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As You Do: Adventures With Evel, Oliver, and The Vice-President Of Botswana: Adventures with Evel, Oliver, and the Vice-President of Botswana

Childrens Toy Shop > Books > Biography
by: Richard Hammond

September 18, 2008
Uneven but fascinating to get to know the characters behind the scenes and to find out about the real close relationships with the people you never normally hear about. Very interesting about the North Pole and Botswana but peters out later and loses momentum. For true Top Gear fans only.

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Gomorrah: Italy's Other Mafia

Childrens Toy Shop > Books > Biography
by: Roberto Saviano

October 03, 2008
Uneven but fascinating to get to know the characters behind the scenes and to find out about the real close relationships with the people you never normally hear about. Very interesting about the North Pole and Botswana but peters out later and loses momentum. For true Top Gear fans only.

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The Two of Us: My Life with John Thaw

Childrens Toy Shop > Books > Biography
by: Sheila Hancock

June 06, 2005
I have just listened to the audio version of this book and was deeply moved. It was very interesting to hear about her life and John Thaws life in the industry, but the sections inbetween when she documents his illness, death and her life after was so moving. My father died last year and my mother was married for over 50 years during which they were inseperable. This book has given me some idea how she is feeling at the moment and I intend to buy it for her as birthday present. Sheila has gone through such sorrow all her life with the spector of cancer destroying many people close to her. Sheila read the book and you can feel the strengh of feeling through her words. Grumpy old woman you are not Sheila.

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In Cold Blood : A True Account of a Multiple Murder and Its Consequences (Penguin Modern Classics)

Childrens Toy Shop > Books > Biography
by: Truman Capote

February 03, 2000
Recently re-read this disturbing factional story of unspeakable horror after some thirty odd years, re-visiting the pain of Holcomb, the scene of the tragic, senseless snuffing out of the Clutters. Contoversial on its publication due to its blending of fact and fiction, a hybrid composite that had not been done before, Capote's "In Cold Blood" reconstucts, in all their brutal detail, the 1959 grisly, cold-blooded murder of the Clutter family on their farm in the plains of western
Kansas when four shotgun blasts changed the town of Holcomb forever.

Capote's meticulous reconstruction covers the lead-up to the gruesome murders and the aftermath. In the lead-up, Capote builds suspense and tension by cross-cutting lntermittently between ... Read More:

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Mein Kampf

Childrens Toy Shop > Books > Biography
by: Adolf Hitler

November 21, 2007
I read Mein Kampf in the hope of understanding some of the madness of Hitler's actions and wasn't disappointed. Although written in the 1920s what can be found here is a sort of blue print for World war Two.Through the book Hitler exposes the dark side of the human race and tries to manipulate the reader into agreeing with him. Unlike the German people of the time the reader has the luxury of knowing the evil of his plan. An informative and dark book that gives history a slightly different slant

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The Last Fighting Tommy: The Life of Harry Patch, the Only Surviving Veteran of the Trenches

Childrens Toy Shop > Books > Biography
by: Harry Patch, Richard Van Emden

June 02, 2008
I have just read Henry Allingham's book which led me to reread Jimmy Corbin's ,(please read my reviews on these books), and now I have just finished rereading Harry's book.
It is very interesting to hear how their lives panned out and when you consider how differently these three mens lives are it beggars belief to even contemplate the lives of every other fighter from ww1 and 2. One thing I know is that every last one of them would have a story worth reading though.
I would distrust anyone who considers this book to be worthy of less than 5 stars as this man like so many others did his duty so we were able to keep our freedom. These boys were fighting for more than their own lives as some reviewers seem to forget.
sour grapes are best left with footballers wives ... Read More:

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Being A Scot

Childrens Toy Shop > Books > Biography
by: Sean Connery

August 21, 2008
If you are looking for an autobiography, or revelations about Ursula Andress or Honor Blackman, then this will be a great disappointment. It is, in large part an opinionated review of Sctoland, something like the rock stars views on global warming,Tibet or PETA, and does ccasionally raise the question of 'so what?' However if you read it as a general overview of Scotland, its culture, development and background, then this is a very well written, thoughtful,thought-provoking and well produced book. Of course his perspective is different from that of most of us, his fame and wealth make that almost unavoidable. Some of it, his recommendations on the Iraqi War based 'Black Watch' play, for example, border on the patronizing - and may even be counter productive in getting his views across. ... Read More:

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Grumpy Old Rockstar: and Other Wonderous Stories: And Other Wonderous Stories

Childrens Toy Shop > Books > Biography
by: Rick Wakeman

August 21, 2008
I liked this book. Anyone looking for a biography will be disappointed as it is simply a collection of remeinisisances from his colourful past.

It is a little disjointed, but this is catered for in the text and actually says so. Having seen a large number of his shows, this was the book I was waiting for. I found it a very easy and comfortable read, and find it easy to dip back into now and again, something I rarely do with other books. Respect to his co-writer. I look forward to another installment.

For those thinking of possible duplications with his "grumpy" dvd, there arn't any as his DVD has other stories. For more of the same, I would recommend his "Live in 2000" dvd.

Avoid the "Other side of Rick Wakeman" dvd though. Its, shall we be ... Read More:

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Katherine Swynford: The Story of John of Gaunt and His Scandalous Duchess

Childrens Toy Shop > Books > Biography
by: Alison Weir

August 07, 2008
Although Weir has written historical biographies of women who were intrinsically interesting -- Eleanor of Acquitaine and Isabella (the She Wolf) of France -- I have always found them a little dry. It's surprisingly, then, that her most lively and readable book so far should be about a woman about whom so little is known.

We can conjecture who Katherine de Roet's father was but the identity of her mother remains unknown; we cannot be sure how many children she bore, assuming that some died young, as was almost inevitable; Weir makes silly statements such as 'Katherine may well have been there that day but there is no evidence of it' a little too often.

Even so, the character of Katherine shines through, the first royal mistress ever to achieve the status of wife, ancestor ... Read More:

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When Genius Failed: The Rise and Fall of Long Term Capital Management

Childrens Toy Shop > Books > Biography
by: Roger Lowenstein

January 02, 2002
I am not an expert in finance; neither do I want to look into the details of LTCM's trading strategies. I was therefore still at a loss about what the LTCM's intricate financial schemes was all about even when I finished reading this book. Nevertheless, Lowenstein's work has impressed me very much since I read his another book 'Buffett: The Making of An American Capitalist' a few months ago. 'When Genius Failed' didn't disappoint me as well.

History repeats itself. Somewhat different as the backdrop and story of those events might have been, numerous financial debacles have taken place so far. Writers of financial history seem to find no shortage of materials on financial disasters. Sooner or later other similar books on the story of money games will appear in bookshops.