Best Selling Books by Michael Smith

It is New Year at Camelot and a mysterious green knight appears at King Arthur’s court. Challenging the knights of the Round Table to a Christmas game, he offers his splendid axe as a prize to whoever is brave enough to behead him with just one strike. The condition is that his challenger must seek him out in a year and a day to have the deed returned. Sir Gawain accepts and decapitates the stranger, only to see him pick up his head, walk out of the hall and ride away on his horse. Now Gawain must complete his part of the bargain, search for his foe and confront what seems his doom... Michael Smith’s translation of this magnificent Arthurian romance draws on his intimate experience of the North West of England and his knowledge of mediaeval history, culture and architecture. He takes us back to the original poetic form of the manuscript and brings it alive for a modern audience, while revealing the poem’s historic and literary context. The book is beautifully illustrated throughout with detailed recreations of the illuminated lettering in the original manuscript and the author’s own linocut prints, each meticulously researched for contemporary accuracy. This is an exciting new edition that will appeal both to students of the Gawain-poet and the general reader alike.

A British journalist specializing in defense topics offers a readable, useful addition to the literature on American special operations forces.

On 17 March 1912, Lawrence 'Titus' Oates crawled bootless from a tent to his death in blizzard conditions of -40°C. Oates, always an outsider on Scott's Polar expedition, died on his 32nd birthday. His parting words were: 'I am just going outside and may be some time.' Oates was the epitome of the Victorian English gentleman: a public schoolboy who became a dashing cavalry officer and hero in the Boer War. Stationed in Ireland from 1902 to 1906, his passion became horse racing and he won numerous victories at racecourses throughout Ireland. Oates' austere and dominating mother blamed Scott for her son's death and was among the first to challenge the accepted version of events. She continued to control his memory long after his death, keeping his diary and letters hidden, even ordering their destruction from her deathbed. Oates always had difficulty forming lasting relationships with women. He died without realising that he was a father. The story of how Oates died, unaware of his daughter, has been a closely guarded secret until now. This is a compelling and heart-rending story of endurance, bravery and folly. From the author of TOM CREAN: AN UNSUNG HERO

Chef Michael Smith keeps cooking real with over 100 simple recipes packed with healthy, wholesome ingredients! Real food is easy to make, delicious and good for you. Michael Smith, a passionate advocate for healthy homemade meals enjoyed around the kitchen table, knows what it takes to keep cooking simple and chock-full of natural, wholesome ingredients. In Real Food, Real Good, Michael shares more than 100 brand-new recipes with ingredients that are great choices for a healthy lifestyle. Real Food, Real Good is a fantastic way to approach everyday cooking—simple, good-for-you food. Full of fresh flavours and whole foods, you’ll feel great starting your morning with dishes like wholesome Coconut Waffles with Lime Mango Yogurt, Veggie Skillet and Ancient Grain Granola Parfaits with Maple Blueberries and Yogurt. Inside you’ll also find plenty of soups, salads and main dishes like Coconut Curry Sweet Potato Soup, Roast Chicken and Kale Hand Pies, Root Vegetable Beef Stew, Zucchini Chia Lasagna and Beefy Lentil Meatloaf. And, best of all, there’s always room for the occasional treat when eating real food, whether it’s Whole Wheat Honey Cookies or Mocha Squares with Dark Chocolate Ganache. Real Food, Real Good includes Michael’s quick and easy strategies, tips and common homemade staples to help you keep your cooking delicious and full of real food every day!

Wondering what to make for dinner that everyone in the family will enjoy? Looking for simple and delicious recipes to make for breakfast, school lunches, and weekday dinners when you are short on time? Want to make mealtime fun and get your family involved in the kitchen? Stress no more: Michael Smith is ready to save your day! Michael is his family’s cook and has been creating delicious, healthy meals for them for years. Now he’s here to help you make—and enjoy—great-tasting dishes while you satisfy even the pickiest eaters in your family. Try some of Michael’s favourites, such as: · Weekend Pancakes · Nacho Burgers · Old World Chicken Cacciatore -Special Shrimp Fried Rice · Tortilla Lasagna · Boston Cream Cupcakes

"The question-and-answer format provides an overview of the marriage law of the [Catholic] church and its practical implications and makes difficult concepts understandable to the nonexpert."--Cover

Gripping, deeply researched, and authoritative, the history of one of the closest intelligence and security relationships in the world The Special Relationship between the United States and Britain is touted by politicians when it suits their purpose and, as frequently, dismissed as myth, not least by the media. Yet the truth is that the two countries are bound together more closely than either is to any other ally. In The Real Special Relationship, Michael Smith reveals how it all began, eighty years ago, when a top-secret visit by four American codebreakers to Bletchley Park in February 1941—ten months before the US entered World War II—marked the start of a close collaboration between the intellitence services of the two nations. When that war ended and the Cold War began, both sides recognized that the way they worked together to decode German and Japanese ciphers could be used to counter the Soviet threat. They laid the foundation for the behind-the-scenes intelligence sharing that has continued—despite rivalries among the services and occasional political conflict and public disputes between the two nations—through the collapse of the Soviet Union, 9/11, the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and to the threats of the present moment. Smith, who served in British military intelligence, brings together a fascinating range of characters, from Winston Churchill and Ian Fleming to John F. Kennedy, Ronald Reagan, Margaret Thatcher, and Edward Snowden. Supported by in-depth interviews and a broad range of personal contacts in the intelligence community, he takes the reader into the workings of MI6, the CIA, the NSA, and all those who strive to keep us safe. Sir John Scarlett, former chief of MI6, has written the introduction, and Michael Hayden, former director of the CIA and the NSA, has provided the foreword.

This book is a compilation of a life well spent as a world traveler and police commander with the Richmond Virginia Police Department. It is presented as is life, in the form of short stories of police operations and life lessons in other areas. There is much humor inside, because this is the way I saw my life. There is, as well, serious and well-thought-out tales that occurred over a lifetime of living.

English food is enjoying a revival after decades spent in the shadow of European and other cuisines. Michael Smith's highly acclaimed book is centred on eighteenth-century recipes, but also delves back into Elizabethan and Stuart kitchens, and his skill in adapting historic dishes for the contemporary cook puts Almond Soup, Asparagus and Bacon Fraze, and Caveached Sole within easy reach of today's reader. Traditionally, English cooking was generous in its use of herbs and spices and adventurous in its combining of flavours, and Michael Smith's wide-ranging research uncovers dishes with a surprisingly modern air: Mustard Soup, Salmon in Red Wine, and Gooseberry and Rosemary Ice Cream, for example, sit alongside classic potted meats and fish. For too long, breakfast and tea have been seen as the only meals at which English cooking has anything to offer the world. This refreshingly contemporary collection of classic recipes proves once and for all that the inventiveness and diversity of English food deserve to be recognised – and enjoyed. 'Of the many books on our food, he is my favourite, the one I use most.' Jane Grigson

'Elements of Ecology' presents a clear, modular approach using explanatory writing style to focus non-majors students on the core concepts of ecology.

The first two chapters provide an introduction to functional groups; these are followed by chapters reviewing basic organic transformations (e.g. oxidation, reduction). The book then looks at carbon-carbon bond formation reactions and ways to 'disconnect' a bigger molecule into simpler building blocks. Most chapters include an extensive list of questions to test the reader's understanding. There is also a new chapter outlining full retrosynthetic analyses of complex molecules which highlights common problems made by scientists.

This book is a compilation of articles dealing with linguistic and literary concerns relating to the global production and consumption of literature in English, and global instruction and education in the English language. The umbrella theme of the book is “English Language and Literature in a Globalized World” or “The Global Appropriation and hybridization of English”. The contributing authors are international scholars and creative writers from different parts of the world who offer unique perspectives on the ways in which the English language and English literature are constantly developing and changing in a postcolonial global world. They are mostly professors of English who have cross-cultural teaching experiences and who live or have lived and worked in both Anglophone and non-Anglophone countries. To many of them English is their dominant language, but not the mother tongue. All of them are bilingual or even trilingual. Thus their scholarly investigations are flavoured with their personal experiences or “adventures” with the language and its users. Their unique visions reveal a process of adoption, adaptation, reinvention and appropriation of both the language and its literature in a multi-national, multi-cultural, and multi-lingual community of a world where English has become the most recognizable sign of globalization. This book will appeal to all scholars and practitioners of English language and literature, particularly those interested in colonial and postcolonial studies, modern and post-modern studies, ethnic and minority studies, feminist studies, cross-cultural studies, linguistics, semantics, ESP and curriculum development.

Describes the work and personalities of the codebreakers who deciphered Japanese codes despite vast linguistic differences between English and Japanese, and explains their contributions to Allied success during World War II.

Chef Michael Smith shares the cuinary master he has created at the Inn at Bay Fortune in this stunning collection of recipes inspired by the ingredients of Prince Edward Island, his passion for farming, and cooking with fire. Famous for its miles of beaches, lighthouses, farmland, and sea-food, Prince Edward Island is a destination for travelers and food lovers alike. Nestled on forty-six acres of land overlooking the picturesque Fortune River near the eastern tip of Prince Edward Island, the Inn at Bay Fortune is a leading five-star country inn with the award-winning restaurant FireWorks offering a unique live-fire culinary experience with unforgettable meals enjoyed family-style at long feast tables. The Inn at Bay Fortune is first an organic farm, encompassing eight fertile acres, multiple herb gardens, various permanent farm beds, five greenhouses, and a small orchard. As a restaurant with its own farm, award-winning chef Michael Smith brings his culinary knowledge and passion for flavour to the restaurant and this stunning collection of recipes inspired by the ingredients of the Island and cooking with multiple fires daily to pull off the FireWorks Feast. Featuring gorgeous food and location photography, Farm, Fire & Feast is an impressive cookbook. Smith’s collection of unique recipes includes Iron-Seared Island Scallops, Oven-Baked Salt-Crusted Halibut, Beach Lobster, Wood-Grilled Butcher’s Steak, Smokehouse Pork Belly, Wood-Roasted Spatchcock Chicken and Vegetables, Fire Garden Tacos, Sunchoke Fries, Potato Bacon Cheddar Tart, Strawberry Rhubarb Shortcake, and Wild Blue-berry Maple Grunt. Packed with recipes to cook over fire, wherever possible, alternative cooking methods are provided so a recipe can be pulled off in an indoor kitchen—and all are well within the reach of the home cook.

This book synthesizes new information about the environmental advantages of plant resistance, transgenic resistance, the molecular bases of resistance, and the use of molecular markers to map resistance genes. Readers are presented in-depth descriptions of techniques to quantify resistance, factors affecting resistance expression, and the deployment of resistance genes. New information about gene-for-gene interactions between resistant plants and arthropod biotypes is discussed along with the recent examples of using arthropod resistant plants in integrated pest management systems.

An argument against the myth of "American exceptionalism" Endless Holocausts: Mass Death in the History of the United States Empire helps us to come to terms with what we have long suspected: the rise of the U.S. Empire has relied upon an almost unimaginable loss of life, from its inception during the European colonial period, to the present. And yet, in the face of a series of endless holocausts at home and abroad, the doctrine of American exceptionalism has plagued the globe for over a century. However much the ruling class insists on U.S. superiority, we find ourselves in the midst of a sea change. Perpetual wars, deteriorating economic conditions, the resurgence of white supremacy, and the rise of the Far Right have led millions of people to abandon their illusions about this country. Never before have so many people rejected or questioned traditional platitudes about the United States. In Endless Holocausts author David Michael Smith demolishes the myth of exceptionalism by demonstrating that manifold forms of mass death, far from being unfortunate exceptions to an otherwise benign historical record, have been indispensable in the rise of the wealthiest and most powerful imperium in the history of the world. At the same time, Smith points to an extraordinary history of resistance by Indigenous peoples, people of African descent, people in other nations brutalized by U.S. imperialism, workers, and democratic-minded people around the world determined to fight for common dignity and the sake of the greater good.

The first part of acclaimed author Mick Smith's epic, completely unauthorised history of Britain s external intelligence community. Six tells the complete story of the service's birth and early years, including the tragic, untold tale of what happened to Britain's extensive networks in Soviet Russia between the wars. It reveals for the first time how the playwright and MI6 agent Harley Granville Barker bribed the Daily News to keep Arthur Ransome in Russia, and the real reason Paul Dukes returned there. It shows development of tradecraft and the great personal risk officers and their agents took, far from home and unprotected. In Salonika, for example, Lieutenant Norman Dewhurst realised it was time to leave when he opened his door to find one of his agents hanging dismembered in a sack. This first part of Six takes us up to the eve of the conflict, using hundreds of previously classified files and interviews with key players to show how one of the world's most secretive of secret agencies originated and developed into something like the MI6 we know today.

Arguing for the importance of the aural dimension of history, Mark M. Smith contends that to understand what it meant to be northern or southern, slave or free--to understand sectionalism and the attitudes toward modernity that led to the Civil War--we mu

From the beginning of the Industrial Age and continuing into the twenty-first century, companies faced with militant workers and organizers have often turned to agencies that specialized in ending strikes and breaking unions. Although their secretive nature has made it difficult to fully explore the history of this industry, From Blackjacks to Briefcases does just that. By digging through subpoenaed documents of strike-bound companies, their mercenaries, and the testimony of executive officers and rank-and-file strikebreakers, Robert Smith examines the inner workings of the antiunion industry. In a clear and lively style, he brings to life the violent armed guards employed on the picket line or in the coal camps; the ruffians who filled the armies marshaled by the “King of the Strikebreakers,” Pearl Bergoff; the labor spies who wrecked countless unions; and, after the Wagner Act, those who manipulated national labor law to serve their clients. In From Blackjacks to Briefcases, Smith follows the history of this ongoing struggle and tells a compelling story that parallels the history of the United States over the last century and a half.

Ernest Shackleton is one of history’s great explorers, an extraordinary character who pioneered the path to the South Pole over 100 years ago and became a dominant figure in Antarctic discovery. A charismatic personality, his incredible adventures on four expeditions have captivated generations and inspired a dynamic, modern following in business leadership. None more so than the Endurance mission, where Shackleton’s commanding presence saved the lives of his crew when their ship was crushed by ice and they were turned out on to the savage frozen landscape. But Shackleton was a flawed character whose chaotic private life, marked by romantic affairs, unfulfilled ambitions, overwhelming debts and failed business ventures, contrasted with his celebrity status as a leading explorer. Drawing on extensive research of original diaries and personal correspondence, Michael Smith's definitive biography brings a fresh perspective to our understanding of this complex man and the heroic age of polar exploration.