The seedy and beguiling Gerald Hamilton was the man who Isherwood modelled Mr Norris on in Mr Norris Changes Train

Immortalised in Christopher Isherwood’s classic novel Mr Norris Changes Trains, Gerald Hamilton was the real-life model for the seedy but beguiling Mr Norris. Isherwood put him on the literary map but he was on other maps already, including those of police forces across Europe, and he was interned in Brixton prison during both world wars as a threat to national security. A Communist agent in the Thirties, Hamilton later drifted to the right and put his faith in the “sacred cause†of ...

Mike Walker’s gripping BBC Radio drama about money, art, religion, politics and powerFlorence, 1415. Banker Cosimo Medici is looked down upon as a jumped up money-changer. Then he marries the noble Contessina de Bardi and becomes the richest man in Europe. But his wealth and power threaten the Florentine elite, who are determined to bring him down...However, the House of Medici cannot be crushed that easily. Sixty years and many violent deaths later, the fa...

Bestselling biography of the enduringly fascinating Wallis SimpsonOne of Britain's most distinguished biographers turns her focus on one of the most vilified women of the twentieth century. Historian Anne Sebba has written the first full biography by a woman of Wallis Simpson, Duchess of Windsor.'That woman', as she was referred to by the Queen Mother, became a hate figure for ensnaring a British king and destabilising the monarchy. Neither beautiful nor br...

NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY JANET MASLIN, THE NEW YORK TIMES'Victoria the Queen, Julia Baird's exquisitely wrought and meticulously researched biography, brushes the dusty myth off this extraordinary monarch' The New York Times Book Review (Editor's Choice).The true story for fans of the hit ITV drama series Victoria starring Jenna Coleman, this page-turning biography reveals the re...

Paul Doiron's The Poacher's Son is a sterling debut of literary suspense. Taut and engrossing, it represents the first in a series featuring Mike Bowditch.Set in the wilds of Maine, this is an explosive tale of an estranged son thrust into the hunt for a murderous fugitive—his own fatherGame warden Mike Bowditch returns home one evening to find an alarming voice from the past on his answering machine: his father Jack, a hard drinking woman...

Queen Victoria was the longest reigning monarch in British history. In this concise biography, Lady Longford, long recognised as an authority on the subject, gives a full account of Queen Victoria's life and provides her unique assessment of the monarch. Victoria ascended the throne in 1837 on the death of her uncle William IV. In 1840 she married her first cousin, Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, and for the next twenty years they were inseparable. Their descendants we...

From the New York Times– bestselling author of The Rebel Romanov , an "absorbing account of the making of a queen through her awful, protracted grief" ( Kirkus Reviews ).As she did in her critically acclaimed The Last Days of the Romanovs, Helen Rappaport brings a compelling documentary feel to the story of this royal marriage ...

The childhood and early life memoir of Antonia Fraser, one of our finest narrative historians.Antonia Fraser's magical memoir describes growing up in the 1930s and '40s, but its real concern is with her growing love of history. A fascination that began with reading Our Island Story and her evacuation to an Elizabethan manor house at the beginning of the Second World War soon developed into an enduring passion, becoming, in her own words, 'an essential part...

The unputdownable biography of the enigmatic spy and traitor Guy Burgess: 'More riveting than a spy novel' - Sunday TelegraphGuy Burgess was the most important, complex and fascinating of 'The Cambridge Spies' - Maclean, Philby, Blunt - all brilliant young men recruited in the 1930s to betray their country to the Soviet Union. An engaging and charming companion to many, an unappealing, utterly ruthless manipulator to others, Burgess rose through academia, ...

The first volume of the 20th century's most phenomenally successful diaries, published alongside first paperback of THE LAST DIARIES.INTO POLITICS begins in 1973 with Clark's selection as Tory candidate for Nancy Astor's old seat in Plymouth (rival candidates included future Conservative luminaries Michael Howard and Norman Fowler). Alan Clark describes his election to the Commons in the 1974 general election; his years as a backbencher coincide with Edward Heath a...

'ENORMOUS FUN' GUARDIAN'SO ENTERTAINING' THE TIMES'GOSSIPY, LIGHT AND FUN' TLS***Queen Bees***looks at the lives of six remarkable women who made careers out of being society hostesses, including Lady Astor, who went on to become the first female MP, and Mrs Greville, who cultivated relationships with Edward VII, as well as Lady Londonderry, Lady Cunard, Laura Corrigan and Lady Colefax. Writ...