In this definitive account of the Peninsular War (1808-14), Napoleon's six-year war against Spain, Ronald Fraser examines what led to the emperor's devastating defeat against the popular opposition - the guerrillas - and their British and Portuguese allies. As well as relating the histories of the great political and military figures of the war, Fraser brings to life the anonymous masses - the artisans, peasants and women who fought, suffered and died - and restores their role in this barbaric war to its rightful place while overturning the view that this was a straightforward military campaign. This vivid, meticulously researched book offers a distinct and profound vision of "Napoleon's Vietnam" and shows the reality of the disasters of war: the suffering, discontents and social upheaval that accompanied the fighting. With a new Introduction by Perry Anderson.

" P]robably the most distinguished writer of English prose in the novel form at present living. He cannot do other than write beautifully." - Humbert Wolfe
"The book abounds in glowing experiences of a world of colour and sensation, minutely imagined. . . . The description of dawn at Kew Gardens is so lovely that the reader will be tempted to endanger his respectability by emulating Judy and climbing the wall." - "Times Literary Supplement"
"Among the few highly important and significant novelists of the day." - "The Observer"
"There is poetry beneath Mr. Fraser's fantastic humour as there is a cunning grace in his prose." - "The Times"
"The erotic awakening of a young woman . . . Judy, a student at Kew Gardens . . . is engaged to a personable young man who does not have the ability to arouse her, though she likes him, and she is disturbed by the utilitarian, materialistic life-philosophy of her businessman brother. She becomes more and more sensitive to the hidden life of the plants at Kew, and comes to see them as personalities, with the giant orchid in the role of passionate lover. . . . Told with delicate imagery and fine perceptions, a minor rococoism of art deco literature." - E.F. Bleiler, "The Guide to Supernatural Fiction" (1983)
This first-ever reprinting of "Flower Phantoms" (1926), the best-known novel by Ronald Fraser (1888-1974), features a new introduction by Mark Valentine.

We discover what civil war, revolution and counter-revolution actually felt like from inside both camps. The contours of the war take shape through the words of the eyewitnesses. The atmosphere of events is vividly recaptured. And though the lived experience of the participants is revealed the uniquely tragic essence of all civil war. 'Fascinating and brilliantly unorthodox.' Hugh Thomas, author of THE CONQUEST OF MEXICO.

This is a new release of the original 1933 edition.

1960s British comedy drama in which a young woman finds a new career as a beauty queen. Attractive typist Shirley Freeman (Janette Scott) is encouraged by newspaper man Don Mackenzie (Ian Hendry) to enter a beauty pageant while on vacation. After winning she decides to quit her job and become a full-time contestant, proving to be very successful. However, her success won't last forever...

In Hiding is the spellbinding story of a man who spent thirty years holed up in his own home to escape execution. Manuel Cortes was a Socialist Party member, an activist in the Republic's land reform movement, and an organizer in the farm workers' unionization struggles. As Mayor of Mijas in Andalusia, he became caught up in the ferment of revolutionary Spain in the late 1930s. A marked man, he evaded Franco's execution squads to survive in hiding through a generation of persecution and terror until amnesty was decreed in 1969-a period of thirty years. With his wife and daughter, he attempted to escape to France, but failed. In this absorbing narrative, based on numerous interviews with the mayor conducted by Ronald Fraser, a master of oral history, Cortes's truly awe-inspiring ordeal is supplemented by his family's life histories and experiences during the Civil War. A haunting tale and a monument to the art of the oral historian, In Hiding reminds us what the Spanish Civil War was really about.

Kessinger Publishing is the place to find hundreds of thousands of rare and hard-to-find books with something of interest for everyone!

Kessinger Publishing is the place to find hundreds of thousands of rare and hard-to-find books with something of interest for everyone!