To Catch a Spy (Hardback)

How the Spycatcher Affair Brought MI5 in from the Cold

Tim Tate

The Spycatcher affair remains one of the most intriguing moments in the history of British intelligence and a pivotal point in the public's relationship with the murky world of espionage and security. It lifted the lid on alleged Soviet infiltration of British services and revealed a culture of law-breaking, bugging and burgling. But how much do we know about the story behind the scandal?

In To Catch a Spy, Tim Tate reveals the astonishing true story of the British government's attempts to silence whistleblower Peter Wright and hide the truth about Britain's intelligence services and political elites. It's a story of state-sanctioned cover-up plots; of the government lying to Parliament and courts around the world; and of stories leaked with the intention to mislead and deceive.

This is a tale of high treason and low farce. Drawing on thousands of pages of previously unpublished court transcripts, the contents of secret British government files, and original interviews with many of the key players in the Spycatcher trials, it draws back the curtain on a hidden world. A world where spies, politicians and Britain's most senior civil servants conspired to ride roughshod over the law, prevented the public from hearing about their actions and mounted a cynical conspiracy to deceive the world. It is the story of Peter Wright's ruthless and often lawless obsession to uncover Russian spies, both real and imagined, his belated determination to reveal the truth and the lengths to which the British government would go to silence him.

Tim Tate is a multi-award-winning documentary film-maker, investigative journalist and best-selling author. Over a career spanning 45 years he has written for most national newspapers and made more than 80 documentaries for British and international broadcasters. His films have been honoured by Amnesty International, the Royal Television Society, UNESCO, the International Documentary Association, the Association for International Broadcasting, the [US] National Academy of Cable Broadcasting and the New York Festivals.

He is the author of 18 published non-fiction books. His most recent work, The Spy Who Was Left Out In The Cold (Transworld, UK/St Martin's Press, US) uncovered the secret history of Cold War superspy Michał Goleniewski. Hitler's British Traitors (Icon Books) revealed the untold story of espionage, sabotage and treachery by pro-Nazi British fascists during the Second World War. It was selected as Book of The Week by The Times. His 2018 book Hitler's Forgotten Children (Elliott & Thompson), which told the story of the Nazi Lebensborn program through the life of one of its victims, Ingrid von Oelhafen, has been translated into twelve languages and published in 16 countries. Tim is a fellow of the Royal Historical Society.

God's Own Gentlewoman (Hardback)

The Life of Margaret Paston

Diane Watt

The remarkable story of Margaret Paston, whose letters form the most extensive collection of personal writings by a medieval English woman.

Drawing on the largest archive of medieval correspondence relating to a single family in the UK, God's Own Gentlewoman explores what everyday life was like during the turbulent decades at the height of the Wars of the Roses. Covering topics including political conflicts and familial in-fighting, forbidden love affairs and clandestine marriages, bloody battles and sieges, fear of plague and sudden death, friendships and animosity, and childbirth and child mortality, Margaret's letters provide us with unparalleled insight into all aspects of life in late medieval England.

Diane Watt, a world expert on medieval women's writing, offers insight into Margaret's activities, experiences, emotions and relationships, presenting the life of a medieval woman who was at times absorbed by the mundane and domestic, but who found herself caught up in the most extraordinary situations and events.

Diane Watt is an award-winning academic and writer. She is the author of Secretaries of God, Medieval Women's Writing, and Women, Writing and Religion. Diane was born and brought up on the west coast of Scotland, and as a child spent her holidays visiting her grandmother in County Durham and aunts and cousins in North Yorkshire. More recently, during the university vacations, she has enjoyed travelling around Norfolk with her wife and their three dogs in search of Margaret Paston.

Foreign Agents (Hardback)

How American Lobbyists and Lawmakers Threaten Democracy Around the World

Casey Michel

Foreign Policy, Most Anticipated Books of 2024

A stunning investigation and indictment of the elements in United States' foreign lobbying industry and the threat they pose to democracy.

For years, one group of Americans has worked as foot-soldiers for the most authoritarian regimes around the planet. In the process, they've not only entrenched dictatorships and spread kleptocratic networks, but they've secretly guided U.S. policy without the rest of America even being aware. And now, journalist Casey Michel contends some of them have begun turning their sights on American democracy itself.

These Americans are known as foreign lobbyists, and many of them spent years ushering dictatorships directly into the halls of Washington, all while laundering the reputations of the most heinous, repressive regimes in the process. These lobbyists include figures like Ivy Lee, the inventor of the public relations industry – a man who whitewashed Mussolini, opened doors to the Soviets, and advised the Nazis on how to sway American audiences. They include people like Paul Manafort, who invented lobbying as we know it – and who then took his talents to autocrats from Ukraine to the Philippines, and then back to the White House. And they now include an increasing number of Americans elsewhere: in law firms and consultancies, among PR specialists and former lawmakers, and even within think tanks and universities.

Many of these lobbyists have transformed into proxies for dictators and strongmen wherever they can be found. And for years, they've escaped scrutiny.

In Foreign Agents, Casey Michel shines a light on these foreign lobbyists, and all the damage and devastation they have caused in Washington and elsewhere. From Moscow to Beijing, from far-right nationalists to far-left communists, from anti-American autocrats to pro-Western authoritarians, these foreign lobbyists have helped any illiberal, anti-democratic government they can find. And after decades of success in installing dictator after dictator, and in tilting American policy in the process, some of these lobbyists have now begun trying to end America's democratic experiment, once and for all.

Casey Michel is an author, journalist, and director of the Combating Kleptocracy Program with the Human Rights Foundation. He is the author of American Kleptocracy, named by The Economist as one of the 'best books to read to understand financial crime.' His writing on offshoring, foreign lobbying, authoritarianism, and illicit wealth has appeared in Financial Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Atlantic, Foreign Affairs, and The Washington Post, among other outlets, and he has appeared on NPR, BBC, CNN, and MSNBC, among other stations. He has also testified in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee on the links between illicit financial networks and national security. He received his Master's degree in Russian, Eurasian, and East European Studies from Columbia University's Harriman Institute, and served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in northern Kazakhstan. Foreign Agents is his second book.

City of Echoes (Paperback)

A New History of Rome, its Popes and its People

Jessica Wärnberg

In Rome the echoes of the past resound clearly in its palaces and monuments, and in the remains of the ancient imperial city. But another presence has dominated Rome for 2,000 years -the pope, whose actions and influence echo down the ages. In this epic tale, historian Jessica Wärnberg tells, for the first time, the story of Rome through the lens of its popes, illuminating how these remarkable (and unremarkable) men have transformed lives and played a crucial role in deciding the fate of the city.

Emerging as the anonymous leader of a marginal cult in the humblest quarters of the city, less than 300 years later the pope sat enthroned in a gilt basilica, endorsed by the emperor himself. Eventually, the Roman pontiff would supplant even the emperors, becoming the de facto ruler of Rome and pre-eminent leader of the Christian world.

Shifting elegantly between the panoramic and the personal, the spiritual and the profane, this is a fresh and often surprising take on a city, a people and an institution that is at once familiar and elusive.

Jessica Wärnberg is a historian of the religious and political history of Europe, with a background in the history of art. She has written for academic journals and popular magazines like History Today. In Rome, the city she knows best, she has worked extensively in the archives of the Vatican and the Jesuits. Jessica has also taught history, including at the University of St Andrews. She lives in London.

The Vagina Business (Hardback)

The Innovative Breakthroughs that Could Change Everything in Women's Health

Marina Gerner

WINNER OF THE PORCHLIGHT BUSINESS BOOK AWARD

This tech could change everything for women – here's how.

From periods and childbirth to menopause, female pain has been normalized, as society shrugs and says 'welcome to being a woman' instead of coming up with better solutions. But it doesn't have to be this way. In The Vagina Business, award-winning journalist Marina Gerner takes an eye-opening look at the innovators challenging the status quo to deliver the healthcare solutions women need.

With interviews from 100 entrepreneurs, researchers and investors across 15 countries, The Vagina Business explores the future of women's health, where female-focused companies are developing products to help women at every stage of life. From a life-saving bra to non-hormonal contraception and new takes on fertility and menopause, it shines a light on innovation that matters. Women should not be denied solutions to health issues just because people are embarrassed to talk about vaginas. We deserve much better.

Marina Gerner is an award-winning financial journalist and columnist. Her work has been published in The Economist, Wall Street Journal, The Times, Financial Times, the Guardian, and Wired.

She is an adjunct professor at the NYU Stern School of Business and has a PhD from the London School of Economics.

Her ideas and research for this book have been awarded grants from the prestigious Alfred P. Sloan Foundation and The Society of Authors.

She was born in Kyiv, has lived in Frankfurt and New York, and is based in London.

How to Rob the Bank of England (Hardback)

Keith Cheeseman Reveals the True Story of Britain’s Biggest Ever Robbery

Keith Cheeseman

Clifford Thurlow

On a sunny May morning in 1990, a bank courier strode out of the Bank of England and, minutes later, was robbed at knifepoint of 301 bearer bonds valued at £292 million. It was the biggest theft in British history.

The thing is… when Keith Cheeseman received a call from a disbarred lawyer connected to London's underworld and attended a meeting on the night of the robbery, he counted £427 million in bonds – £135 million more than the Bank of England had reported.

As Keith set out to launder the bonds, Scotland Yard and the FBI were always one step ahead in tracking them down. Over the next eighteen months, two gangland figures were shot dead and more than eighty people were arrested. Keith was the only man ever jailed for the crime.

Keith Cheeseman is the last of the old-time gangsters, a con man who detests violence, wears Savile Row suits and gold watches, and loves classic cars and good dining. He bought non-league Dunstable Town football club and signed Manchester United star George Best to play for the team. He knew the legendary Kray twins and killer Frankie Fraser once threatened to snuff him out over a game of chess.

So what happened to the missing £135 million?

In this breath-taking adventure, featuring colourful characters from showbusiness alongside royalty, the IRA and even Pablo Escobar, Clifford Thurlow reveals Keith Cheeseman's incredible true story for the first time.

Clifford Thurlow has been described as 'one of the UK's best ghostwriters'. He has worked on a wide range of titles, including Sunday Times best-sellers Runaway and Today I'm Alice. He worked with Wing Commander Mike Sutton to write Typhoon: The Inside Story of an RAF Fighter Squadron at War.

Keith Cheeseman is the only person ever convicted in connection to the biggest robbery in British history. He is also famous as the former chairman of non-league Dunstable Town, notably tempting George Best out of retirement. Cheeseman spent a lifetime rubbing shoulders with everybody from British high society to American gangsters.

The Baton and the Cross (Hardback)

Russia's Church from Pagans to Putin

*SHORTLISTED FOR THE ORWELL PRIZE 2025*
*SHORTLISTED FOR THE PUSHKIN HOUSE BOOK PRIZE 2025*

*’A TIMELY AND IMPORTANT BOOK’ – ORLANDO FIGES*
*’SPELLBINDING’ – ANDREI KURKOV*
*ONE OF HISTORY TODAY’S BEST BOOKS OF 2024*

For more than a millennium, the Russian Orthodox Church has shown astonishing survival skills – from the Mongol yoke to tsarist demagoguery and enlightenment, from Soviet atheism to the chaotic 1990s. Now again, it is at the right hand of power, sanctifying Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.

In this provocative new book, Lucy Ash reveals how, under Putin, religion is being stripped of its spiritual content and used as a weapon to control the population. Orthodox clerics and their acolytes distort theology as they preach Slav Christian supremacy and drag Russia backwards into a new Middle Ages.

Combining historical research with vivid present-day reportage, The Baton and the Cross explores the impact the Church is having on millions of lives – from the tower blocks of big cities to far-flung villages in Siberia. Delving into the underbelly of politics, state security and big money, Ash shows how these forces have formed an unholy alliance with Orthodoxy in the dystopia of twenty-first century Russia.

Lucy Ash is an award-winning presenter of radio and TV documentaries. An expert on Russia and post-Soviet countries she was first sent to Moscow by the BBC in 1990 and has been covering the region’s social, political, and cultural issues ever since. The Baton and the Cross is her first book.

White Supremacy (Hardback)

From Eugenics to Great Replacement

Gavin Evans

Buffalo, New York, 2022. Ten black people murdered. The killer, 18-year-old Payton Gendron, says he was driven by 'Great Replacement' – the conspiracy theory that a Jewish-led elite is replacing white people with black and brown people. This, and a spate of similar hate crimes, begs the question: what are the origins of such behaviour?

Gavin Evans traces the historical roots of white supremacy. He begins in the 19th century with Charles Darwin and his cousin Francis Galton's race-based theories before looking at the spread of eugenics ideas throughout the UK, Europe and the United States, their Holocaust-prompted decline after the Second World War, and their revival in a different guise through the promotion of race science from the late 20th century. Evans also examines the hatching of 'Great Replacement' conspiratorial ideas in the 21st century – and their expression via alt-right forums to the minds of troubled young men with access to assault rifles.

White Supremacy breaks new ground in showing the links between mainstream 'Replacement Theory' and the terrorist version cited by far-right killers. It also traces the thread between these ideas and the race science promoted both by the far right and establishment figures. It looks at what these ideas have in common with those promoted by, for example, the founder of eugenics.

Gavin Evans grew up in South Africa and was intensely involved in anti-apartheid activities in the 1980s. He is an established authority on the history of race science and discrimination and lectures at Birkbeck, University of London.