Some new freebies from Endeavour...
Tracking Marco Polo by Tim Severin
Quote:
Marco Polo was one of the greatest explorers of all time.
After the best-selling The Brendan Voyage and The Sinbad Voyage, Tim Severin took up the challenge of following in his footsteps.
Using the great explorer’s journals as a route guide, Severin followed him all the way from Venice to Afghanistan — on a motorbike.
This is his witty and enthralling account of a latter-day caravan through Armenia and Persia, across deserts and mountains, as Severin and his companions overcome crashes, floods, sandstorms and linguistic muddles with zest and ingenuity.
Ancient and modern jostle for attention in the bustling towns and panoramic landscapes of Turkey and Afghanistan. Seeking out thirteenth-century Asia, they pass through the Valley of the Assassins to find the village of the Magi. And even with his foot in plaster, Severin takes a camel ride high into the Deh Bakri Pass in search of the famed ‘apples of paradise’.
The excitement, the discomfort, and the sheer magic of this epic journey are brought vividly to life by one of Britain’s finest travel writers.
Travel alongside Tim Severin as he goes ‘Tracking Marco Polo’.
|
Singapore Burning: Heroism and Surrender in World War II by Colin Smith
Quote:
In 1927, its sixtieth anniversary as a Crown colony, Singapore was thriving.
The Jazz age roared on, rubber prices soared, people worked as hard as was considered healthy in tropical climes and many, perhaps, played rather harder than they should have done.
But then, not twenty years later, in 1942 ‘The worst disaster and largest capitulation in British history,’ according to Winston Churchill, took place on the island.
Churchill's description of the fall of Singapore in 1942, which led to over 100,000 British, Australian and Indian troops being captured by the Japanese, was no wartime exaggeration.
With new material from British, Australian, Indian and Japanese sources, Colin Smith has woven together the full and terrifying story of Singapore's fall and its aftermath.
Alongside cowardice and incompetence he uncovers acts of true heroism, alongside treachery heart-rending loyalty.
And he finds compassion as well as brutality from the bravest and most capricious enemy Britain has ever faced.
|