A selection from the beloved bestseller Among the Thugs, “Waiting for a Goal” pinpoints the actual soccer amid the rampant hooliganism.They have names like Barmy Bernie, Daft Donald, and Steamin’ Sammy. They like lager (in huge quantities), the Queen, football clubs, and themselves. Their dislikes encompass the rest of the known universe, and England’s soccer thugs express their feelings in ways that range from petty vandalism to riots that terrorize entire cities. And for...

Ten years after the success of the 1983 Best of Young British Novelists issue, four judges -- A.S. Byatt, Salman Rushdie, bookseller John Mitchinson and Granta editor Bill Buford -- set out to identify twenty more young and promising writers. The list introduced astonishing emerging talents: Alan Hollinghurst, Will Self, Hanif Kureishi, A.L. Kennedy and many more. A widely varied anthology including novel extracts and stories that showcase a generation of writers coming into its o...

What sort of man spends his Saturday afternoons with people named Bonehead, Paraffin Pete and Steamin' Sammy? Bill Buford's acclaimed Among the Thugs is a book about the experience, and the attractions, of crowd violence.

From the author of the widely acclaimed Heat, an exhilarating account of Bill Buford's adventures in the world of French cooking.'A romping, chomping, savoury tour de force... Hilarious' Simon SchamaWhat does it take to master French cooking? This is the question that drives Bill Buford to abandon his perfectly happy life in New York City and (with his wife and three-year-old twin sons in tow) move to Lyon, the so-called gastronomi...

Bill Buford, an enthusiastic, if rather chaotic, home cook, was asked by the New Yorker to write a profile of Mario Batali, a Falstaffian figure of voracious appetites who runs one of New York's most successful three-star restaurants. Buford accepted the commission, on the condition Batali allow him to work in his kitchen, as his slave.He worked his way up to 'line cook' and then left New York to learn from the very teachers who had taught his teacher: preparing game with Marco Pie...

Daniel Boulud, one of America's most respected and successful chefs, delivers a definitive, yet personal cookbook on his love of French food.From coming of age as a young chef to adapting French cuisine to American ingredients and tastes, Daniel Boulud reveals how he expresses his culinary artistry at Restaurant Daniel. With more than 75 signature recipes, plus an additional 12 recipes Boulud prepares at home for his friends on more casual occasions.Dan...

A guide to some of the world’s most fascinating places, as seen and experienced by writer, television host, and relentlessly curious traveler Anthony BourdainAnthony Bourdain saw more of the world than nearly anyone. His travels took him from the hidden pockets of his hometown of New York to a tribal longhouse in Borneo, from cosmopolitan Buenos Aires, Paris, and Shanghai to Tanzania’s utter beauty and the stunning desert solitude of Oman’s Empty Quarter—and many p...

Bloomsbury presents World Travel by Anthony Bourdain, read by Laurie Woolever, Shep Gordon, Christopher Bourdain, Jen Agg, Matt Walsh, Bill Buford, Claude Tayag, Nari Kye, Vidya Balachander and Steve Albini.'Terrific … His love for his subjects – both the food and the cook – sings' Telegraph'Christ, could Bourdain weave words ... The guy wrote like a poet' GuardianA celebration of the life and legac...

They have names like Barmy Bernie, Daft Donald, and Steamin' Sammy. They like lager (in huge quantities), the Queen, football clubs (especially Manchester United), and themselves. Their dislike encompasses the rest of the known universe, and England's soccer thugs express it in ways that range from mere vandalism to riots that terrorize entire cities. Now Bill Buford, editor of the prestigious journal Granta, enters this alternate society and records both its savageries and its sinister al...

An anecdote-driven narrative of the classic footballer's ‘DOs and DO NOTs’ from the ever-popular Arsenal legend and football pundit Paul Merson, aka ‘The Merse’.When it comes to advice on the pitfalls of life as a professional footballer, Paul Merson can pretty much write the manual. In fact, that's exactly what he's done in this hilarious new book which manages to be simultaneously poignant and gloriously funny.Merson was a prodigiously talented footballer in the 80s and 9...

In the state of Texas American football is a religion. And nowhere is more fanatical about its football than the small town of Odessa. There, every Friday night from September to November, a bunch of seventeen-year-old kids play their hearts out for the honour of their high school. In front of 20,000 people.In 1988 H.G. Bissinger spent a season in Odessa discovering just what makes a town pin its hopes on eleven boys on a football field. He lived with the students, coaches and town...

"One of the best baseball—and management—books out....Deserves a place in the Baseball Hall of Fame."—ForbesMoneyball is a quest for the secret of success in baseball. Following the low-budget Oakland Athletics, their larger-than-life general manger, Billy Beane, and the strange brotherhood of amateur baseball enthusiasts, Michael Lewis has written not only "the single most influential baseball book ever" (Rob Neyer, Slate) but also what "may be the best ...