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A glorious, edible tour of Paris through six decades of writing from Gourmet magazine, edited and introduced by Ruth Reichl For sixty years the best food writers have been sending dispatches from Paris to Gourmet . Collected here for the first time, their essays create a unique and timeless portrait of the world capital of love and food. When the book begins, just after the war, we are in a hungry city whose chefs struggle to find the eggs and cream they need to re-create the cuisine from before the German occupation. We watch as Paris comes alive again with zinc-topped tables crowded with people drinking café au lait and reveling in crisp baguettes, and the triumphant rebirth of three-star cuisine. In time, nouvelle cuisine is born and sweeps through a newly chic and modern city. It is all here: the old-time bourgeois dinners, the tastemakers of the fashion world, the hero-chefs, and, of course, Paris in all its snobbery and refinement, its inimitable pursuit of the art of fine living. Beautifully written, these dispatches from the past are intimate and immediate, allowing us to watch the month-by-month changes in the world’s most wonderful city. Remembrance of Things Paris is a book for anyone who wants to return to a Paris where a buttery madeleine is waiting around every corner. Contributors include Louis Diat, Naomi Barry, Joseph Wechsberg, Judith and Evan Jones, Don Dresden, Lillian Langseth-Christensen, Diane Johnson, Michael Lewis, and Jonathan Gold. |
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Acclaimed journalist Bernard Ollivier begins his epic journey on foot across the Silk Road. Upon retirement at the age of sixty-two, and grieving his deceased wife, renowned journalist Bernard Ollivier felt a sense of profound emptiness: What do I do now? While some see retirement as a chance to cash in their chips and settle into a comfy armchair, Ollivier still longed for more. Searching for inspiration, he strapped on his gear, donned his hat, and headed out the front door to hike the Way of St. James, a 1400-mile journey from Paris to Compostela, Spain. At the end of that road, with more questions than answers, he decided to spend the next few years hiking another of history’s great routes: the Silk Road. Out of Istanbul is Ollivier’s stunning account of the first part of that 7,200-mile journey. The longest and perhaps most mythical trade route of all time, the Silk Road is in fact a network of routes across Europe and Asia, some going back to prehistoric times. During the Middle Ages, the transcribed travelogue of one Silk Road explorer, Marco Polo, helped spread the fame of the Orient throughout Europe. Heading east out of Istanbul, Ollivier takes readers step by step across Anatolia and Kurdistan, bound for Tehran. Along the way, we meet a colorful array of real-life characters: Selim, the philosophical woodsman; old Behçet, elated to practice English after years of self-study; Krishna, manager of the Lora Pansiyon in Polonez, a village of Polish immigrants; the hospitable Kurdish women of Dogutepe, and many more. We accompany Ollivier as he explores bazaars, mosques, and caravansaries—true vestiges of the Silk Road itself—and through these encounters and experiences, gains insight into the complex political and social issues facing modern-day Turkey. Ollivier’s journey, far from bragging about some tremendous achievement, humbly takes the reader on a colossal adventure of human proportions, one in which walking itself, through a kind of alchemy, fosters friendships and fellowship. |
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Nouvelle édition mise à jour du Guide de conversation L'espagnol pour les Nuls ! Nouvelle édition mise à jour du Guide de conversation L'espagnol pour les Nuls ! Avec 112 000 lecteurs conquis, le guide de conversation L'espagnol pour les Nuls revient tout en couleurs pour cette nouvelle édition. Des bases de la prononciation au vocabulaire nécessaire pour sortir en ville, de la grammaire aux indications nécessaires en cas d'urgence en passant par tous les termes essentiels à connaître si vous souhaitez aller au restaurant, apprendre l'espagnol ne sera plus une corvée ! |
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Enrichissez votre vocabulaire en espagnol avec le lexique pour les Nuls ! La collection "Pour les Nuls" connaît toujours plus de succès dans le secteur des Langues étrangères. Une nouvelle thématique indispensable pour tous les apprenants : le lexique de vocabulaire. Le lexique espagnol pour les Nuls recense de manière accessible et décomplexée les mots espagnols indispensables pour approfondir son vocabulaire et pour être parfaitement bilingue. Découvrez plus de 3 500 mots et expressions sur tous les thèmes : la société, la famille, le voyage, les transports, les vêtements, le corps, etc. et tous les bons tuyaux pour maîtriser la langue de Cervantès ! Des informations linguistiques et culturelles sur l'emploi des mots pour être sûr de passer pour un vrai natif de pays hispanophone ! |
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Acclaimed journalist Bernard Ollivier continues his epic journey across Persia and Central Asia as he walks the length of the Great Silk Road.    Walking to Samarkand  is journalist Bernard Ollivier’s stunning account of the second leg of his 7,200-mile walk from Istanbul, Turkey, to Xi’an, China, along the Silk Road--the longest and perhaps most mythical trade route of all time. Picking up where  Out of Istanbul  left off, Ollivier heads out of the Middle East and into Central Asia, grappling not only with his own will to continue but with new, unforeseen dangers. After crossing the final mountain passes of Turkish Kurdistan, Ollivier sets foot in Iran, keen on locating vestiges of the silk trade as he passes through Persia’s modern cities and traditional villages, including Tabriz, Tehran, Nishapur, and the holy city of Mashhad. Beyond urban areas lie deserts: first Iran’s Great Salt Desert, then Turkmenistan’s forbidding Karakum, whose relentless sun, snakes, and scorpions pose continuous challenges to Ollivier’s goal of reaching Uzbekistan.   Setting his own fears aside, he travels on, wonderstruck at every turn, borne by a childhood dream: to see for himself the golden domes and turquoise skies of Samarkand, one of Central Asia’s most ancient cities. But what Ollivier enjoys most are the people along the way: Askar, the hospitable gardener; the pilgrims of Mashhad; and his knights in shining armor, Mehdi and Monir. For, despite setting out alone, he comes to find that walking itself—through a kind of alchemy—surrounds him with friends and fosters fellowship.   From the authoritarian mullahs of revolutionary Iran to the warm welcome of everyday Iranians—custodians of age-old, cordial Persian culture; from the stark realities of former Soviet republics to the region’s legendary bazaars—veritable feasts for the senses—readers discover, through the eyes of a veteran journalist, the rich history and contemporary culture of these amazing lands.   |
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In April 1992 a young man from a well-to-do family hitchhiked to Alaska and walked alone into the wilderness north of Mt. McKinley. His name was Christopher Johnson McCandless. He had given $25,000 in savings to charity, abandoned his car and most of his possessions, burned all the cash in his wallet, and invented a new life for himself. Four months later, his decomposed body was found by a moose hunter.  How McCandless came to die is the unforgettable story of Into the Wild . Immediately after graduating from college in 1991, McCandless had roamed through the West and Southwest on a vision quest like those made by his heroes Jack London and John Muir.  In the Mojave Desert he abandoned his car, stripped it of its license plates, and burned all of his  cash.  He would give himself a new name, Alexander Supertramp, and , unencumbered by money and belongings, he would be free to wallow in the raw, unfiltered experiences that nature presented.  Craving a blank spot on the map, McCandless simply threw the maps away.  Leaving behind his desperate parents and sister, he vanished into the wild. Jon Krakauer constructs a clarifying prism through which he reassembles the disquieting facts of McCandless's short life.  Admitting an interst that borders on obsession, he searches for the clues to the dries and desires that propelled McCandless.  Digging deeply, he takes an inherently compelling mystery and unravels the larger riddles it holds: the profound pull of the American wilderness on our imagination; the allure of high-risk activities to young men of a certain cast of mind; the complex, charged bond between fathers and sons. When McCandless's innocent mistakes turn out to be irreversible and fatal, he becomes the stuff of tabloid headlines and is dismissed for his naiveté, pretensions, and hubris.  He is said  to have had a death wish but wanting to die is a very different thing from being compelled to look over the edge. Krakauer brings McCandless's uncompromising pilgrimage out of the shadows, and the peril, adversity , and renunciation sought by this enigmatic young man are illuminated with a rare understanding--and not an ounce of sentimentality. Mesmerizing, heartbreaking, Into the Wild is a tour de force . The power and luminosity of Jon Krakauer's stoytelling blaze through every page. |
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A must-read for fans of Rachel Joyce's The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry and Maria Semple's Where'd You Go, Bernadette 'A touching, sometimes funny, often wise portrait of grief.' Kirkus Heartbreaking and hilarious in equal measure, by the author of the New York Times bestselling phenomenon A Man Called Ove will charm and delight anyone who has ever had a grandmother. Everyone remembers the smell of their grandmother's house. Everyone remembers the stories their grandmother told them. But does everyone remember their grandmother flirting with policemen? Driving illegally? Breaking into a zoo in the middle of the night? Firing a paintball gun from a balcony in her dressing gown? Seven-year-old Elsa does. Some might call Elsa's granny 'eccentric', or even 'crazy'. Elsa calls her a superhero. And granny's stories, of knights and princesses and dragons and castles, are her superpower. Because, as Elsa is starting to learn, heroes and villains don't always exist in imaginary kingdoms; they could live just down the hallway. As Christmas draws near, even the best superhero grandmothers may have one or two things they'd like to apologise for. And, in the process, Elsa can have some breath-taking adventures of her own . . . |
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Rob Krause and Daria Salamon sold their car, rented out their Winnipeg home, and packed up their two young children to embark on a 12-month journey around the world. In this dual retelling of their ambitious year abroad, Don’t Try This at Home chronicles the hilarious and sensational misadventures of a Canadian family as they travel across 15 different countries in the Southern Hemisphere. In an honest reflection on parenting, marriage, and living for a year on a tight budget, Krause and Salamon take readers through some of the world’s most stunning vistas while meeting the challenges of foreign customs, broken-down buses, stomach bugs, personal loss, and their often less-than-enthusiastic children. |
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'A hugely enjoyable romp through the pleasures and pitfalls of setting up home in a foreign land' PD Smith, Guardian When she was suddenly given the opportunity of a new life in rural Jutland, journalist and archetypal Londoner Helen Russell discovered a startling statistic: the happiest place on earth isn’t Disneyland, but Denmark, a land often thought of by foreigners as consisting entirely of long dark winters, cured herring, Lego and pastries. What is the secret to their success? Are happy Danes born, or made? Helen decides there is only one way to find out: she will give herself a year, trying to uncover the formula for Danish happiness. From childcare, education, food and interior design (not to mention 'hygge') to SAD, taxes, sexism and an unfortunate predilection for burning witches, The Year of Living Danishly is a funny, poignant record of a journey that shows us where the Danes get it right, where they get it wrong, and how we might just benefit from living a little more Danishly ourselves. |
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National Bestseller  A bank of clouds was assembling on the not-so-distant horizon, but journalist-mountaineer Jon Krakauer, standing on the summit of Mt. Everest, saw nothing that "suggested that a murderous storm was bearing down." He was wrong. The storm, which claimed five lives and left countless more--including Krakauer's--in guilt-ridden disarray, would also provide the impetus for Into Thin Air , Krakauer's epic account of the May 1996 disaster. By writing Into Thin Air , Krakauer may have hoped to exorcise some of his own demons and lay to rest some of the painful questions that still surround the event. He takes great pains to provide a balanced picture of the people and events he witnessed and gives due credit to the tireless and dedicated Sherpas. He also avoids blasting easy targets such as Sandy Pittman, the wealthy socialite who brought an espresso maker along on the expedition. Krakauer's highly personal inquiry into the catastrophe provides a great deal of insight into what went wrong. But for Krakauer himself, further interviews and investigations only lead him to the conclusion that his perceived failures were directly responsible for a fellow climber's death. Clearly, Krakauer remains haunted by the disaster, and although he relates a number of incidents in which he acted selflessly and even heroically, he seems unable to view those instances objectively. In the end, despite his evenhanded and even generous assessment of others' actions, he reserves a full measure of vitriol for himself. This updated edition of Into Thin Air includes an extensive new postscript that sheds fascinating light on the acrimonious debate that flared between Krakauer and Everest guide Anatoli Boukreev in the wake of the tragedy.  "I have no doubt that Boukreev's intentions were good on summit day," writes Krakauer in the postscript, dated August 1999. "What disturbs me, though, was Boukreev's refusal to acknowledge the possibility that he made even a single poor decision. Never did he indicate that perhaps it wasn't the best choice to climb without gas or go down ahead of his clients." As usual, Krakauer supports his points with dogged research and a good dose of humility. But rather than continue the heated discourse that has raged since Into Thin Air 's denouncement of guide Boukreev, Krakauer's tone is conciliatory; he points most of his criticism at G. Weston De Walt, who coauthored The Climb , Boukreev's version of events. And in a touching conclusion, Krakauer recounts his last conversation with the late Boukreev, in which the two weathered climbers agreed to disagree about certain points. Krakauer had great hopes to patch things up with Boukreev, but the Russian later died in an avalanche on another Himalayan peak, Annapurna I. In 1999, Krakauer received an Academy Award in Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters--a prestigious prize intended "to honor writers of exceptional accomplishment."  According to the Academy's citation, "Krakauer combines the tenacity and courage of the finest tradition of investigative journalism with the stylish subtlety and profound insight of the born writer.  His account of an ascent of Mount Everest has led to a general reevaluation of climbing and of the commercialization of what was once a romantic, solitary sport; while his account of the life and death of Christopher McCandless, who died of starvation after challenging the Alaskan wilderness, delves even more deeply and disturbingly into the fascination of nature and the devastating effects of its lure on a young and curious mind." |
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Bryson brings his unique brand of humour to travel writing as he shoulders his backpack, keeps a tight hold on his wallet and heads for Europe.  Travelling with Stephen Katz--also his wonderful sidekick in A Walk in the Woods --he wanders from Hammerfest in the far north, to Istanbul on the cusp of Asia.  As he makes his way round this incredibly varied continent, he retraces his travels as a student twenty years before with caustic hilarity. |
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Le guide Ulysse Explorez la Gaspésie et le Bas-Saint-Laurent est l’outil idéal pour planifier un voyage et tirer le maximum d’un séjour dans ces superbes régions du Québec. Tout en couleurs et en photos, le guide de voyage Explorez la Gaspésie et le Bas-Saint-Laurent est aussi agréable à consulter qu’ultra-pratique grâce à son format de poche et sa structure facile à comprendre en un clin d’œil. La première section, intitulée « Le meilleur de la Gaspésie et du Bas-Saint-Laurent », met en lumière à l’aide de listes thématiques ce que la destination a de mieux à offrir et facilite l’organisation générale de son séjour selon ses envies. Le chapitre « Découvrir la Gaspésie et le Bas-Saint-Laurent » propose ensuite une série d’itinéraires clés en main pour ne rien manquer des villes et villages de la région : Le Bas-Saint-Laurent au gré du fleuve Saint-Laurent, circuit qui traverse des villes et villages aux splendides maisons ancestrales comme La Pocatière, Kamouraska, Rivière-du-Loup, Trois-Pistoles et Rimouski; Le Bas-Saint-Laurent entre mer et montagnes, une incursion dans l’arrière-pays forestier et tranquille, où l’on côtoie patrimoine et accueil chaleureux; Le Témiscouata, région de lacs et de collines boisées prisée par les amateurs de plein air; La Haute-Gaspésie, où s’étend le parc national de la Gaspésie; La pointe de la Gaspésie, réputée pour son célèbre rocher Percé, le magnifique parc national Forillon et ses villes de Gaspé et de Percé; La baie des Chaleurs, avec ses plages de sable, et la vallée de la Matapédia, parsemée d’irrésistibles petits villages. Pour chaque itinéraire, un plan double-page précis permet de se repérer, avec localisation des attraits, activités, boutiques d’artisans, restaurants, bars, boîtes de nuit et lieux d’hébergement. Impossible de louper quoi que ce soit! Qui plus est, un système d’étoiles et les coups de cœur d’Ulysse guident le lecteur vers les adresses qui se démarquent. |
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Lonely Planet: The world’s number one travel guide publisher Lonely Planet’s Canada is your passport to the most relevant, up-to-date advice on what to see and skip, and what hidden discoveries await you. Hike the Rockies, marvel at the Northern Lights and indulge in Montreal’s cafe culture – all with your trusted travel companion. Get to the heart of Canada and begin your journey now! Inside Lonely Planet’s Canada :  • Color maps and images throughout • Highlights and itineraries help you tailor your trip to your personal needs and interests • Insider tips to save time and money and get around like a local, avoiding crowds and trouble spots • Essential info at your fingertips - hours of operation, phone numbers, websites, transit tips, prices • Honest reviews for all budgets - eating, sleeping, sightseeing, going out, shopping, hidden gems that most guidebooks miss • Cultural insights give you a richer, more rewarding travel experience - history, people, music, landscapes, wildlife, cuisine, politics • Covers Ontario, Québec, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island, Newfoundland & Labrador, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta, British Columbia, Yukon Territory, Northwest Territories, Nunavut, and more The Perfect Choice: Lonely Planet’s Canada is our most comprehensive guide to Canada, and is perfect for discovering both popular and off-the-beaten-path experiences.  eBook Features: (Best viewed on tablet devices and smartphones) • Downloadable PDF and offline maps prevent roaming and data charges • Effortlessly navigate and jump between maps and reviews • Add notes to personalise your guidebook experience • Seamlessly flip between pages • Bookmarks and speedy search capabilities get you to key pages in a flash • Embedded links to recommendations’ websites • Zoom-in maps and images  • Built-in dictionary for quick referencing About Lonely Planet: Lonely Planet is a leading travel media company and the world’s number one travel guidebook brand, providing both inspiring and trustworthy information for every kind of traveler since 1973. Over the past four decades, we’ve printed over 145 million guidebooks and grown a dedicated, passionate global community of travelers. You’ll also find our content online, and in mobile apps, video, 14 languages, nine international magazines, armchair and lifestyle books, eBooks, and more.    ‘Lonely Planet guides are, quite simply, like no other.’ – New York Times ‘Lonely Planet. It's on everyone's bookshelves; it's in every traveller’s hands. It's on mobile phones. It's on the Internet. It's everywhere, and it's telling entire generations of people how to travel the world.’ – Fairfax Media (Australia) |
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Delia Owens, author of the best-selling Where the Crawdads Sing , began her career writing riveting real-life adventure and wildlife tales with her husband, Mark Owens. Collected in a single volume for the first time, these three odysseys show how the Owenses’ “ingenuity, courage, and accomplishment are beyond exaggeration.” ( People ) Carrying little more than a change of clothes and a pair of binoculars, two young Americans, Delia and Mark Owens, caught a plane to Africa, bought a third-hand Land Rover, and drove deep into the Kalahari Desert. In this vast wilderness they met animals that had never seen humans before, and leopards, giraffes, and brown hyenas were regular visitors to their camp, all chronicled in Cry of the Kalahari . But the Kalahari is not Eden, and Mark and Delia were continually threatened by wildfires, drought, violent storms, and sometimes by the animals they studied and loved. They set off on another African odyssey in search of a new wilderness in The Eye of the Elephant . They land in a remote valley of Zambia, where the hippos swam in the river just below their tents, lions stalked the bush, and elephants wandered into camp to eat marula fruits. The peace, though, was soon shattered with gunfire, and Delia and Mark were inexorably drawn into a high-stakes struggle to save the wildlife. With Secrets of the Savanna , Delia and Mark tell the dramatic story of their last years in Africa, fighting to save elephants, villagers, and—in the end—themselves. The award-winning zoologists and pioneering conservationists describe their work in the remote and ruggedly beautiful Luangwa Valley, in northeastern Zambia. |
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God only knows what possessed Bill Bryson, a reluctant adventurer if ever there was one, to undertake a gruelling hike along the world's longest continuous footpath—The Appalachian Trail. The 2,000-plus-mile trail winds through 14 states, stretching along the east coast of the United States, from Georgia to Maine. It snakes through some of the wildest and most spectacular landscapes in North America, as well as through some of its most poverty-stricken and primitive backwoods areas. With his offbeat sensibility, his eye for the absurd, and his laugh-out-loud sense of humour, Bryson recounts his confrontations with nature at its most uncompromising over his five-month journey. An instant classic, riotously funny, A Walk in the Woods will add a whole new audience to the legions of Bill Bryson fans. |
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Bill Bryson returns to his internationally beloved topic, Britain, with his first travel book in fifteen years . In 1995, Bill Bryson went on a trip around Britain to celebrate the green and kindly island that had become his home. The hilarious book he wrote about that journey, Notes from a Small Island , became one of the most loved books of recent decades.     Now, in this hotly anticipated new travel book, his first in fifteen years and sure to be greeted as the funniest book of the decade, Bryson sets out on a brand-new journey, on a route he dubs the Bryson Line, from Bognor Regis on the south coast to Cape Wrath on the northernmost tip of Scotland.     Once again, he will guide us through all that's best and worst about Britain today--while doing that incredibly rare thing of making us laugh out loud in public. |
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An intimate journey across and in search of America, as told by one of its most beloved writers, in a deluxe centennial edition In September 1960, John Steinbeck embarked on a journey across America. He felt that he might have lost touch with the country, with its speech, the smell of its grass and trees, its color and quality of light, the pulse of its people. To reassure himself, he set out on a voyage of rediscovery of the American identity, accompanied by a distinguished French poodle named Charley; and riding in a three-quarter-ton pickup truck named Rocinante.   His course took him through almost forty states: northward from Long Island to Maine; through the Midwest to Chicago; onward by way of Minnesota, North Dakota, Montana (with which he fell in love), and Idaho to Seattle, south to San Francisco and his birthplace, Salinas; eastward through the Mojave, New Mexico, Arizona, to the vast hospitality of Texas, to New Orleans and a shocking drama of desegregation; finally, on the last leg, through Alabama, Virginia, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey to New York.   Travels with Charley in Search of America is an intimate look at one of America's most beloved writers in the later years of his life—a self-portrait of a man who never wrote an explicit autobiography. Written during a time of upheaval and racial tension in the South—which Steinbeck witnessed firsthand— Travels with Charley is a stunning evocation of America on the eve of a tumultuous decade. This Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition also features French flaps and deckle-edged paper. For more than sixty-five years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,500 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators. |
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Jupiter's Travels -Ted Simon's astonishing 4 year motorbike journey around the world The book that inspired Ewan McGregor's Long Way Round In the late 1970s Ted Simon set off on a Triumph and rode 63,000 miles over four years through fifty-four countries in a journey that took him around the world. Through breakdowns, prison, war, revolutions, disasters and a Californian commune, he travelled into the depths of fear and reached the heights of euphoria. He met astonishing people and was treated as a spy, a welcome stranger and even a god. For Simon the trip became a journey into his own soul, and for many others - including bikers Charley Boorman and Ewan McGrergor - it provides an inspiration they will never forget. This classic text, which has informed a whole genre of travel writing in the thirty years since it was first published, will never be bettered for sheer adventure, passion, humour and honesty. Brought up in England by a German mother and a Romanian father, Ted Simon found himself impelled by an insatiable desire to explore the world. It led him to abandon an early scientific career in favour of journalism, and he has worked for several newspapers and magazines on Fleet Street and elsewhere. Ted Simon is also the author of Riding Home and The Gypsy in Me . |
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Speak Québec! is a practical handbook for understanding Québécois, the day-to-day French spoken in the Province of Québec. Comprising over three thousand commonly-used words and expressions, it provides a dynamic & fun yet accurate reference for English speakers who wish to express themselves in daily Québec conversation. Designed to open the door to Québec culture, Speak Québec! provides a linguistic basis to help understand and appreciate one of the oldest, richest, and most inspired cultures in North America. |
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Acclaimed travel writer Rick Antonson ( Full Moon Over Noah’s Ark ) tackles his most challenging adventure yet: a formidable trail through the remote jungles of Papua New Guinea.   Rick Antonson has traveled to parts of the world that are not simply exotic but sometimes damned near inaccessible. He has climbed to the summit of Mount Ararat in eastern Turkey, traveling beyond to Iraq and Iran and Armenia. He has undertaken an improbable overland journey to the ancient city of Timbuktu, an enlightening look into efforts to preserve the city’s priceless manuscripts. Now he has traversed the notorious Kokoda Trail in Papua New Guinea, a country some call “the last wild place on earth.” The trail is a narrow, 60-mile footpath featuring rough jungle, 6,000 feet in elevation change, and punishing weather extremes. In a country unfairly locked in Western misperceptions, the track is inhospitable terrain yet home to hospitable indigenous peoples, who live among the rusting reminders of the Japanese, Australian, and American armies that clashed in some of the deadliest protracted combat of World War II. In Walking With Ghosts in Papua New Guinea , Antonson shares a journey of physical and mental endurance in his inimitable way, in the company of a mixed band of resolute adventurers, blending fascinating historical context with the tribulations of unexpected discoveries in faraway lands.   |
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From the Yenisey’s headwaters in the wild heart of central Asia to its mouth on the Arctic Ocean, Colin Angus and his fellow adventurers travel 5,500 kilometres of one of the world’s most dangerous rivers through remotest Mongolia and Siberia, and live to tell about it. Exploration is Colin Angus’ calling. It is not only the tug of excitement and challenge that keeps sending him on death-defying journeys down some of the world’s most powerful waterways, it is a desire to know a place more intimately than you could from the window of a train, to feel the soul of a place. Angus emphasizes that rivers have always been key to the development of complex societies and the rise of civilizations, offering as they do irrigation, transportation, hydroelectric power, and food. But, as Lost in Mongolia captures with breathtaking detail, while they giveth plenty, the great rivers also taketh away in an instant. In Lost in Mongolia , Colin Angus takes readers through never-before-seen territory and his wonderful sense of adventure and humour come through on every page. |
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THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER SHORTLISTED FOR THE SAMUEL JOHNSON PRIZE The original bestseller from the beloved author of UNDERLAND, LANDMARKS and THE LOST WORDS - Robert Macfarlane travels Britain's ancient paths and discovers the secrets of our beautiful, underappreciated landscape ' The Old Ways confirms Macfarlane's reputation as one of the most eloquent and observant of contemporary writers about nature' Scotland on Sunday Following the tracks, holloways, drove-roads and sea paths that form part of a vast ancient network of routes criss-crossing the British Isles and beyond, Robert Macfarlane discovers a lost world - a landscape of the feet and the mind, of pilgrimage and ritual, of stories and ghosts; above all of the places and journeys which inspire and inhabit our imaginations. 'Sublime... It sets the imagination tingling, laying an irresistible trail for readers to follow' Sunday Times 'Read this and it will be impossible to take an unremarkable walk again' Metro 'He has a rare physical intelligence and affords total immersion in place, elements and the passage of time: wonderful' Antony Gormley |
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Deliciously funny, fact-filled and adventurous, In a Sunburned Country takes us on a grand tour of Australia. It's a place where interesting things happen all the time, from a Prime Minister lost — yes, lost — while swimming at sea, to Japanese cult members who may (entirely unnoticed) have set off an atomic bomb on their 500,000 acre property in the great western desert. Australia is the only island that is also a continent, and the only continent that is also a country. Its aboriginal people, a remote and mysterious race with a tragic history, have made it their home for millennia. And despite the fact that it is the most desiccated, infertile and climatically aggressive of all inhabited continents, it teems with life. In fact, Australia has more things that can kill you in extremely nasty ways than anywhere else: sharks, crocodiles, the planet's ten most deadly poisonous snakes, fluffy yet toxic caterpillars, sea shells that actually attack you, and the unbelievable box jellyfish (don't ask). The dangerous riptides of the sea and the sun-baked wastes of the outback both lie in wait for the unwary. Australia is an immense and fortunate land, and it has found in Bill Bryson its perfect guide. In a Sunburned Country offers the best of all possible introductions to what may well be the best of all possible nations. Even with those jellyfish. |
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Acclaimed travel writer Rick Antonson sets his adventurous compass on Mount Ararat, exploring the region’s long history, religious mysteries, and complex politics. Mount Ararat is the most fabled mountain in the world. For millennia this massif in eastern Turkey has been rumored as the resting place of Noah’s Ark following the Great Flood. But it also plays a significant role in the longstanding conflict between Turkey and Armenia. Author Rick Antonson joined a five-member expedition to the mountain’s nearly 17,000-foot summit, trekking alongside a contingent of Armenians, for whom Mount Ararat is the stolen symbol of their country. Antonson weaves vivid historical anecdote with unexpected travel vignettes, whether tracing earlier mountaineering attempts on the peak, recounting the genocide of Armenians and its unresolved debate, or depicting the Kurds’ ambitions for their own nation’s borders, which some say should include Mount Ararat. What unfolds in Full Moon Over Noah’s Ark is one man’s odyssey, a tale told through many stories. Starting with the flooding of the Black Sea in 5600 BCE, through to the Epic of Gilgamesh and the contrasting narratives of the Great Flood known to followers of the Judaic, Christian and Islamic religions, Full Moon Over Noah’s Ark takes readers along with Antonson through the shadows and broad landscapes of Turkey, Iraq, Iran and Armenia, shedding light on a troubled but fascinating area of the world. Skyhorse Publishing, as well as our Arcade imprint, are proud to publish a broad range of books for readers interested in history--books about World War II, the Third Reich, Hitler and his henchmen, the JFK assassination, conspiracies, the American Civil War, the American Revolution, gladiators, Vikings, ancient Rome, medieval times, the old West, and much more. While not every title we publish becomes a New York Times bestseller or a national bestseller, we are committed to books on subjects that are sometimes overlooked and to authors whose work might not otherwise find a home. |
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At the Fairbanks International Airport’s main terminal, we went to the ticket counter to pay for our plane trip. The young lady working asked us if we were going to Lake Minchumina for trophy fishing. She continued to tell us that a lot of people go there for the big fish. I made the mistake of telling her that we were going on a hike to the federal land settlement area to find land to stake a claim. Her mouth said nothing, but her eyes screamed “crazy person.” I resisted the urge to try and explain further because it was obvious her mind was made up. I said no more and walked away with my dignity (somewhat) intact.  |
