John Van Der Kiste: 39 books

This history brings together numerous murderous tales that shocked not only the county but also made headlines. They include the cases of Elizabeth and Betty Branch, a mother and daughter who beat a young servant girl to death in Hemington in 1740; 13-year-old Betty Trump, whose throat was cut while...

Prince Alfred, who was created Duke of Edinburgh in 1866 and became Duke of Saxe-Coburg Gotha in 1893, was the second son of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert. A patron of the arts, pioneer philatelist and amateur violinist, he joined the Royal Navy as a boy and rose to become Admiral of the Fleet....

The eldest of King George III's children, who became Prince Regent and King George IV, is less remembered for his patronage of the arts than for his extravagance and maltreatment of his wife. This objective portrayal of the royal family draws upon sources to lay to rest the gossip and exaggeratio

Born in Birmingham, Steve Winwood was already a semi-professional musician, playing keyboards and guitar, while still at school. As lead vocalist with The Spencer Davis Group, he had had two chart-topping singles by the time he was aged eighteen. In 1967 he formed Traffic, long noted as one of the...

Jonathan Wild (born c.1683), probably Britain's most well-known criminal of the 18th century, was known as the director of a 'corporation of thieves'. He learned his 'trade' while serving a sentence in a debtor's prison, and established a curious reputation as 'Thief Taker General of Great Britain...

When singer-songwriter Alan Hull joined the group Brethren in 1969 and they were renamed Lindisfarne shortly afterwards, nobody could have foreseen that the name would still be around more than forty years later. It has been a chequered saga for them, from the members’ origins in the beat and folk...

Did you know cornwall has the longest coastline of any English county. A quarry at Carclaze was used as the location for filming Dr. Who in the 1970s. D.H. Lawrence and his German wife were forced to leave the county in the First World War under the Defence of the Realm Act. A compendium of fascinating...

A compendium of fascinating information about Devon past and present, this book contains a plethora of entertaining facts about the county's famous and occasionally infamous men and women, its towns and countryside, history, natural history, literary, artistic and sporting achievements, agriculture,...

ELO (Electric Light Orchestra) were formed by Roy Wood and Jeff Lynne of The Move as a fusion of rock and contemporary classical-style music, combining orchestral instruments, guitars, keyboards, and drums in the same line-up. Their aim was to continue from where The Beatles’ ‘I am the Walrus’...

Taking you through the year day by day, The Plymouth Book of Days contains a quirky, eccentric, amusing, or important event or fact from different periods of history. Find out when Plymothians elected the first woman to take her seat at Westminster, when Sir Francis Chichester sailed back into the...

Detailed UK and US discographies, including release dates and chart positions A thoroughly researched collection of facts and trivia guaranteed to delight and enthral any fan of the group, young and old Considerable media focus on The Beatles expected in 2017, the 50th anniversary of the release...