Showing titles in Adventurers, Explorers & Survival

In September 1921, four young men and Ada Blackjack, a diminutive 25-year-old Eskimo woman, ventured deep into the Arctic in a secret attempt to colonize desolate Wrangel Island for Great Britain. Two years later, Ada Blackjack emerged as the sole survivor of this ambitious polar expedition. This young, unskilled woman - who had headed to the Arctic in search of money and a husband - conquered the seemingly unconquerable north and survived all alone after her male companions had perished.

Della Wright is an incredible campaigner for the rights of abuse victims after suffering a lifetime of betrayal. Left alone at home for the first time at only two years old by those tasked with her care, Della was let down first by social services. When known paedophile Terry Price entered her life when she was six, moving into her home, he would groom and sexually abuse her for the next five years. Even the sight of a little girl going to his probation meetings wasn't enough to make the authorities act.

In this grand and thrilling narrative, the acclaimed biographer of Magellan, Columbus, and Marco Polo brings alive the singular life and adventures of Sir Francis Drake, the pirate/explorer/admiral whose mastery of the seas during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I changed the course of history.

He's shattered world records. He's climbed the highest and coldest mountains wearing nothing but shorts. Most of all, he's shown us that these feats are not superhuman - but that each of us has the ability to be healthier, stronger and happier than we've ever imagined.

When her father died, singer songwriter Roxanne de Bastion inherited a piano she knew had been in her family for over a hundred years. But it is only when she finds a cassette recording of her grandfather, Stephen, playing one of his compositions, the true and almost unbelievable history of the piano, this man and her family begins to unravel.

In 1810, Matthew Flinders made his final voyage home to his beloved wife, Ann, his body ravaged by the deprivations of years of imprisonment by the French. Four years later, at the age of just 40, he would be dead – a premature, tragic end to one of the world’s greatest maritime adventurers who circumnavigated and mapped the famed Great Southern Land, and whose naming of the vast continent would become its modern title: Australia.

"Interessant! Du lebst in einem Van?" Die Autorin schildert ihre Erlebnisse eines minimalistischen Lebensexperiments im Van nach der Auflösung ihres gesamten Hausrats. Als sie sich von Norden nach Süden auf dem Weg zur Selbstfindung begibt, stellt sie sich die Fragen: Was macht mich glücklich? Was brauchen meine Seele und mein Körper? Welchen Sinn und Zweck hat mein Dasein? Kapitel für Kapitel führen den Zuhörer auf eine unterhaltsame und inspirierende Reise, die durch Momente des Erkennens und des Loslassens gekennzeichnet ist.

The Eurofighter Typhoon FGR4 is the most advanced multi-role combat aircraft in the world. Capable of flying at nearly twice the speed of sound and powering to a height of more than 10 miles in less time than it takes to boil a kettle, a single Typhoon can also deliver a heavy bombload with such lethal precision that a whole squadron of Lancasters could not have guaranteed the same result.

In Wild Men, Wild Alaska professional hunting and fishing guide and outfitter Rocky McElveen tells the stories of his own adventures as well as those of some of his well-known clients. The book takes listeners directly into the Alaskan bush, and shares the intense challenges of a majestic wilderness that pushes a man to his limits.

Michael Palin journeys to a vast country of unimaginable contrasts - Brazil. An economic powerhouse, it is host to a staggering variety of peoples. He starts his journey in the north, in the remote mountains and forests on the border with Venezuela, and finishes in the south at the legendary Iguaçu Falls. He travels by river-boat, float-plane and foot to visit tribes deep in the jungle, samples life in the agricultural and mining heartland of Brazil, experiences the modernism of Brasília and the heady mix of Rio de Janeiro, and ventures into the favelas.

In the summer of 1913, the wooden-hulled brigantine Karluk departed Canada for the Arctic Ocean. At the helm was Captain Bob Bartlett, considered the world’s greatest living ice navigator. The expedition’s visionary leader was a flamboyant impresario named Vilhjalmur Stefansson hungry for fame. Just six weeks after the Karluk departed, giant ice floes closed in around her. As the ship became icebound, Stefansson disembarked with five companions and struck out on what he claimed was a 10-day caribou hunting trip. Most on board would never see him again.

In April 2018, seasoned adventurer Ben Fogle and Olympic cycling gold medallist Victoria Pendleton, along with mountaineer Kenton Cool, took on their most exhausting challenge yet – climbing Everest for the British Red Cross to highlight the environmental challenges mountains face. It would be harrowing and exhilarating in equal measure as they walked the fine line between life and death 8,000 metres above sea level.

A 5-year-old boy, Ethan, is brought to Casey in the middle of the night after the sudden death of his young mother after a drug overdose. Estranged from her parents, Ethan’s mum had been abused by her ex-partner, and began taking drugs to cope. Ethan is obviously lost and bewildered, and regularly wakes up screaming for his mum in the night. He begins to lash out at other kids at school and his behaviour becomes more volatile.

Nina Siegal, an accomplished journalist and novelist, weaves together excerpts from the daily journals of collaborators, resistors, and the persecuted—a Dutch Nazi police detective, a Jewish journalist imprisoned at Westerbork transit camp, a grocery store owner who saved dozens of lives—into a braided nonfictional narrative of the Nazi occupation and the Dutch Holocaust, as individuals experienced it day by day.

The real story of one of the greatest explorers who ever lived by the man described by the Guinness Book of Records as ‘the world's greatest living explorer’. Sir Ranulph Fiennes is uniquely qualified to write a new biography of Captain Scott. This is the first biography of Scott by someone who has experienced the deprivations, the stress and the sheer physical pain that Scott lived through.

They say that only truck drivers experience the true grandeur and landscape of America. In A Trucker's Tale, Ed Miller gives an inside look at the allure of the work and the colorful characters who haul our goods on the open road. He shares what it was like to grow up in a trucking family, his experience as an equipment officer in Vietnam, and the trials and tribulations of life as a trucker. His tales are often funny, sometimes sad, cringeworthy, or unbelievable. Many are the results of what he calls "just plain stupidity."

A shocking true story that reveals how one woman was tormented to the very depths of despair by her husband through coercive control and continual physical and sexual abuse. Broken in mind, body and spirit and completely isolated from the rest of the world, Hannah thinks she’ll never find the strength to escape, until one day an opportunity arrives....

It was 13 October 1972. Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571, carrying a team of young rugby players, their families and friends, took off for the very last time. A deadly miscalculation saw F571 crash directly into the Andean mountains to devastating consequences: the body of the plane broke violently into two, its floor torn to smithereens; seats flew out of the air taking passengers with them. In the weeks that followed, the remaining people who were on board - the society of the snow - emerged to fight a dire, gruelling battle for survival.

Gaia Cooper is just 14 years old when she is groomed by a criminal gang and forced to commit organised credit card fraud. Despite being placed in care – somewhere Gaia should feel safe – she is left even more vulnerable, and is horrifically abused and exploited by the men manipulating her. Will the authorities save Gaia – or will she have to save herself?

At 28,251 feet, K2 might be almost 800 feet shorter than Everest, but it’s a far harder climb. It will kill you on the way up and the way down. Mick Conefrey guides us through the early story of the legendary mountain and the extraordinary attempts that led up to its first ascent in 1954 - these are tales of riveting drama and unimaginable tragedy.