Showing titles in Politics & Activism

On 6 February 1918, after campaigning for over 50 years, British women were finally granted the vote. In November 1919, the first woman MP, Lady Nancy Astor, was elected to the House of Commons. History was made. A hundred years on, it is time to reflect on the daring and painful struggle women undertook to break into a political system that excluded them.

A powerful ruler, an alluring young woman, a scandal that would rock the nation: Anne Boleyn’s life story sounds more like a juicy TV docu-drama than a chapter of English history. Although she is not of noble birth or even especially beautiful, Anne Boleyn manages to rise to the very pinnacle of the English aristocracy. Renowned for her extraordinarily vivid recreations of historical events, Carolly Erickson brings out the full fascinating story of the enigmatic Anne Boleyn.

Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr. served as special assistant to President John F. Kennedy throughout his presidency—from the long and grueling campaign to Kennedy's tragic and unexpected assassination by Lee Harvey Oswald. In A Thousand Days, Schlesinger combines intimate knowledge as one of President Kennedy's inner circle with sweeping research and historic context to provide a look at one of the most legendary presidential administrations in American history.

In A Royal Duty, Paul Burrell reveals the truth about Princess Diana, as well as a faithful account of her thoughts. He was the favourite footman who formed a unique relationship with the Queen. He was the butler who the Princess of Wales called "my rock" and "the only man I can trust". He was accused of theft, then acquitted following the historic intervention of the monarch. He was the Princess' most intimate confidant.

Every queen had ladies-in-waiting. Her confidantes and chaperones, they are the forgotten agents of the Tudor court. Ever present and yet hidden behind the scenes, these women held the secrets and the hearts of some of the Tudor period's most powerful men and women. Experts at survival, negotiating the competing demands of their families and their queen, the ladies-in-waiting of Henry VIII's wives were far more than decorative 'extras': they were serious political players who changed the course of history, and four of them became queen themselves.

In her memoir, Giorgia Meloni speaks about herself in depth for the first time. She talks about her roots, her childhood, and her relationship with her mother Anna, her sister Arianna, her grandparents Maria and Gianni, and the pain of her father’s absence. She shares her visceral passion for politics, which took her from her neighborhood of Garbatella to the Government as a Minister, and then to the leadership of Fratelli d’Italia and the European Conservatives.

Winner of the Costa Biography Award What makes a Stalin? Was he a Tsarist agent or Lenin's bandit? Was he to blame for his wife's death? When did the killing start? Based on revelatory research, here is the thrilling story of how a charismatic cobbler's son became a student priest, romantic poet...

Was Tony Blair a visionary, impatiently looking ahead, or a leader trapped by his past: Labour's vote-losing 1980s and the dominance of Margaret Thatcher? Was the party's move to the right under Blair necessary in order for them to win, or could they, after 18 years of Tory rule, have afforded to be more daring, more left-wing, than their leader wished to recognise? In Steve Richards' short, provocative and highly engaging new biography, he argues that Blair was often the opposite of what we remember him being.

Brought to you by Penguin. A major reassessment of one of Britain’s most strange and fascinating kings, James I of England and VI of Scotland James VI & I, who died 400 years ago, was one of Britain’s most consequential and interesting monarchs, not least in creating the British monarchy...

A unique burden was inherited by the children of President John Fitzgerald Kennedy and his celebrated siblings, Senators Robert and Ted Kennedy. Raised in a world of enormous privilege against the backdrop of American history, this third generation of Kennedys often veered between towering accomplishment and devastating defeat. In his revelatory new audiobook, acclaimed Kennedy historian J. Randy Taraborrelli draws back the curtain on the next generation of America’s most famous family.

In 16th-century Europe, two women came to hold all the power, against all the odds. They were Elizabeth I and Catherine de Medici. One a Virgin Queen who ruled her kingdom alone, and the other a clandestine leader who used her children to shape the dynasties of Europe, much has been written about these iconic women. But nothing has been said of their complicated relationship: 30 years of friendship, competition and conflict that changed the face of Europe.

THE #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER ‘Every time Churchill took to the airwaves it was as if he were injecting adrenaline-soaked courage directly into the British people … Larson tells the story of how that feat was accomplished … Fresh, fast and deeply moving.’ New York Times A STARTLING...

Medieval queens were seen as mere dynastic trophies, yet many of the Plantagenet queens of the High Middle Ages dramatically broke away from the restrictions imposed on their sex, as Alison Weir shows in this gripping group biography of England's fourteenth-century consorts. Using personal letters and wonderfully vivid sources, Alison Weir evokes the lives of five remarkable queens: Marguerite of France, Isabella of France, Philippa of Hainault, Anne of Bohemia and Isabella of Valois.

Despite considerable press coverage and a lengthy trial, the full story of the Fundamentalist Church of Latter Day Saints has remained largely untold. Only one man can reveal the whole, astounding truth: Sam Brower, the private investigator who devoted years of his life to breaking open the secret practices of the FLDS and bringing Warren Jeffs and his inner circle to justice.

SOON TO BE THE TV SERIES 'THE SERPENT QUEEN', STARRING SAMANTHA MORTON The bestselling revisionist biography of one of the great women of the 16th century Orphaned in infancy, Catherine de Medici was the sole legitimate heiress to the Medici family fortune. Married at fourteen to the future...

One of the most famous queens in history, Mary Stuart lived in her homeland for just twelve years: as a dauntless child who laughed at her friends' seasickness as they sailed to safety in France and later, on her return as an eighteen-year-old widow to take control of a nation riven with factions, dissent, and religious strife. Brief though her in time Scotland was, her experience profoundly influenced who she was and what happened to her.

In the year 493, the leader of a vast confederation of Gothic warriors, their wives, and children personally cut down Odoacer, the man famous for deposing the last Roman emperor in 476. That leader became Theoderic the Great (454-526). This engaging history of his life and reign immerses listeners in the world of the warrior-king who ushered in decades of peace and stability in Italy as king of Goths and Romans.

She was peaches-and-cream innocence; he was a handsome war hero. Both had royal blood coursing through their veins. The marriage of Britain's Princess Elizabeth to Lt Philip Mountbatten in November 1947 is remembered as the beginning of an extraordinary lifelong union but success was not guaranteed. Elizabeth and Philip: A Story of Young Love, Marriage and Monarchy plunges us back into 1940s Britain where a teenage Princess fell in love with a foreign Prince. 

Power and Glory begins with the fallout from the revelation of the Duke of Windsor's wartime treachery, and ends with the Coronation of Elizabeth II on 2 June 1953. In between, it depicts a monarchy - and a country - struggling to cope with the aftermath of World War Two, in an era where old...

Books about the Kennedys are legion. Yet missing until now has been the exploration of the bond between Jack and Bobby, and the part that it played in their rise and fall. Richard D. Mahoney gives us Jack and Bobby in all their hubris and humanity, youthfulness and fatalism. Here is American history as it unfolds. The Kennedy Brothers is a fresh and masterful account of the men whose legacy continues to hold the American imagination.