Showing results by narrator "Finlay Robertson" in All Categories

Joe Mulhall knows what it’s like to stare fascism in the face. For a decade, often undercover at significant personal risk, he has investigated hate groups. He infiltrated a US white supremacist militia, set up a fake Ku Klux Klan branch, has been on countless street marches with violent far-right groups across Europe and got inside some of the most important ‘alt-right’ meetings ever held. Brazil, India and the US are still in thrall to authoritarian populism, and far-right views have become steadily normalised in mainstream politics.

It's 2006 in the fictional East London borough of Leytonstow. The UK’s pub smoking ban is about to happen, and 38-and-a-half year old John Torrington, a mopper and trolley collector at his local DIY store, is secretly in love with the stylish, beautiful, and middle-class barmaid Lois. John and his hapless, strange, and down-on-their-luck friends, Gabby Longfeather and Glyn Hopkins, live in Clements Markham House - a semi-derelict Edwardian villa divided into unsanitary bedsits, and (mis)managed by the shrewd, Dickensian business man, Mr Kapoor.

When Henry Scowcroft's partner, Zarah, was diagnosed with stage-four bladder cancer in 2016, their world fell apart. An award-winning science writer for Cancer Research UK, Henry had spent 14 years at the coal-face of cancer research, but now the disease had infiltrated his personal life too. Henry uses this unique perspective to tell the story of Zarah's illness, how he tried in vain to use everything he'd learnt in his professional career to try to save her and in doing so, how he realised that even a career writing about cancer daily isn't enough preparation for what comes next.

Artist, lover, wife, mother: can one woman be them all? Born in 1924, Jennet Mallow grew up with a disillusioned mother and a father haunted by memories of war. But Jennet has a talent - and a passion - for art. When she meets the handsome painter David Heaton, they begin a tempestuous affair which takes them from the dank terraces of London to a bohemian artistic community in St Ives. But as Jennet's career flourishes, her relationship with David suffers - with potentially tragic consequences....

What happens to a man who has his ear pressed to the lives of others but not much life of his own? When Stephen Donaldson joins The Institute, he anticipates excitement, romance and new status. This becomes a reality when he is assigned a new case: Phoenix, in which he becomes mesmerized by the voice of the target's wife. Dangerously in love and very lonely, Stephen sets himself up for a vertiginous fall that will forever change his life.

Towards the end of the Second World War a British artist called Kenneth Brill is arrested for painting near the village of Heathrow. Under interrogation a picture emerges as Brill tells the story of his life. Vanishing sees the world through the eyes of one of the forgotten geniuses of British Art, a man whose artistic vision is so piercing he has trouble seeing what is right in front of him.

In this witty and mischievous book, philosopher Peter Cave dissects the most controversial disputes today and uses philosophical argument to reveal that many issues are less straightforward than we'd like to believe. Leaving no sacred cow standing, Cave uses ingenious stories and examples to challenge our most strongly held assumptions. Is democracy inherently a good thing? What is the basis of so-called human rights? Is discrimination always bad? Are we morally obliged to accept refugees?

Tess and Gus are meant to be. They just haven't met properly yet. And perhaps they never will.... 'Today is the first day of the rest of your life' is the motto on a plate in the kitchen at home, and Tess can't get it out of her head, even though she's in Florence for a final idyllic holiday before university. Her life is about to change forever - but not in the way she expects. Gus and his parents are also on holiday in Florence. Their lives have already changed suddenly and dramatically.

Tess and Gus are strangers when their lives collide one sun-drenched morning in Florence, but it feels as if fate has brought them together. One their return to rainy London, will their love be strong enough to survive the challenges of their complicated lives? Is it even possible for two such different people to live happily ever after?

The social revolution of the Swinging Sixties led to a renaissance of unchecked hair growth, and long hair, especially on men, was worn as a political or countercultural symbol of protest and as an expression of masculinity. No-one who was affected by one of a turbulent decade's loudest controversies—or anyone who ever wondered what all the fuss was about—will fail to be interested in this personal account of when the 'us and them' divide between youth and elders was most profound.

This is a book of parts. Part tongue-in-cheek field guide, part comic memoire and country yearbook. It’s also a chronicle of calamities – of those unexpected events and terrible ordeals that can occur when you are out and about, just trying to enjoy life. Set over the course of 12 months, covering everything from driven pheasant, fishing in the Pyrenees, goose shooting in Scotland, boar hunting in France and foraging for food on freezing beaches in the 1970s.