New non-fiction for September 2020
The wild silence, by Raynor Winn
Raynor Winn returns with her second book. This time the narrative explores the difficulties surrounding the return to mainstream life after a period of homelessness. Recovering self-esteem and trust, in herself and in others, is harder than she expected. Raynor and her husband Moth continue to face his debilitating illness, until an incredible gesture by someone who read 'The Salt Path' changes everything. This book is about readjusting to life after homelessness, but also about recovering trust and self-belief after a traumatic event - feelings that can translate to many episodes in the life of any of us.
Tomorrow will be a good day: my autobiography, by Tom Moore
Captain Tom Moore is an inspiration. At the height of the Covid-19 pandemic in early April this 99-year-old Second World War veteran came up with a big idea: he'd walk laps of his garden to raise money for the NHS. Despite using a walking frame as well as recent treatment for cancer and a broken hip, he was determined to hit 1000 by his 100th birthday on 30th April. By the time the telegram from the Queen arrived, he'd raised over 30 million.
In this, his official autobiography, published in support of the creation of the Captain Tom Foundation, he tells us of his long and dramatic life. How his spirit was forged on the battlefields of Burma where victory was snatched from the jaws of defeat. How he fearlessly raced motorbikes competitively. How, in his 90s, he took off for the Himalayas and Everest, simply because he'd never been. And, finally, how this old soldier came to do his bit for the NHS.
Borrow Tomorrow will be a good day →
Ottolenghi flavour, by Yotam Ottolenghi and Ixta Belfrage
Flavour-forward, vegetable-based recipes are at the heart of Yotam Ottolenghi's food. In this stunning new cookbook Yotam and co-writer Ixta Belfrage break down the three factors that create flavour and offer innovative vegetable dishes that deliver brand-new ingredient combinations to excite and inspire.
Burning the books: a history of knowledge under attack, by Richard Ovenden
Opening with the notorious bonfires of 'un-German' and Jewish literature in 1933 that offered such a clear signal of Nazi intentions, 'Burning the Books' takes us on a 3000-year journey through the destruction of knowledge and the fight against all the odds to preserve it.
This land: the story of a movement, by Owen Jones
On 12th December 2019, the Left died. That at least was the view of much of Britain's media and political establishment, who saw the electoral defeat of Jeremy Corbyn's Labour Party as the damning repudiation of everything it stood for. Yet, just over four years previously, the election of Corbyn as Labour leader seemed like a sea-change in politics: reanimating not just a party in apparently terminal decline but a country adrift, with a transformative vision based on a more just, more equal society and economy. In this book, Owen Jones explores how these ideas took hold, how they promised to change the nature of British politics - and how everything then went profoundly, catastrophically wrong.
The Reacher guy: the authorised biography of Lee Child, by Heather Martin
'The Reacher Guy' is a life of bestselling superstar Lee Child, a portrait of the artist as a young man, refracted through the life of his fictional avatar, Jack Reacher. It tells the story of how the boy from Birmingham reinvented himself to become the strongest brand in publishing, selling over one hundred million books in more than forty different languages across the globe.
And now for the good news..: to the future with love, by Ruby Wax
Dear Reader, I know what you're thinking, is it some kind of macabre joke? Has she been in a coma? How can Ruby Wax write a book about good news when the world is facing the worst disaster since the Plague? Let me explain. I began writing in 2018, back when the world's worries were somewhat different. Climate change, greedy bankers, exam results, crap politicians, mental health: these are still huge issues, but even the ancient soothsayers reading pig entrails couldn't have predicted this. This is my new mission: to share the green shoots of hope peeping through the soil of civilisation.
Borrow And now for the good news →
The lives of Lucian Freud. Fame 1968-2011, by William Feaver
William Feaver, Lucian Freud's collaborator, curator and close friend, knew the unknowable artist better than most; and over many years, Freud narrated to him the story of his life, our novel'. The result is this electrifying biography, shot through with Freud's own words. In this second volume of Feaver's definitive portrait of one of the most captivating artists of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, we follow Freud - with wives and mistresses, children and gangsters, critics and collectors trailing in his wake - through the glittering landscape of stardom.
Borrow The lives of Lucian Freud →
Bringing Back the Beaver: The Story of One Man's Quest to Rewild Britain's Waterways, by Derek Gow
Bringing Back the Beaver is farmer-turned-ecologist Derek Gow's inspirational and often riotously funny firsthand account of how the movement to rewild the British landscape with beavers has become the single most dramatic and subversive nature conservation act of the modern era.
Borrow Bringing back the beaver →
The shift: how I (lost and) found myself after 40 - and you can too, by Sam Baker
Invisible to society now you're past child-bearing age? Tired of being disregarded, overlooked and underestimated? Wondering what the hell is happening to your body, mind and internal thermostat? Women over forty are the most ignored demographic in society. And yet this is the time when you are likely to have the most freedom, power, confidence and self knowledge than ever before. Some serious life has been lived: there have been great loves, heartbreaks, births, marriages, careers, betrayals, bereavements and survival.
So what now? What happens when the narrative given to you by society - husband, babies, house - runs out and you become storyless? Including chapters on menopause, sex, culture, work, rage and freedom, writer and journalist Sam Baker shares her experiences of life post 40 and shows how women to create their own story.