Bloomsbury

Before he was a top chef, Tom Colicchio learned to love cooking when he was still slinging burgers at a poolside snack bar. Barbara Lynch tells the story of lying her way into her first chef’s job and then needing to cook her way out of trouble in the galley kitchen of a ship at sea. Stories of mentorship abound: Rick Bayless tells the story...

"We are not short of good playwrights in Britain, but I know of none with Nichols’ power to put modern Britain on the stage and send the spectators away feeling more like members of the human race" (Irving Wardle, The Times).Among Nichols’ most important plays are A Day in the Death of Joe Egg, The National Health and Forget-me-Not...

A Year in the Merde is the almost-true account of the author’s adventures as an expat in Paris. Based on his own experiences and with names changed to "avoid embarrassment, possible legal action-and to prevent the author’s legs being broken by someone in a Yves Saint Laurent suit", the book is narrated by Paul West, a...

Moscow, 1939. The great author Isaac Babel is spending his last days in the infamous Lubyanka prison, forbidden to write. His final works have been consigned to the young archivist Pavel Dubrov, who must destroy them. But Pavel makes a reckless decision in the face of a vast bureaucracy of evil: he will save the stories of the writer he so admires,...

"The recipe book of great television from one of the best TV makers in the world" Jamie OliverStory structure is a huge weakness for many factual or reality filmmakers and TV producers, who often concentrate on subject areas and issues rather than dramatic and memorable narrative. Consequently programmes fail to attract the audience or win any...

At long last, Gaius Petreius Ruso and his companion, Tilla, are headed home-to Gaul. Having received a note consisting only of the words "COME HOME!" Ruso has (reluctantly, of course) pulled up stakes and brought Tilla to meet his family.But the reception there is not what Ruso has hoped for: no one will admit to sending for him, and his brother...