{"title":"Lives","description":"\u003cp\u003eDiscover captivating biographies and memoirs that bring extraordinary lives to light. From historical figures to contemporary icons, explore tales of resilience, innovation, and remarkable achievement. Start your journey today.\u003c\/p\u003e","products":[{"product_id":"napoleon-book-paul-johnson-9781842126509","title":"Napoleon","description":"A short and vivid biography, which deconstructs the Napoleonic myth and reveals the reality of his rule.  'Written with his customary verve and certainty' Andrew Roberts, SUNDAY TELEGRAPH  Written with great wit and panache, this biography also has a serious purpose: to make us face up to the moral bankruptcy of Napoleon's dictatorship.   Johnson tells the whole story: his astonishing gift for battle tactics and his complete control of propaganda. His audacious, hyperactive and aggressive leadership alongside his failure as an international statesman, as Europe grew to hate him.  His marshals and ministers; his wives, mistresses. The mistakes he made; the escape from Elba, and the world-changing events leading up to Waterloo and the battle itself.   This riveting account is a fascinating look at one of the most notorious military leaders of all time.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"GB \/ VERY_GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":49504185254161,"sku":"GOR001463172","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"GB \/ NEW \/ GARDNERS","offer_id":49732522410257,"sku":"NGR9781842126509","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"US \/ WELL_READ \/ SBYB","offer_id":50400726483217,"sku":"CIN1842126504A","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ VERY_GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":51767950639377,"sku":"CIN1842126504VG","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ LIKE_NEW \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":51797409005841,"sku":"GOR011149587","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":52107287626001,"sku":"CIN1842126504G","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":53012371898641,"sku":"GOR003199903","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/1842126504.jpg?v=1772704413"},{"product_id":"lives-buddha-book-karen-armstrong-9780753813409","title":"Lives: Buddha","description":"'Karen Armstrong has been one of the most persistent and powerful voices in the eminently respectable task of popularising religious scholarship in the anglophone world' GUARDIAN  'Her work has a broad sweep and that is extremely important' TLS  Buddhism is a faith that commands over 100 million followers throughout the world. Buddha stands with Christ, Confucius and Mohammed as someone who revolutionised the religious ideas of his time to advocate a new way of living.   Since Buddhism promotes no personal god, Buddhism, writes Armstrong, 'is essentially a psychological faith'. In our own age of secular anxiety, she shows that it has profound lessons to teach about selflessness and the simple life.  All that is known about Buddha comes from a collection of ancient writings that fuse history, biography and myth. Karen Armstrong distils from these the key events of Buddha's life: his birth as Siddhartha Gotama in the fifth century BC and his abandonment of his wife and son; his attainment of enlightenment under the Banyan tree (the moment he became a buddha, or enlightened one; his political influence; the divisions among his followers; and his serene death. 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His well-documented life - the enormous quantity of work, his public readings and his difficult relationships have always made fascinating reading. As a novelist herself, Jane Smiley approaches her subject from a new angle making this biography a must for both aficionados and new recruits. Instead of tracing the events in his life chronologically, she reveals things only as he did - sometimes years after the event. Thus we see him as his contemporaries would have done and get to know him more intimately than ever before. 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Johnson tells the whole story: his astonishing gift for figures and calculation, his mastery of cannon; his audacious, hyperactive and aggressive generalship and his simple battle tactics; his complete control of propaganda and the success of the cultural presentation of the Empire; the Code Napoleon; his failure as an international statesman, as Europe grew to hate him; his marshals and ministers; his wives, mistresses, personal style and working methods; the British blockade and the Continental System; the mistakes in Spain and Russia. The escape from Elba, the events leading up to Waterloo and the battle itself, which gets a full treatment, is particularly riveting.","brand":"WoB","offers":[{"title":"GB \/ VERY_GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":49518902673681,"sku":"GOR001775972","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true},{"title":"GB \/ LIKE_NEW \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":50261811593489,"sku":"GOR010645339","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ VERY_GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":51747260825873,"sku":"CIN0297607375VG","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"US \/ GOOD \/ SBYB","offer_id":51767216668945,"sku":"CIN0297607375G","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false},{"title":"GB \/ GOOD \/ INTERNAL","offer_id":53208574460177,"sku":"GOR002029926","price":0.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":false}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/0297607375.jpg?v=1751389720"},{"product_id":"proust-book-edmund-white-9780297842422","title":"Proust","description":"This life of Marcel Proust will send readers back to Proust's classic Remembrance of Things Past. 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