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  James and Esther Cooper Jackson...

  Sara Rzeszutek Haviland

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  This dual biography “examines the ideas and activism of two of the most committed and significant freedom fighters in twentieth-century America” (Erik Gellman, author of Death Blow to Jim Crow). 
   
  Growing up in Virginia during the Great Depression, James E. Jackson and Esther Cooper Jackson understood that opportunities came differently for blacks and whites, men and women, rich and poor. They devoted their lives to the black freedom movement and saw a path to racial equality through the Communist Party. This political affiliation would come to define not only their activism but also the course of their marriage as the Cold War years unfolded. 
   
  In this dual biography, Sara Rzeszutek examines the couple's political involvement as well as the evolution of their personal and public lives in the face of ever-shifting contexts. She documents the Jacksons' contributions to the early civil rights movement, discussing their time leading the Southern Negro Youth Congress, which laid the groundwork for youth activists in the 1960s; their writings in periodicals such as Political Affairs; and their editorial involvement in The Worker and the civil rights magazine Freedomways. 
   
  Drawing upon correspondence, organizational literature, and interviews with the Jacksons themselves, Haviland presents a portrait of a remarkable pair who lived during a transformative period of American history. Their story offers a vital narrative of persistence, love, and activism across the long arc of the black freedom movement.

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  Anoint My Head - How I Failed to...

  Andy Macleod

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  It’s 1992 and Horace dreams of becoming a rockstar with his band the Pointy Birds. The only problem is that his day-job (mis)filing vinyl in a Soho record store is stealing all his time and energy, plus rival bands like Suede, Blur, Pulp and Radiohead are moving on to bigger and better things. But then someone called Ricky offers his services as a band manager and at last the dream can start. 
  Anoint My Head is the tale of a band who didn’t become rich, or famous but had a manager who did. It is also the story of a musical era, and documents the rise of some of the biggest British Britpop bands of the nineties, plus a comedian who went on to write quite a successful sitcom about a paper merchants in Slough. 
  A coming-of-age story about pursuing your dreams and what happens when reality gets in the way.  
  Perfect for fans of Caitlin Moran, Nicky Hornby & Ricky Gervais. 
  ‘Captures the time and the aspirations of a young band brilliantly. A great eye-opener into the absurd thought process of what it might take to headline Glastonbury!' Steve Lamacq BBC 6 Music 
  ‘All the fun of youthful dreams and the poignancy of disappointment - plus a remarkable A-list cameo. Magnificent.’ Phil Harrison Time Out / Guardian  
  ‘Hilarious warts-and-all story of a Britpop band whose big ambitions did not meet their talents’ Dan Carrier Camden New Journal 
  'Super-evocative, Proustian and a wonderful walk down memory lane.’ Mark Bowen Wichita Recordings 
  "A healthy measure of Nick Hornby with a dash of Adrian Mole had he joined an indie band. Just the tonic for these serious and uncertain days. Bottoms up!' Josh Levay Pointy Birds keyboardist/naysayer 
  “If Spinal Tap had been an indie band in 1990s Britpop London. Brilliant!” Dave Macleod

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  Dear Black Girls - How to Be...

  A'ja Wilson

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  From Olympic gold medalist and two-time professional basketball MVP A’ja Wilson comes an inspirational collection on what it means to grow up as a Black girl in America.This is a book for all the girls with an apostrophe in their name.This is for all the girls who are “too loud"  and “too emotional.”This is for all the girls who are constantly asked, “Oh, what did you do with your hair? That’s new.”This is for my Black girls.In this empowering and deeply personal collection—adapted from and expanded upon the piece of the same name in The Players’ Tribune—WNBA star A’ja Wilson shares stories from her life. Despite gold medals, championships, and a list of accolades, Wilson knows how it feels to be swept under the rug. To not be heard, to not feel seen, to not be taken seriously. As a fourth grader going to a primarily white school in South Carolina, she was told she’d have to stay outside for a classmate’s birthday party. “Huh?” she asked. Because the birthday girl’s father didn’t like Black people.Wilson tells stories like this: stories that held her down but didn’t stop her. She shares her contribution to “The Talk,” and how to keep fighting, all while igniting strength, resilience, and passion. Dear Black Girls is one remarkable author’s necessary and meaningful exploration of what it means to be a Black woman in America today—and an of-the-moment rally cry to lift up women and girls everywhere.

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  Single Journey Only - A Memoir

  Ursula Owen

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  Ursula Owen has been a significant figure in the worlds of literature and free expression since the 1970s. A founding director of Virago Press in 1974, later becoming Joint Managing Director, she worked with a committed teams as the company rapidly developed an international reputation, rediscovering and repositioning women writers and, over two decades, transforming both the literary canon and the contemporary publishing world.
  During the 1990s, Owen became a director of the Paul Hamlyn Fund, Cultural Policy Advisor to the Labour Party and Chief Executive of Index on Censorship. Yet behind these and other signal achievements lies the story of a refugee, a child who fled the Nazis, was educated at Putney High School, went up to Oxford, trained as a researcher in social services, travelled extensively, marrying, becoming a mother, and eventually separating. In this frank and compelling memoir, we discover an extraordinary life where culture prevails against the tumultuous conflicts of the twentieth-century, as well as the twenty-first.

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  Frantisek Josef Benedikt Dusik -...

  Matjaz Barbo

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  The book discusses the life of the Czech composer Frantisek Josef Benedikt Dusik (1765-after 1817). Dusik was born into a musical family in Cáslav (Bohemia, today Czech Republik). After stuying in Prague he went to northern Italy. In the last decade of the eighteenth century he stayed in Ljubljana where he married and became one of the most important musical figures. He appeared as a musician in several famous Italian musical theatres of that time, from La Scala in Milan to San Benedetto in Venice. In Ljubljana he regularly appeared in musical theatre, was employed as an organist and regens chori in the cathedral and played a leading role in the Philharmonic Society. He wrote operas, church compositions, instrumental pieces, and foremost, symphonies, which represent the first Slovene works of that genre. 
  
  The biography introduces readers to an almost forgotten musician, whose fortune led him to be a bandmaster of various Austrian infantry regiments, and at almost the same time a composer who praised Napoleon.

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  Albanian Assignment - The Memoir...

  David Smiley

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  Albanian Assignment is one of the finest special forces memoirs to come out of the Second World War. Listeners of Damien Lewis, Ben Macintyre, and Patrick Leigh Fermor will be enthralled by this book.In 1940 Winston Churchill established the Special Operations Executive to "set Europe ablaze."Three years later David Smiley and Billy McLean were parachuted into northern Greece and crossed the border into Albania to do just that.For the next eight months Smiley mediated between the competing resistance factions and organized them to conduct ambushes and acts of sabotage on fascist armies and infrastructure.His actions were rewarded with an immediate Military Cross, yet his work in Albania was not done. Soon after he had left the country tensions between the Albanian resistance movements had deteriorated into open conflict meaning that Smiley and McLean were once again forced to parachute into the country to reconcile the guerrilla forces whilst continuing the fight against the Nazi forces.Smiley's account of his time in Albania is a remarkable book that uncovers the operations and its difficulties of an SOE agent in one of the forgotten fronts of World War Two.

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