DAVID ANTHONY DURHAM – OTHER LANDS

At night Armand lay in bed with a sadness in his heart that ballooned until there was room for nothing else. He thought with horror of the lying-down room... Paris; in the stifling August heat, Commandant Serge Morel is called to a disturbing crime scene. An elderly woman has been murdered to the soundtrack of Faure’s Requiem, her body then grotesquely displayed. At first this strange case seems to offer few clues; and Morel has problems of his own. His father – always a great force in his life – is beginning to succumb to senility; and he is unsettled by the reappearance of the beautiful Mathilde, the woman he once loved. Only origami can help calm the detective and focus his thoughts on this troubling crime. As the investigation progresses, the key suspects to emerge are a middle-aged man and a mute teenage boy who have been delivering religious pamphlets in the city’s suburbs. But as more elderly ladies are targeted, Morel will find his enquiries leading him back into the past, from the French countryside to Soviet Russia – and to two young boys with the most terrible of stories to tell...

To avoid fainting keep repeating, It's only a move ..only a movie ..only a movie ..only a movie If you grew up believing that Planet of the Apes told you all you needed to know about politics, that Slade in Flame was a savage exposé of the pop world, and that The Exorcist revealed the meaning of life, then you probably spent far too many of your formative years at the cinema. Just as likely, you soon realised that there was only one career open to you - you'd have to become a film critic. In It's Only a Movie, the incomparable Mark Kermode takes us into the weird world of a life lived in widescreen. Join him as he embarks on a gut-wrenching journey through the former Soviet Union on the trail of the low-budget horror flick Dark Waters, cringe as he's handbagged by Helen Mirren at the BAFTA awards ceremony, cheer as he gets thrown out of the Cannes Film Festival for heckling in very bad French, and don't forget to gasp as he's shot at while interviewing Werner Herzog in the Hollywood Hills. Written with sardonic wit and wry good humour, this compelling cinematic memoir is genuinely 'inspired by real events'.

1828. King Shaka has survived an assassination attempt. Important trade routes have been secured. Yet all is far from calm in the Zulu Empire... The bulk of Shaka's army toils in the diseased swamps of Mozambique; the white men at Port Natal have begun disobeying his laws; and enemy tribes are slowly infiltrating Zulu territory. Both king and kingdom are more vulnerable than ever. With Shaka increasingly withdrawn, it falls to the Induna - his most loyal warrior - and his trusted sidekick, to quell this disquiet. And thus begins their adventure... The duo must solve mysteries, brave battles and shed blood - and in the process face off against bandits, thieves, slavers, cannibals and plotting princes - if their magnificent kingdom and its ailing creator are to stand a chance of enduring.