Gordon Thorburn – författare

The hey-day of the British gypsy caravan was short, only about 70 years, during which period it grew from a simple utility vehicle, blossomed and flourished as a mobile work of art, then disappeared from common sight. These caravans were masterpieces of woodcraft and design, and the best of them cost as much as a small house. Unlike any small house, almost half the cost was in the decoration. This beautifully illustrated book presents the different types of caravan and the great variety of art which was carved and painted upon them and their brothers-in-transport, the old narrowboats. While there were certain rules and conventions of style, the decoration on and in all the types was ultimately governed only by how much money could be spent. The caravan in particular was the supreme status symbol among travelling people and its art the prime means for expressing where one stood in the world.

From 11 June 1943, the date of Lancaster Mark III EE136 WS/R’s very first op, to her last with 9 Squadron (on 19 October 1944), eighty-six Lancasters were assigned to Number 9. Of these, fifty were lost to enemy action, another five crashed at home, three crashed in Russia on the first Tirpitz raid and four were transferred to other squadrons only to be lost by them, leaving just twenty-four still flying.As more came in, three of those twenty-four were transferred to a new squadron, the reforming No 189. These were EE136 (93 operations), PB146 (36 ops), and LM745 (four ops). All three saw the war out, unlike so many others. During 189 Squadron’s operational period featuring EE136 (1 November 1944 to 3 February1945) thirty-four Lancasters came on the strength, of which nine were lost. Over the operational lifetime of Lancaster EE136, forty-two different skippers took her on a grand total of 109 trips. Altogether, 315 men flew on ops in this machine, many of them more than once - the most ‘capped’ captain, F/O Roy Lake, twenty-two times - and of those men, 101 were killed in other aircraft.Those are the statistics. But this is the story of the men behind the numbers.

For Bomber Command, the term 'Phoney War' never really meant much. Five Blenheims of 107 Squadron were among the blood and bullets the day after war was declared and only one came back.On 14 December 1939, in a disastrous raid on shipping, 99 Squadron lost six Wellingtons with only three survivors out of thirty-six crew. Even worse, in the biggest air battle so far, 18 December, Wilhelmshaven, five Wellingtons of 9 Squadron went down, four of 37 Squadron and two of 149 Squadron.Bomber Command lost sixty-eight aircraft and crews in action in the four war months of 1939, and a further seventy-eight in accidents. In the months up to the French surrender, losses rose spectacularly as the Germans triumphed wherever they went. In a few hours on 14 May, resisting the Blitzkrieg, forty-seven Fairey Battles and Bristol Blenheims were shot from the sky. Through the Scandinavian defence, in France and Belgium, at Dunkirk and, at last, over Germany, for Bomber Command there was no Phoney War. It was real war from the start.

In 1943, there was no thought of good times for two battalions of Scottish soldiers. For them, India meant a new and unimaginably arduous kind of training.Some of the Black Watch boys had seen action in Somaliland, Crete and Tobruk. Some of the Cameronians had fought the Japs in the Burma retreat. Even for these, such training was trial by ordeal. Many more of the Jocks were new, just shipped out from Scotland, but all of them were ordinary men, men from the towns and villages whod taken the Kings shilling in their countrys peril.These were first-class British infantry, but not the super-selected special forces types that we know today. Nevertheless, it was a special-forces job they were supposed to do and that is what they were called, Special Force. The challenge in Madhya Pradesh was to turn themselves into jungle fighters as good as the Japanese. They had a few short months to become Chindits.The two brigades they joined numbered 7,677 officers and men going into the jungle, of whom 531 were killed, captured or missing, and around 1,600 were wounded. By the end, some 3,800 were too sick to fight. Only 1,754 could be classified as 'effective' when they came out and, in truth, half of those were fit for no more than a hospital bed. It was a miracle anybody survived at all.And that was just two of the five brigades that went in. Was this the greatest medical disaster of World War Two? Who caused it? This new book has the answers.

Superpiss used to be a brand of windscreen washer fluid in Finland but they've changed the name for some reason. Bra milk has gone the same way.Luckily, there is still an Italian detergent called BumBum, a Ghanaian pepper sauce called Shitto, Jamaicans can buy Mannish Water Ram Goat Soup, those horrible Danish salt-liquorice pastilles are Spunk brand, the Swedes eat marshmallows called Skum, you can keep your feet dry in China with a Sex Shoes Set and refresh after a jog in Japan with a glass of Sweat.This hilarious book contains hundreds of examples from foreign parts of product names, signs and advertising puffery that make English speakers laugh immoderately, plus a few mistakes that slipped through at home.It's all real. None of it has been invented. In Egypt, you really can buy German Winter Hats for Diabetics.

This is the true story of an unusual hero. Tall, dark and handsome and often surrounded by an admiring crowd, this is no film star but an eight-year old bay gelding from the Mounted Branch of the Metropolitan Police. Horses such as Merlin go through a challenging training process to prepare them for life in the force. There are three stages of training; red, amber and green. Reports from his early training show that Merlin was sometimes naughty and spirited - but once his training was complete he was disciplined enough to maintain order at some of the toughest and most high-profile events in London. This book looks at Merlin's daily life and duties and his fascinating partnership with his mounted constable, Karen Howell. When Karen first met Merlin during his training it was love at first sight and over the years she has developed an intriguing bond with this brave, eccentric and deeply individual character.