Feed: "Big Issue" By: Kieron Connolly on Sunday, July 6, 2025

In 1989, on this day, I was in my office in Maynooth 🇮🇪 - in my first job as a Germanist. This calendar was on my wall. None of my colleagues anywhere in the world had any idea that within a week, the #DDR would be finished.

An excellent review of Linda Jaivin's Bombard the Headquarters! by Wanning Sun in Asia Times. ' Jaivin’s narrative flair and sense of drama give new life to what is almost certainly the sorriest period in recent Chinese history...she is a consummate storyteller.' asiatimes.com/2025/07/lear...

High in Alps on Italian Front was Marmolada glacier battleground. Sep 24 1917 #OTD photos show positions, including barracks and artillery positions, of the Austro-Hungarians Empire carved into mountain peaks ÖNB Digital ID: 15428012, 15428033, 15428040 bsky.app/profile/this...

We are thrilled that Lesley Downer's The Shortest History of Japan has been selected as one of Waterstone's non-fiction paperbacks of the year. @waterstones.bsky.social @lesleydowner.bsky.social www.waterstones.com/campaign/pap...

Tickets are still available for in person (and online) for Ian Mortimer's event at the Gloucester History Festival this evening. @ianmortimer.bsky.social

'[Livy would] be a good BBC historian, popping up and doing documentaries, tramping around fields to tell us where things happened...' The Shortest History of Ancient Rome's Ross King on the best Roman history books. @fivebooks.com fivebooks.com/best-books/t...

Tickets are now available for Ross King's talk at Waterstones Gower St on Monday 20 October about his excellent new book THE SHORTEST HISTORY OF ANCIENT ROME. Out now in hardback @waterstones.bsky.social www.waterstones.com/events/the-s...

'Condensed, lively brevity... an excellent guide to how and why China “went mad”.' MICHAEL EASSON, The Sydney Institute, on Linda Jaivin's BOMBARD THE HEADQUARTERS! THE CULTURAL REVOLUTION IN CHINA. Out now in hardback. thesydneyinstitute.com.au/blog/worlds-...

Timetravelling historian Ian Mortimer will be talking about his forthcoming book MORTIMER'S A-Zs of ENGLISH HISTORY at the Gloucester History Festival this Friday 19 Sept. Pre-publication copies of the book will be on sale. Online tickets are available here: www.ticketsource.co.uk/whats-on/onl...

From The Gulag Archipelago to Khrushchev Remembers, Sheila Fitzpatrick, author of The Death of Stalin, chooses the five best books on the Soviet Union for FiveBooks @fivebooks.com fivebooks.com/best-books/t...

RIP Chris Steele-Perkins, the man who shot the ultimate "What, me worry?" photo.

© Chris Steele-Perkins (28 juil. 1947 - 8 sept. 2025) RIP

RIP Chris Steele-Perkins 1947-2025 🩶

www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/epis... Including the first ever visit by a film crew to Dr Kafka’s asylum for mentally damaged folk-comrades, in Frankenstein. Really.

Happy publication day to Ross King's excellent book THE SHORTEST HISTORY OF ANCIENT ROME. 'King’s supreme ability is to imagine himself into the past… The scope of his knowledge is staggering' —John Carey, Sunday Times

'Rich, readable... Jones is a compelling tour guide through time' Russell Williams in the TLS on Colin Jones's The Shortest History of France. Out now in hardback. @thetls.bsky.social @rwilliamsparis.bsky.social www.the-tls.com/regular-feat...

It's Day 3 of the countdown and we already have a bonus book! No. 8 is all about basketball.

Enjoy this little snippet of This Perfect Friend, the first single from my upcoming album LIAR (Love Isn't A Right) ☀️🌈

Russell Williams on governing a country with 246 types of cheese

The Shortest History of Music's Andrew Ford on Boulez and this year's Proms #Boulez #Proms insidestory.org.au/boulez-at-10...

Happy UK publication day to Joe Posnanski's Why We Love American Football - A History in 100 Moments. ‘Contemporary sports writing’s biggest star’ Wall St Journal 'This is the best kind of sports writing. Entertaining, enlightening, heartbreaking, hilarious...' Ron Kaplan

From Joseph Roth to the Siege of Vienna, Nicholas T. Parsons recommends @fivebooks.com the best books to read on Austria: fivebooks.com/best-books/a...

'With an innate sense of the dramatic, Jaivin conjures up these historical moments like a scriptwriter for an epic...' - Linda Jaivin's BOMBARD THE HEADQUARTERS! THE CULTURAL REVOLUTION IN CHINA reviewed by Wanning Sun in @theconversation.com theconversation.com/chinas-night...

Nicholas T. Parsons' The Shortest History of Austria - a short book for such a wide-ranging history - is also a FiveBooks highlight this month.

@fivebooks.com Very good to see the launch title in Old Street's Great Events series, Sheila Fitzpatrick's THE DEATH OF STALIN, recommended as a top history highlight by Five Books. fivebooks.com/best-books/n...

Ross King will be talking about his excellent new book The Shortest History of Ancient Rome at Waterstones Gower St on 20 October. Who were the Romans? How did they build such a mighty empire? And why did it fall? @waterstones.bsky.social www.waterstones.com/events/the-s...

Time-travelling historian Ian Mortimer will be talking about his new book MORTIMER'S A-Zs of ENGLISH HISTORY at the Gloucester History Festival on the evening of Friday 19 September. @https://www.gloucesterhistoryfestival.co.uk/events/mortimers-a-to-z/

Time-travelling historian Ian Mortimer will be talking about his new book MORTIMER'S A-Zs of ENGLISH HISTORY at the Gloucester History Festival on the evening of Friday 19 September. @https://www.gloucesterhistoryfestival.co.uk/events/mortimers-a-to-z/

Ross King will be talking about his excellent new book The Shortest History of Ancient Rome at Waterstones Gower St on 20 October. Who were the Romans? How did they build such a mighty empire? And why did it fall? @waterstones.bsky.social www.waterstones.com/events/the-s...

Thanks Johnnie Johnstone and Shindig! for this review of Down River: In search of David Ackles

@fivebooks.com Very good to see the launch title in Old Street's Great Events series, Sheila Fitzpatrick's THE DEATH OF STALIN, recommended as a top history highlight by Five Books. fivebooks.com/best-books/n...

Great to see Linda Jaivin's Bombard the Headquarters!, Sheila Fitzpatrick's The Death of Stalin and Nicholas T. Parsons' The Shortest History of Austria all being chosen as non-fiction highlights by @fivebooks.com fivebooks.com/best-books/n...

Great to see Linda Jaivin's Bombard the Headquarters!, Sheila Fitzpatrick's The Death of Stalin and Nicholas T. Parsons' The Shortest History of Austria all being chosen as non-fiction highlights by @fivebooks.com fivebooks.com/best-books/n...

That time in 1902 when the medieval bell tower at St Mark's Square in Venice crashed to the ground. And was caught on camera!

The Shortest History of Music's Andrew Ford on Boulez and this year's Proms #Boulez #Proms insidestory.org.au/boulez-at-10...

Sheila Fitzpatrick's The Death of Stalin and Nicholas T. Parsons' The Shortest History of Austria selected as history highlights by @fivebooks.com fivebooks.com/category/his...

With an innate sense of the dramatic, Jaivin conjures up these historical moments like a scriptwriter for an epic...' - Linda Jaivin's BOMBARD THE HEADQUARTERS! THE CULTURAL REVOLUTION IN CHINA reviewed by Wanning Sun in @theconvo-bot.bsky.social theconversation.com/chinas-night...

'With an innate sense of the dramatic, Jaivin conjures up these historical moments like a scriptwriter for an epic...' - Linda Jaivin's BOMBARD THE HEADQUARTERS! THE CULTURAL REVOLUTION IN CHINA reviewed by Wanning Sun in @theconversation.com theconversation.com/chinas-night...

Happy paperback publication day to David Safier's MURDER AT THE CASTLE. Just what does Angela Merkel do to keep her sharp mind occupied in retirement? Why, she becomes a brilliant amateur sleuth, of course. 'Perfectly judged' @financialtimes.com 'Immensely enjoyable' New European

Linda Jaivin's book on the Chinese Cultural Revolution BOMBARD THE HEADQUARTERS! and Sheila Fitzpatrick's THE DEATH OF STALIN reviewed by Andrew Bonnell in Inside Story: insidestory.org.au/ghosts-of-di...

I was delighted to be able to write this piece on the updated edition of my book ABANDONED PLACES for THE BIG ISSUE. @bigissue.com www.bigissue.com/culture/book...

Long summer days on Hampstead Heath in London – in pictures

Happy publication day to the paperback of Andrew Ford's THE SHORTEST HISTORY OF MUSIC. 'Wonderful... as riveting as it is revelatory' CLEMENCY BURTON-HILL 'Fascinating, broad and (like all good histories) has humanity at its centre' PROSPECT @prospectmagazine.co.uk

Linda Jaivin interviewed by Richard Fidler on ABC News talking about Bombard the Headquarters! The Cultural Revolution in China. www.abc.net.au/listen/progr...

Immensely readable and accessible...a gripping account...Excellent' MICHAEL KITSON of Books + Publishing on Linda Jaivin's BOMBARD THE HEADQUARTERS! THE CULTURAL REVOLUTION IN CHINA. Out now in hardback. www.booksandpublishing.com.au/articles/202...

Another fabulous day here at the #AlderneyLitFest 2025. We kick off Day 2 with the fabulous Lesley Downer who will talk briefly about the issues and challenges of dealing with history in these different ways, focussing on her newest book, The Shortest History of Japan, which pulls it all together.

The Shortest History of Japan by @lesleydowner.bsky.social www.tripfiction.com/an-overview-... "..written with authority and style..."