Subtitled 'the curious origins of common words and phrases', this book by Max Cryer is a must buy present for just about anyone, this Christmas!
The person who just likes to know lots of random stuff, the person who sets the village pub quizzes, a writer, someone who loves the history of the English language, etc.
Buy them this book (or just buy it for yourself as your Christmas indulgence for yourself, this year!) and they'll learn who wrote "absence makes the heart grow fonder?" who originated "accidentally on purpose" who came up with the ultimate putdown, "a legend in his own lunchtime" who came up with "sex, drugs and rock and roll" and who first got really cross because somebody really DID steal his thunder?"
There are also some other modern coinings as well as the old classics, such as "Gridlock", "One-upmanship" and the like.
You'll also be surprised about the relevantly ancient origins of some phrases. You will also find out who did not say what, too!
This book is in hardback and costs a very reasonable £9.99. It is published by Summersdale the ISBN is 978 1 84953 191 7. Although please do check out the That's Books Amazon powered book shop, where it may well be considerably less.
www.summersdale.com.
Book review blog site, with some entertainment material from time-to-time.
Saturday, 10 December 2011
That's Christmas: Ideal Christmas gift! Homework For Grown-ups Quiz ...
That's Christmas: Ideal Christmas gift! Homework For Grown-ups Quiz ...: Who is Senuna? Where would you find the islets of Langerhans? Mr Deasy, Gabriel Conroy and Robert Hand are all characters from works by whic...
Magic City by Michael Dean
A sexual coming-of-age comedy set in seventies Berlin.
Magic City is a comedy of errors set in West Germany in 1971. Marcus Himmelfahrt, unable to come to terms with his Jewish heritage and his sexual impotence, has no idea what to do with his life. He takes a job as an English teacher in Ludwigsburg, the Magic City of the title, intending to re-invent himself under a false name.
On day one, he does something he shouldn't in a graveyard and the police are called. His personal habits repeatedly upset his highly strung landlord. He is nevertheless a hit at the language school, and fast establishes a reputation as a ladies' man. But can he live up to it?
Meanwhile, as he wanders around unaware in dreamy innocence, he is framed, followed and shot at. He finally finds love only to be wrongly accused of rampant womanising. Against a background of retribution against a former Nazi and a robbery by the Baader-Meinhof gang, our still oblivious hero is hunted by drug dealers, by his terrifying employer, and by both the East and West German intelligence services.
As the forces against him gain momentum and menace, even the Magic City may not be enough to save him.
Michael Dean read history at Worcester College, Oxford, and has an MSc in Applied Linguistics from the University of Edinburgh. He is a fluent German speaker and a translator - an Associate of the Institute of Linguists. He has had three previous novels published, The Crooked Cross, Hirschfeld's Friends and THORN. He is also the author of Chomsky: A Beginner's Guide and more than 30 English Language Teaching titles, including the best-selling short story New York Café. He lives in Colchester, Essex.
£16.99
978-1-84624-637-1
Magic City is a comedy of errors set in West Germany in 1971. Marcus Himmelfahrt, unable to come to terms with his Jewish heritage and his sexual impotence, has no idea what to do with his life. He takes a job as an English teacher in Ludwigsburg, the Magic City of the title, intending to re-invent himself under a false name.
On day one, he does something he shouldn't in a graveyard and the police are called. His personal habits repeatedly upset his highly strung landlord. He is nevertheless a hit at the language school, and fast establishes a reputation as a ladies' man. But can he live up to it?
Meanwhile, as he wanders around unaware in dreamy innocence, he is framed, followed and shot at. He finally finds love only to be wrongly accused of rampant womanising. Against a background of retribution against a former Nazi and a robbery by the Baader-Meinhof gang, our still oblivious hero is hunted by drug dealers, by his terrifying employer, and by both the East and West German intelligence services.
As the forces against him gain momentum and menace, even the Magic City may not be enough to save him.
Michael Dean read history at Worcester College, Oxford, and has an MSc in Applied Linguistics from the University of Edinburgh. He is a fluent German speaker and a translator - an Associate of the Institute of Linguists. He has had three previous novels published, The Crooked Cross, Hirschfeld's Friends and THORN. He is also the author of Chomsky: A Beginner's Guide and more than 30 English Language Teaching titles, including the best-selling short story New York Café. He lives in Colchester, Essex.
£16.99
978-1-84624-637-1
Fish in Water by Alain Merheje
A tiny, remote village in Cyprus is the scene for a romantic farce.
Cyprus in the summer heat. The smallest village in the world. Nine inhabitants, one drop-dead gorgeous tourist, a flock of impatient hens and an exhausted rooster. This is the stuff that chaos is made of.
Centred on Toni's crumbling taverna, and his surprisingly well-equipped cellar, the action takes place in the course of one dramatic day. What made the delicious Gina behave so oddly? Will Yiannis get his true love back? Can the village idiot save the day? Will Toni ever get a customer to pay for a meal? Can anyone smell chicken cooking?
This is a laugh out loud Hellenic novel of Latin proportions!
Alain Merheje was educated in Syria and Lebanon before relocating to London where he held various posts in the advertising industry which took him all over the world. Eventually he settled on Cyprus (where he now lives) and now indulges his passion for writing and photography. His previous works include a collection of poetry in French and, in English, a collection of poetry, a children's story and a pantomime.
Ideal title to take on holiday
Light, humorous romance set in the sunny Mediterranean calls to mind Mama Mia and Shirley Valentine.
£16.99
978-1-84624-644-9
Cyprus in the summer heat. The smallest village in the world. Nine inhabitants, one drop-dead gorgeous tourist, a flock of impatient hens and an exhausted rooster. This is the stuff that chaos is made of.
Centred on Toni's crumbling taverna, and his surprisingly well-equipped cellar, the action takes place in the course of one dramatic day. What made the delicious Gina behave so oddly? Will Yiannis get his true love back? Can the village idiot save the day? Will Toni ever get a customer to pay for a meal? Can anyone smell chicken cooking?
This is a laugh out loud Hellenic novel of Latin proportions!
Alain Merheje was educated in Syria and Lebanon before relocating to London where he held various posts in the advertising industry which took him all over the world. Eventually he settled on Cyprus (where he now lives) and now indulges his passion for writing and photography. His previous works include a collection of poetry in French and, in English, a collection of poetry, a children's story and a pantomime.
Ideal title to take on holiday
Light, humorous romance set in the sunny Mediterranean calls to mind Mama Mia and Shirley Valentine.
£16.99
978-1-84624-644-9
Karpov's Strategic Wins 2: The Prime Years By Tibor Karolyi
This is the ideal gift for all fans of the great game of chess.
Tibor Karolyi explains Karpov's particular genius: features Karpov's most entertaining and instructive strategic wins from 1986-2009 when Karpov was battling with his young rival Garry Kasparov for chess supremacy It was during this period, at Linares in 1994, that Karpov achieved what statistics show to be the finestever tournament performance.
Tibor Karolyi is an International Master from Budapest who was Hungarian Champion in 1984.
2011 PB
9781906552428 £20.99
Quality Chess UK Ltd
Tibor Karolyi explains Karpov's particular genius: features Karpov's most entertaining and instructive strategic wins from 1986-2009 when Karpov was battling with his young rival Garry Kasparov for chess supremacy It was during this period, at Linares in 1994, that Karpov achieved what statistics show to be the finestever tournament performance.
Tibor Karolyi is an International Master from Budapest who was Hungarian Champion in 1984.
2011 PB
9781906552428 £20.99
Quality Chess UK Ltd
Interdisciplinary Approaches To Twilight: Studies in Fiction, Media & A Contemporary Cultural Experience By Mariah Larsson & Ann Steiner (eds)
The Twilight novels by Stephenie Meyer have developed from a book series into a powerful phenomenon with an astonishing impact.
Not only have the books been adapted for the screen, but they have also spawned a huge number of works by fans, readers, reviewers, and scholars. The multi-faceted "Interdisciplinary Approaches to Twilight" brings together scholars from a variety of disciplines in order to address the key themes in the complex global phenomenon that is Twilight; a phenomenon that transcends the boundaries between continents, generations, and producers and consumers, and not least between different genres and media.
The authors present in-depth literary and film analyses, and shed new light on perspectives on gender, fandom, vampire fiction and the economics of the book market. The book fills a void in Twilight research, and, linked by their cutting-edge research and unique theoretical and analytical perspectives, the authors compellingly map a massive global experience that speaks to the realities of contemporary culture.
2011 HB
9789185509638 £32.95 Nordic Academic Press
Not only have the books been adapted for the screen, but they have also spawned a huge number of works by fans, readers, reviewers, and scholars. The multi-faceted "Interdisciplinary Approaches to Twilight" brings together scholars from a variety of disciplines in order to address the key themes in the complex global phenomenon that is Twilight; a phenomenon that transcends the boundaries between continents, generations, and producers and consumers, and not least between different genres and media.
The authors present in-depth literary and film analyses, and shed new light on perspectives on gender, fandom, vampire fiction and the economics of the book market. The book fills a void in Twilight research, and, linked by their cutting-edge research and unique theoretical and analytical perspectives, the authors compellingly map a massive global experience that speaks to the realities of contemporary culture.
2011 HB
9789185509638 £32.95 Nordic Academic Press
Fiona Pardington: The Pressure Of Sunlight Falling By Kriselle Baker & Elizabeth Rankin (eds)
European explorers of the Pacific in the 18th and early 19th centuries faced a problem -- how to describe the people they met and report what they had seen and found. From Cook onwards, a serious expedition included artists and scientists in its ship's company.
An ambitious journey of the 19th century was the third voyage of the French explorer Dumont d'Urville, from 1837 to 1840. It was just before the invention of photography, when phrenology, the study of people's skulls, was the latest thing. D'Urville chose to take on the voyage an eminent phrenologist, Pierre-Marie Dumoutier, to preserve likenesses of people by making life casts.
When the expedition returned to France, the casts were displayed, and later stored in the Musée de l'Homme in Paris, to be joined eventually by other casts from Dumoutier's collection, including those of the d'Urville and Dumoutier families. All were overtaken by photography and history. Fiona Pardington first learnt of the life casts in 2007, when a chance conversation initiated a four-year project.
It took her from Auckland to the Musée de l'Homme, as she researched and photographed some of more than fifty casts of Maori, Pacific and European heads, including casts of her Ngai Tahu ancestors. This book publishes these photographs and coincides with the opening of a major travelling exhibition. The photographs are extraordinarily beautiful, evocative and spiritually powerful images. They recover likenesses and revive the life force of Dumoutier's subjects, eliciting our empathy and fascination with a world we can never really know. This is a rich and engaging book.
With essays by leading scholars in Pacific history, art and photography, on subjects as diverse as phrenology and cast-making, the voyage, and the identity of the Maori casts, it will appeal to anyone interested in nineteenth-century encounters between voyagers and the peoples of the Pacific, or contemporary art and photography.
Dr Kriselle Baker is a freelance writer and curator. Professor Elizabeth Rankin teaches Art History at Auckland University. Previously professor at the University of Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, her writing has focused on retrieving the histories of neglected South African artists, and on sculptors and printmakers internationally.
2011 HB 9781877578090 £49.99
Otago University Press
An ambitious journey of the 19th century was the third voyage of the French explorer Dumont d'Urville, from 1837 to 1840. It was just before the invention of photography, when phrenology, the study of people's skulls, was the latest thing. D'Urville chose to take on the voyage an eminent phrenologist, Pierre-Marie Dumoutier, to preserve likenesses of people by making life casts.
When the expedition returned to France, the casts were displayed, and later stored in the Musée de l'Homme in Paris, to be joined eventually by other casts from Dumoutier's collection, including those of the d'Urville and Dumoutier families. All were overtaken by photography and history. Fiona Pardington first learnt of the life casts in 2007, when a chance conversation initiated a four-year project.
It took her from Auckland to the Musée de l'Homme, as she researched and photographed some of more than fifty casts of Maori, Pacific and European heads, including casts of her Ngai Tahu ancestors. This book publishes these photographs and coincides with the opening of a major travelling exhibition. The photographs are extraordinarily beautiful, evocative and spiritually powerful images. They recover likenesses and revive the life force of Dumoutier's subjects, eliciting our empathy and fascination with a world we can never really know. This is a rich and engaging book.
With essays by leading scholars in Pacific history, art and photography, on subjects as diverse as phrenology and cast-making, the voyage, and the identity of the Maori casts, it will appeal to anyone interested in nineteenth-century encounters between voyagers and the peoples of the Pacific, or contemporary art and photography.
Dr Kriselle Baker is a freelance writer and curator. Professor Elizabeth Rankin teaches Art History at Auckland University. Previously professor at the University of Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, her writing has focused on retrieving the histories of neglected South African artists, and on sculptors and printmakers internationally.
2011 HB 9781877578090 £49.99
Otago University Press
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