Reverend Willie Maxwell was a rural preacher accused of murdering five of his family members for insurance money in the 1970s. With the help of a savvy lawyer, he escaped justice for years until a relative shot him dead at the funeral of his last victim. Despite hundreds of witnesses, Maxwell?s murderer was acquitted - thanks to the same attorney who had previously defended the Reverend. As Alabama is consumed by these gripping events, it?s not long...

Warm, funny, generous, entertaining and, above all, deeply considered, they offer thoughts on a wide variety of topics, including the origin and composition of Philip?s own stories, the craft of writing and the story-tellers who have meant the most to Philip. The art of story-telling is everywhere present in the essays themselves, in the instantly engaging tone, the vivid imagery and striking phrases, the resonant anecdotes, the humour and learnedness....

After nearly two decades in Britain, Bill Bryson took the decision to move back to the States for a few years, to let his kids experience life in another country, to give his wife the chance to shop until 10 p.m. seven nights a week, and, most of all, because he had read that 3.7 million Americans believed that they had been abducted by aliens at one time or another, and it was thus clear to him that his people needed him. But before leaving his much-loved...

I didn?t give my hands much thought before they turned against me. ? They have been chipping away at my life, slowly, slowly, in a way I could never have predicted.? Lauren Brown is anxious. And when she feels worried, she picks at her skin. Secretly, quietly, but increasingly compulsively, her skin-picking begins to affect her day-to-day life until she realizes she must unravel the reasons behind it. This sparkling memoir follows the thread of Lauren?s...

'Grief is a cruel kind of education. You learn how ungentle mourning can be, how full of anger. You learn how glib condolences can feel. You learn how much grief is about language, the failure of language and the grasping for language' On 10 June 2020, the scholar James Nwoye Adichie died suddenly in Nigeria. In this tender and powerful essay, expanded from the original New Yorker text, his daughter, a self-confessed daddy's girl, remembers her beloved...

In Defense of Plants will be a celebration of plants as living, breathing organisms fighting for survival on planet Earth. Plants don't really have a voice in today's busy world. The few plants that do get any attention are those that we humans have some use for. Whether for economic gain or some sort of purported medicinal benefit, we only seem to care what plants can do for us. Written by internationally recognized podcaster and blogger, Matt Candeias,...

Alan Bennett's third collection of prose 'Keeping On Keeping On' follows in the footsteps of the phenomenally successfully 'Writing Home' and 'Untold Stories', each published ten years apart. The latest collection contains Bennett's peerless diaries 2005 to 2015, reflecting on a decade that saw four premieres at the National Theatre, a West End double-bill transfer, and the films of 'The History Boys' and 'The Lady in the Van'.

From Frazzles to Foie Gras: a memoir of wanting moreFrom an early age, Grace Dent was hungry. As a little girl growing up in Currock, Carlisle, she yearned to be something bigger, to go somewhere better.Hungrytraces Grace?s story from growing up eating beige food to becoming one of the much-loved voices on the British food scene. It?s also everyone?s story - from treats with your nan, to cheese and pineapple hedgehogs, to the exquisite joy...

THE SUNDAY TIMES AND IRISH TIMES BESTSELLER In this incisive, radical and practical essay, Emma Dabiri - acclaimed author of Don't Touch My Hair - draws on years of research and personal experience to challenge us to create meaningful, lasting change.

Will Self and Ralph Steadman join forces once again in a further post-millennial meditation on the vexed relationship of psyche and place in a globalised world; Psycho Too brings together a second helping of their very best words and pictures from Psychogeography', the columns they contributed to the Independent for half a decade. The introduction, Journey Through Britain' is a new extended essay by Self, accompanied by Steadman's...