Janey The Vet: Saving Sri Lanka’s Street Dogs
Janey Lowes
Published: March 2020, Michael O’Mara
In 2014 and in her mid-twenties, Janey Lowes had been a vet for just two years when she left her home in County Durham and went travelling. Visiting Sri Lanka, she was horrified to see the state of so many of the island’s dogs, in particular the three million strays. Over 5,000 miles from home, Janey decided there and then that she was going to move to the island indefinitely and do everything within her power to help them. She raised £10,000 to get started, setting up a charity called WECare Worldwide, and began work.
Frightened, determined and excited all at the same time, she found a local who was willing to work with her and began scouring the streets for dogs in need. Some she patched up as best she could at the roadside, others she brought back and treated in a make-shift surgery she had cobbled together in her new home. With very little equipment, she and her small team came up with new and ingenious ways to treat the animals.
In this highly inspiring and heartfelt book full of challenges and adventure, Janey introduces us to her world and the tireless work she carries out. As she says, ‘I feel as though all these dogs are my dogs and I have a responsibility to them.’ In it, we meet many of the colourful characters who have come to offer help, along with innumerable street dogs who have suffered all sorts of trauma and injury, only to be scooped up by Janey and her team and saved.
No Filter
Grace Victory
Published: July 2017, Headline
Award-winning vlogger, TV presenter and body-positive internet queen Grace Victory is well known for her open honesty. Here, in No Filter, she shares her inspirational story and her wealth of advice and experience on problems that all young people face, including topics that are perceived taboo.
Grace will teach you to love your body and to dress for yourself, as well as guiding you through more serious issues including domestic abuse, mental health and other personal battles, all in her honest, warm and sassy way.
Brimming with hilarious anecdotes and no-nonsense advice, the Internet’s Big Sister tells you everything you need to know about accepting yourself and fighting back, in style.
The Earth Moved
Row Smith
Published: November 2016, Story Terrace
Row and her husband Tom were trekking in the Langtang Valley of Nepal when a 7.8-magnitude earthquake shook the country to its core. As they hurtled across the ice and snow of Tsergo Ri peak, Row and Tom were certain their lives were over. Along with the other survivors – trekkers from all over the globe – the couple spent the next three days in a battle for survival with no food, no water and no shelter. The things Row saw will break your heart, but her brave and candid retelling make our human frailty seem that much more beautiful.
Nine thousand people lost their lives in the 2015 Nepal earthquake and its aftershocks, and thousands more lost their families and homes. All profits from this book will go directly to Community Action Nepal and Drs For Nepal.
Fighting ISIS
Tim Locks
Published: July 2016, Sidgwick & Jackson
In February 2015, Tim Locks headed to Kurdistan to fight ISIS. After watching images of the Yazidi people being slaughtered, he couldn’t sit back and do nothing. Having worked as a prison officer and a bouncer, he knew how to handle himself – and had a huge protective streak. He sold his house to raise money, put himself through arms training and bought his equipment on eBay.
In this gripping book he reveals what it is like to fight alongside the Kurds as well as British and American ex-military. He has cleared the enemy from occupied villages, come under mortar and small-arms fire, and witnessed the horrific atrocities committed by ISIS. He also describes how WiFi on the front line allows today’s soldiers to communicate, how they always find time for selfies, even when under attack, and how the Kurds are so used to this way of life they stop mid-firefight to have a cup of chai and play Candy Crush while manning the mortars. As cultures clash, and the bullets start flying, Tim shares his adventures with honesty and black humour.
Essex Boy
Kirk Norcross
Published: April 2013, Pan Macmillan
As the rich, club owner’s son on The Only Way is Essex, everyone assumes Kirk Norcross has always lived the life of luxury.
But in his autobiography, Kirk reveals how he actually spent his childhood moving from tough council estates to hostels, with the threat of homlessness often hanging over him. It was only aged 18 that Kirk was reconciled with his millionaire dad, and started to see a different side of Essex life.
The reality star also tackles the difficult struggles he has faced with anxiety, panic attacks and self doubt. And of course he opens up to give the truth about Celebrity Big Brother, TOWIE and his relationships with co-stars Amy Childs and Lauren Pope.
This book will make every reader see Kirk in a very new light!
Queen of the Rising Sun: From Landlady of an East End Pub to Essex Nan
Nanny Pat
Published: February 2013, Sidgwick & Jackson
A charming, evocative memoir of her years as an East End landlady, by Nanny
Pat from The Only Way is Essex
Life for East End families like Pat’s was always a struggle. She worked for
years in Tate & Lyle’s sugar factory while her husband Charlie took on two
jobs so their growing family could survive. Until one day Charlie came home
with a brilliant idea – they should take over The Rising Sun pub in
Bromley-by-Bow.
In this charming memoir Pat describes her years as a pub landlady and
vividly evokes the East End community she served in the 1960s, the
extraordinary characters she encountered and the changes that swept through
society at that time. She also reveals why she and Charlie moved to Essex,
and what it felt like to become a star of The Only Way is Essex in her
seventies.
Still Standing
Kerry Katona
Published: November 2012, Orion
Since bursting on to the scene in 1999 with girl band Atomic Kitten, hardly
a week has gone by without Kerry Katona hitting the headlines.
For over a decade she has been one of the most talked about celebrities, and
her turbulent life has been the subject of thousands of newspaper and
magazine articles, as well as television shows.
Life has been especially tough for Kerry over recent years – bad men, drug
addiction (both prescribed and unprescribed), bankruptcy, armed robberies,
embezzlement, plastic surgery, weight battles, booze, and being diagnosed
bi-polar then conquering the illness, the 31 year old has seen it all. And
more importantly, survived it, and come out the other side a stronger
person.
This book, Kerry’s second biography, will reveal all the turbulent twists
and turns of her rollercoaster life.
Penny Sweets and Cobbled Streets
Nanny Pat
Published: August 2012, Sidgwick & Jackson
Nanny Pat has always been the heart of her family, and her children and
grandchildren regularly pitch up at her house for a cup of tea, a slice of
her famous sausage plait and some wise advice.
This book evokes the colourful East End world of her childhood. Pat was born
in 1935 and, apart from a brief period when she was evacuated during the
Second World War, she lived in Bow, part of a poor but close-knit community.
Her mother died when Pat was only eleven, leaving her to run the household.
It was a lonely life at times, as her strict father refused to let her go
courting. But then she met a handsome young man called Charlie . . .
Full of great characters, from her deaf Nan to Auntie Alice, who would dress
in all her furs to pop out to buy a pork chop, and packed with wonderful
anecdotes, this delightful memoir vividly captures a lost way of life
Living Life the Essex Way
Sam Faiers
Published: May 2012, Simon & Schuster
Welcome to the glam and fab world of Sam Faiers star of the hit TV
programme The Only Way is Essex.
At the start of 2010 Sam Faiers was a normal 19-year-old girl from
Brentwood: she was working in a local bank, plotting a glamour modelling
career and planning what outfit to wear to Sugar Hut. Then the first episode
of TOWIE aired, and suddenly Sam was catapulted into a world of champagne
cocktails, TV studios, nightclubs and paparazzi.
In Living Life the Essex Way, Sam lifts the lid on her childhood, her rise
to fame and her beauty regime, as well as her dating rules, dealing with
instant fame, the men in her life and what really goes on behind the scenes
on the hit ITV2 show.
The Best Day of My Life
Published 2008, John Blake
In this unique anthology of more than 80 personal stories, subjects ranging from the frivolous to the deadly serious combine to paint a picture of humanity at its most upbeat. Celebrities and ‘everyday’ people all contribute the story of the most memorable day in their life. With such a wide open subject, stories range from escaping death in Iraq, to setting up a new life France, to being the youngest person to climb Everest. The Best Day of My Life will enlighten, amuse, and provide the perfect tonic for those days when life just seems to get you down.