Crypt by Professor Alice Roberts
£22 – signed special editions in stock now
The history of the Middle Ages is typically the story of the rich and powerful – there’s barely a written note for most people’s lives. Now, cutting-edge science can give us a new understanding of the past – one more intimate and inclusive than ever before.
The seven stories in Crypt are not comforting tales. We meet the victims of the St Brice’s Day Massacre. We see a society struggling to make sense of disease, disability and death, as incurable epidemics sweep through medieval Europe. We learn of a protracted battle between Church and State that led to t the destruction of the most famous tomb in England, and we come face to face with the archers who went down with Henry VIII’s favourite ship, the Mary Rose.
‘We are using the same techniques that we use to track diseases now. We are using the same techniques to sequence DNA – just from very, very old bones. Rather than a swab to the mouth, you take DNA from the bones. It gives you an extraordinary insight into families through time.’
The Ladder: Life Lessons from Women Who Have Scaled the Heights and Dodged the Snakes by Cathy Newman £18.99
Journalist and presenter of Channel 4 News Cathy Newman’s new book The Ladder brings together discussions between women – about work, love, growth, challenge, the big decisions and the stories of their lives.
Offering inspiration and wise counsel from some of the world’s most acclaimed and influential women, this book is an insight and a trove of solidarity. It talks about change, anger, illness, imposter syndrome, self-knowledge, purpose, how to not panic in a crisis and how to stop worrying you’re boring.
Amid the pages are discussions with women who have achieved extraordinary things in their fields and pursuits, from scientists like Dame Jocelyn Bell Burnell, activists like Rosamund Kissi-Debrah, film-makers like Waad Al-Kateab, religious leaders like Rose Hudson-Wilkin and broadcasters like Joan Bakewell.
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