History

The day was hot and sticky. The man in the rowboat was an impetuous hothead. His row across the choppy Hudson that morning led to a confrontation that has burned...

For the great majority of his long life, Benjamin Franklin was a loyal British royalist. In 1757, having made his fortune in Philadelphia and established his fame as a renowned...

'Beautiful, like a muddy journey through time . . . a really important book' RAYNOR WINN, author of The Salt Path Lisa Woollett has spent her life combing beaches and...

'Convincingly researched and thoroughly entertaining' - Wall Street JournalTHE TIMES BEST BOOKS OF 2020'This book shows that, despite rumours of demon dwarfs, piano-playing crocodiles and world domination, the real story...

WINNER OF THE 2024 PULITZER PRIZE SHORTLISTED FOR THE ORWELL PRIZE LONGLISTED FOR THE BAILLIE GIFFORD PRIZE'A deeply immersive portrait of daily life in Israel and the West Bank' The...

**SOON TO BE A MINI-SERIES FROM PARAMOUNT+ IN SPRING 2024** From bestselling author and the producer of the hit cable series Masters of Sex, Thomas Maier, comes a true story...

A magisterial, single-volume history of the greatest conflict the world has ever known by our foremost military historian.The Second World War began in August 1939 on the edge of Manchuria...

While much of the US media and the professional political classes whip themselves into a frenzy as to how President Trump got into office and how he is behaving there,...

On 29 September 1934, at the German Embassy office in London, Christabel Bielenberg officially became a German citizen. Having met her German husband Peter two years prior, Christabel decided to...

THE INSTANT SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER A TIMES BOOK OF THE YEAR Winner of the Slightly Foxed Best First Biography Prize 2023 'Epic, moving and important' ROBERT HARRIS 'A modern classic'...

THIS HAS HAPPENED BEFORE.The current financial crisis has only one parallel: the Wall Street Crash of 1929 and subsequent Great Depression of the 1930s, which crippled the future of an...

In the tradition of Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee, a stunningly vivid historical account of the forty-year battle between Comanche Indians and white settlers for control of the American...

'I cannot remember the last time I read a book so immediately absorbing and affecting. Michael Palin has never been better - which is, of course, saying a great deal.'...

Pharaoh.Icon.Enigma.Lost for three thousand years, misunderstood for a century.A hundred years ago, a team of archaeologists in the Valley of the Kings made a remarkable discovery: a near-complete royal burial,...

*** BARACK OBAMA'S SUMMER READING LIST 2024 ****** One of the New York Times Top Ten Books of 2024 ****** NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER ***'The story of Captain Cook's third...

Pioneering human rights campaigner, patriot, romantic, traitor, LGBTQ+ martyr: this is the story of Roger Casement, one of the 20th century's most complex and compelling figures.'Minutely researched, superbly written, genuinely...

There have been many biographies of Stalin, but the court that surrounded him is untravelled ground. Simon Sebag Montefiore, acclaimed biographer of Catherine the Great's lover, prime minister and general...

Up until the age of 64, much of Kari Rosvall's early life was shrouded in mystery. Then, one day, a letter arrived through the post . . . In it...

'This is a wonderful, surging narrative - a brilliant and meticulous synthesis of the ancient sources . . . This is a story that should be read by anyone interested...

With what this poor woman had been through the sight of her crying tore at my heartstrings. What if something should happen to her; who would care for her little...

'In the beginning was the Word,' says the Gospel of John. This sentence - and the words of all four gospels - is central to the teachings of the Christian...

A FINANCIAL TIMES BEST BOOK OF 2014 PICKA TOP TEN BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR PICK BY PUBLISHERS WEEKLYA gripping account of the 1978 Camp David summit when President Jimmy...

The epic true-life story of one of the most notorious maritime disasters of the nineteenth century - and inspiration for `Moby-Dick' - reissued to accompany a major motion picture due...

On 28th April 1789 a small and unremarkable merchant vessel became one of the most famous ships in maritime history. HMS Bounty was under the command of 34-year-old Lieutenant William...

A Guardian, Financial Times, New Statesman, The Rest is Politics and Waterstones Best Book for 2024'A work of great confidence, empathy, learning and imagination' RORY STEWART'Eye-popping, mind-blowing, ground-breaking' LUCY WORSLEY'Bold,...

'Reads like something from a thriller...colourful, detailed and meticulously researched' Sunday Times'Gripping from start to finish' Peter Frankopan, author of The Silk Roads'Remarkable and brilliantly researched non-fiction thriller...focussing on one...

'This is an extraordinary biography. A gripping narrative that opens as derring-do wartime escape drama rapidly turns into a horror story about man's inhumanity to man...Important and unforgettable' Jonathan Dimbleby,...

'A dozen pages in I realized that I had been waiting for much of my life to read this extraordinary book' Annie ProulxA way of life that once encompassed most...

'If you love Indiana Jones, this is the real thing' DAN SNOW'Fascinating' GREG JENNER'A thrilling investigation' SUZANNAH LIPSCOMB'An essential read for anyone with even a fleeting interest in exploring the...

'In the last couple of years I realised that, as one of the last witnesses, I must speak out.'Tomi Reichental, who lost 35 members of his family in the Holocaust,...

The incredible true story of Louis Zamperini, now a major motion picture directed by Angelina Jolie. THE INTERNATIONAL NUMBER ONE BESTSELLER In 1943 a bomber crashes into the Pacific Ocean....

A timely analysis and re-creation of the turning point of World War II. In october 1942, a panzer officer wrote "Stalingrad is no longer a town... Animals flee this hell;...

Behind every soldiers death lies a story, a tale not just of the cold mathematics of the battlefield but of an individual human being who gave his life. What psychological...

On which day was history's shortest war waged and won (in roughly 40 minutes)? How was Napoleon bested by a group of rabbits in 1807? Why did a dispute about...

The bestselling author of STALINGRAD and BERLIN: THE DOWNFALL on the Spanish Civil War, drawing on masses of newly discovered material from the Spanish, Russian and German archives.The civil war...

Winner of the Longman-History Today Book Prize 2016 On a sunny morning in May 1939 a phalanx of 800 women - housewives, doctors, opera singers, politicians, prostitutes - were marched...

'Every so often a book arrives that demands to be read' John Humphrys'An unforgettable and deeply moving story' Jeremy Bowen'I read this book with gratitude and urgency' Fergal Keane '[A]...

This book examines how the Royal Navy protected our shores and wider interests through the First World War and the one that was to follow, from the northern patrol lifelines...

The funny and tragic, bestselling biography of The Queen's sister, Princess Margaret, perfect for fans of Netflix's The Crown. A GUARDIAN BOOK OF THE YEAR * A TIMES BOOK OF...

Despatches in this volume include those covering the Battle of Matapan in 1941, Fleet Air Arm operations in 1940, the Battle of Sirte in 1942, the action with the Italian...

Why did the medieval Church bless William of Normandy's invasion of Christian England in 1066 and authorise cultural genocide in Provence? How could a Christian army sack Christian Constantinople in...

A magisterial work of gripping history, City of Fortune tells the story of the Venetian ascent from lagoon dwellers to the greatest power in the Mediterranean - an epic five...

The Sunday Times bestseller now updated with a new forewordAmong millions of Holocaust victims sent to Auschwitz II-Birkenau in 1944, Priska, Rachel, and Anka each passed through its infamous gates...

Cambridge spy Guy Burgess was a supreme networker, with a contacts book that included everyone from statesmen to socialites, high-ranking government officials to the famous actors and literary figures of...

This book, published to coincide with a major exhibition at the National Maritime Museum to mark the 350th anniversary of the Great Fire of London, centres on Samuel Pepys (1633...

'I hope The Long Walk will remain as a memorial to all those who live and die for freedom, and for all those who for many reasons could not speak...