Showing results by author "David" in All Categories

The New Testament gives us 27 canonical texts - gospels, letters, and more - but these works are only a tiny fraction of the many volumes written about the life of Jesus, his family, and the apostles. This alternative body of literature falls under the category of "apocrypha", which means "hidden" or "secret", and it offers fascinating insights into the early Christian world. But these early Christian apocryphal works are more than historical curiosities.

Digital Apollo examines the design and execution of each of the six Apollo moon landings, drawing on transcripts and data telemetry from the flights, astronaut interviews, and NASA's extensive archives. Mindell's exploration of how human pilots and automated systems worked together to achieve the ultimate in flight - a lunar landing - traces and reframes the debate over the future of humans and automation in space.

In this unique new history of the world's most ubiquitous language, linguistics expert David Crystal draws on words that best illustrate the huge variety of sources, influences and events that have helped to shape our vernacular since the first definitively English word was written down in the fifth century.

Arlott and Swanton typified the contrasting aspects of post-war Britain. Because of their strong personalities and distinctive voices – Swanton's crisp and upper-class, Arlott's with its Hampshire burr – each had a loyal following. As England moved from a class-based to a more egalitarian society, nothing stayed the same – including professional cricket. Wise, lively and filled with rich social and sporting history, Arlott, Swanton and the Soul of English Cricket shows how, as the game entered a new era, these two very different men battled to save the soul of the game.

Moscow, 1993. The end of the Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet Union have brought unimaginable change to Russia. With this change come new freedoms: freedom to travel abroad and to befriend Westerners, freedom to make money, and even the freedom for an underground gay scene to take root. Encouraged by the new climate of openness, twenty-one-year-old Kostya ventures out of the closet and resolves to pursue his dreams: to work in the theatre and to find love as his idol Tchaikovsky never could.

The murder of brutal landowner Fyodor Karamazov changes the lives of his sons irrevocably: Mitya, the sensualist, whose bitter rivalry with his father immediately places him under suspicion for parricide; Ivan, the intellectual, driven to breakdown; the spiritual Alyosha, who tries to heal the family's rifts; and the shadowy figure of their bastard half-brother, Smerdyakov. Dostoyevsky's dark masterwork evokes a world where the lines between innocence and corruption, good and evil, blur and everyone's faith in humanity is tested.

In a prosperous yet gruesomely violent near future, superhero vigilantes battle thugs whose heads are full of supervillain fantasies. The peace is kept by a team of smooth, well-dressed negotiators called The Men in Fancy Suits. Meanwhile a young girl is caught in the middle and thinks the whole thing is ridiculous. Zoey, a recent college graduate with a worthless degree, makes a reluctant trip into the city after hearing that her estranged con artist father had died in a mysterious yet spectacular way.

The war of Troy is looming, and all the kings of the Great Green are gathering, friends and enemies, each with their own dark plans of conquest and plunder. Into this maelstrom of treachery and deceit come three travellers; Piria, a runaway priestess nursing a terrible secret, Kalliades, a warrior with a legendary sword, and Banokles who will carve his own legend in the battles to come.

The first edition, published in 2007, won a James Beard Award. Now updated with newly discovered recipes and historical information, this updated edition includes the origins of the first American drink, the mint julep (which Wondrich places before the American Revolution) and those of the cocktail itself. It also provides more detail about 19th-century spirits, many new and colorful anecdotes and details about Thomas' life, and a number of particularly notable, delicious, and influential cocktails not covered in the original edition.

In the aftermath of the Dropsite Massacre at Isstvan V, a battered and bloodied force of Iron Hands, Raven Guard and Salamanders regroups on a seemingly insignificant death world. Fending off attacks from all manner of monstrous creatures, the fractious allies find hope in the form of human refugees fleeing from the growing war and cast adrift upon the tides of the warp.

The war is over; Hitler is dead - and yet his evil legacy lives on. Saffron Courtney and her beloved husband, Gerhard, only just survived the brutal conflict, but Gerhard's Nazi-supporting brother, Konrad, is still free and determined to regain power. As a dangerous game of cat and mouse develops, a plot against the couple begins to stir. One that will have ramifications throughout Europe....

DCI Harry Grimm has a sneaking suspicion the bleak Yorkshire Dales are growing on him. Though shadows from his big-city past still loom, he’s finding his place among the quirky townsfolk and their eccentric eating habits. But his gruesome crime scene expertise takes center stage when a successful visiting author is found dead. Investigating the cantankerous writer’s entourage, Grimm lines up too many suspects with motives for murder. But with the evidence not adding up and the press piling on relentless pressure, the determined policeman could end up facing his own final chapter.

Aeons once ruled the world. Now, their empire lies in ruin, and the survivors hide on the fringes of society. Nahlia is a librarian's apprentice who's obsessed with Aeon lore, scavenging for hints of their legendary power. But others are searching too, including the Templars who seek to hunt down the Aeon survivors. When the Templars attack her family, Nahlia is forced to infiltrate a secret academy and rise beyond everything she's ever known.

For most of human history, the seas and oceans have been the main means of long-distance trade and communication between peoples - for the spread of ideas and religion as well as commerce. This book traces the history of human movement and interaction around and across the world's greatest bodies of water, charting our relationship with the oceans from the time of the first voyagers.

The finale of the Zombie Road tale. It's been a month since the outbreak, and the survivors of the zombie apocalypse have started a new life in a walled city. There are still a few enemies that need to be dealt with, the kind that can think and plan, and they can be more devastating than a horde of the undead.

In a world where vampires and witches live in secrecy, 16-year-old Larissa Norton's life is turned upside down when her vampire parents are murdered and a dark presence begins pursuing her. Forced to flee into hiding, Larissa discovers she is not who she thought she was. She learns her real name is Larissa Dubois, a powerful witch born in 1920s New Orleans.

In The Song of the Dodo, we follow Quammen's keen intellect through the ideas, theories, and experiments of prominent naturalists of the last two centuries. We trail after him as he travels the world, tracking the subject of island biogeography, which encompasses nothing less than the study of the origin and extinction of all species. Why is this island idea so important? Because islands are where species most commonly go extinct - and because, as Quammen points out, we live in an age when all of Earth's landscapes are being chopped into island-like fragments by human activity.

David Stahel's groundbreaking new account of Operation Typhoon captures the perspectives of both the German high command and individual soldiers, revealing that despite success on the battlefield the wider German war effort was in far greater trouble than is often acknowledged.

In Tibet, geologist David R. Montgomery heard a local story about a great flood that bore a striking similarity to Noah’s Flood. Intrigued, Montgomery began investigating theworld’s flood stories and - drawing from historic works by theologians, natural philosophers, and scientists - discovered the counterintuitive role Noah’s Flood played in the development of both geology and creationism.

Alexander of Macedon was one of history’s greatest ever military commanders. By the time of his death, aged just 32, he had conquered the entire Persian Empire and was ruler of a vast territory stretching from Greece to the borders of India. These six episodes tell his extraordinary life story, as reimagined by acclaimed dramatist David Wade.