The title of this book undersells its subject; it is so much more than a history of the pageant and the year in which it fell. The Year of the Pageant is an economic, political and social encyclopaedia of Edwardian Bath and its surrounding towns and villages.
The year of the pageant refers to the [...]

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Wild Dayz is a reminder of a time before camera phones when photography was more art than mental illness. Shot with wit and innocence on the Bristol hip-hop scene between 1983 and 1988, each of the hundred or so pictures in this book tells the story of music and youth culture through the eyes of [...]

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The Rapallo Legacy is Bristol-based writer Alison Cooper’s first novel. Sixty year-old Diana Motcombe described herself as happy. She had a loving husband, two children, a comfortable home and enough money. But when her husband, Bernard, dies leaving a note not to be opened until six months after his death a whole new world unfolds. [...]

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Aahh, (or should that be Arrghh?) everyone loves a pirate. Men, women and children happily don peg-leg, eye-patch and hook-for-a-hand and attempt a gruff approximation of a beloved West Country burr when there’s a party in town. But the loveable rogue of film, television and fancy dress is a thousand leagues away from the grim [...]

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As one who always meant to go to India, but to date has never quite made it, reviewing this book was almost as good as the real McCoy. Beginning at the back, geographical descriptions of the various Indian states include an indication of the best time of year to visit a particular region; the corresponding [...]

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A few years ago, just before he died, I had a brief but memorable encounter with that noted denizen of Soho, Daniel Farson, outside the French Pub. I had some friends with me and one of them aimed a remark, that might be regarded in retrospect as mildly disrespectful, at the friend of Bacon and [...]

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As an enthusiastic amateur photographer there have been a number of occasions when I have been out with my camera and have been struck by a location and said to myself, ‘There’s a picture here somewhere’. So when I was given the book Finding the Picture by Phil Malpas and Clive Minnitt I was hoping [...]

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Us writers tread a line. On one side is publication, (Glory! Respect!); on the other, rejection – and character building.
In music and art, there’s an apprenticeship, a long immersion, a perfecting of skills, and finding a level. But is there a similar apprenticeship for a novelist? If there is it might be served reading [...]

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The Sunday People once described Ian Bone as ‘Britain’s Most Dangerous Man’. Here, he has rescued from obscurity a hundred-year-old gem of anarchist literature. Hartmann the Anarchist is a nineteenth-century tale of personal resolve and the allure of extremism – and a cracking action-adventure to boot.
Stanley the narrator is a political activist but a [...]

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Unrivalled in most respects, Alastair Sawday’s format for holiday guidebooks marries prose, symbols and illustrations to feed the reader tempting suggestions for that all-important event, the holiday. The latest in Special Places to Stay, Green Europe, is attentive to eco-matters – such topics as biodynamic farming, renewable energy, owners’ contributions to the welfare of the [...]

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