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Audiobooks Narrated by Adam Bromley
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John Bindon was a modern legend. A powerful figure in London's underworld, his film-star looks, charm and talent brought him worldwide exposure. His story reads like the plot of a movie in which Big John himself might have landed a part. Usually typecast in tough-guy roles, his on-screen persona was chillingly close to the real-life one.
Big John's good looks and charisma led to encounters with stunning women, most famously Princess Margaret, and numerous high profile relationships. But most of all, Big John was a warm-hearted, complex man, utterly devoted to those who gave him respect and always prepared to be the last line of defence to those closest to him. He emerged from a poor, working class London childhood and fraternised with the Krays and the Richardsons, but eventually turned his back on crime to play major parts in films such as Mick Jagger's Performance, The Who's Quadrophenia and Michael Caine's Get Carter. This is a truly moving story about a man who was many different things to many people, but never anything but himself.
Killing Goldfinger charts the extraordinary rise and spectacular bullet-riddled fall of John Palmer, the richest, most powerful criminal ever to have emerged from the modern British underworld. During the late 1990s, Palmer was rated as rich as The Queen by the Sunday Times Rich List.
Palmer earned his nickname Goldfinger after smelting (in his back garden) tens of millions of pounds worth of stolen gold bullion from the 20th century's most lucrative heist; the Brink's-Mat robbery. Palmer then used his share of the millions to become the vicious overlord of a vast illegal timeshare property empire in Tenerife. At the same time, Goldfinger financed huge international drugs shipments as well as some of the most notorious UK robberies of the past 30 years, including the £50m Securitas heist in Kent in 2006 and, many believe, the Hatton Garden heist in 2015.
Palmer vowed to hunt down all his underworld enemies. But in the end it was those same criminals who decided to bring his life to an end. Murdered in June 2015, with charges of fraud, money laundering and worse pending, this book tells his murky story for the first time.
As outrageous and bullet-riddled as the hit Netflix series Narcos, Killing Goldfinger tells the true story of Britain's underworld kingpin, who turned the sunshine holiday island of Tenerife into his very own Crime Incorporated and then paid the ultimate price.
Written by leading experts, How to Win on the Battlefield will prove indispensable listening for historians, military enthusiasts and business leaders.
How can you off-balance your enemy? When is the best moment to deliver a counter-attack? What is the effect of shock action or defence in depth? Certain tactical concepts have stood the test of time. This ground-breaking book examines, in a series of case studies, 25 of the key tactics that have achieved victory through the ages. Drawing on examples of battles from around the globe, on land, at sea and in the air, and across history, the authors reveal the enduring value of each tactic in clear and compelling descriptions and analysis.
General Robert E. Lee, although heavily outnumbered achieved a remarkable victory through an audacious flanking manoeuvre at Chancellorsville in 1863; the same bold move had been used over 600 years before by the king of France at Bouvines. For the Parthian general Surenas at Carrhae in 53 BC and again for Kitchener at Omdurman in 1989, an overwhelming concentration of firepower ensured a decisive outcome, while drawing the enemy led to victory both for Saladin at Hattin in 1187 and for the Russians against Napoleon in 1812. The book examines how Allied armies seized and retained the initiative through the airborne landings in Normandy in 1944, and how Soviet General Zhukov pierced enemy lines and penetrated in depth using Blitzkriegtactics in Mongolia in 1939.
'Original and innovative' - Michael Neiberg, author of Fighting the Great War: A Global History
'A useful and timely reminder of the theory of tactics that have evolved during the long history of warfare' - General Sir Michael Rose, former Adjutant General of the British Army and author of Washington's War
'A riveting study of tactics ancient and modern' - Richard Holmes
Emerging from a collection of disparate city states 150 years ago, no other country has had as turbulent a history as Germany or enjoyed so much prosperity in such a short time frame. Today, as much of the world succumbs to authoritarianism and democracy is undermined from its heart, Germany stands as a bulwark for decency and stability. Mixing personal journey and anecdote with compelling empirical evidence, this is a searching and entertaining exploration of the country many in the West still love to hate. Raising important questions for our post-Brexit landscape, Kampfner asks why Germany has become a model for others to emulate, while Britain still languishes in wartime nostalgia and fails to tackle contemporary challenges. Part memoir, part history, part travelogue, Why the Germans Do It Better is a rich and witty portrait of an eternally fascinating country.
"Smart, provocative and entertaining, this is a timely and enthralling love letter to our much misunderstood near neighbour" KAY BURLEY
This fascinating and inspiring biography of John Haynes - the man behind Haynes manuals - looks 'under the bonnet' at his extraordinary life, and his legacy to the motoring world. This is the story of how one man's vision and enthusiasm gave a small enterprise in rural Somerset a global footprint. The story begins with John's childhood in Ceylon and his school days - when as a young entrepreneur he sowed the seeds for what would become the iconic Haynes car repair manuals - to his time as a young RAF officer, and then as the driving force behind the growth of the iconic Haynes brand and the Haynes International Motor Museum. Family and friends recount the many adventures and experiences of living, socialising and working with John throughout his life - which more often than not revolved around his passion for all things automotive.
John's legacy to motoring is summed up in a tribute from Practical Classics Editor Danny Hopkins: "John Haynes' immense contribution is multi-faceted and his legacy is permanent. John's extraordinary gift to the owners of all cars, classic and modern... facilitating their ability to be self-sufficient cannot be overstated. The Haynes manual is an icon... just like many of the cars, planes, ships and trains it taught us how to repair. John's life in cars has also left us with another legacy. His creation of one of the world's most exciting car collections, a collection he so generously shared with the nation at the Haynes International Motor Museum: it is his passion made metal."
"If you grew up in the era when cars and motorbikes were unreliable, John Haynes was the Messiah." JAMES MAY
In artist Paul Klee's The Twittering Machine, the bird-song of a machine acts as bait to lure humankind into a pit of damnation. Leading political writer Richard Seymour argues that this is a chilling metaphor for our relationship with social media. Former social media executives tell us that the system is an addiction-machine. We are users, waiting for our next hit as we like, comment and share. We write to the machine as individuals, but it responds by aggregating our fantasies, desires and frailties into data, and returning them to us as a commodity experience. Through journalism, psychoanalytic reflection and insights from users, developers, security experts and others, Seymour probes the human side of the machine, asking what we're getting out of it, and what we're getting into.
"Richard Seymour has a brilliant mind and a compelling style." GUARDIAN
"A brilliant, urgent, game-changing intervention." CHINA MIÉVILLE
Italy's ultras are the most organised and violent fans in European football. Many groups have evolved into criminal gangs, involved in ticket-touting, drug-dealing and murder. A cross between the Hells Angels and hooligans, they're often the foot-soldiers of the Mafia and have been instrumental in the rise of the far-right. But the purist ultras say that they are insurgents fighting against a police state and modern football. Only amongst the ultras, they say, can you find belonging, community and a sacred concept of sport. They champion not just their teams, they say, but their forgotten suburbs and the dispossessed. Through the prism of the ultras Jones crafts a compelling investigation into Italian society and its favourite sport. He writes about not just the ultras of some of Italy's biggest clubs - Juventus, Torino, Lazio, Roma and Genoa - but also about its lesser-known ones from Cosenza and Catania. He examines the sinister side of football fandom, with its violence and political extremism, but also admires the passion, wit, solidarity and style of a fascinating and contradictory subculture.
