Jack the Ripper (Pocket Essentials: History)

Computers & Technology

Whitehead, Mark

Rivett, Miriam

Programming

Pocket Essentials

Describes some of the best known societies along with some of their least known counterparts, highlighting the similarities that all these cults have - working to a similar pattern and that basic human psychology plays a far more important role in their continued existence and their enduring appeal than any hidden wisdom, knowledge or world-shattering secret.

Secret Societies

History

NICK HARDING

World

London, more than any other city, has a secret history concealed from view. Behind the official façade promoted by the heritage industry lies a city of esoteric traditions, obscure institutions, and forgotten locations. Occult London rediscovers this history, unearthing the hidden city that lies beneath the known, from the Elizabethan magic of Dr. Dee and Simon Forman to the occult designs of Wren and Hawksmoor; from the Victorian London of Spring-Heeled Jack to the fin de siècle heyday of Madame Blavatsky and Aleister Crowley. This book describes these practitioners of the occult, alongside the myths and legends through which the city has always been perceived. The role of the occult within London's literary history is also outlined, while a gazetteer maps the sites of the most resonant occult locations. Merlin Coverley also examines the roots of a current revival of occult interest.

Occult London (Pocket Essential series)

Coverley, Merlin

Europe

It's one of the most successful—and surprising—of phenomena in the entire crime fiction genre: detectives (and proto-detectives) solving crimes in earlier eras. Barry Forshaw has written a lively, wide-ranging and immensely informed history of the genre, which might be said to have begun in earnest with Ellis Peters’ crime-solving monk Brother Cadfael in the 1970s and Umberto Eco’s The Name of the Rose in 1980 (with another monkish detective), but which has now taken readers to virtually every era and locale in the past. Forshaw has produced the perfect reader's guide to a fascinating field; every major writer is considered, often through a concentration on one or two key books, and exciting new talents are highlighted.

Historical Noir: The Pocket Essential Guide to Fiction, Film & TV (Pocket Essential series)

Humor & Entertainment

Forshaw, Barry

Movies

The Korean War of 1950-1953 ended in a frustrating stalemate, the echoes of which reverberate to this day. It was the only conflict of the Cold War in which forces of major nations of the two opposing systems - capitalism and communism - confronted each other on the battlefield. And yet, in the sixty years since it was fought it has been strangely neglected, perhaps because no one was able to claim the victor's spoils.

The War that Never Ended: A Short History of the Korean War (Pocket Essential series)

Kerr, Gordon

Military

A Short History of Disease: Plagues, Poxes and Civilisations

Health, Fitness & Dieting

Martin, Sean

Diseases & Physical Ailments

Agatha Christie (Pocket Essential series)

Biographies & Memoirs

Campbell, Mark

Arts & Literature

After nearly 1,000 books, half a dozen journals, two official inquiries, several million pages of declassified documents, dozens of TV documentaries, and hundreds of websites, is there anything left to say about the assassination of President John F. Kennedy? Hell, yes. The Kennedy assassination remains both the greatest whodunit of the post-World War II era and the best route into recent American history. Taking it as proved that Lee Harvey Oswald was indeed the patsy he claimed to be before he was murdered, this short book explores the major alternative theories produced by the critics of the official version, the major landmarks in the Kennedy assassination research, the disinformation produced on the subject since the event, and some startling recent work, which seems—finally—to lead to an answer to the question "Who killed JFK?"

Who Shot JFK? (Pocket Essential series)

Ramsay, Robin

Americas

Examines the history of saints and the development of the notion of sainthood through to the modern day.

Saints

Morgan, Giles

Religion & Spirituality

Ancient Greece (Pocket Essential series)

Western civilization began with the Greeks. From the highpoint of the 5th century BC through the cultural triumphs of the Alexandrian era to their impact on the developing Roman empire, the Greeks shaped the philosophy, art, architecture, and literature of the Mediterranean world. Beginning with the Homeric period, once believed to be a realm of myth, Paine takes the reader on a journey through more than 12 centuries of Greek culture. He shows what archaeologists have revealed of the Trojan Wars and Mycenae, outlines the glories of Athens at its height, and provides a gripping narrative of the struggle between the Greeks and the mighty Persian empire. The guide also highlights the careers of great political and military leaders, such as Pericles and Alexander the Great, and explores the importance of great philosophers, including Plato and Aristotle. Dramatists and demagogues, stoics and epicureans, aristocrats and helots all take their place in the unfolding story of Greek achievement.

Paine, Mike

Ancient Civilizations

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