Giles Milton – författare

THE 25th ANNIVERSARY EDITION WITH A NEW FOREWORD FROM WILLIAM DALRYMPLE'A book to read, reread, then read again to your children' Independent on Sunday'Once embarked upon the journey of the book, one is loath, sometimes unable to turn back' Sunday Times'A book that makes the reader sit in a trance, lost in passionate desire to pack a suitcase and go to the fabulous place' The SpectatorThe legendary story of how one man's actions led to the birth of New York - and the beginning of the British Empire. In 1616, English adventurer Nathaniel Courthope stepped ashore on a remote island in the East Indies on a secret mission - to persuade the islanders of Run to grant a monopoly to England over their nutmeg, a fabulously valuable spice. This infuriated the Dutch, who were determined to control the world's supply. For five years Courthope and his band of thirty men were besieged by a force one hundred times greater. His heroism set in motion a series of events that led to England owning Manhattan, culminating in the creation of New York and the launch of the British Empire.Beautifully told, Nathaniel's Nutmeg is a modern classic of adventure, ambition and exploration.

On Saturday 9th September, 1922, the victorious Turkish cavalry rode into Smyrna, the richest and most cosmopolitan city in the Ottoman Empire. What happened over the next two weeks must rank as one of the most compelling human dramas of the twentieth century. Almost two million people were caught up in a disaster of truly epic proportions.PARADISE LOST is told with the narrative verve that has made Giles Milton a bestselling historian. It unfolds through the memories of the survivors, many of them interviewed for the first time, and the eyewitness accounts of those who found themselves caught up in one of the greatest catastrophes of the modern age.

'It reads like fiction, but it is, astonishingly, history' THE TIMESIN 1917, AN ECCENTRIC BAND OF BRITISH SPIES IS SMUGGLED INTO NEWLY SOVIET RUSSIA.Their goal is to defeat Lenin's plan to destroy British India and bring down the democracies of the West. These extraordinary spies, led by Mansfield Cumming, proved brilliantly successful. They found a wholly new way to deal with enemies, one that relied on espionage and dirty tricks rather than warfare. They were the unsung founders of today's modern, highly professional secret services. They were also the inspiration for fictional heroes to follow, from James Bond to James Bond.'Readers will find themselves as gripped as they would be by the very best of Fleming or le Carré' SUNDAY TIMES'Marvellous, meticulously researched and truly groundbreaking' SIMON WINCHESTER

Edward Trencom has bumbled through life, relying on his trusty nose to turn the family cheese shop into the most celebrated fromagerie in England. But his world is turned upside down when he stumbles across a crate of family papers. To his horror, Edward discovers that nine previous generations of his family have come to sticky ends because of their noses. When he investigates further, Edward finds himself caught up in a Byzantine riddle to which there is no obvious answer . . .Giles Milton’s deliciously comic debut novel is a mouth-watering blend of Louis de Bernieres, Tom Sharpe and P. G. Wodehouse with every page permeated by the pungent odour of cheese.'The pong of ripe Limburger lingers impressively' - Observer 'Comic novels are difficult to write: any old halfwit can produce 400 pages of stinking high seriousness, but it takes a real wit to manage 400 pages of mild, fragrant good humour' Guardian

In April 1586, Queen Elizabeth I acquired a new and exotic title. A tribe of North American Indians had made her their weroanza - 'big chief'.The news was received with great joy, both by the Queen and her favourite, Sir Walter Ralegh. His first American expedition had brought back a captive, Manteo, whose tattooed face had enthralled Elizabethan London. Now Manteo was returned to his homeland as Lord and Governor. Ralegh's gamble would result in the first English settlement in the New World, but it would also lead to a riddle whose solution lay hidden in the forests of Virginia.A tale of heroism and mystery, BIG CHIEF ELIZABETH is illuminated by first-hand accounts to reveal a remarkable and long-forgotten story.

In 1611 an astonishing letter arrived at the East India Trading Company in London after a tortuous seven-year journey. Englishman William Adams was one of only twenty-four survivors of a fleet of ships bound for Asia, and he had washed up in the forbidden land of Japan.The traders were even more amazed to learn that, rather than be horrified by this strange country, Adams had fallen in love with the barbaric splendour of Japan - and decided to settle. He had forged a close friendship with the ruthless Shogun, taken a Japanese wife and sired a new, mixed-race family.Adams' letter fired up the London merchants to plan a new expedition to the Far East, with designs to trade with the Japanese and use Adams' contacts there to forge new commercial links.SAMURAI WILLIAM brilliantly illuminates a world whose horizons were rapidly expanding eastwards.

This is the forgotten story of the million white Europeans, snatched from their homes and taken in chains to the great slave markets of North Africa to be sold to the highest bidder. Ignored by their own governments, and forced to endure the harshest of conditions, very few lived to tell the tale.Using the firsthand testimony of a Cornish cabin boy named Thomas Pellow, Giles Milton vividly reconstructs a disturbing, little known chapter of history. Pellow was bought by the tyrannical sultan of Morocco who was constructing an imperial pleasure palace of enormous scale and grandeur, built entirely by Christian slave labour. As his personal slave, he would witness first-hand the barbaric splendour of the imperial court, as well as experience the daily terror of a cruel regime.Gripping, immaculately researched, and brilliantly realised, WHITE GOLD reveals an explosive chapter of popular history, told with all the pace and verve of one of our finest historians.

In 1322 Sir John Mandeville left England on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem. Thirty-four years later, he returned, claiming to have visited not only Jerusalem, but India, China, Java, Sumatra and Borneo as well.His book about that voyage, THE TRAVELS, was heralded as the most important book of the Middle Ages as Mandeville claimed his voyage proved it was possible to circumnavigate the globe.In the nineteenth century sceptics questioned his voyage, and even doubted he had left England.THE RIDDLE AND THE KNIGHT sets out to discover whether Mandeville really could have made his voyage or whether, as is claimed, THE TRAVELS was a work of imaginative fiction. Bestselling historian Giles Milton unearths clues about the journey and reveals that THE TRAVELS is built upon a series of riddles which have, until now, remained unsolved.

The Aïchele family were decent, cultured, peace-loving Germans trying their hardest not to get swept up in the madness of Hitler's Third Reich. But by the time war came, for civilians on all sides, there was nowhere left to hide.The conflict took Wolfram, the family's gentle, 18-year-old son, to the Russian Front and the Normandy beaches. It also engulfed the town of his childhood, obliterating its inhabitants in a devastating firestorm.Wolfram is a powerful story of human survival. It is testimony to the fact that even in the darkest times there remains a spark of humanity that can never be totally extinguished.

One man's lust for empire sent fifteen people into the Arctic - only one came back.1913, the Arctic circle. Charismatic explorer Vilhjalmur Stefansson is obsessed with a frozen speck of land in the Siberian Arctic: Wrangel Island. Believing that whoever possesses it would control the future - air routes, resources, even the balance of power in the northern hemisphere, he takes an impossible gamble. Dispatching a small, ill-equipped venture to stake a frozen colony in Britain's name, it is a triumph of brilliance, ego and breathtaking hubris.What follows is a catastrophe of starvation, madness, and geopolitical risk. As winter seals the island in ice, relief ships fail to arrive and tensions among the colonists spiral toward despair. While diplomats spar and warships steam north, the settlers are left to endure scurvy, polar bears, and the terror of abandonment. At the centre of it all stands one unlikely survivor - a young Inuit seamstress who can outlast them all...Sweeping, chilling and stranger than fiction, Empire at the Edge of the World is a story of greed and justice at the edge of the world.

One man's lust for empire sent fifteen people into the Arctic - only one came back.1913, the Arctic circle. Charismatic explorer Vilhjalmur Stefansson is obsessed with a frozen speck of land in the Siberian Arctic: Wrangel Island. Believing that whoever possesses it would control the future - air routes, resources, even the balance of power in the northern hemisphere, he takes an impossible gamble. Dispatching a small, ill-equipped venture to stake a frozen colony in Britain's name, it is a triumph brilliance, ego and breathtaking hubris.What follows is a catastrophe of starvation, madness, and geopolitical risk. As winter seals the island in ice, relief ships fail to arrive and tensions among the colonists spiral toward despair. While diplomats spar and warships steam north, the settlers are left to endure scurvy, polar bears, and the terror of abandonment. At the centre of it all stands one unlikely survivor - a young Inuit seamstress who can outlast them all...Sweeping, chilling and stranger than fiction, Empire at the Edge of the World is a story of greed and justice at the edge of the world.

'A magnificent story, brilliantly told. Read it!' ANTHONY HOROWITZSIX GENTLEMEN, ONE GOAL - THE DESTRUCTION OF HITLER'S WAR MACHINE.In the spring of 1939, a top secret organisation was founded in London: its purpose was to plot the destruction of Hitler's war machine through spectacular acts of sabotage. The guerrilla campaign that followed was to prove every bit as extraordinary as the six gentlemen who directed it. One of them, Cecil Clarke, was a maverick engineer who invented a lethal bomb. Another, William Fairbairn, was the world's leading expert in silent killing. Led by dapper Scotsman Colin Gubbins, and aided by a group of formidable women, these six men and their sabotage attacks single-handedly changed the course of the war.'Terrific . . . a great read' IAN HISLOP'Could not be faster-moving or more exciting' LITERARY REVIEWPreviously published in hardback as The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare.

'Giles Milton is a man who can take an event from history and make it come alive . . . an inspiration for those of us who believe that history can be exciting and entertaining' Matthew Redhead, The TimesDid you know that Hitler took cocaine? That Stalin robbed a bank? That Charlie Chaplin's corpse was filched and held to ransom? Giles Milton is a master of historical narrative: in his characteristically engaging prose, Fascinating Footnotes From History details one hundred of the quirkiest historical nuggets; eye-stretching stories that read like fiction but are one hundred per cent fact.There is Hiroo Onoda, the lone Japanese soldier still fighting the Second World War in 1974; Agatha Christie, who mysteriously disappeared for eleven days in 1926; and Werner Franz, a cabin boy on the Hindenburg who lived to tell the tale when it was engulfed in flames in 1937. Fascinating Footnotes From History also answers who ate the last dodo, who really killed Rasputin and why Sergeant Stubby had four legs. Peopled with a gallery of spies, rogues, cannibals, adventurers and slaves, and spanning twenty centuries and six continents, Giles Milton's impeccably researched footnotes shed light on some of the most infamous stories and most flamboyant and colourful characters (and animals) from history.

'Vivid, graphic and moving' Mail on Sunday Book of the Year'It has a wonderful immediacy and vitality - living history in every sense' Anthony Horowitz'Fantastic' Dan Snow'Compellingly authentic, revelatory and beautifully written. A gripping tour de force' Damien Lewis'Stirring and unsettling in equal measure, this is history writing at its most powerful' Evening StandardAlmost seventy-five years have passed since D-Day, the day of the greatest seaborne invasion in history.The outcome of the Second World War hung in the balance on that chill June morning. If Allied forces succeeded in gaining a foothold in northern France, the road to victory would be open. But if the Allies could be driven back into the sea, the invasion would be stalled for years, perhaps forever.An epic battle that involved 156,000 men, 7,000 ships and 20,000 armoured vehicles, the desperate struggle that unfolded on 6 June 1944 was, above all, a story of individual heroics - of men who were driven to keep fighting until the German defences were smashed and the precarious beachheads secured. Their authentic human story - Allied, German, French - has never fully been told.Giles Milton's bold new history narrates the day's events through the tales of survivors from all sides: the teenage Allied conscript, the crack German defender, the French resistance fighter. From the military architects at Supreme Headquarters to the young schoolboy in the Wehrmacht's bunkers, D-Day: The Soldiers' Story lays bare the absolute terror of those trapped in the frontline of Operation Overlord. It also gives voice to those hitherto unheard - the French butcher's daughter, the Panzer Commander's wife, the chauffeur to the General Staff.This vast canvas of human bravado reveals 'the longest day' as never before - less as a masterpiece of strategic planning than a day on which thousands of scared young men found themselves staring death in the face. It is drawn in its entirety from the raw, unvarnished experiences of those who were there.

'Brilliantly recapturing the febrile atmosphere of Berlin in the first four years after the Second World War, Giles Milton reminds us what an excellent story-teller he is' - Andrew Roberts, author of Churchill: Walking with DestinyBerlin was in ruins when Soviet forces fought their way towards the Reichstag in the spring of 1945. Streets were choked with rubble, power supplies severed and the population close to starvation. The arrival of the Soviet army heralded yet greater terrors: the city's civilians were to suffer rape, looting and horrific violence. Worse still, they faced a future with neither certainty nor hope.Berlin's fate had been sealed four months earlier at the Yalta Conference. The city, along with the rest of Germany, was to be carved up between the victorious powers - British, American, French and Soviet. On paper, it seemed a pragmatic solution; in reality, it fired the starting gun for the Cold War. As soon as the four powers were no longer united by the common purpose of defeating Germany, they reverted to their pre-war hostility and suspicion. Rival systems, rival ideologies and rival personalities ensured that Berlin became an explosive battleground. The ruins of this once-great city were soon awash with spies, gangsters and black-marketeers, all of whom sought to profit from the disarray. For the next four years, a handful of charismatic but flawed individuals - British, American and Soviet - fought an intensely personal battle over the future of Germany, Europe and the entire free world.CHECKMATE IN BERLIN tells this exhilarating, high-stakes tale of grit, skullduggery, and raw power. From the high politics of Yalta to the desperate scramble to break the Soviet stranglehold of Berlin with the greatest aerial operation in history, this is the epic story of the first battle of the Cold War and how it shaped the modern world.

'Brilliantly written and completely absorbing, this is Milton's masterpiece' ANTHONY HOROWITZBERLIN'S FATE WAS SEALED AT THE 1945 YALTA CONFERENCE.The city was to be carved up between the victorious powers - British, American, French and Soviet - with four all-powerful commandants ruling over their sectors. On paper, it seemed a pragmatic solution; in reality, it marked the start of a ferocious battle of wits. As relations between east and west broke down, these rival commandants fought a desperate battle for control. In doing so, they fired the starting gun for the Cold War.From America's explosive Frank 'Howlin' Mad' Howley, a sharp-tongued colonel with a loathing for Russians, to his nemesis, Russia's charmingly deceptive General Alexander Kotikov, CHECKMATE IN BERLIN tells the exhilarating, high-stakes story of kidnap, skullduggery, sabotage, murder and the greatest aerial operation in history. This is the epic story of the first battle of the Cold War and how it shaped the modern world.'An excellent storyteller' ANDREW ROBERTS'A book full of heroes' THE TIMES

A BBC RADIO 4 BOOK OF THE WEEKA SPECTATOR BOOK OF THE YEAR'Hugely enjoyable' The Spectator'Delivered with flamboyance, it features a sparkling cast of chancers' KATJA HOYER, Daily Telegraph 5* review'Page-turning . . . a sizzling high-stakes tale' JAMES HOLLAND'This book might read like the screenplay of a gripping movie, yet every word is accurate and verified' ANDREW ROBERTS'Giles Milton is a phenomenon' DAN SNOW'Another rollercoaster ride from Giles Milton. Endlessly surprising' ANTHONY HOROWITZFrom internationally bestselling historian Giles Milton comes the remarkable true story of the Allies' secret mission to wartime Moscow.In the summer of 1941, as Hitler invaded the Soviet Union, Stalin's forces faced a catastrophic defeat which would make the Allies' liberation of Europe virtually impossible. To avert this disaster, Britain and America mobilized an elite team of remarkable diplomats with the mission of keeping the Red Army in the war. Into the heart of Stalin's Moscow Roosevelt sent Averell Harriman, the fourth richest man in America and his brilliant young daughter Kathy. Churchill dispatched the reckless but inventive bon vivant Archie Clark Kerr - and occasionally himself - to negotiate with the Kremlin's wiliest operators. Together, this improbable group grappled with the ingenious, mercurial Stalin to make victory possible. But they also discovered that the Soviet dictator had a terrifying masterplan for the post-war world.Based on astonishing unpublished diaries, letters and secret reports, The Stalin Affair reveals troves of new material about the most unlikely coalition in history.

'Delivered with flamboyance, it features a sparkling cast of chancers' KATJA HOYER, Daily Telegraph 5* review'Page-turning . . . a sizzling high-stakes tale' JAMES HOLLAND'This book might read like the screenplay of a gripping movie, yet every word is accurate and verified' ANDREW ROBERTS'Giles Milton is a phenomenon' DAN SNOW'Another rollercoaster ride from Giles Milton. Endlessly surprising' ANTHONY HOROWITZFrom internationally bestselling historian Giles Milton comes the remarkable true story of the Allies' secret mission to wartime Moscow.In the summer of 1941, as Hitler invaded the Soviet Union, Stalin's forces faced a catastrophic defeat which would make the Allies' liberation of Europe virtually impossible. To avert this disaster, Britain and America mobilized an elite team of remarkable diplomats with the mission of keeping the Red Army in the war.Into to the heart of Stalin's Moscow Roosevelt sent Averell Harriman, the fourth richest man in America and his brilliant young daughter Kathy. Churchill dispatched the reckless but brilliant bon vivant Archie Clark Kerr - and occasionally himself - to negotiate with the Kremlin's wiliest operators. Together, this improbable group grappled with the ingenious, mercurial Stalin to make victory possible. But they also discovered that the Soviet dictator had a terrifying masterplan for the post-war world.Based on astonishing unpublished diaries, letters and secret reports, The Stalin Affair reveals troves of new material about the most unlikely coalition in history.*Giles Milton's The Stalin Affair was a Radio 4 Book of the Week in the week of 17th June 2024.*