'It was a harsh intrusion into the peaceful setting of a village cricket match. In the countryside gunshots are not unusual. Farmers are not averse to potting rabbits or scaring birds off their crops. In those circumstances more than one shot would be expected. It might have been a car backfiring. It was the fact that some people thought they had a heard a scream that tended to rule out these explanations.' Fatally Cricket portrays the world of village cricket at its most murderous.

The Book of the Courtier (Il Cortegiano), describing the behaviour of the ideal courtier (and court lady) was one of the most widely distributed books in the 16th century. It remains the definitive account of Renaissance court life. This edition, Thomas Hoby's 1561 English translation, greatly influenced the English ideal of the "gentleman." Baldesar Castiglione was a courtier at the court of Urbino, at that time the most refined and elegant of the Italian courts. Practising his principles, he counted many of the leading figures of his time as friends, and was employed on important diplomatic missions. He was a close personal friend of Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino, better known as Raphael, who painted the sensitive portrait of Castiglione on the cover of this edition.

One would think that only a club with at least twenty-two players would arrange to play simultaneous fixtures. But with the Outcasts CC - England's most notorious wandering club - it is different, of course. Still, the challenge provided by a clash of fixtures should at least allow the club to put behind it the unfortunate memories of their first ever fixture in France. Or perhaps not.

The Book of the Courtier, Baldassare Castiglione's classic account of Renaissance court life, offers profound insight into the refined behavior which defined the era's ruling class. The courtly customs and manners of Italy to a great extent characterized the Renaissance, which elevated art and expression to new heights. Baldassare Castiglione published this book with the intention of chronicling the manners, customs and traditions which underpinned how courtiers, nobles, and their servants, behaved. Although ostensibly a book of etiquette and good conduct, Castiglione's treatise carries enormous historical value. He derived his observations directly from the many gatherings and receptions conducted by society's elite. Conversations with the officials, diplomats and nobility of the era further enhanced the accuracy of this book, imbuing it with an authenticity seldom seen elsewhere.

The Outcasts CC always set off to their matches with the best intentions (so they say) - so why do their matches always bring the game into such disrepute? Now the mayhem goes global. From small town Australia to a country house somewhere in Hertfordshire, cricket's most notorious club becomes ever more entangled with the most deplorable behaviour. In "Accidentally Cricket", village cricket meets the world of celebrity - supposedly. The result is neither pretty nor excusable.

Der Romancier Willibald Alexis (1798-1871) ist mit seinem literarischen Werk, den so genannten vaterländischen Romanen, im deutschen Sprachraum weitgehend unbekannt. Obwohl er als Literaturkritiker und zeitkritischer Publizist bei seinen Zeitgenossen eine angesehene und gefragte Persönlichkeit war, gelang es ihm nicht, als Romancier zu demselben Ruhm zu gelangen. Während Jahrzehnten wurde ihm zum Vorwurf gemacht, sein Erzählstil sei abgehackt, chaotisch, die Romane seien langatmig, verwirrend und spannungslos. Doch gerade seine vaterländischen Romane haben den deutschen historischen Roman als Gattung hinsichtlich des Erzählstils und der Darstellungsweise massgeblich beeinflusst. Anhand des so genannten Zürcher Modells wird Alexis' Hauptwerk Ruhe ist die erste Bürgerpflicht (1852) systematisch analysiert. Folgende Fragen sind dabei zentral: Welche Formen an Mittelbarkeit enthält der Roman, welche fehlen? Welche Elemente erzeugen Unmittelbarkeit? Wie sieht die Innerlichkeit der Figuren aus? Ist sie dargestellt oder berichtet? Welche Figuren sind der Leserin und dem Leser weshalb näher? Durch eine erzähltheoretische Analyse und Interpretation, die zeigt, dass Alexis' Erzählweise keineswegs alt und verstaubt, sondern erfrischend modern ist, versucht diese Arbeit dem Text seinen rechtmässigen Platz im 19. Jahrhundert zu geben.

'What do you get when a writer of extreme intelligence, insight, style and beauty chronicles the lives of self-absorbed hedonists - The Great Gatsby, Bright Lights, Big City, and now Neon in Daylight. Hermione Hoby held me spellbound' Ann Patchett, author of COMMONWEALTH 'Hoby is so good at unpacking all the strange dynamics at work in sex and desire' Emma Cline, author of THE GIRLS 'The perfect book with which to while away those hot summer nights' Independent 'Expect Gatsby-esque hedonism and lyricism' Evening Standard 'You will be transfixed' The Pool 'Smart, shimmering ... glinting with pocketable images and insights ... A vibrant rush of a novel' Observer A New York summer so hot the air is turning yellow. Kate, a young woman newly arrived from London, is determined to become the kind of person who is up for it and down for it - and not remotely troubled over how those two semantically opposed phrases could have come to mean the same thing. In the sweltering city, she encounters Bill, a once-lauded now booze-sodden novelist, and Inez, his teenage daughter who makes extra cash catering to the sexual fantasies of men she has met online - and falls into a complex infatuation with them both.

Carter Catalano and Hoby Schweikert, two 5th graders from Baden Academy, were invited to visit Dr. Emily Furbee at the University of Pittsburgh's Computational Biology Department. After their visit, Carter and Hoby worked to craft a storybook for children with Dr. Furbee's help. Fred the Fruit Fly visits Dr. Furbee's Lab introduces kids to some difficult concepts of DNA through fun metaphors and an engaging story. All profits from book sales are donated to Hillman Cancer Center.