As any, even vaguely addicted book collector will have swiftly learned, most booksellers' catalogues are written in a parallel language that can fool anyone but the 'cognoscenti' and which makes the mysteries of the Rosetta stone, or Linear B, look like something out of Enid Blython. Without a smattering of inside information, the baffled but hopelessly-bitten book buyer is drifting unarmed and unprepared into a minefield whose perilous complexities will usually only be made plain when an eagerly awaited parcel of dream volumes arrives and mangled contents are revealed in all their deceptive glory.... But all is not lost. Help is at hand! After a lifetime of avidly scanning the frequently poisonously-tinted pages of innumerable book catalogues, Ronald Searle has become expert in the art of decoding those esoteric, poetic and usually approximate, descriptions of literary come-ons. Now, licking his wounds, he publishes his hard-earned findings in this fully illustrated pioneer guide, designed to foil the devious machinations of scheming and wicked booksellers for ever more. No longer will the innocent book collector need to puzzle over the finer meaning of 'old half road', 'good working copy', blind tooled', or 'tail-edged shaved'. The unvarnished truth is here exposed at last, both in the shocking explicit drawings and in the devastatingly frank glossary whose revelations will startle even the most battle-scarred of bibliophiles. The result is one of the funniest, most entertaining books to have emerged from the brilliantly perceptive pen of the master. No book collector, and certainly no bookseller, can afford to be without it - even the wicked ones.

Illustrated in Searle's inimitable style are the ancient noble ceremony of slashing the trockenbeerenauslese, the inauguration of the first authentic denominazione di origine controllata e garantita, and the vinolympics. For wine lovers who have never tasted ptolemy nouveau or watched the uncorking of the kangarouge, these experiences are related with warmth and humor. The many ways to open a bottle of wine are illustrated, and the rituals and delights of wine around the world are described.

*Longlisted for the Baillie Gifford Prize*? “A shattering portrait of addiction—generously open, desperately honest and confronting.” —Catherine Cho, author of Inferno: A Memoir of Motherhood and Madness An electrifying debut memoir of a pastor’s son chronicling his loss of faith, his addiction to heroin and our universal quest to find something to believe in Matt Rowland Hill had two great loves in his life: Jesus and heroin. The son of an evangelical minister, Hill grew up with an unwavering devotion to the tenets of his parents’ Baptist church. But by high school, he began to experience a crisis of faith. To fill the void, he turned to literature, and then to heroin and cocaine. By his twenties, Hill’s substance abuse escalated into a full-on addiction. As he grew increasingly suicidal, he knew he had to come to terms with both religion and drugs to survive. Hill’s debut is an extraordinary, gorgeously crafted memoir of faith, family, loss, shame and addiction. But ultimately, Original Sins is a raw portrait of survival—of growing up and learning how to live.

Paris is seen through the eyes of artist Fabrice Moireau, with sketches in watercolor and pencil perfectly matched by an introduction by Mary A. Kelly. These residents of the world's most romantic capital city are the perfect guides to its streets, monuments, gardens and delightfully hidden corners.

Dispatched to America in the early ’60s, the golden age of illustrative reportage, Ronald Searle spent several years covering everything―in the form of drawings in his trademark satirical and virtuosic style―from sports to politics, for magazines such as The Saturday Evening Post and TV Guide. Topics included Palm Springs, Las Vegas, the Presidential contest between John F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon―as seen through the eyes of a caustic Englishman.

Offers a collection of full-page cat portraits that document the most adorable, or repulsive, facets of feline personality while, at the same time, depicting that trait in its human manifestation