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From the double Man Booker Prize-winning author of ‘Wolf Hall’, a wry, shocking and beautiful memoir of childhood, ghosts, hauntings, illness and family.At no. 58 the top of my head comes to the outermost curve of my great-aunt, Annie Connor. Her shape is like the full moon, her smile is beaming; the outer rim of her is covered by her pinny, woven with tiny flowers. It is soft from washing; her hands are hard and chapped; it is barely ten o'clock and she is getting the cabbage on. 'Hello, Our Ilary,' she says; my family has named me aspirationally, but aspiration doesn't stretch to the 'H'.Giving Up the Ghost is award-winning novelist Hilary Mantel's wry, shocking and uniquely unusual five-part autobiography of childhood, ghosts, illness and family.It opens in 1995 with 'A Second Home', in which Mantel describes the death of her stepfather, a death which leaves her deeply troubled by the unresolved events of childhood. ‘Now Geoffrey Don't Torment Her' begins in typical, gripping Mantel fashion: 'Two of my relatives have died by fire.' Set during the 1950s, it takes the reader into the muffled consciousness of her early childhood, culminating with the birth of a younger brother and the strange candlelit ceremony of her mother's 'churching'. In 'The Secret Garden' Mantel moves to a haunted house and mysteriously gains a stepfather. When she is almost eleven, her family flee the gossips and the ghosts, and resolve to start a new life. 'Smile' is an account of teenage perplexity, in a household where the keeping of secrets has become a way of life. Convent school provides a certain sanctuary, with tacit assistance from the fearsome 'Top Nun.' In the final section, the author tells how, through medical misunderstandings and neglect, she came to be childless, and how the ghosts of the unborn, like chances missed or pages unturned, have come to haunt her life as a writer.

‘The word “mesmerising” is frequently applied to memoirs, but seldom as deservedly as in the case of Girl With Dove’ Financial Times‘Reading is a form of escape and an avid reader is an escape artist…’Growing up in a dilapidated house by the sea where men were forbidden, Sally’s childhood world was filled with mystery and intrigue. Hippies trailed through the kitchen looking for God – their leader was Aunt Di, who ruled the house with charismatic force. When Sally’s baby brother vanishes from his pram, she becomes suspicious of the activities going on around her. What happened to Baby David and the woman called Poor Sue? And where did all the people singing and wailing prayers in the front room suddenly go?Disappearing into a world of books and reading, Sally adopts the tried and tested methods of Miss Marple. Taking books for hints and clues, she turns herself into a reading detective. Her discovery of Jane Eyre marks the beginning of a vivid journey through Victorian literature where she also finds the kind, eccentric figure of Charles Dickens’ Betsey Trotwood. These characters soon become her heroines, acting as a part of an alternative family, offering humour and guidance during many difficult moments in Sally’s life.Combining the voices of literary characters with those of her real-life counterparts, Girl With Dove reads as a magical series of strange encounters, climaxing with a comic performance of Shakespeare in the children’s home where Sally is eventually sent.Weaving literary classics with a young girl’s coming of age story, this is a book that testifies to the transformative power of reading and the literary imagination. Mixing fairy tale, literary classics, nursery rhymes and folklore, it is the story of a child’s adventure in wonderland and search for truth in an adult world often cast in deep shadow.

From the bestselling author of Eats, Shoots and Leaves, a hilarious new book from Lynne Truss about her strange journey through the world of sport and sports journalism.Get Her Off the Pitch! is the story of one woman's foray into the very masculine and rather baffling world of sport. Lynne Truss, author of Eats, Shoots and Leaves, spent four years as an unlikely sports writer for The Times. It was a job that took her around the world (via the most difficult journeys and least glamorous hotels) and introduced her to some of the greatest living sportsmen (and many argumentative men with clipboards).During her time at the newspaper she faced disdain from fellow sports writers; undertook last-minute, pre-fight research into 'The Rumble in the Jungle' (Muhammad Ali won, surprisingly); tried unsuccessfully to interpret bizarre commentary and memorize results statistics; wept at football matches and discovered a lasting love for golf. She was even nominated for Sports Writer of the Year.Get Her Off the Pitch! is the hilarious, perceptive and at times moving account of those four strange years. It is perfect for those for whom sport is a matter of life and death, for those who have no idea what all the fuss is about – and for everyone in between.

A biography of Borges, by his translator.Jorge Luis Borges, known as Georgie to his friends, married Elsa Astete Millán in 1967. Borges was sixty-eight years old at the time of the wedding; Elsa, a widow,with a son in his twenties, was eleven years younger.It proved to be a tempestuous and eventful marriage that would leave an indelible mark on the remainder of Borges’ life, but their relationship has been largely glossed over by previous biographers. This is because the one person who knew all the details has refused to speak about it.Until now.Norman Thomas di Giovanni worked with Borges in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and in Buenos Aires from late 1967 to 1972 and thereafter sporadically until Borges’s death in 1986. During their first period together di Giovanni spent more time with the couple than did almost anyone else. He was privy to the private side of their relationship and to its sudden decline. It was di Giovanni who helped the demoralized Borges by organizing and arranging his divorce and at the same time rescuing his library and smuggling him out of Buenos Aires to avoid the wrath of Elsa and her lawyers.The book is based on the author’s extensive collection of original material in the form of diaries, notebooks, letters, manuscripts, and photographs, most of which has never before been seen. It provides a unique insight into one of the few true geniuses of literature.

Few modern British sportsmen have fascinated the public more than Geoff Boycott. In this first comprehensive and balanced account of Boycott’s life – fully updated to include his battle against cancer – award-winning author Leo McKinstry lifts the lid on one of cricket’s great enigmatic characters.A record-breaking Test cricketer and acerbic commentator, Geoff Boycott has never been far away from controversy during his long career in the game.Based on meticulous research and interviews with a host of players, Test captains, officials, broadcasters, friends and enemies, this definitive biography cuts through the Boycott myth to expose the truth about this charismatic, single-minded and often exasperating personality.What was Boycott like as a schoolboy? How did his England cricket colleagues such as Graham Gooch, Dennis Amiss and Brian Close feel about him as a person? Why was he so unpopular in his early career for Yorkshire? And what is the real truth about the relationships that soured his private world?From his upbringing as a miner’s son in a Yorkshire village, through highlights like his hundredth century at Headingley against Australia, to the low points such as the damaging court case in France, this warts-and-all account of his life makes for captivating reading.

Silver boots, perma-tanned skin, shaven legs and gravity-defying red spikes in his hair – Gavin Henson is Wales’s hottest new celeb and rugby’s golden boy. This is his story of a momentous year in rugby, starting with an epic Six Nations Grand Slam for Wales, followed by the toughest of all tours, the British Lions in New Zealand.After kicking the 50-yard goal that sent England to shock defeat in the 2005 Six Nations, the 23-year-old Gavin Henson demonstrated that here, at last, was a Welsh sportsman who was ready to put his proud rugby nation back on the world map.Wales’s Grand Slam triumph – their first since 1978 – was done the hard way, with dramatic victories against the world champions followed by France in Paris, and climaxing in the Millennium stadium against Ireland, amid a crescendo of noise and passion-fuelled expectation.The flamboyant Henson relives those special moments on and off the field: the build-up to the games and the stories from within the inner sanctum of the Welsh dressing room; the pressure of suddenly becoming favourites to win the trophy; the nail-biting victories over England and France; and the moment when Henson knew that life would never be the same again.Fast forward to summer 2005. Wales’s No 12, the inside-centre whose clever running, booming kicks and crunching tackling make him a genuine all-rounder, is the favourite to play alongside captain and Irish phenomenon Brian O’Driscoll in the Lions team against the All Blacks in this most eagerly awaited clash of the Northern and Southern hemispheres.Henson’s insight into this defining tour, his views on coach Clive Woodward and his home nation colleagues (including a fit-again Jonny Wilkinson), and the eye-opening stories away from the rugby – plus all the other highlights of an unprecedented season for Wales’s new generation of talent – will make this book essential reading for the autumn.

Alan Curbishley has spent a lifetime in football both as a fan, player and manager.In his forty years, he has seen the game he loves change beyond all recognition. The money, the media, the celebrity culture, the agents – when Curbishley began his playing career in 1975, no one could have foreseen a future in which television rights sold for £10 billion.Through incredible access to the biggest names in the game, he takes a look at the modern game in all its guises, from the chairmen and chief executives at the very top to managers and players and all the way to the fans and ground staff. On the way, we hear from an eclectic and colourful cast of characters and some true legends of the sport, old and new: Arsène Wenger, Stevie Gerrard, Frank Lampard, Rio Ferdinand, Harry Redknapp, Harry Kane.This is a truly unique football book, written by one of the most respected and well-connected men in the sport. Never before has such an array of talent been collected within the pages of one book – it will spark discussion, enliven arguments and throw fire onto the debate: as the game changes, does it change for the better?

David Lovelace, along with his brother and both his parents, is bipolar. This is his extraordinary and vivid memoir of life within his memorable, maddening, loving and unique family.Full Blown is Lovelace's poignant, humorous, and vivid account of growing up and coming to terms with the highs and lows of manic depression.David's father was a Princeton-trained theology professor deemed too eccentric for the ministry and his mother battled depression all her life. Manic episodes were part of family life – they called them the 'whim-whams'. David was a teenager when his first serious depression hit, and at college when he first became manic. He ran to escape it – to Mexico, South America and then New York, to drugs and alcohol – before he realised the futility of running.A father himself, a son and a brother, David's matter-of-fact approach to growing up surrounded by the unique creativity often sparked by manic depression is compelling. In the vein of Stuart, A Life Backwards and Augusten Burroughs’ Running with Scissors , David’s poetic ability to detail the unique highs and harrowing lows makes a remarkable and gripping read.