The Student Book

Chris Davies is acknowledged to be Britain’s foremost graduate coach. He founded his company, Graduate Coach, seven years ago and, since then, has kick-started the careers of over 300 graduates. As a result, Amazon, Aviva, Bloomberg, Coca-Cola, Deloitte, Facebook, Goldman Sachs, Google, JP Morgan, Lloyds Bank and many other blue chip companies count Chris’s alumni among their employees. So, too, do organisations such as Network Rail and the NHS. Before Graduate Coach, Chris pursued two other careers, in magazine publishing and advertising and marketing. In both cases, Chris built successful enterprises from scratch.

The Tale of a Hip

The Tale of a Hip is an account of the author’s 80-year life to date, through a period of huge social change, during which, technology has taken over from nature. It is the story of true love lasting six decades, despite the fact that physical aspects of the relationship were less good than they might have been, due to an unsuspected structural problem that only came to light when Pamela and her husband, John, took up dancing in their 40s.

The mystery of Pamela’s shifting bones is unravelled piece by piece, from art-influenced early years in Yorkshire, through the excitement and romance of working in a burgeoning post-war London, to marriage and, later, to obsession with dancing, resulting in back and hip issues for many years.

The Twins’ Twins

Rayn, a self-made businesswoman is in infinite danger of being arrested for domestic violence against Nathanial, her partner. She flees Western Australia and ends up in a hastily agreed house swap at the foot of Muckish Mountain in Donegal, Ireland.
Friendless and alone she becomes involved with 20-year-old identical twins, Isaac and Raphael. The twins play a game where they both make love to her.
Rayn is horrified to find she is pregnant. She plans to have an abortion in England.
Both the twins believe they are the father. Isaac wants her to have an abortion.
Raphael cancels her appointment at the London clinic.
Rayn becomes suicidal. She climbs Muckish to end her life under the Whispering Waterfall.
But this is Ireland. Things are not always as they seem.

The Unknown Confidante

The true story of a woman who lost the most precious thing in her life because of another woman. Apparently, we can forgive as much as we are able to love, but I have found this is not always true.

Today, even after so much time has passed, and although I have accepted what happened to me, I still don't understand what it was supposed to teach me. I won't get the answers that would enlighten this darkness in the time I have left on this earth. I waited a decade for one of these answers, and I will wait even my entire lifetime for the other ones.

The Unspoken Identity

What will you do upon waking up and discovering that you have two vaginas, two cervixes and two wombs? How would you feel? How do you explain it to your friends and family?

This and many other questions led to the story you are about to read. Elizabeth a young vibrant lady, full of life was just like many of you. However, she never knew that her challenging health journey as a young woman growing up was all part of the big discovery that would unfold later in her adult life.

Elizabeth, curious in her nature, decided to seek answers for her chronic pains, fatigue and recurrent infections. She knew something was not quite right but could not confirm what it was. Read her story to discover how she was diagnosed with this rare biological abnormality and her quest to share her findings with the rest of the world.

The Wars of Nagorno Karabagh – Stage and Backstage

At the end of September 2020, the Azerbaijani army launched a sudden and massive assault against the Armenian enclave of Nagorno Karabagh.

Over six weeks, the Azerbaijani army (fully supported by Turkey) and the Armenian armies (from the Republic of Armenia and Nagorno Karabagh) violently clashed amidst artillery fire, deadly drone ballets and tanks attacks… In early November 2020, the Armenians were defeated. The world then suddenly remembered that the Caucasus is as complicated as it is explosive.

The Wars of Nagorno Karabagh – Stage and Backstage is intended to help better understand this crisis – its historical background, implications and pitfalls (first prize in the last category would go to the regional political map redrawn by Stalin) as well as the geopolitical interests of Russia, Iran, and Israel… Particular attention is given to the new game played by Turkey which is now spurred on by the ambition of again becoming, at all costs, a member of the club of world powers.

The Way We Are

The Way We Are is an account of a life passed in England, Saudi Arabia, and 50+ years in post-war Japan.

How a search for peace of mind became an attempt at self-realization – “satori” or enlightenment, and an acceptance of why we cannot be other than we are – involving (for no clear reason) an induction into a local secret society, learning to deal with voices in the head and telepathy, hypnotism and “Ki” (being manipulated by another person’s will), prescience, visual and other apparitions, 'ghosts', 'poltergeists' etc. All personally experienced without the influence of any stimulants.

This book deals with questioning the limitations of ‘self’ as sufficient identity in this truly modern world, a world where every single one of us is now almost certainly, at some stage, going to be obliged to recognize themselves as that very much rejected and unwanted ‘other’. It also explores moving the mind away from conflict as a solution and examining the fine line between political, commercial, philosophical/religious guidance and control.

The Weird Way Round

A 40-year-old Sydney-based Englishman at a personal and professional crossroads in his life embarks on four months of solo global travel, which he resolutely refuses to accept might be best described as an exercise in ‘finding himself’. Epic landscapes, humorous encounters with an eclectic mix of Airbnb hosts, a late-in-life induction into dating apps and a keen eye for the curious and bizarre combine to turn the trip into a thought-provoking adventure. From unexplained crimes in Panama, sex tourism in Costa Rica and disastrous dating in Guatemala through to hire-car burial in the Californian desert and an encounter with a toothless lady in a bar in San Francisco, it’s a story about strange and unpredictable things that happen when you hit the road in search of the unknown. 

There is a Light

Abandoned

Orphaned

Manipulated

Gay

It was no wonder that I became rebellious and resentful. Standing up to all these pressures in my life and faced with my grandmother’s mortality, I reverted to the frightened child I thought I had left behind. I was overcome with anxiety and panic attacks; that paralysed me to the point of contemplating suicide.

The years of abandonment and feelings of futility following my childhood institutionalisation and the early death of my mother from a lifelong illness, manifested themselves in highly emotional and physical ways that made it impossible for me to function in society – so I withdrew.

From within this debilitating experience, I had to find a way through by obtaining the professional help I needed. This is my story of tenacity to live my life with the freedom to make my own decisions.

There was Once a Street in Bethnal Green

Derek Houghton was born and bred in London’s East End, Bethnal Green, when horses and carts were just as predominant on its streets as motorised vehicles. It was at a time when National Health was not even a dream, or any kind of benefit existed, the only benefit available was by taking the “Means Test” (Dole Money) that most East Enders were too proud to take. Poverty was never any stranger to their doors, unemployment was rife, and the pawnshops did a roaring trade. People then could walk the streets in safety, the streets were the children’s playgrounds, where they played unhindered. As hard as times were, neighbours showed great compassion in helping each other. Each street was like a village, where everybody knew everyone else. World War II was to bring about an even stronger bond with each other. Above all, it was the love of a street – “Our Street.”

They Call Me Jake

In this captivating memoir, Jakob, a Welsh-born Australian, takes readers on a remarkable journey that begins with a troubled youth and a life-changing decision. After running into legal trouble as a teenager, his family sends him off to sea on Scandinavian ships, where Jakob finds himself working out of Brooklyn, New York, joining ships engaged in global trade. It’s the era of rock and roll, with an atmosphere of freedom, free-spiritedness, and indulgence. However, tired of the endless partying and constant financial struggle, Jakob sets his sights on a new path.

He travels to England, enrolls in a navigational school, and earns his license as a ship’s deck officer. But his thirst for adventure and reinvention leads him to an unexpected destination - Israel. Jakob’s love for the kibbutz lifestyle and a young woman on the kibbutz captures his heart. However, as war disrupts the region, their relationship crumbles, and Jakob finds solace in a hippie commune on the sunny shores of Eilat. Through ups and downs, Jakob’s journey takes him across continents, from the Canadian Arctic to Thailand and beyond. His tale is one of resilience, self-discovery, and the pursuit of a meaningful life amidst the challenges and uncertainties of a rapidly changing world.

They Never Reigned

British kings and queens are famous today. But many heirs to the British throne never became the actual king or queen due to various quirks of fate. This is their story. The stories include the oldest son of William the Conqueror, who lost the chance to become king because he was off fighting in the First Crusade; the White Ship disaster of 1120, England’s medieval Titanic, in which the sole male heir to the throne, and many others, drowned; an intrepid woman who nearly became queen in her own right four centuries before a woman actually did so; two princes who should have become a second King Arthur; the romantic warrior known to history as the Black Prince; the Princes in the Tower, who were supposedly murdered by King Richard III; the ill-fated Mary, Queen of Scots, beheaded by Queen Elizabeth I after an utterly unfair trial; James, who was born the heir and then was overthrown while still a baby, and was later known as the Old Pretender; a beloved Nineteenth Century princess who tragically died in childbirth at the age of 21; and many more.

Who suspected that the heirs who never reigned are every bit as interesting as those who did reign?