Mawson – Peter Fitzimmons

Douglas Mawson, born in 1882 and knighted in 1914, was Australia’s greatest Antarctic explorer. This is the incredible account of an expedition he led on December 2, 1911, from Hobart, to explore the virgin frozen coastline below, 2000 miles of which had never felt the tread of a human foot.

After setting up Main Base at Cape Denision and Western Base on Queen Mary Land, he headed east on an extraordinary sledging trek with his companions, Belgrave Ninnis and Dr Xavier Mertz. After five weeks, tragedy struck—Ninnis was swallowed whole by a snow-covered crevasse, and Mawson and Mertz realized it was too dangerous to go on. Dwindling supplies forced them to kill their dogs to feed the other dogs, at first, and then themselves. Hunger, sickness, and despair eventually got the better of Ninnis, and he succumbed to madness and then to death. Mawson found himself all alone, 160 miles from safety, with next to no food.

This staggering tale of his survival, against all odds, also masterfully interweaves the stories of the other giants from the heroic age of polar exploration, to bring the jaw-dropping events of this bygone era dazzlingly back to life.

Legacy of Hartlepool Hall – Paul Torday

Ed Hartlepool has been living in self-imposed exile for five years, but with a settlement regarding his inheritance looming, he must return to his ancestral seat, Hartlepool Hall. On his return, he discovers that his father has left him, along with the house, a seven million pound tax bill, two massive overdrafts, an 80-year-old butler, and a vast country estate that is creaking at the seams. Not only that, but there is a strange woman in residence at Hartlepool Hall who seems to have made herself very much at home.

It turns out that ‘Lady Alice’ was his father’s first mistress and she tells him more about his father than he ever discovered during his life. With the debts mounting, it seems that Ed’s only recourse is to turn to his friend Annabel’s new boyfriend, a property developer who plans to turn Hartlepool Hall into luxury flats and a golf course.

But can Ed save his inheritance without such a drastic move and thereby preserve a way of life that has been in his family for generations? And is Lady Alice really the person she claims to be?

Mystery

Cold Wind – C.J. Box
Afraid of the Dark – James Grippando
The House of Silk- Anthony Horowitz
Nightmare – Stephen Leather
Birthdays for the Dead – Stuart MacBride
Breakdown – Sarah Paretsky
A Very Private Murder – Stuart Pawson
Sleepwalker – Karen Robards
No One Left To Tell – Karen Rose
American Devil – Oliver Stark

Novel
A Devil Is Waiting – Jack Higgins
The Underside of Joy – Sere Prince Hakversib
The Book of Lost Fragrances – M.J. Rose
The Legacy of Hartlepool Hall – Paul Torday
Outside the Ordinary World – Dori Ostermiller

Romance
The Ideal Man – Julie Garwood
The Girl in Steel Capped Boots – Loretta Hill
Me Before You – Jo Jo Moyes

Scandinavian
Midwinter Sacrifice – Mons Kallentoft
Phantom – Jo Nesbo

Non Fiction
The Most Beautiful EWalk in the World – John Baxter
Mawson – Peter Fitzsimons
See Naples and Die – Penelope Green
We Bought a Zoo – Benjamin Mee

Twilight Talk Dates

April 20, 27
May 4,18, 25
June 1

July 13, 20, 27
August 3, 10, 17

October 5, 12, 19, 26
November 2, 9

Details of speakers and subjects will follow soon.

I will mention a few prices at the time of my arrival in San Francisco (1855), though I fear that some readers will scarcely believe these enormous prices. A house with 5 or 6 small rooms lets for 250 pounds a month. The large fashionable shops paid a rent of 150 pounds a month. Carpenters and masons earned $8 a day, dressmakers $4, beef is a shilling a pound, milk a shilling a quart…..

Ida Pfeiffer A Lady’s Second Journey Around the World.

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