Christopher Hilton – författare

On 7 May 1945, Grand Admiral Donitz, named in Hitler's will as head of state, authorised the unconditional surrender of all German forces to the Allies on the following day. World War II in Europe was at an end. But many of the German people would continue to endure hardships, as both the country and the capital were to be divided between France, the UK and the USA in the west and the USSR in the east. East and West Germany, and East and West Berlin, would remain divided until 1989. By October 1990, however, the two countries were reunited, and the Berlin Reichstag was once again the seat of government. Here, politicians would put East and West back together again, marrying a totalitarian, atheist, communist system with a democratic, Christian, capitalist one. How did this marriage affect the everyday life of ordinary Germans? How did combining two telephone systems, two postal services, hospitals, farm land, property, industry, railways and roads work? How were women's rights, welfare, pensions, trades unions, arts, rents and housing affected? There had been no warning of this marriage and no preparation for it - and no country had ever tried putting two completely opposite systems together before. This is the story of what happened, in the words of the people it happened to - the people's story of an incredible unification.

The little band of Puritan emigres that left Southampton in 1620 to found a godly colony in Virginia (as the eastern seaboard of the North American continent was known at the time) carried with them the ideological seed-corn of a new nation. They were leaving England so that they could worship God in the way their conscience told them was right, but they were the forerunners of the greatest feat of nation building in the early modern world. The vibrant self-determination of these Protestant exiles would play an important part in precipitating the imperial conflict with Britain after 1763 and would later stand at the core of the American ideal during the centuries after Independence, providing a powerful pull factor for aspirant migrants around the world. Mayflower is the story of their voyage, their settlement in New England and the influence they had on the forging of a nation.

The 9/11 attacks on the United States in 2001 sent shockwaves across the world; they were the deadliest terrorist attacks on American soil in US history, killing nearly 3,000 people and injuring thousands more. For those whose lives it directly impacted, the effects are enduring and deeply felt.Women’s Stories of 9/11 observes the events that unfolded from a woman’s perspective. It is a series of interviews with eleven very different women – some from the West, some from Afghanistan – who each offer remarkably candid insights into their own personal experiences before, during and after the attacks. In the honest and heartfelt stories that emerge we hear the voices of women whose ordinary lives were suddenly changed, emotionally and physically, and who became actors in some of the most far-reaching events of the modern world.

The Berlin Olympic Games, more than 70 years on, remain the most controversial ever held. This book creates a vivid account of the disputes, the personalities, and the events which made these Games so memorable. Ironically, the choice of Germany as the host nation for the 1936 Olympics was intended to signal its return to the world community after defeat in World War I. In actuality, Hitler intended the Berlin Games to be an advertisement for Germany as he was creating it, and they became one of the largest propaganda exercises in history. Two Germans Jews competed in the Games while the most memorable achievement was that of black American Jesse Owens, who won four gold medals. Ultimately, however, Germany was the overall biggest medal winner. The popular success of Owens allowed the Nazis to claim that their policies had no racial element and charges of antisemitism that did arise were levelled at the Americans.

Adolf Hitler understood the importance of sport, and exercised his malign and dangerous influence to try to co-opt it for the Nazi cause. He intended to own the Olympic movement, housing it permanently in Berlin from 1940 in a stadium seating 450,000 people. His hijack of the 1936 Games remains one of sport’s most controversial events, using it as he did to promote Aryan supremacy and showcase the Nazi state. Austria was forced to withdraw from the 1938 football World Cup just days before it started because the country no longer existed. The boxing matches between Joe Louis and Max Schmeling in 1936 and 1938 came to represent democracy versus fascism. German technology crushed all comers in Grand Prix racing, as well as the Isle of Man TT. A government ministry was even set up to use physical fitness to prepare the population for war. Hitler understood that sport has many uses: this is how he used it.