HarperCollinsPublishers LONDON BOOK FAIR 2021 TRANSLATION RIGHTS NON-FICTION Contents History & Reference 3 Society 11 Art, Music & Literature 26 Life stories & Personal Narratives 31 Nature & Environment 39 Illustrated Reference, Tech & 48 Popular Science Sports & Adventure 59 Skincare, Health & Wellbeing 67 Gift & Humour 83 Food & Drink 103 Parenting & Children’s Reference 121 True Life 127 Contacts 134 History & Reference THE YOUNG ALEXANDER Alex Rowson In this brilliant biography, Alex Rowson offers an astonishing new account of one of the most important figures of the ancient world, whose earlier years have until now been a mystery: Alexander the Great. Imprint: William Collins Alexander the Great conquered land from Macedonia to Egypt to India. Editor: Arabella Pike He is known now both for his accomplishments and his precocity; he Publication: 14 Apr 2022 Format: Hardback achieved it all before dying abruptly at the age of thirty-two. But while Extent: 336pp much is known of his later years, almost nothing had survived of his first two decades – until now. Genre: Historical biography Since the astonishing discovery of the tomb of Macedon – that of Themes: Ancient History, Alexander’s father – in 1977, archaeologists have been scouring what is Greek civilization now northern Greece to uncover extraordinary details of life in ancient The author: Alex Rowson is a Macedonia. writer and award-winning TV producer who has worked Alex Rowson tells this story, drawing from new knowledge to portray the on some of the most successful British history and tempestuous relationship between Alexander’s parents, Philip and the archaeology programmes of Molossian princess Olympias, his education by Aristotle, and the strict recent times, including military training which would serve him so well in later years. Richard III: The King in the Car Park and Time Team on In a rare explosion of fresh understanding of the ancient world, Rowson Channel 4 and Digging for Britain (BBC4). offers a new story about a figure we all thought we knew. 4 • LBF21 PUBLISHERS • HARPERCOLLINS THE ROAD Christopher Hadley Travelling from London northwards to York, Christopher Hadley traces England’s great Roman road, the Ermin way, through its history. Imprint: William Collins Two thousand years in the making, this journey packs together a Editor: Arabella Pike miscellany of histories and stories anchored to the Ermin way, a road no Publication: 17 Feb 2022 Format: Hardback longer visible but seared through British history. Extent: 336pp In a grand detective story, Hadley traces the road from its origins, built by Genre: History, archaeology Roman legionaries in the months after Queen Boudicca’s revolt, through red herrings and bread crumb trails, ambitious forged documents that Themes: Roman British history sought to twist history and modern attempts to pin down the facts. The author: Christopher Hadley is a journalist and In a glorious amalgam of archaeology, folklore, historiography and local author writing at the murky, history’s deep mysteries, we are always looking for more than just the wonderful intersection of path beneath our feet. Hadley helps us discover a curious and history and folklore. His pieces have appeared in compulsive history of how Britain has found its way since the Romans. the Independent, the Praise For Christopher Hadley’s Hollow Places: Guardian, the Times, London Review of Books, Esquire and his local parish magazine, ‘Impossible to summarise and delightfully absorbing, Hadley’s book is comfortably among many other the most unexpected history book of the year.' Sunday Times publications. His first book, Hollow Places, was published ‘Christopher Hadley’s celebration of English folklore across 800 years delights in in 2019 these imaginative tales which have shaped and coloured the cultural landscape of the nation …Enriching and at times surprising … Anchored by memorable tales, the narrative over-turns long-held historical beliefs as it goes … Hollow Places has an innate charm … The book’s real success lies in being alert to what makes these superstitions and rituals special – the understanding that imagination trumps truth.’ TLS ‘Hadley wears his scholarship lightly but at the heart of this antiquarian wild goose chase is an ingenious meditation on what history, in all its complexity and unevenness, really is.’ Guardian 5 • ‘This meditation on the power of folk myth lives up to its billing as an ‘unusual history’. It’s also engaging, wide-ranging stuff, exploring how stories become ties LBF21 that bind.’ BBC History Magazine PUBLISHERS • HARPERCOLLINS PALACES OF REVOLUTION Life, Death and Art at the Stuart Court Dr Simon Thurley In Palaces of Revolution, Dr Simon Thurley tells the fascinating story of the Stuart dynasty, a breathless soap opera played out in just a hundred years, in an array of buildings that span Europe from Scotland via Denmark, Holland and Spain to England. Imprint: William Collins Although the Tudors are the nation’s favourite royal dynasty, the story of Editor: Myles Archibald the Stuarts is much more exciting. It’s the remarkable tale of James I, Publication: 27 May 2021 Format: Hardback whose favourite son dies and is succeeded by his second son, Charles, Extent: 368pp an aesthete incapable of ruling. Charles I goes to war against his own people; he loses and is executed. His son, also Charles, gets crowned king in Scotland but, exiled, holds court in Europe. England under Oliver Genre: History and Cromwell, meanwhile, is still a monarchy in all but name. When Cromwell architecture dies nobody knows what to do. Themes: British history, Kings and Queens, the Stuarts Short on options, Charles II is restored to the throne. He has no legitimate children and, unlike Henry VIII, does not divorce his queen; ;the heir is his The author: Dr Simon Thurley brother James, a bigoted and narrow-minded Roman Catholic. When is one of Britain’s leading architectural historians. A James comes to power he turns everyone against him and is driven out regular broadcaster on and replaced by his Protestant daughter, Mary, and her Dutch husband television and radio, he was William of Orange. Mary tragically dies and William leaves no heir, the until 2015 the Chief throne going to James II’s younger daughter Anne. She also fails to have Executive of English issue and the Stuarts are extinguished as a royal line. Heritage, the government’s principal advisor on the historic environment in Simon Thurley shows us these places in graphic detail. It takes us from England. Previous posts have Royston and Newmarket, where James I appropriated most of the town included Curator of the centre as a sort of rough-and-ready royal housing estate, to the steamy Historic Royal Palaces and Director of the Museum of Turkish baths at Whitehall where Charles II seduced his mistresses. The London. Simon is the author book is thus about the everyday life of the monarchy, presented of a number of acclaimed chronologically, through the buildings in which they lived. It presents new books on architectural stories and information about the period not only in the text but through history, including Whitehall maps and plans that bring life to the Stuart age. Palace, Hampton Court, The Building of England and Houses of Power. He is Praise for Simon Thurley: married to the historian and 6 • writer Anna Keay, and lives ‘An absorbing account of the lives of these royal houses. It is a journey not just in London and Norfolk. from palace to hunting lodge to castle, but into the small and poignant details of LBF21 domestic existence.’ Times Literary Supplement ‘This is a landmark book. Nobody interested in Tudor England can afford not to own a copy of this gateway into a lost world . compulsively readable.’ Country Life PUBLISHERS • ‘Unrivalled architectural expertise . Superb writing . A triumph: a masterly collective biography of [Tudor Royal] buildings, replete with insights into their owners’ private lives and into politics, diplomacy and court etiquette.’ Literary Review HARPERCOLLINS AN ATLAS OF EXTINCT COUNTRIES The Remarkable (and Occasionally Ridiculous) Stories of 48 Nations that Fell off the Map Gideon Defoe Prisoners of Geography meets Bill Bryson: a funny, fascinating, beautifully illustrated – and timely – history of countries that, for myriad and often ludicrous reasons, no longer exist. Imprint: Fourth Estate Countries die. Sometimes it’s murder, sometimes it’s by accident, and Editor: Helen Garnon- sometimes it’s because they were so ludicrous they didn’t deserve to Williams Publication: 3 Sep 2020 exist in the first place. Occasionally they explode violently. A few slip Format: Hardback away almost unnoticed. Often the cause of death is either ‘got too Extent: 144pp greedy’ or ‘Napoleon turned up’. Now and then they just hold a referendum and vote themselves out of existence. Genre: History This is an atlas of nations that fell off the map. The polite way of writing For: Amateur historians and geographers, map and an obituary is to dwell on the good bits and gloss over the embarrassing miscellanies geeks stuff. This book fails to do that. And that is mainly because most of these dead nations (and a lot of the ones that are still alive) are so weird or The author: Gideon Defoe is borderline nonsensical that it’s impossible to skip the embarrassing stuff. the author of The Pirates! book series and wrote the screenplay for the Oscar- The life stories of the sadly deceased involve a catalogue of chancers, nominated Aardman film racists, racist chancers, conmen, madmen, people trying to get out of The Pirates in an Adventure paying tax, mistakes, lies, stupid schemes and general idiocy. Because of with Scientists. He has this – and because treating nation states with too much respect is the penned a computer game tie-in novel for Gollancz and entire problem with pretty much everything – these accounts are not written about how animals fussed about adding to all the earnest flag saluting in the world, however have sex because he is bad nice some of the flags are.