Nonfiction

"In the autumn month of September, eighteen hundred and fifty-seven... two idle apprentices, exhausted by the long, hot summer, and the long, hot work it had brought with it, ran...

Great Irish Documents presents the most momentous and stirring documents in the history of Ireland. From St Patrick's confession, via the harrowing reports of the Famine Relief Commission, the dramatic...

"Marie Duffy is one of the best choreographers in the world. She has been my dance master and right-hand person since 1996. She is like my twin sister. I will...

The Sunday Times Top 10 BestsellerShortlisted for a British Book Industry Book of the Year Award 2016Ancient Rome matters.Its history of empire, conquest, cruelty and excess is something against which...

Richard Crosbie (1756-1824) is rightly celebrated as Ireland's first aeronaut. Inspired by balloon experiments in France, he constructed a hydrogen balloon with the aim of flying across the Irish Sea....

The Ulster Tourist Development Association declared in 1935 that 'Armagh is perhaps the most important county in Ulster from the tourist's point of view'. It is certainly the case that...

Kilmainham Gaol is a building with a remarkable history. From 1796, when the first prisoners were received within its portals, to 1924, when the last prisoners were removed, it held...

In 1914, County Armagh represented a microcosm of Ireland, with an industrialised, urban north, and a largely rural, agricultural south. It was also the ecclesiastical capital of Ireland and the...

In this important new work, the author analyses the contributions that our Ministers for Education made to the Irish education system between the years 1919 and 1999.Covering the social, economic...

Offering a unique insight into the habitual inebriate offender class in Ireland, this book examines the inebriate reformatory system in Ireland from its foundation in 1900 until its closure in...

The Irish heritage of the Bronte family has long been overlooked, partly because both Charlotte and her father Patrick did their very best to ensure that this was the case...

In this fundamentally important work, Professor Brendan Kelly explores the background to Irish psychiatry in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, charting its progress and development. Using detailed case studies...

Patrick Pearse, teacher, poet, and one of the executed leaders of the 1916 Rising has long been a central figure in Irish history. The book provides a radically new interpretation...

Derry~Londonderry has a distinctive cultural history which reflects its unique position in the history of Ireland. This ground-breaking book examines three centuries of music and theatre in the city highlighting...

In 1914, County Armagh represented a microcosm of Ireland, with an industrialised, urban north, and a largely rural, agricultural south. It was also the ecclesiastical capital of Ireland and the...

Beyond the footlights

THE LITTLE BOOK OF IRISH LANDMARKS is a compendium of fascinating, obscure, strange and entertaining facts about some of Ireland's most iconic landmarks and popular tourist attractions.Here you will find...

From Hugh de Lacy's effective conquest of Meath in the 1170s and the establishment of Anglo-Norman power, through to the demise of what has been termed the `landed aristocracy' at...

From postcolonial Africa to revolutionary Iran, from the military dictatorships of Latin America to Soviet Russia, the Polish journalist and writer Ryszard Kapuscinski was one of the most dauntless and...

For centuries the Celts held sway in Europe. Even after their conquest by the Romans, their culture remained vigorous, ensuring that much of it endured to feed an endless fascination...

Almost seventy-five years ago, MI9 dreamt up the most audacious escape and evasion plan of World War Two. Formulated by Airey Neave, one of the first men ever to escape...

A dazzling account of the development of American cultural hegemony from one of the world's leading literary theorists. Franco Moretti, acclaimed author of Graphs, Maps, Trees and Distant Reading, distils...

A journey - both historical and contemporary - among the fantastical landscapes, resourceful inhabitants and isolated tribes of the world's fourth-largest island of enduring fascination for its rich biodiversity: Madagascar.'A...

PAPERBACK EDITION INCLUDES AN AFTERWORD WITH NEW INFORMATION ON THE KELLY CASE. A DAILY TELEGRAPH BOOK OF THE YEAR. 'A compelling, authoritative insight into possibly the most controversial death in...

Julia Kelly met a charismatic and successful artist, Charlie Whisker, while she was working on her first novel. He was twenty years older than her. Their relationship was passionate and...

With the imminent arrival of her third child, veterinary surgeon, Gillian Hick, decides to abandon the perils of mixed animal practice, in a favour of setting up a small animal...

By the time of his death, Thomas Stamford Raffles (1781-1826) was the founder of Singapore and Governor of Java, having left school in his early teens to become a clerk...

'Zingy, fresh, and unexpected: Annie Gray, the queen of food historians, finds her perfect subject. A book to devour.' - Lucy WorsleyThis is the story of a woman who was...

SHORTLISTED FOR THE WAINWRIGHT PRIZE FOR NATURE WRITING - HIGHLY COMMENDED'Remarkable' Robert Macfarlane'Beautiful' Amy Liptrot'Powerful, unflinching . . . Part hymn to nature, part Troubles memoir' GuardianKerri ni Dochartaigh was...

For more than two thousand years the people of St Kilda remained remote from the world. Their society was viable, utopian even; but in the nineteenth century the islands were...

In this frank, playful and typically unorthodox collection of essays, Alasdair Gray tells how his early life experiences influenced his writing, including the creation of those landmarks of literature, Lanark...

From the debris of her troubled early life, Lidia Yuknavitch weaves an astonishing tale of survival. It is a life that navigates, and transcends, abuse, addiction, self-destruction and the crushing...

'London is a giant kaleidoscope, which is forever turning. Take your eye off it for more than a moment and you're lost.' Robert Elms has seen his beloved city change...

'London is a giant kaleidoscope, which is forever turning. Take your eye off it for more than a moment and you're lost.'Robert Elms has seen his beloved city change beyond...

In Miniature is a delightful, entertaining and illuminating investigation into our peculiar fascination with making things small, and what small things tell us about the world at large.Here you will...

A quiet chat with Casanova turns into a catalogue of racy encounters set in 18th-century Venice and other cities ... and we can even ask questions! You'll find out just...

The first ever collection of the letters between Churchill and his mother. '[An] entertaining and illuminating collection ... As a whole it is a deeply moving account' Literary Review. 'This...

To maintain the pace at which he worked as a parliamentarian, cabinet minister, war leader, writer and painter, Churchill required a vast female staff of secretaries, typists and others. For...

A Sunday Times Book of the Year'A book about love, identity, acceptance and the freedom to write, paint, compose and wear corduroy breeches with gaiters. To swear, kiss, publish and...

Over the last twenty years, critical discussion of Thomas Mann has highlighted the role of his homosexuality for his creative work. This not only is presented as a dynamic underlying...

In the wake of Texas enacting a bill to deny abortions after 6 weeks, Loved and Wanted shines a light on motherhood and the right to choose.'Haunting, wild, and quiet...

'Ridiculously enjoyable' Tom HollandA Book of the Year for The Times, Mail on Sunday and BBC History MagazineThe 'Mermaid of Morwenstow' excommunicated a cat for mousing on a Sunday. When...

A Guardian best history book of 2016Eccentric, shy aristocrat ... or mad, bad and dangerous to know?Neighbour Jane Austen found the 3rd earl of Portsmouth a model gentleman and Lord...

'Tim Tate, in Hitler's British Traitors, [explores] the entire grimy landscape of British treachery during the Second World War and the astonishing rogues' gallery of traitors working to help Nazi...

At the outbreak of war in 1939, ordinary people were quickly forced to adapt to the realities of a nation under dire threat. But it soon became known as the...