This fascinating selection of photographs traces some of the many ways in which Birkenhead has changed and developed over the last century

The Wirral peninsula is a microcosm, having experienced every historical development to have affected England since the Stone-Age hunter-gatherers came. Inhabited in the Bronze and Iron Ages, it was exploited by Romans from their nearby fortress of Deva, then settled by Celts, Anglo-Saxons and Scandinavians. Its growing medieval population mainly lived by farming and fishing, but the 19th century brought dramatic changes-colonisation by wealthy Liverpudlians, then the rapid growth of the great urban and industrial centres of Ellesmere Port, Birkenhead and Wallasey. Every aspect of the past lives of its people is explored, and how they moulded today's Wirral.

In powerful and spirited prose, Peter Birkenhead recounts a childhood spent trying to make sense of his father, a terrifying, charismatic presence who brutalized his family physically and emotionally at the same time that he enchanted them with his passion and whimsy. An avid gun collector yet an anti-war activist, a popular economics professor and a wife-swapping nudist, a leftist and a lifelong fan of the British Empire who would occasionally don an authentic pith helmet and imitate Michael Caine’s performance as the heroic Lieutenant Gonville Bromhead in the bloody war film Zulu, he was a man who could knock his young son down the stairs one day and the next cry about putting the family’s aged dog to sleep. Such is the contradictory figure at the center of this astonishingly candid and shocking memoir. As a young adult, Birkenhead reacted to his volatile childhood by forgetting its worst moments. He adopted all the trappings of normalcy, threw himself into a career as an actor, landing parts in Broadway plays like Brighton Beach Memoirs and Broadway Bound, both by Neil Simon, and found himself often playing characters who were angry at their fathers. Yet he discovered that he was sleepwalking through life, on occasion falling into rages that reminded him of his father. Then at thirty-one, eleven years after his parents’ divorce, Birkenhead told his mother about his recurring dream of flying down the stairs of their house as a young boy. She revealed that it wasn’t a dream, but a memory from his early childhood of being carried rapidly down the stairs by his mom after his father had pointed a gun at them. The revelation about the dream sparked the painful yet necessary process of examining his childhood and of ultimately moving beyond it, forcing Birkenhead to finally confront his father in a way that released him and his family from this complicated legacy. Combining the terror and wit of Running with Scissors, the poignancy and sense of place of The Tender Bar, with the sparkling prose of Oh the Glory of It All, Gonville is light on its feet even as it deals in the darkest of family tales. A harrowing and often humorous story of a son coming to terms with his alternately charming, cruel, generous, and violent father.

Becoming a manager is not a progression in your career, it's a move into an entirely new job, one that requires a unique set of skills. Get it right and you'll inspire your team to deliver outstanding results. But get it wrong and you'll create stress, apathy and dysfunction in your team. Penguin Business Expert Simon Birkenhead has been guiding first-time and established managers for over two decades, helping them implement his blueprint for success. Here he reveals his framework that clearly explains what you must do for your employees to be the best they possibly can. Learn how to: - Activate motivation - Set clear expectations - Provide effective feedback - Master your communication skills - Build a high-performance team culture Managing People is your complete guide to becoming a truly great manager for whom people want to do their best work.

Full of the warmth and excitement of growing up in the 1950s, awakening nostalgia for times that seemed cosy and carefree with families at last enjoying peacetime, this book is packed with the experience of school days, playtime, holidays, toys, games, clubs and hobbies conjuring up the genuine atmosphere of a bygone era. As the decade progressed, rationing ended and children's pocket money was spent on goodies like Chocstix, Spangles, Wagon Wheels and Fry's Five Boys. Television brought Bill and Ben, The Adventures of Robin Hood and, for teenagers, The Six-Five Special, along with coffee bars and rock 'n' roll. This book opens a window on an exciting period of optimism, when anything seemed possible, described by the children and teenagers who experienced it. Liverpool's traditional sense of community, strengthened by the war years, provided a secure background from which children and teenagers could welcome a second Elizabethan era.

A unique and charming look at the history of Birkenhead and its inhabitants, through a fascinating collection of beautiful photographs.