No catches, no fine print just unadulterated book loving, with your favourite books saved to your own digital bookshelf.
New members get entered into our monthly draw to win £100 to spend in your local bookshop Plus lots lots more…
Find out moreFeeling the desire to explore closer to home or travel to far flung places? We have a selection of titles to satisfy your wanderlust. Whether you’re planning a great adventure or reading about your favourite parts of the world, have a browse of our Travel selection.
From its opening overview and highlighted Top Ten attractions (including ancient St Peter Port, Castle Cornet, Hautville House and car-free Herm), to the eight wonderful walking tours, this guidebook makes a superb travelling companion to those seeking to explore gorgeous Guernsey independently. The detailed tours section covers St Peter Port, St Peter Port to Moulin Huet Bay, Southern Guernsey, Central Guernsey, Northern Guernsey, Herm, Sark and Alderney, which means travellers will never be short of something to do or see, with must-see sights clearly highlighted, and suggested places to stop off for food and drink along the way. Talking of which, the Food and Drink feature highlights the island’s Gallic-flavoured gastronomic delights and also provides an excellent overview of Guernsey’s great craft ale offerings.
June 2017 Non-Fiction Book of the Month. A book to put a great big beaming (and somewhat tearful) smile on your face. ‘Finding Gobi’ documents the quite amazing story of one man’s quest to find the little dog who had stolen his heart. Dion Leonard was a serious ultra marathon competitor in a race through the Gobi Desert, when a little street dog joined him, running by his side. We hear about Dion’s childhood, why he started running, what it takes to be an ultra competitor, and we meet Gobi, the dog with eyes that appear to see into your soul. You may already be aware of this story, as it took social media by storm, if like me, you weren’t, then the prologue sets your mind at ease before you start this simply sensational story. ‘Finding Gobi’ joins man and dog in a story to warm the cockles of your heart, I absolutely adored it. It is worth noting that a children’s version of the story is also available. ~ Liz Robinson
'My favourite debut of 2017 ...as funny as it is poignant' Lena Dunham When Nell Stevens was given the opportunity to spend three months in a location of her choice in order to write her novel, she was determined to rid herself of all distractions. So Nell decided to travel to Bleaker Island (official population: two) in the Falklands where she would write 2,500 words a day. But Bleaker House is not that novel. Instead this is a book about a young woman realising that the way to writing fiction doesn't necessarily lie in total solitude and a clear plan. Nor does it lie in a daily ration of 1085 calories, no means of contacting the outside world and a slow descent towards something that feels worryingly like madness ...
The first known inhabitant of St Helena - long before Napoleon - was a 16th-century Portuguese renegade. In 1506 Fernao Lopes, a member of his country's minor nobility, travelled to Goa in search of honour and wealth. There he converted to Islam, married a Muslim, fought his former countrymen, and was eventually captured - his nose and hands publicly cut off for treachery. Eventually sailing for home, he jumped ship at St. Helena, becoming the island's first inhabitant, with only a black cockerel for company. News of Lopes reached the King of Portugal. Picked up by a ship sent especially for him, Lopes so impressed the King, and the Pope in Rome, that he was granted one wish. He requested his return to St Helena.
Simon Nye's TV series, The Durrells, is based loosely on Gerald Durrell's Corfu Trilogy and in particular his much-loved bestseller, My Family and Other Animals. These books in turn are based somewhat loosely on actual events. The real-life Durrells went to Corfu at the urging of Lawrence Durrell, who was already living on the island with his wife, Nancy Myers. Their intent was to keep the family together as his mother, Louisa, was drinking heavily and recovering from a breakdown; 'We can be proud of the way we brought her up,' Larry said, only half-jokingly, of the family's subsequent Corfu sojourn.
We have lived in villages a long time. The village was the first model for communal living. Towns came much later, then cities. Later still came suburbs, neighbourhoods, townships, communes, kibbutzes. But the village has endured. Across England, modernity creeps up to the boundaries of many, breaking the connection the village has with the land. With others, they can be as quiet as the graveyard as their housing is bought up by city 'weekenders', or commuters. The ideal chocolate box image many holidaying to our Sceptred Isle have in their minds eye may be true in some cases, but across the country the heartbeat of the real English village is still beating strongly - if you can find it. To this mission our intrepid historian and travel writer Tom Fort willingly gets on his trusty bicycle and covers the length and breadth of England to discover the essence of village life. His journeys will travel over six thousand years of communal existence for the peoples that eventually became the English.
Ordinary women doing the extraordinary. This book is testament to following your dreams and that you can do anything you put your mind too if you work hard enough. Four middle aged friends who met at a local Saturday morning rowing club decide to take on The Talisker Whiskey Challenge – also known as ‘The World's Toughest Row’ - across 3,000 miles of treacherous ocean. All four are mothers, wives and professional women but athletes? No, not athletes, yet they had a dream to follow and follow it they did. This is a story of determination, of pushing past the overwhelming feeling of failing, letting everyone down and of course of silencing the doubters, the people who say ‘You can’t do this’. This is an incredible story about an amazing experience by four amazing women. There were moments that sent shivers down my spine as I followed their journey from the very beginning when even getting to the start line was a massive undertaking. The story is told by all four women, all four friends and it feels like that too. Their warmth and love for each other shines through as they share ever moment, every fear, every failure and ultimately their success. By the end I felt so proud of the achievement and so emotionally engaged with these four ordinary mums who just happened to row an ocean. April 2017 Non-Fiction Book of the Month.
This compact guide is perfect for long weekends in Reykjavik, and longer stays in/tours around the whole country, with excellent information about which out-of-town attractions are in easily reach of the capital, including Arbær Open-Air Museum, Fjörukráin Viking Village and an unforgettable trip to the amazing Blue Lagoon (pre-booking essential!). The “What to do” section is really useful for families, split as it is into interest areas (including outdoor activities like horse-riding, hiking, swimming and whale-watching) so plans can be made to keep everyone happy. If you’re travelling solo or as a couple, it’s also strong on nightlife and shopping recommendations, with plenty of how-to-get-there information throughout.
In 1975, decades before ‘The Gap Year’ was commonplace, 22-year-old student Devika A. Rosamund fulfilled a life long dream to take time away from her studies in England to travel by herself to India. And not by hopping on a plane rather by bus as far as Iran and then by local transport through Afghanistan and Pakistan, taking six weeks with a total budget of just £300!The Road to East India is an authentic diary account of this exciting and emotional journey of a lifetime where as well as seeing famous sites in India she discovers spirituality in an Ashram and her inner strength to overcome the challenges she faces.Devika says ‘I am publishing my diary with the hope that it will inspire others to go on a journey both inner and outer, and explore this beautiful world and also their own world within.’
Yeongdo, Korea 1911. In a small fishing village on the banks of the East Sea, a club-footed, cleft-lipped man marries a fifteen-year-old girl. The couple have one child, their beloved daughter Sunja. When Sunja falls pregnant by a married yakuza, the family face ruin. But then Isak, a Christian minister, offers her a chance of salvation: a new life in Japan as his wife. Following a man she barely knows to a hostile country in which she has no friends, no home, and whose language she cannot speak, Sunja's salvation is just the beginning of her story. Through eight decades and four generations, Pachinko is an epic tale of family, identity, love, death and survival.
A fictional travelogue of Finn, a free-spirited American and budding travel writer, journeying around Europe and the Middle East in the 1970’s. Letters to Strabo is an evocative, candid and life-affirming coming of age story with a strong sense of place that will appeal to readers who enjoy literary travel writing.David Smith has also written Searching for Amber, Death in Leamington and Love in Lindfield.
Alan Partridge can make a trip to buy a pint of milk into an epic dual with destiny so I’m surprised he’s managed to “trek” as far as he documents in Nomad. It must be the Amazon you guess, or possibly a lone trek across the searing Australian desert? But no, this duel with destiny starts in Norwich and ends at… Dungeness and he’s got the new scarf and safari jacket to prove it. A life or death struggle with the elements, a coming to terms with the past that deals with failure (inability to get into Tilbury Docks) and triumph on reaching the end without too much blood spilt. Only Alan Partridge could do this journey and survive to write about it – learn and laugh reader, learn and laugh... ~ Sue Baker Like for Like ReadingMolvania: A Land Still Untouched by Modern Dentistry, Santo CelauroThree Men in a Boat to Say Nothing of the Dog, Jerome K Jerome
We all love to travel. We all love escape. Granted, some are more adventurous than others, hankering to cross vast plains of unchartered territory, while the rest of us just want to find a nice hotel somewhere by a crystal blue sea. Whatever your level of wanderlust, there’s something here to inspire, inform and invade your senses. Follow in the footsteps of pioneers, heroes or trusted raconteurs; visit the real settings of favourite works of fiction (See our Reading on Location guide and read great novels set in the place you’re sitting in!); discover off the beaten track getaways; ponder the history of travel itself, laugh at anecdotes of the hapless. In short, by using our Book of the Month recommendations and taking a little stroll around the section, you can discover the world without leaving your fireside chair. Free your mind, they say, and the rest will follow.
“We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.” T.S. Elliot