So you’re a fairly decent chess player. You compete in tournaments, you play on the Internet. But you would love to make that leap to become a chess master. What do you need to know, how much do you have to practise, and how much of the success of the masters is simply a matter of innate talent, superior brainpower or just good luck? This useful book, aimed at all chess players who aspire to become chess masters, shows you what the masters know and you don’t. 

Written by one of our biggest-selling and best-loved chess authors, in his trademark chatty, accessible but always informative style, this book is filled with practical exercises and test games that will reveal the secrets of how to join chess’s elite ranks.

• Always wanted to play chess but haven’t much time to learn? This dinky little book will show you how – in just 10 minutes.
• Covers all the pieces and how they move, plus simple tips and tricks.
• Informative chessboard diagrams and quirky illustrations help the information stick.

Most people think chess is a difficult game to learn. But that really isn’t the case. By the time you’ve read this helpful little book, you’ll have absorbed all the information you need to know to go off and play your first game. In clear, simple, humorous text, backed up with useful chessboard diagrams and illustrations, the author shows you round the board, introduces the pieces and how they move, and lets you into the secrets of special moves such as castling. It finishes off with some invaluable advice on how to marshal your troops and win the game: why you need to avoid the sides of the boards, and how to see every threat as an opportunity, and every opportunity as a a potential minefield. Armed with the information in this book, you’ll become a real chess player – in super-quick time!

• Fancy yourself as a bridge player? This essential little book will show you how – in just 10 minutes.
• Introduces the basic rules and techniques for bidding, declarer play and defence.
• Useful bridge-table diagrams and quirky illustrations help the information stick.

Bridge can sometimes look incredibly complicated and opaque. But that really isn’t the case: it is a very easy game to learn. By the time you’ve read this invaluable little book, you’ll be equipped with all the knowledge you need to take your partner and play your first game. In clear, easy-to-follow text, backed up with useful diagrams and illustrations, the author shows you exactly how bridge works, including bidding, defence, declaring and trumps. The book then goes on to more advanced strategies, including how to use your opponent’s bidding to your advantage, and discusses the finer points of etiquette and conduct during a bridge game. Armed with the information in this book, you can go on to become a star bridge player – in double-quick time!

Hazel Soan’s Watercolour Rainbow is an inspiring yet practical book on colour. She sets out to encourage and inspire all watercolour artists to make really radiant and colourful paintings. Hazel takes each main colour in the palette in turn and shows how to use the pigments to their maximum effect with lots of practical hints and tips throughout, as well as projects to show how the colours work in practice. 

All artists, whatever their level, seek advice on how to improve their paintings and this exciting book will inspire all watercolourists to use their palette to the maximum effect.

The book includes: Colour Rules; The Pigments; Transparency and Opacity; Mixing Colours; The Yellows, The Reds, The Blues, The Greens, The Browns, The Blacks and Greys, The Whites; The End of the Rainbow.

An essential book for any textile artist looking to expand their repertoire into two- and three-dimensional work. Leading textile artist, teacher and examiner Jean Draper takes you through the entire process from designing through construction to embellishment with mixed media.

This beautiful and very practical book includes diagrams, detailed drawings and stitch information to guide the reader through the techniques, which include hand and machine embroidery. It covers: Design, including recording information for translation into stitch (with lots of drawing tips); Choice of Threads, including some unusual threads and customizing them; Constructing with Thread, everything from knotted forms, with decorative threads, grids and stacks, and coiled structures; Stitches in Thin Air, constructing with stitch alone using moulds and soluble fabric; Using Mixed Media in Stitched Structures, such as paper, sticks, wire and plastics; Adding Structure to an Existing Fabric; Three-Dimensional Fabric Structures.

Working in two and three-dimensions is a growing genre of textile art and this incorporates a fresh approach and great design advice. 

In 1940 Doreen Wallace, prolific novelist, academic, social campaigner and farmer, wrote a book for Batsford on vegetable growing, as part of the publisher’s iconic Home Front Handbook series. With its chatty, readable writing style and its beautiful Brian Cook cover, the book became a wartime classic, invaluable for everyone growing fruit and vegetables at home to help the war effort.

This reissue of that important book retains all the appeal of the original. As well as being a great read, it contains a wealth of information that is still useful for vegetable gardeners today. It tells you what fruit and vegetables to grow and when, how and why, how to keep down weeds and pests, explores ‘The Vexed Question of Small Fruit’, gives tips on arrangement and rotation of crops, and even touches on the subject of keeping hens and pigs in your garden. Full of sensible practical advice mixed with whimsical musings and a great deal of charm, this book would make a perfect gift for any gardener.

New to Twitter and feeling a little confused? On first glance, all those half-conversations and unfamiliar symbols may look like gobbledegook. But it’s really very simple – and this useful book is here to help.

In straightforward, chatty text accompanied by amusing illustrations, popular tweeter and blogger Lynn C Schreiber helps you get the most out of Twitter. She demystifies the jargon (hashtags? Follow Friday? DMs? All explained here) and gives easy ways to find friends, gain followers, and have fun! The book also provides an insight into the all-important rules of Twitter etiquette, and the various applications you can use with Twitter to enhance your experience even more. Armed with the information in this book, you’ll become an assured and expert tweeter – in super-quick time!

100 Diagrams That Changed The World is a fascinating collection of the most significant plans, sketches, drawings and illustrations that have changed the way we think about the world. From primitive cave paintings to the complicated DNA double helix drawn by Crick and Watson, they chart dramatic breakthroughs in our understanding of the world and its history.

This fascinating book encompasses everything from the triple spirals found on prehistoric megalithic tombs dating right up to the drawings sent out on the side of space exploration probes. Discover Leonardo da Vinci’s beautiful technical drawings, pre-empting the invention of manned flight, Copernicus’s bold diagrams that dared to tell us that Earth was not at the centre of the Universe, as well as the history of the more everyday diagrams that we now take for granted. Every diagram is clearly illustrated and placed into context with very accessible text even for the lay reader.

Diagrams include: Egyptian Book of the Dead, Chauvet cave drawings, Aztec Calendar, sheet music, Vitruvian Man, Galileo’s telescope, Hooke’s Micrographia, the Porphyrian Tree, Dunhuang Star Map, Newcomen’s steam engine, the Morse Code, Brooks Slave Ship, William Playfair’s bar chart, Thomas Edison’s light bulb, Nazi propaganda map, sewing patterns, Feynman Diagrams, the DNA double helix, IKEA flat-pack furniture instructions, the World Wide Web schematic, Carl Sagan’s Pioneer Plaque.

Starting with the basic blocks for skirts and bodices (and also a jacket and trouser block), Gillian Holman shows you how to add the refinements, such as necklines, collars, sleeves, yokes, flounces, pleats, peg tops, pockets, and crossovers. Each design element is accompanied by sketches and patterns. It is a step-by-step introduction to the techniques of pattern cutting for fashion students and amateur dressmakers. 

Glasgow Then and Now takes many classic archive photos of the city and compares them to the scene today. It reveals a transition from an industrial city based around the Clyde, its docks and great shipyards, to a modern twenty-first-century economy. Today, the shipyards are all but gone, but the docks are finding new purpose as evidenced by some spectacular comparisons between old and new.

Some 70 historic photographs of Glasgow’s past are paired with specially commissioned contemporary views taken from the same vantage point. You can see the same streets and buildings as they were ‘then’ and as they are ‘now’. It includes  the Cathedral and Necropolis, Provand’s Lordship, the Tontine Building, Saltmarket, City Chambers, Royal Exchange, St Enoch Hotel, Jamaica Bridge, Doulton Fountain, Argyle Street, Sauchiehall Street, Britannia Music Hall, Glasgow University, Gallowgate, Trongate, Gorbals, Queen’s Dock, Yorkhill Dock and Hampden Park.

Part of the bestselling ‘Then and Now’ series, this charming contrast of old and new photographs highlights the stunning changes – and the equally amazing similarities – of one of the most culturally thriving cities in Britain, its well-known places but also some of its hidden gems.

The revised edition of the classic cycling guide by Harold Briercliffe of 1950. Used as the inspiration for the Britain by Bike television series and a vital part of the award-winning Britain by Bike book by Jane Eastoe, the original book is reproduced along with suggested cycling routes in the Central England region for today’s cyclists. Harold Briercliffe was the Alfred Wainwright of cycling and his books provide great insight into cycling in various parts of the UK in the 1940s. Harold’s fascinating description of the towns, villages and roads of Britain at the time is a joy for all those who love these isles and especially for cyclists looking for inspiration. Many roads have changed over the decades and are now too busy for enjoyable cycling, so Mark Jarman, along with Sustrans, have made suggestions for alternative routes in the region for today’s cyclists. The book includes the original photographs taken by Harold Briercliffe and the original illustrations. The Cycling Touring Guide: Southern England covers cycle routes in the Thames Valley and the Cotswolds, The Isle of Wight, The New Forest, between London and the South Coast, and routes along the South Coast. The cycle routes vary in length from half day and day-long trips to weekend and week-long tours.

The revised edition of the classic cycling guide of 1947 by Harold Briercliffe. Used as the inspiration for the Britain by Bike television series and a vital part of the award-winning Britain by Bike book by Jane Eastoe, the original book is reproduced along with suggested cycling routes in the northern England region for today’s cyclists. Harold Briercliffe was the Alfred Wainwright of cycling and his books provide great insight into cycling in various parts of the UK in the 1940s. Harold’s fascinating description of the towns, villages and roads of Britain at the time is a joy for all those who love these isles and especially for cyclists looking for inspiration. Many roads have changed over the decades and are now too busy for enjoyable cycling, so Mark Jarman, along with Sustrans, have made suggestions for alternative routes in the region for today’s cyclists. The book includes the original photographs taken by Harold Briercliffe and the original illustrations. The Cycling Tourng Guide: Northern England covers cycle routes in the Lake District, the Yorkshire Dales, and the North East Coast, plus shorter tours around the Ribble Valley, Forest of Bowland, around Pendle Hill, Bronte Country, Lancashire Coast, Lunedale and the Pennine Link. It also covers shorter trips around the Plain of York, and from Pool to Richmond. The cycle routes vary in length from half day and day-long trips to weekend and week-long tours.