On 6 June 1944 when the allied armies landed on D-Day, the Second World War had already lasted almost five years.Yet many of the British and American troops who invaded Normandy were virgin soldiers, never before committed to battle. They quit summer England to face within hours a storm of machine-gun and mortar fire. They witnessed scenes, above all of sudden death, such as no exercise had prepared them for.In Sword, veteran chronicler of war Max Hastings explores with extraordinary vividness the actions of the Commando brigade, Montgomery’s 3rd Infantry and 6th Airborne divisions on and around a single British beach. He describes their frustrations, hopes, loves and fears through the apparently interminable years training and preparing in England, then their triumphs and tragedies on the beach and beyond. Here are the airborne assaults on the Caen Canal bridge and Merville Battery, the battles on the shoreline and against the German strongpoints inland, narrated and explained with all the insights that Hastings’ decades of study, veterans’ interviews and new archive research enable him to deploy. The book offers a searching analysis of why British troops did not reach Caen on 6 June, as Montgomery had promised Churchill that they would – and the story of the brigadier who was sacked for that failure. There is also a host of personal portraits of key figures from commando leader Lord Lovat, famously brave but supremely arrogant, to tank colonel Jim Eadie, whose tanks of the Staffordshire Yeomanry repulsed a panzer division in the last hours of 6 June, and some of the humbler participants to whom extraordinary things happened.This is D-Day as you have never read the story told before, with the blend of narrative, analysis and human insight that made Max Hastings’ last book Operation Biting, like many of his earlier works, a Sunday Times No.1 bestseller.Max Hastings's book 'Operation Biting' was a No.1 Sunday Times bestseller w/c 2024-05-27. Read more

THE UNMISSABLE, UNVARNISHED MEMOIRS OF BORIS JOHNSONA BOOK OF THE YEAR IN THE FINANCIAL TIMES, TELEGRAPH, DAILY MAIL, TIMES AND SUNDAY TIMES‘ABSOLUTELY, TOTALLY, MIND-BLOWINGLY EXPLOSIVE’ ED BALLS'SENSATIONAL' DAILY MAILBoris Johnson has always been larger than life. Controversial, untrammelled by the normal rules of politics, his route to becoming Britain’s prime minister included a landmark career as a journalist, two terms as London’s mayor, leading the Vote Leave Brexit campaign and acting as foreign secretary. He won the largest Tory majority since 1987 when he went to the polls in December 2019 for a mandate to ‘Get Brexit Done’ – only to have his administration hit by the global Covid pandemic and toppled in a Tory putsch.Unleashed is his account of his time in politics, and a book that shatters the mould of the modern prime ministerial memoir. Written in his inimitable style, it is honest, unrestrained and deeply revealing about the politician who has dominated our times.This is his story of the fifteen years since he trounced Ken Livingstone at the polls to become mayor of London. Riots, tackling knife crime, bikes, buses, the London Olympics, and so much more. He writes about his role in Brexit, takes readers through all the big decisions and his reasons for taking them, and describes how he nearly died from Covid.Underlying everything in the book is his view that the UK is an extraordinary country and should have an exceptional future. These are the reflections of a political leader who believes fundamentally in levelling up – that there are millions of people in Britain who do not have the present they need or the future they deserve, and that it is the first job of politicians to put this right.It is all here. From soup to nuts, warts and all. As a journalist he was famed as a blurter of unsayable truths, and he has drawn again on this quality for the book. About people, policies, mistakes and triumphs. This is it – the reality as he saw it: unvarnished, unlocked, unleashed.Boris Johnson's book 'Unleashed' was a No.1 Sunday Times bestseller w/c 2024-10-07. Read more

'James comes alive in full flamboyance … Russell expertly weaves the bedchamber gossip into the tapestry of a tumultuous reign' SUNDAY TIMES'Brings the backbiting and power struggles of the Jacobean court to life with wit and vigour' OBSERVER‘A warts and all story told with compassion’ PHILIPPA GREGORY_______________________________‘Elizabeth was king,Then James was queen.’ – English author (1603)James Stuart, King of England, Scotland, and Ireland did not always love wisely, but he never failed to do so boldly.He fell in love three times – with a Scottish lord, a knight and George Villiers, ‘the handsomest man in the whole world’. He was infatuated three more times – with a Highland earl, a Welsh lord and an English spy.We know so much about the six wives of Henry VIII, why not the six loves of James I?This groundbreaking new book puts James – genius, liar, spendthrift, idealist, witch-hunter – and the men he loved at the centre of one of the most dramatic stories in British royal history.Beginning with the brutal and mysterious murder of his father in 1567, James’s life encompassed kidnapping, witchcraft trials, torture, his mother’s beheading, poison, political radicalism, religious fundamentalism, a queen’s alleged abortion, passionate sex, strong love, stronger hate, espionage, brothels, and a decade-long love affair that ended in assassination.It is unquestionably one of the most gripping stories in British history, retold in Gareth Russell’s Queen James with scholarship, biographical insight and wit.________________________________'Books like this don't come along very often. Told with Gareth Russell's characteristic verve and exquisite eye for detail, it is a story so compelling and surprising that it feels as if it has been hiding in plain sight for 400 years. A stunning achievement and a must for history fans everywhere' TRACY BORMAN Read more

THE INSTANT SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER ‘Epic, moving and important’ ROBERT HARRIS'I'm not sure I've ever come across quite such a revelatory account of the Holocaust and yet despite the horror and the sadness it's also a 'memoir of miraculous survival'. I can't recommend it enough' ANTHONY HOROWITZ'A modern classic’ OBSERVER‘An unforgettable epic of a book’ DAILY MAILFrom longstanding political columnist and commentator Daniel Finkelstein, a powerful memoir exploring both his mother and his father’s devastating experiences of persecution, resistance and survival during the Second World War.Daniel’s mother Mirjam Wiener was the youngest of three daughters born in Germany to Alfred and Margarete Wiener. Alfred, a decorated hero from the Great War, is now widely acknowledged to have been the first person to recognise the existential danger Hitler posed to the Jews and began, in 1933, to catalogue in detail Nazi crimes. After moving his family to Amsterdam, he relocated his library to London and was preparing to bring over his wife and children when Germany invaded the Netherlands. Before long, the family was rounded up, robbed and sent to starve in Bergen-Belsen.Daniel’s father Ludwik was born in Lwów, the only child of a prosperous Jewish family. In 1939, after Hitler and Stalin carved up Poland, Ludwik’s father was arrested and sentenced to hard labour in the Gulag. Meanwhile, deported to Siberia and working as a slave labourer on a collective farm, Ludwik survived the freezing winters in a tiny house he built from cow dung.Hitler, Stalin, Mum and Dad is a deeply moving, personal and at times horrifying memoir about Finkelstein’s parents’ experiences at the hands of the two genocidal dictators of the twentieth century. It is a story of persecution; survival; and the consequences of totalitarianism told with the almost unimaginable bravery of two ordinary families shining through.‘Danny Finkelstein has written an elegant, moving account of the history of one family, and in doing so shines light on the history of the 20th century. If you want to understand Hitler and Stalin, read this book about people whose lives were upended by both of them’ ANNE APPLEBAUM, author of Gulag: A History, winner of the Pulitzer PrizeDaniel Finkelstein's book 'Hitler, Stalin, Mum and Dad' was a Sunday Times bestseller w/c 2023-06-26. Read more

The fifteenth century experienced the longest and bloodiest series of civil wars in British history. The crown of England changed hands violently five times as the great families of England fought to the death for the right to rule.Some of the greatest heroes and villains in history were thrown together in these chaotic years. Yet efforts were made to maintain some semblance of peace and order, as chivalry was reborn, the printing press arrived, and the Renaissance began to flourish. Following on from Dan Jones's bestselling The Plantagenets, The Hollow Crown is a vivid and engrossing history of these turbulent times. Read more

In 1666, London's citizens woke to see the skyline above their city's cramped wooden houses ablaze. The Great Fire of London is a hauntingly beautiful visual re-telling of one of the most well-known disasters in the city's history. To commemorate the 350th anniversary of the fire, powerful and sumptuous drawings from the new east London illustrator, James Weston Lewis, bring the events of November 1666 to life in this stunning gift book.Lewis's drawings take readers on a journey, from the single smouldering coal that falls out of the baker's oven to the swirling clouds of ash that engulf the city and then in to the very heart of the fire itself. As the pages turn, you can witness London burning to the ground and then rebuilding again. Children will love examining the rich detail of each spread, from the detailed city map to the drawings of London before, during and after the fire took hold. This book takes the dramatic historical information surrounding the Great Fire of London and transforms it into a breathtaking story that will transfix readers of all ages. Read more

One of the most powerful monarchs in British history, Henry VIII ruled England in unprecedented splendour. In this remarkable composite biography, Alison Weir brings Henry's six wives vividly to life, revealing each as a distinct and compelling personality in her own right. Drawing upon the rich fund of documentary material from the Tudor period, The Six Wives of Henry VIII shows us a court where personal needs frequently influenced public events and where a life of gorgeously ritualised pleasure was shot through with ambition, treason and violence.'At last we have the truth about Henry VIII's wives. This book is as reliable and scholarly as it is readable' Evening Standard Read more

From the bestselling author of The Mitford Girls: A 'wonderfully researched' (Sunday Express) biography of Bess of Hartwick, the most powerful woman in England next to Queen Elizabeth Bringing 'the Tudor Age to exuberant life' (Hugh Massingberd, Mail on Sunday), Mary S. Lovell tells the story of Bess of Hardwick,, one of the most remarkable women of the Tudor era. Gently-born in reduced circumstances, she was married at 15 and when she was widowed at 16, she was still a virgin. At 19 she married a man more than twice her age, Sir William Cavendish, a senior auditor in King Henry VIII's Court of Augmentations. Responsible for seizing church properties for the crown during the Dissolution, Cavendish enriched himself in the process. During the reign of King Edward VI, Cavendish was the Treasurer to the boy king and sisters, and he and Bess moved in the highest levels of society. They had a London home and built Chatsworth House in Derbyshire. After Cavendish's death her third husband was poisoned by his brother. Bess' fourth marriage to the patrician George, 6th Earl of Shrewsbury, Earl Marshall of England, made Bess one of the most important women at court. Her shrewd business acumen was a byword, and she was said to have 'a masculine understanding', in that age when women had little education and few legal rights. The Earl's death made her arguably the wealthiest, and therefore - next to the Queen - the most powerful woman in the country. 'This wonderfully researched book is an intimate portrait of [Bess's] life and a vivid insight into life in Tudor society' Sunday Express Read more

THE SUNDAY TIMES #1 BESTSELLERA Times Best History Book of the Year; A Waterstones Best Book of the Year'Reads like a thriller… I couldn't put Max Hastings's new book down' DAILY MAIL'Hastings is a master of drama, a writer intimately familiar with the mind of the soldier' THE TIMESOperation Biting was one of the most thrilling British commando raids of World War II, and probably the most successful. In February 1942 RAF intelligence was baffled by a newly-identified radar network on the coast of Nazi-occupied Europe, codenamed Würzburg. The brilliant scientist Dr RV Jones proposed an assault to capture key components. The nearest accessible enemy set stood upon a steep cliff at Bruneval in Normandy. Winston Churchill enthused, as did Lord Louis Mountbatten, chief of Combined Operations. A company of the newly-formed Airborne Forces was committed to the operation, which took place on the night of 27/28 February. Amid heavy snow 120 men landed, some of whom were misdropped almost two miles from their objective. They nonetheless launched the assault, dismantled the German radar, and after three nail-biting hours in France and a fierce battle with Wehrmacht defenders, escaped in the nick of time by landing-craft across stormy seas to Portsmouth.Max Hastings recounts this cliffhanging tale in a wealth of previously unchronicled detail. He portrays its remarkable personalities: the ‘boffin’ RV Jones; the peacock Mountbatten; the troubled husband of Daphne Du Maurier, Gen. ’Boy’ Browning, who commanded the Airborne Division; ‘Colonel Remy’, the French secret agent whose men reconnoitered Bruneval at mortal risk; Major John Frost, who led the paras into action; Charlie Cox, the little RAF technician who stripped the Würzburg and became an unexpected hero; Wing-Commander Charles Pickard, a legendary bomber pilot who led the drop squadron. Seldom have so many fascinating personalities been brought together to fulfil a mission that became a front-page triumph in a season of British defeats.Recounted in Hastings’ familiar best-selling blend of top-down and bottom-up action detail, Operation Biting tells a story that has become almost forgotten yet deserves to rank among the epic tales of courage and daring that took place in the greatest conflict in history.Max Hastings's book 'Operation Biting' was a No.1 Sunday Times bestseller w/c 2024-05-27. Read more

A FRESH ACCOUNT OF TWO OF ENGLANDS BEST-KNOWN QUEENS: PERFECT FOR FANS OF WOLF HALL AND SIX THE MUSICAL Readers LOVE Anne Boleyn & Elizabeth I:'A wonderful book and one I'm sure I'll be reading again' ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐'This really is a triumph! . . . A lucid and fascinating account' ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐'So well written and meticulously researched' ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐*************************Anne Boleyn is a subject of enduring fascination. By far the most famous of Henry VIII's six wives, she has inspired books, documentaries and films, and is the subject of intense debate even today, almost 500 years after her violent death. For the most part, she is considered in the context of her relationship with Tudor England's much-married monarch. Dramatic though this story is, of even greater interest - and significance - is the relationship between Anne and her daughter, the future Elizabeth I.Elizabeth was less than three years old when her mother was executed. Given that she could have held precious few memories of Anne, it is often assumed that her mother exerted little influence over her. But this is both inaccurate and misleading. Elizabeth knew that she had to be discreet about Anne, but there is compelling evidence that her mother exerted a profound influence on her character, beliefs and reign. Even during Henry's lifetime, Elizabeth dared to express her sympathy for her late mother by secretly wearing Anne's famous 'A' pendant when she sat for a painting with her father and siblings.Piecing together evidence from original documents and artefacts, this book tells the story of Anne Boleyn's relationship with, and influence over her daughter Elizabeth. In so doing, it sheds new light on two of the most famous and influential women in history.*****************************Critical acclaim for Anne Boleyn & Elizabeth I:'(A)sensational book by one of our greatest and best-loved historians... Astoundingly good.' - Alison Weir'Masterful, captivating, page-turning, this is solid gold history at its best.' - Nicola Tallis'(A) thought-provoking, impeccably researched, and moving account uncovering how Anne's family, intellect, and tragedy shaped Elizabeth I's extraordinary career.' - Gareth Russell'Her extensive research... reveals them as the most dazzling female double act in history.' - Sarah Gristwood'Incredibly well-researched, elegantly written, and overall genuinely ground-breaking,' - Estelle Paranque Read more

AN INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLERA Telegraph Best Book of the Year'An intense, evocative portrait of one of the most remarkable figures of our era' ANNE APPLEBAUM'This is the Zelensky book we’ve been waiting for’ CATHERINE BELTONTHE TIMES: A BEST BOOK OF 2024 – NEXT YEAR’S TOP READSGUARDIAN: BOOKS TO LOOK OUT FOR IN 2024INDEPENDENT: A BOOK OF THE MONTHWritten with unprecedented access, this is the first inside, intimate account of the Russian invasion of Ukraine from the perspective of President Zelensky and his team.Based on four years of reporting; extensive travels with President Zelensky to the front; and dozens of interviews with him, his wife, his friends and enemies, his advisers, ministers and military commanders, The Showman tells an intimate and eye-opening story of the President’s evolution from a slapstick actor to a symbol of resilience, revealing how he managed to rally the world’s democracies behind his cause.Clear-eyed about the President’s early failures as a peacemaker and his willingness to silence political dissent, the book offers a complex picture of a man struggling to break what he sees as a historical cycle of oppression that began generations before he was born. Even as the war drags on, Zelensky lays out his vision for its future course and, through his actions, demonstrates his strategy for countering the Russians and keeping the West on his side. The result is a riveting, up-close picture of the invasion as experienced by its number one target and improbable hero.The Showman, as a work of eyewitness journalism, provides an essential perspective on the war defining our age. As a study in leadership and human resolve, its appeal is timeless and universal.'Intimate but unflinchingly objective, this biography gives you a seat at Zelensky's war cabinet and penetrates his mind as he battles to save Ukraine's freedom―and ours' Peter Pomerantsev, author of Nothing Is True and Everything Is Possible Read more

‘Lucid and damning … an absorbing – and infuriating – tale of complicity, coverup and denial’ PATRICK RADDEN KEEFE, author of EMPIRE OF PAINA groundbreaking investigation of how the Nazis helped German tycoons make billions from the horrors of the Third Reich and World War II – and how the world allowed them to get away with it.In 1946, Günther Quandt – patriarch of Germany’s most iconic industrial empire, a dynasty that today controls BMW – was arrested for suspected Nazi collaboration. Quandt claimed that he had been forced to join the party by his arch-rival, propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels, and the courts acquitted him. But Quandt lied. And his heirs, and those of other Nazi billionaires, have only grown wealthier in the generations since, while their reckoning with this dark past remains incomplete at best. Many of them continue to control swaths of the world economy, owning iconic brands whose products blanket the globe. The brutal legacy of the dynasties that dominated Daimler-Benz, cofounded Allianz and still control Porsche, Volkswagen and BMW has remained hidden in plain sight – until now.In this landmark work, investigative journalist David de Jong reveals the true story of how Germany’s wealthiest business dynasties amassed untold money and power by abetting the atrocities of the Third Reich. Using a wealth of untapped sources, de Jong shows how these tycoons seized Jewish businesses, procured slave labourers and ramped up weapons production to equip Hitler’s army as Europe burnt around them. Most shocking of all, de Jong exposes how the wider world’s political expediency enabled these billionaires to get away with their crimes, covering up a bloodstain that defiles the German and global economy to this day. Read more

How Manchester United conquered all, by the players who won everything______________________________________________________________With a foreword by Ruud van NistelrooyAn Irish Times BestsellerThe Champions League, the Club World Cup, 6 Premier League Titles, 1 FA Cup, 3 League Cups, 4 Community Shields, 1 legendary manager. From Rio to Rome, 2000–2010.This is the story of one of the greatest eras in the history of England’s most successful club, told through the eyes of the players who made it happen. Not just the big wins, the cup finals and the trophy parades, but the half-time rows, the mad pranks, the boozy nights out and the training-ground bust-ups.Andy Mitten has tracked down eleven of the stars from those Premier League and Champions League winning teams to open the door to both the dressing room and the boardroom at Old Trafford as the club cemented its status as the dominant force in English football.Bring on United is an astonishingly candid and revealing insight into the workings of a relentless winning machine. More than that, it’s as lively and entertaining a sports book as you’ll ever read.Featuring exclusive interviews with Nemanja Vidić, Ole Gunnar Solskjær, Patrice Evra, Gary Neville, Dimitar Berbatov, Jaap Stam, John O’Shea, Wes Brown, Dwight Yorke, Diego Forlán and Ryan Giggs. Read more

Previously published as The Shorter Pepys, Samuel Pepys' The Diary of Samuel Pepys: A Selection is a collection of scintillating first-hand accounts of Restoration England, from the most tumultuous events to the simplest domestic pleasures, selected and edited by Robert Latham.The 1660s represent a turning point in English history, and for the main events - the Restoration, the Dutch War, the Great Plague, the Fire of London - Pepys provides a definitive eyewitness account. As well as recording public and historical events, Pepys paints a vivid picture of his personal life, from his socializing and amorous entanglements, to his theatre-going and his work at the Navy Board. Unequalled for its frankness, high spirits and sharp observations, the diary is both a literary masterpiece and a marvellous portrait of seventeenth-century life.Samuel Pepys (1633-1703) achieved fame as a naval administrator and a friend and colleague of the powerful and learned. For nearly ten years he kept a private diary in which he recorded life in Restoration London, commenting on politics, public events, and private matters.If you enjoyed The Diary of Samuel Pepys, you might like Alexander Pope's The Rape of the Lock and Other Major Writings, also available in Penguin Classics.''For anyone who wants to get to grips with Pepys but quails at more than a million words, here is the solution: Robert Latham's beautifully judged abridgment of the Diary. Pure pleasure'Clare Tomalin, author of Samuel Pepys: The Unequalled Self'This prince of Diarists, this most amiable and admirable of men, has at last been worthily served'Paul Johnson, Spectator Read more

The Sunday Times bestsellerNow a major BBC TV series presented by Andrew MarrDavid Attenborough. Marcus Rashford. Jan Morris. Diana Dors. Bob Geldof. David Olusoga. Elizabeth David. Zaha Hadid. Frank Crichlow. Quentin Crisp. Dusty Springfield. Captain Tom.Who made modern Britain the country it is today? How do we sum up the kind of people we are? What does it mean to be the new Elizabethans?In this wonderfully told history, spanning back to when Queen Elizabeth became queen in 1953, Andrew Marr traces the people who have made Britain the country it is today. From the activists to the artists, the sports heroes to the innovators, these people pushed us forward, changed the conversation, encouraged us to eat better, to sing, think and to protest. They got things done. How will our generation be remembered in a hundred years’ time? And when you look back at Britain’s toughest moments in the past seventy years, what do you learn about its people and its values?In brilliantly entertaining style and with unexpected insights into some of our sung and unsung heroes, Andrew Marr offers up a first draft of the history we are all living. This is our story as the new Elizabethans – the story of how 1950s Britain evolved into the diverse country we live in today. In short, it is the history of modern Britain. Read more

LONGLISTED FOR THE WOMEN'S PRIZE FOR NON-FICTION 2025LONGLISTED FOR THE CWA ALCS GOLD DAGGER FOR NON-FICTION 2025FROM BRITAIN'S TOP-SELLING TRUE CRIME WRITER AND THE #1 BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF THE SUSPICIONS OF MR WHICHER A BOOK OF THE YEAR FOR: The Times/Sunday Times, Financial Times, Spectator, Independent, Tablet and New Statesman 'Once more, Kate Summerscale shatters our preconceptions of a classic crime' Val McDermid 'I really, really loved it. It's written so beautifully and it really makes you feel like you're in the 1950s' Richard Osman 'Every bit the gripping, page-turning treat' Mark Bostridge, Spectator London, 1953. Police discover the bodies of three young women hidden in a wall at 10 Rillington Place, a dingy terrace house in Notting Hill. On searching the building, they find another body beneath the floorboards, then an array of human bones in the garden. But they have already investigated a double murder at 10 Rillington Place, three years ago, and the killer was hanged. Did they get the wrong man? A nationwide manhunt is launched for the tenant of the ground-floor flat, a softly spoken former policeman named Reg Christie. Star reporter Harry Procter chases after the scoop. Celebrated crime writer Fryn Tennyson Jesse begs to be assigned to the case. The story becomes an instant sensation, and with the relentless rise of the tabloid press the public watches on like never before. Who is Christie? Why did he choose to kill women, and to keep their bodies near him? As Harry and Fryn start to learn the full horror of what went on at Rillington Place, they realise that Christie might also have engineered a terrible miscarriage of justice in plain sight. In this riveting true story, Kate Summerscale mines the archives to uncover the lives of Christie's victims, the tabloid frenzy that their deaths inspired, and the truth about what happened inside the house. Read more

The bestselling historian's biography of a decisive figure in England's history.No Englishman has made more impact on the history of his nation than Oliver Cromwell; few have been so persistently maligned in the folklore of history. The central purpose of Antonia Fraser's book is the recreation of his life and character, freed from the distortions of myth and Royalist propaganda.Cromwell was a man of contradictions and surprising charm. This decisive and ruthless commander was also a country gentleman and a passionate connoisseur of music. Of Cromwell's fitness for high office, this fascinating biography leaves no doubt. Under his rule English prestige abroad rose to a level unequalled since Elizabeth I, yet his campaign in Ireland has cast a shadow over his reputation.Antonia Fraser displays great insight into this complex man and reveals a totally unexpected Cromwell, far removed from the received stereotype. Read more

Divorced, beheaded, died, divorced, beheaded, survivedCATHERINE OF ARAGON: the pious Spanish Catholic who suffered years of miscarriages and failed to produce a male heir... ANNE BOLEYN: the pretty, clever, French-educated Protestant whose marriage to Henry changed England forever...JANE SEYMOUR: the demure and submissive contrast to Anne Boleyn's radical and vampish style... ANNE OF CLEVES: 'the mare of Flanders' whose short marriage to the overweight Henry followed a farcical 'beauty contest'...CATHERINE HOWARD: the flirtatious teenager whose adulteries made a fool of the ageing king... CATHERINE PARR: the shrewd, religiously radical bluestocking who outlived him...In this dazzling study, David Starkey gives us a richly textured picture of daily life at the Tudor Court from the woman's point of view. Above all, he establishes the interaction of the private and the public, and demonstrates how the Queens of Henry VIII were central in determining political policy. Read more

'Bower's book is a devastating indictment' Sunday Times'Explosive … Bower reveals a remarkable and sinister picture of the man who likes to appear as the ever-smiling hero' Daily MailA sensational critical biography of the man and his business practices.No British tycoon is better known, few claim to be richer and none has masterminded a more recognisable brand than Richard Branson.What is behind the success of the buccaneering balloonist, the tabloids’ favourite celebrity nude, the ‘grinning jumper’ and the scourge of corporate goliaths?Tom Bower has a uncovered a different tale to the one so eagerly promoted by Virgin’s publicists. Here is the full story of Branson: his businesses, his friendships, his ambition, his law-breaking, his drug-taking, his bullying.Offering an intimate scrutiny of exactly how Richard Branson created and sold himself, this biography reveals Branson to be a single-minded profiteer who, while occasionally generous to others, has a fixed purpose to enhance his family’s wealth in secret off-shore trust funds. Instead of a glittering saint, Branson emerges as a devious actor, proud of plucking for his own profit the good ideas of others.Tom Bower's book 'The House of Beckham' was a No.1 Sunday Times bestseller w/c 2024-06-24. Read more

SHORTLISTED FOR THE SLIGHTLY FOXED BEST FIRST BIOGRAPHY PRIZE 2017Born into nobility and married into the royal family, Catherine Howard was attended every waking hour – secrets were impossible to keep. In this thrilling reappraisal of Henry VIII’s fifth wife, Gareth Russell’s history unfurls as if in real time to explain how the queen’s career ended with one of the great scandals of Henry’s reign. This is a grand tale of the Henrician court in its twilight, a glittering but pernicious sunset during which the king’s unstable behaviour and his courtiers’ labyrinthine deceptions proved fatal to many, not just to Catherine Howard. Read more