Other books that might interest you

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  Get Carman - In court with...

  Karen Phillipps

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  George Carman QC was, and perhaps still is, Britain's most famous lawyer within living memory. Equally feared and respected, he made his name as an erudite and incisive advocate largely in the field of libel. Coming to prominence with his superb defence of disgraced former Liberal Party leader Jeremy Thorpe on a charge of conspiracy to murder, Carman subsequently defended many well-known faces from the worlds of entertainment, sport, politics and business, including Ken Dodd, Richard Branson and Elton John.
  Away from court, Carman was a complex and private yet not unsociable man. In 1986, he met barrister Karen Phillipps and, although she turned down his immediate marriage proposal, the two would have a close platonic relationship for the rest of Carman's life.
  Carman intended to write his memoirs but became too ill to complete the book and died in 2001. Using his papers, press cuttings and court transcripts – along with the testimonies of some of those who saw him in action and her own extensive memories of her close friend –Phillipps presents a portrait of this eminent advocate through the cases that made him famous. All the drama of the courtroom world that Carman belonged to is here, along with some of the best and most entertaining theatre the English justice system has ever seen.

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  She Made Me Laugh - My Friend...

  Richard Cohen

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  Nora Ephron, one of the most famous writers, film makers, and personalities of her time is captured by her long-time and dear friend in a hilarious, blunt, raucous, and poignant recollection of their decades-long friendship. 
   
  Nora Ephron (1941–2012) was a phenomenal personality, journalist, essayist, novelist, playwright, Oscar-nominated screenwriter, and movie director (Sleepless in Seattle; You’ve Got Mail; When Harry Met Sally; Heartburn; Julie & Julia). She wrote a slew of bestsellers (I Feel Bad About My Neck: And Other Thoughts on Being a Woman; I Remember Nothing: And Other Reflections; Scribble, Scribble: Notes on the Media; Crazy Salad: Some Things About Women). She was celebrated by Hollywood, embraced by literary New York, and adored by legions of fans throughout the world. 
   
  Award-winning journalist Richard Cohen, wrote this about his “third-person memoir”: “I call this book a third-person memoir. It is about my closest friend, Nora Ephron, and the lives we lived together and how her life got to be bigger until, finally, she wrote her last work, the play, Lucky Guy, about a newspaper columnist dying of cancer while she herself was dying of cancer. I have interviewed many of her other friends—Mike Nichols, Tom Hanks, Steven Spielberg, Meryl Streep, Arianna Huffington—but the book is not a name-dropping star turn, but an attempt to capture a remarkable woman who meant so much to so many other women.”

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  The Long Walk Home - An Escape...

  Peter Medd, Frank Simms

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  On September 13th 1943, two young British officers seized the chance to escape their PoW convoy after the capitulation of Italy. This catapulted them onto a two-month, seven-hundred-mile journey through enemy territory down the spine of Italy, helped by
  many brave local families. This new edition of The Long Walk Home sets the record of this extraordinary adventure straight. It gives Frank Simms equal billing as author, something that was denied him by the tragic early death of his companion Peter Medd. Simms's son, Marcus Binney, fleshes out the father he barely knew, who also died young less than a decade after this daring escape, and in the process does much to put the adventure in context. He has also unearthed his father's thrilling account of his previous 'Great Escape' by tunnelling out of the PoW camp at Padula in the south of Italy.

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  Becoming Mr Nice - The Howard...

  Amber Marks

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  NOW A TWO-PART BBC TWO DOCUMENTARY
  Welcome to the personal archives of Britain's biggest dope smuggler.
  For 40 years Howard Marks traversed the globe: an international businessman who became an inmate in America's toughest penitentiary before standing for election in the United Kingdom.
  Becoming Mr Nice reveals an extraordinary montage of previously unseen material from his roller-coaster life, interwoven with his daughter's incisively researched and deadpan commentary. It includes intelligence reports, phone transcripts, the business cards and letterheads used as trading fronts, and cryptic faxes from the Far East. But more than that, it offers a vista onto his many and varied experiences and escapades, through notebooks, personal items and correspondence with the characters who surrounded him.
  It includes extracts from a lavishly detailed and hitherto unpublished account of Howard's years on the run (written in confidence for the benefit of his otherwise baffled defence team) along with transcripts from his trial at the Old Bailey, in which he successfully claimed that his involvement in the biggest ever importation of cannabis into the United Kingdom was on behalf of the secret services.
  Peppered with comic observations from Howard's private letters, this book provides a uniquely personal insight into one of Britain's most remarkable characters.

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  Shining Star - Braving the...

  Philip Bailey, Keith Zimmerman,...

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  With more than ninety million records sold and eight Grammy Awards throughout its forty-year history, Earth, Wind & Fire has staked its claim as one of the most successful, influential, and beloved acts in music history. Now, for the first time, its dynamic lead singer, Philip Bailey, chronicles the group's meteoric rise to stardom and his own professional and spiritual journey.Never before had a musical act crossed multiple styles and genres with a quixotic blend of astrology, Universalism, and Egyptology as Earth, Wind & Fire (EWF) did when it exploded into the public's conscience during the 1970s. The group's shows became sensory experiences, with their dramatic staging, shimmering costumes, elaborate choreography, baffling magic tricks, and a thumping backbeat. At the center of the group was its charismatic founder, Maurice White, and Bailey, with his soaring multioctave range and distinctive falsetto. After being signed by recording titan Clive Davis, EWF went on to produce a remarkable series of platinum and gold albums and to headline stadiums around the world.Bailey hit the wall due to fame, fortune, and the excesses of global success. The constant touring and performing took its toll on him publicly and privately. While White and Bailey's relentless work ethic shot the band into the stratosphere, it also exhausted and emotionally gutted the group. In 1983, White abruptly dismantled the band, leaving Bailey and the rest of the members to fend for themselves.Shining Star is the true story of what happens when real life exceeds your dreams and when the power and pain of building a legacy bring both joy and faith-testing challenges.

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  Akhenaten and Amarna: The...

  Charles River Editors

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  Africa may have given rise to the first human beings, and Egypt probably gave rise to the first great civilizations, which continue to fascinate modern societies across the globe nearly 5,000 years later. From the Library and Lighthouse of Alexandria to the Great Pyramid at Giza, the Ancient Egyptians produced several wonders of the world, revolutionized architecture and construction, created some of the world’s first systems of mathematics and medicine, and established language and art that spread across the known world. With world-famous leaders like King Tut and Cleopatra, it’s no wonder that today’s world has so many Egyptologists.  
  Although the Egyptians may not have passed their civilization directly on to later peoples, the key elements that comprised Egyptian civilization, including their religion, early ideas of state, and art and architecture, can be seen in other pre-modern civilizations. Indeed, since Egyptian civilization represented some fundamental human concepts, a study of their culture can be useful when trying to understand many other pre-modern cultures. 
  Part of the reason Egyptian history is so intriguing is because it is so enigmatic – even today, despite the wealth of written materials and countless monuments, Egyptologists constantly uncover more mysteries about ancient Egypt, even if many of those mysteries are somewhat mundane and appeal more to academics. For example, historians still debate precise chronologies of dynasties, theological nuances, and architectural details. 
  One such mystery that shows no signs of going away is the history of the archeological site known as Amarna, which is actually the name of the modern village that is closest to the ancient Egyptian city of Akhet-Aten. Akhet-Aten was built during the reign of one of Egypt’s most enigmatic pharaohs, Akhenaten (ruled ca. 1364-1347 BCE), and modern archaeological studies have shown it was hastily built and almost as quickly abandoned. 
  Although the city had a brief lifespan, it was vitally important at the time, so much so that the late Eighteenth Dynasty has been named the Amarna Period by modern scholars. The importance is reflected in the changes that Akhenaten attempted to make to Egyptian religion, art, architecture, and society, all of which can be found among the ruins of Amarna, from texts that described the Aten as the one true god to the depictions of the royal family that were like nothing seen before or after in ancient Egyptian art. An examination of Akhenaten’s rule and the life of the city of Akhet-Aten has helped modern scholars unravel some of the mysteries of the Amarna Period, but many still remain. 
  Akhenaten and Amarna: The History of Ancient Egypt’s Most Mysterious Pharaoh and His Capital City chronicles what’s known and unknown about the Egyptian city and the pharaoh who was responsible for it. Along with pictures depicting important people, places, and events, you will learn about Amarna like never before.

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