Desert Island Books: 89 books

Was Vlad the Impaler the inspiration for Bram Stoker's novel Dracula? No! Did Stoker write about Transylvania from first-hand experience? No! Has the model for Count Dracula's castle been found? No! Must Count Dracula stay out of the sunlight? Absolutely not! Literary sleuth Elizabeth Miller exposes...

The scariest place on earth.' So said President Bill Clinton on his visit to the no-man's land between South and North Korea. The minefields and barbed wire mark the jagged edge of world peace. If the world is to see a nuclear war, Korea is the likely flashpoint. The contrast between the two Koreas...

The resonant and awesome figure of Count Dracula. his Transylvanian lair, and his powers of supernatural evil, have imprinted themselves on the popular imagination, largely through the medium of the cinema. And yet, until now, no one has undertaken a detailed analysis of the source of our preconceptions...

This is two books in one. In 2002 Peter Jones published Wrexham: The European Era. His story began in 1972, when the club first competed in the European Cup-Winners Cup. This was undoubtedly the most successful and dramatic period in the clubs history. The European era also saw numerous acts of domestic...

British author Rob Hadgraft specialises in biographies of marathon and ultra-distance runners. All are available worldwide as ebooks. His five subjects to date are:1. The Little Wonder: The Untold Story of Alfred Shrubb - World Champion Runner.2. Beer and Brine: The Making of Walter George - Athletics'...

British author Rob Hadgraft specialises in biographies of marathon and ultra-distance runners. All are available worldwide as ebooks. His five subjects to date are:1. The Little Wonder: The Untold Story of Alfred Shrubb - World Champion Runner.2. Beer and Brine: The Making of Walter George - Athletics'...

In the Cobblers' post-war history, two seasons stand out. The first, 1965-66, was explored in Northampton Town: A Season in the Sun, when the players rubbed shoulders with the mightiest in the land. The second season, 1986-87, was the opposite. This time the Cobblers were in the bottom division, not...

In 1909 when Arthur Joscelyne was six his father emptied the family savings from the jug on the mantelpiece to buy 200 yards of beach on the north shore of the River Thames. Arthur helped run Joscelynes Beach for 20 years. In his 80th year he recorded his remarkable early life in two manuscripts. The...

British author Rob Hadgraft specialises in biographies of marathon and ultra-distance runners. All are available worldwide as ebooks. His five subjects to date are:1. The Little Wonder: The Untold Story of Alfred Shrubb - World Champion Runner.2. Beer and Brine: The Making of Walter George - Athletics'...

Timing is everything, and Billy Walker certainly had great timing. Had he been born a few years earlier he would have lost his youth and maybe his life to the First World War. Instead in 1920, aged just 22, he helped Aston Villa claim the first post-war FA Cup. He didnt score that day, but by the...

Notts County's Tommy Lawton Era came in three parts first as player from November 1947 to March 1952, then as manager from May 1957 to July 1958, and finally as coach and chief scout from October 1968 to December 1969. Lawton was one of the biggest names in football when he sensationally left Chelsea...

Dracula Unearthed takes the lid off Stoker's most famous novel. With the aid of 3,400 textual endnotes and annotations, new light is shed on its sources, characters and structure. Stoker never went to Transylvania, so how could he describe it so graphically? Prior to Dracula, he had never written about...

Over the past 50 years Luton Town have been rocked by twelve calamities. Each of them threatened the very future of the club. Trouble and strife have become a way of life at Kenilworth Road. But in the summer of 2008 the Hatters suffered a crisis of catastrophic proportions. An unprecedented 30 points...

Priscilla Wong had had six boyfriends. Because she did not marry the first or second, her classmates called her a prostitute. Yet she was still a virgin. A virgin whore. Perhaps the contradiction could only exist in China. I grew fond of the idea, for it seemed a perfect caricature of China as a whole...