professional writer, scholar, broadcaster and traveller for more than 40 years. He has written and presented over 100 documentaries for BBC Radios 3 and 4 and is the author of some two dozen books mainly on Asia and exploration. His narrative histories India: A History, China: A History and The Honourable Company: A History of the English East India Company are widely regarded as standard works. A Fellow of the Royal Literary Fund, his prose has been described as ‘exquisite’ (Observer) and his historical analysis as ‘forensic’ (The Guardian). He has also edited The Royal Geographical Society’s History of World Exploration and encyclopaedias of both Scotland and London. For his literary contribution to Asian studies he was awarded the Royal Society for Asian Affairs' Sir Percy Sykes Memorial Medal in 2009. He lives in Argyll.

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Talking Points

Exploration and travel

The travels of a maverick mercenary who, having crossed Central Asia's arid deserts and high
mountain passes in the hope of finding ‘happiness among wild races and in exploring unknown lands’, astounded his contemporaries in ways no man had since Marco Polo

Lone Survivor

What are the odds of a lone traveller surviving thirteen years amidst some of the harshest conditions in Asia, roaming the deserts of Turkestan, trekking round the world’s most fearsome knot of mountains, fending off a wolf-pack, evading the clutches of Central Asian slave-traders, engaging in raids and ambushes against bandits in Afghanistan, and spending nine months in an underground dungeon?

Lost treasure

The fabulous treasure horde, amassed by an American soldier of fortune who had the opportunity to steal the Koh-i-Noor diamond, remains waiting to be discovered somewhere in the subcontinent

Inspiration for Kipling?

As the first white man to trek across the secretive anti-Islamic mountain enclave of Kafiristan (‘Land of the Unbeliever’) and live to tell the tale, was Alexander Gardner the real inspiration behind Kipling’s famous novel, The Man Who Would Be King?

The First American in Afghanistan

Revealing the remarkable tale of a lone American who, two centuries before the United States’ began its military action, became the first of his nation to venture into Afghanistan.

A Son of Scotland & His Tartan Turban

Exploring the ancestry, shifting identities, achievements and tartan tastes of a pioneering Scots American who went native in Asia.

The fashion of white men wearing turbans

Alexander Burnes - British political agent in Afghanistan who lost Alexander Gardner’s crucial Kafiristan journal in the 1840s

Queen Victoria’s sons - they were dressed up like Sikh princes by Maharaja Duleep Singh
(who Gardner had guarded when he ruled at Lahore) soon after his arrival in the UK in 1854
William Simpson - war artist who, like George Landseer who captured Gardner’s portrait, was in
Kashmir in 1860s; the works of both artists are in the collections of the Victoria & Albert
Museum

George Hayward - a military man who turned explorer consulted Gardner on routes into the
Pamir mountains

August Schoefft - painter who travelled across India in the 1830s-40s and produced works
connected to the court of Lahore (captured other white officers but not Gardner, who may
have been away on campaign)

Victorian / Edwardian military officers - men like General Sir Samuel James Browne VC (Sam Browne’s Cavalry), Captain Robert Shebbeare VC (15th Punjab Infantry) and Sir John Smyth VC, who wore turbans on campaign, all commanded men (or their descendants in the case of Smyth) from the disbanded Sikh army when Britain took control of Punjab

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We Were the Lucky Ones by Georgia Hunter

An extraordinary debut novel, drawn from author’s family history of survival in the Nazi Holocaust.

“Reading Georgia Hunter’s We Were the Lucky Ones is like being swung heart first into history … A brave and mesmerizing debut, and a truly tremendous accomplishment.”

— Paula McLain, author of The Paris Wife

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14 February 2017 / Hardback / Allison & Busby / £14.99 / fiction 

‘By the end of the Holocaust, 90 per cent of Poland’s three million Jews were annihilated; of the more than 30,000 Jews who lived in Radom, fewer than 300 survived.’

The Kurc family shouldn’t have survived the Holocaust. In the spring of 1939 three generations are living relatively normal lives in Poland, despite the hardships Jews face. When war breaks out and the family is cast to the wind, the five Kurc siblings do everything they can to find their way through a devastated continent to freedom.

Addy, a musician, charms his way into possession of a Brazilian visa and into the first class piano lounge on a ship full of refugees bound for Rio; Jakob marries the love of his life in an abandoned house to a soundtrack of air sirens; Mila hides her daughter in a Catholic convent outside of Warsaw, only to return weeks later to find the convent in ruins; Genek endures a brutal winter in a Siberian gulag before embarking with his wife and newborn son on a yearlong exodus through Persia to fight for the Allies; and Halina attempts to flee over the Austrian Alps on foot – while pregnant. All this, across continents and often in ignorance as to the fate of the rest of their family, while the wheels of war turn.

We Were the Lucky Ones is a profoundly moving and memorable novel, and a gripping tale of bravery, based on the author’s family experiences.  It takes you on a journey through unimaginable darkness to a place of hope/ 

When Georgia Hunter was fifteen years old, she learned that she came from a family of Holocaust survivors. We Were the Lucky Ones was born of her quest to uncover her family’s staggering history. She lives in Connecticut, USA, and is available for interview and to write features.

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Talking points

Discovering her Polish / Jewish heritage, aged 15

Growing up, while Georgia was close to her grandparents, she had no idea she was a quarter Jewish, or that she came from a family of Holocaust survivors - it wasn’t a big secret, just a piece of her grandfather’s past he had chosen to put behind him.

 At a family reunion in 2000 she discovered the greater Kurc family saga.  Snippets of stories overheard include: a sister who walked over the Austrian Alps, pregnant; a cousin born in the Siberian gulag, where it was so cold his eyes would freeze shut in the mornings and his mother had to use the warmth of her breast milk to coax them open; a harrowing mother-daughter escape from the Radom ghetto; a secret wedding in a blacked-out house in Lvov.

Travelling through Europe, tracing her family’s footsteps

Georgia followed in the Kurc family’s footsteps, travelling the route her family travelled, through Poland, Austria, Italy, and Brazil.  Some of the most moving moments were wandering the streets of Radom, where she discovered a mezuzah - one of only 2 remaining - in the doorway to their old apartment building, and standing with her son on the train platform in Bari, where several relatives reunited after the war.

Researching her family story

The story came together through travel, extensive interviews and outside research, with key findings through the Shoah Foundation, the Hoover Institution at Stamford and the UK Ministry of Defence.

Fact to fiction

While the bones of the story are all true (e.g., who was where, when), Georgia’s goal in writing We Were the Lucky Ones was to put readers in the shoes of her relatives, which is why she chose to write the novel in the present tense - to help the story feel relevant, visceral, memorable.  When she finally allowed herself to fictionalize the details it helped to bring the story closer to the truth.

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