History

THE SUNDAY TIMES AND ECONOMIST BOOKS OF THE YEAR 2016'Hugely impressive... Wilson is an assured guide through the millennium-long labyrinth of papal-imperial relations' Literary ReviewA great, sprawling, ancient and unique...

An ageing queen, an heirless state, conspiracy all round: here is the court of Elizabeth I as never known beforeHistory has pictured Elizabeth I as Gloriana, an icon of strength...

'Superb...his pages fizz with character and colour' Dominic Sandbrook, Sunday Times 'Scholarly and very readable' Andrew Lycett, Spectator 'Energetic and hugely entertaining' A.N.Wilson, TLSThe definitive biography of Alfred Harmsworth, 1st...

Revolutions, droughts, famines, invasions, wars, regicides - the calamities of the mid-seventeenth century were not only unprecedented, they were agonisingly widespread. A global crisis extended from England to Japan, and...

Following the Reformation, a growing number of radical Protestants came together to live and worship in Catholic France. These Huguenots survived persecution and armed conflict to win-however briefly-freedom of worship,...

By early 1945, the war against Japan was at its height and General Douglas MacArthur began to fulfil his vow of liberating the Philippines. He was already planning his own...

A new and definitive account of the German invasion of Poland that initiated WWII in 1939, written by a historian at the height of his abilities.'Deeply researched, very well-written... This...

This is an entertaining collection of the world's stupidest headlines, featuring over 300 examples of the most ludicrous headlines ever to be printed in newspapers throughout the world. At first...

A profoundly moving celebration of love under the darkest of circumstances from the author of The NineFrom the moment they met in 1940 in Ravensbruck concentration camp, Milena Jesenska and...

From the Sunday Times bestselling author of Lawrence in Arabia, a spellbinding narrative history of the 1979 Iranian Revolution and its devastating consequences'Authoritative, well-reported and elegantly written... If you want...

WINNER OF THE SAMUEL JOHNSON PRIZE FOR NON-FICTION 'A heartbreaking, beautifully written book. A classic for sure' Claire Tomalin, GuardianExtraordinary true stories of those who lived in East Germany. Travel...

War changes everyone and for those lucky enough to survive there can be no return to the carefree days before the hell of war broke out. William Earl was a...

In 1950, James Paul Donahue inherited a $15 million Woolworth's fortune and on the same day met the Duke and Duchess of Windsor. This book is the remarkable story of...

Winner of the Slightly Foxed Best First Biography Prize 2014 A rich historical biography of 'those wild Wyndhams' - three cultured aristocratic sisters born into great privilege in late Victorian...

This unique insight into RAF Reaper operations in Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria is based on unprecedented research access to the Reaper squadrons and personnel at RAF Waddington in Lincolnshire and...

Waterloo was the climax of almost twenty years of war in Europe. It dramatically ended Napoleon's dream of a lasting empire. Through the skillful use of original source material, noted...

Were the Vikings, as contemporary description had it, a "valiant, wrathful, foreign, purely pagan people" who swept in from the sea to plunder and slaughter? Or were they unusually successful...

25 April 1974, Lisbon. Over the course of a single day, Europe's oldest fascist regime falls. On its 50th anniversary, this is the story of the revolution that changed Portugal...

'Bracingly apocalyptic stuff: atmospheric, chock-full of information and with a constantly escalating sense of pace and tension' Sunday TelegraphSimon Winchester's brilliant chronicle of the destruction of the Indonesian island of...

WINNER OF THE CUNDHILL HISTORY PRIZE 2017 SHORTLISTED FOR THE WOLFSON HISTORY PRIZE 2017, THE PUSHKIN HOUSE RUSSIAN BOOK PRIZE 2017 AND THE LONGMAN-HISTORY TODAY BOOK PRIZE 2017THE TIMES, SPECTATOR,...

In 1942 the battle-hardened troops of the Japanese army overran Burma with frightening speed despite opposition from Indian and British troops, triggering the exodus of half a million people who...

The Civilizing Process stands out as Norbert Elias' greatest work, tracing the "civilizing" of manners and personality in Western Europe since the late Middle Ages by demonstrating how the formation...

From Neil MacGregor, the author of A History of the World in 100 Objects, this is a view of Germany like no otherFor the past 140 years, Germany has been...

'Brilliant and gripping, here is the full true Renaissance in a history of compelling originality and freshness' SIMON SEBAG MONTEFIOREThe Italian Renaissance shaped western culture - but it was far...

Most believed it had begun when God placed Adam & Eve, fully formed, into the Garden of Eden. Archaeology changed all that. Besides revealing to us the treasures, tombs and...

A burgeoning new city is built on the dreams of the American gold rush. It is also built upon a landscape that has been stretching, sliding and breaking apart for...