"Moby-Dick" is perhaps the greatest of the Great American Novels, yet its length and esoteric subject matter create an aura of difficulty that too often keeps readers at bay. In this book, the author offers a cabin master's tour of this novel rich with adventure and history.

Many bright minds have come up with expressions we now take for granted as part of the English language, and which we use freely in vernacular speech. But the originators of many of our most useful second-hand remarks go uncredited. The Bible and Shakespeare are rich sources of many common phrases, but in this book Max Cryer concentrates on familiar expressions whose origins lie elsewhere. So who said it first? This collection sets out to credit - as far as it's possible to do so - the people who actually created many familiar term... read more

Learned Optimism shows us how to stop automatically assuming guilt; how to get out of the habit of seeing the direst possible implications in every setback; how to be optimistic. With concrete examples Dr Seligman documents the effects of optimism on the quality of life, provides tests to determine the degree of our negative and positive orientation, and offers a program of specific exercises to help break the habit of pessimism and learn the habit of optimism for both ourselves and our children. Learn how to: recognise your 'expl... read more

Pulitzer Prize-winning reporting team, husband and wife Nicholas D. Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn, take us on a journey through Africa and Asia to meet an extraordinary array of exceptional women struggling against terrible circumstances.
More girls have been killed in the last fifty years, precisely because they are girls, than men were killed in all the wars of the twentieth century combined. More girls are killed in this routine 'gendercide' in any one decade than people were slaughtered in all the genocides of the twentieth c... read more

Steven Pinker's The Language Instinct propelled him to worldwide fame in 1994. His groundbreaking book's premise - that language is instinctual rather than acquired - so shook the foundations of biological science that the reverberations are still being felt today.

Whether to escape the rat race or to help save our environment, people are getting back to nature. Allotments and green spaces have never been so popular, seasonal and local produce is the order of the day, and the healthy nostalgia of growing heirloom vegetables is unquestionably and delightfully in vogue. A Potted History of Vegetables embraces this idea by reaquainting the reader with the origins, nature, and peculiarities of the world's produce. Combining beautiful reproductions of the finest nineteenth century botanical illust... read more

The bestselling author of "The Man Who Mistook His Wife For a Hat" describes how we experience the visual world. In "Musicophilia", Oliver Sacks explored music and the brain; now, in "The Mind's Eye", he writes about the myriad ways in which we experience the visual world: how we see in three dimensions; how we recognize individual faces or places; how we use language to communicate verbally; how we translate marks on paper into words and paragraphs, even how we represent the world internally when our eyes are closed. Alongside rem... read more

With buying local or gathering and harvesting your own fruit very much in vogue and heirloom varieties enjoying a renaissance, here is your opportunity to discover the origins, nature and personalities of everyday and unusual fruit. Combining exquisite botanical illustrations with fascinating facts and practical tips for growing and enjoying your own produce, A Potted History of Fruit unearths a wealth of kitchen and garden knowledge. Whether it's the creation of the cubic watermelon, the electric power of the lemon, or a guide to ... read more

Everyone needs this book if they want to know how to get out of difficult situations whether at home or abroad. Written by Rosie Garthwaite, whose career as a journalist started in war-torn Basra, this book combines practical advice with contributions from many journalists and commentators including Rageh Omar and John Simpson, who share their own experience and advice on surviving in difficult and dangerous situations. Topics include how to avoid being misunderstood; how to avoid bombs and booby traps; how to escape from a riot; h... read more

Hysteria as a disease no longer exists, but in the nineteenth century hysteria was thought to affect half of all women in one of its myriad forms. In 1862 the famous and infamous Salpetriere Hospital in Paris, under the reign of renowned neurologist Jean-Martin Charcot, became the focal point for study of the mysterious illness. Physicians could find no cause, which meant a cure was not possible, but Charcot concentrated on treating the symptoms; with hypnosis, gongs, tuning forks, piercing and the evocation of demons and saints. C... read more

Stories of individual pirates in the Caribbean, from Blackbeard to Calico Jack, have been the stuff of legend since the eighteenth century, but in Spanish Gold pirate expert David Cordingly at last gives us the big picture in all its bold and ruthless truth. Cordingly shows how the attacks of the buccaneers on the treasure ports of the Spanish Main, and the sacking of Panama by Sir Henry Morgan in 1671, were the prologue to an explosion of piracy which led to the establishment of a pirate colony at Nassau in the Bahamas. By ... read more

Hilarious and moving, The Family Law is a linked series of tales from a born humorist. Benjamin Law invites readers into the world of his endearing yet profoundly eccentric family. Why won't his Chinese dad wear made-in-China underpants? Why was most of his extended family deported in the 1980s? Will Benjamin's childhood dreams of Home and Away stardom come to nothing? What are his chances of finding love?

He raises hackles or receives resounding cheers, he's loved or hated but never ignored. Christopher Hitchens is possibly the most provocative writer of our time, fearless and forthright with no subject off limits. This volume of essays spans a remarkable four decades of writing. From early articles in the New Statesman, where he worked alongside writers such as Ian McEwan and Martin Amis, through to his pieces for Salon, The Atlantic and Vanity Fair, these articles display his rare genius, indomitable wit and singular command of la... read more

In the tradition of Freakonomics and The Tipping Point, Reframe brings a fresh perspective to our toughest political problems. This is a book by a young Australian thinker that turns conventional thinking on its head.

A lively and eclectic sequence of more than 150 concise and intellectually challenging essays in which the world's leading thinkers reflect on how the internet has changed their modes of thought.
In How is the Internet Changing the Way you Think?, 154 of the world's leading intellectuals - scientists, artists and creative thinkers - explore exactly what it means to think in the new age of the Internet: from Nicholas Carr's reflections on what the Internet is doing to our brains, to Richard Dawkins's sanguine assessment of it... read more

The Victorian era was the high point of literary tourism. Writers such as Charles Dickens, George Eliot, and Sir Walter Scott became celebrities, and readers trekked far and wide for a glimpse of the places where their heroes wrote and thought, walked and talked. Even Shakespeare was roped in, as Victorian entrepreneurs transformed quiet Stratford-upon-Avon into a combination shrine and tourist trap. Stratford continues to lure tourists today, as do many other sites of literary pilgrimage throughout Britain. And our modern age coul... read more

Esteemed American journalist David Rieff argues against our passion for the past. He looks at how memory serves nationalistic history every ANZAC Day and annual pilgrimage to Gallipoli, and how memory of past horrors inflame deep-seated ethnic hatreds, violence and wars.

The author of "The French", "Happiness" and "A History of French Passions" writes about the history of human feelings, habits, emotions and perceptions across time. From Vikings and Aztecs to contemporary hypochondriacs, from ancient Arab writings to American theories of business management, Zeldin looks at the dilemmas of ordinary life, exploring what makes us most human - the intimate experience of men and women through the ages.

Are you still the person who lived 15, 10 or five years ago? 15, 10 or five minutes ago? Can you plan for your retirement if the you of 30 years hence is in some sense a different person? What and who is the real you? Does it remain constant over time and place, or is it something much more fragmented and fluid? Is it known to you, or are you as much a mystery to yourself as others are to you?With his usual wit,infectious curiosity and bracing scepticism, Julian Baggini sets out to answer these fundamental and unsettling questions.... read more

This is the seventh edition of the most comprehensive one-volume book of identification for Australian birds. Completely revised with all new maps, text and many new or revised colour plates, this guide is a must for all birdwatchers, students and travellers. Over 400 000 copies sold.