We publish Sussex books and other fiction and non-fiction titles, and specialise in self-publication
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Sussex BooksA SUSSEX KIPLING This is the first comprehensive anthology of Rudyard Kipling’s prose and poetry for many years. It includes practically all his Sussex verse, several short stories, excerpts from his autobiography and a sprinkling of his amusing and idiosyncratic letters. Kipling lived in Sussex for the greater part of his life, and this illustrated collection is saturated with a profound love of what he called ‘the most marvellous of all foreign countries that I have ever been in’. We first meet him in Rottingdean, and we follow his escapades as one of the country’s pioneer motorists, but it is the Bateman’s period which dominates. Here he created the writer’s haven we can still visit today– immersing himself in the life of Sussex, telling its history through the children’s stories of Puck of Pook’s Hill and fashioning a potent literary myth from his study of the Sussex people and their colourful past.
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DEAD & BURIED IN SUSSEX incorporating WHAT THE VICAR SAW Here we have two successful books brought together in one binding. Dead & Buried in Sussex is the first ever book on the county’s abundant churchyard heritage. It traces the colourful history of our epitaphs and memorials, discovering a wealth of striking examples – many of which would never be allowed today. The chapter headings include Words to the Wise (dire warnings), Many a Slip (masons’ mistakes), A Pride in the Job (trades and professions) and Gripes and Grievances (memorials with a grudge). The copious photographs include gruesome death scenes, a smattering of Sussex dialect, some poignant verses and memorials to animals. What the Vicar Saw is a collection of remarkable marginal comments in the parish records of yesteryear. Vicars often treated the birth, death and marriage registers as if they were their own personal diaries, scrawling witty or contemptuous comments that would have astounded their unsuspecting flock. These secret scribblings reveal a vivid cast of characters gamely struggling against life’s adversities – cruel accidents, ghastly diseases and the lurid temptation of sex and drink.
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THE INNS OF LEWES past and present Lewes once had at least seven breweries and seventy inns, and this book (a revised edition of Leslie Davey's original work of 1977) traces those long-gone, the many sturdy survivors and a sprinkling of recent additions. A map of 1890 shows 66 pubs against just 21 today, the newest addition being the John Harvey Tavern in Cliffe. Attractively presented, this is a fine inspiration for all pub-crawlers of an historical bent.
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BRIGHTON & HOVE BUS NAMES Here’s a treat not only for bus buffs but for anyone who’s wondered what all those people remembered on the front of Brighton & Hove buses actually did for the city. The company says it gets more queries about the bus names than about its services – so this book is meeting an established need. Produced in full colour, it includes pen portraits by veteran Argus reporter Adam Trimingham, together with photographs of the personalities themselves and the buses on which they appear. Extending alphabetically from Micky Adams to Bobby Zamora, and including such wildly varied notables as Sir Winston Churchill, Fat Boy Slim, Martha Gunn, Derek Jameson, Rudyard Kipling, Desmond Lynam, Lord Olivier, the Prince Regent, Magnus Volk and Norman Wisdom, it’s nothing less than a people-centred potted history of Brighton and Hove.
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WHATEVER HAPPENED TO JOHN HENTY? It’s a question many of his fans from the good old days of BBC local radio in Sussex have long been asking. And here, in a typically offbeat autobiography, is the answer. Henty, a south London lad, took off for America as a young man, later worked for BEA’s public relations arm and – after many an excursion and detour – found himself in the 1960s behind a microphone at one of the first of Britain’s new local radio stations, Radio Brighton. Here he discovered the talents of an insurance salesman with a keen interest in sport – Desmond Lynam. (Lynam describes him as ‘One of the most agile minds I have ever met in the world of broadcasting . . . a wholly original talent’) Here, too, his inspired zaniness found him an early morning audience devoted to his special brand of good-humoured banter, and he broadcast from the studios at Marlborough Place for many years. After leaving the radio station he went freelance, but an abiding interest in these post-BBC days was his growing collection of Mabel Lucie Attwell memorabilia. He’s now the world’s leading authority on the subject, has written a book about her and for some years, with his wife Sylvia, founded and ran a museum in Cornwall dedicated to her art and the products it inspired.
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WHEN SKIES WERE ALWAYS BLUE Illustrated with his drawings of the family home in West Street, Lewes, this memoir by the late W.F. (Bill) Wells brings to life a world between the two world wars that has gone for ever – a humble Sussex upbringing without television or telephone, radio or refrigerator, central heating or even electric light. Blessed with vivid recall, the author takes us through the streets of the county town, savouring its fairs, markets and shops. He recalls his first sight of an aeroplane and taking train trips, third class, to the seaside. We follow him to school and church, and savour the thrill of the circus. If life was harder then, it had no shortage of joys. As he writes in an epilogue, "What fun that boy had yesterday!"
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BRAVE NEW CITY Brash and exotic, vivacious and louche, Brighton has a famously colourful past, but what does the future hold for Britain’s premier seaside resort? In this remarkable book, Anthony Seldon presents his vision of a bold and beautiful city by the sea – a Brighton and Hove for the 21st century, built around the values of commerce, culture and community, and enjoying a rejuvenated seafront, a lively arts scene and a thriving business sector. Looking back to earlier glories, and drawing on the achievements of maritime towns in Britain and other parts of the world, this powerful polemic urges us to reject conformity and compromise in order to create a vibrant international city for tomorrow.
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THE SUSSEX TRILOGY No county is more endearingly English than Sussex, with its scatterings of little flint and tile-hung cottages lost along winding country lanes. Few can match the scenic variety that makes this landscape of sea-sprayed chalk cliffs, rolling Downs and densely wooded Weald such a haven for wildlife. None has more tangible history, in the way of Bronze Age burial mounds, Iron Age hillforts, Roman villas, Norman castles, medieval monastic ruins, ancient parish churches, Elizabethan manor houses, coaching inns, windmills and canals. The Sussex Trilogy comprises David Arscott’s three lavishly illustrated volumes on the county: In Praise of Sussex (a celebration of our Sussex heritage in memorable poetry and prose); The Sussex Story (the most comprehensive Sussex history package ever devised); and Living Sussex (the wildlife safari that begins on your doorstep). Special features include striking original watercolours and line-drawings by David Marl, suggestions of hundreds of places to visit, with map references for easy exploration, and exhaustive indexes and gazetteers in all three volumes – making The Sussex Trilogy an unrivalled guide to the county’s history, wildlife and literature. |
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THE SUSSEX TREE BOOK Great hollowed oaks, towering conifers, ancient churchyard yews – Owen Johnson takes us on a fascinating and gorgeously illustrated tour of our Sussex champion trees, native and exotic. A feast of colourful tree lore, this unique volume is ideal both for the ordinary lover of our leafy countryside and for the more scientifically minded who will find here the very first county guide to an amazing range of more than a thousand different species. Visiting these remarkable historic trees is made easy by the inclusion of a detailed gazetteer, with a special section for those who (like the author) get about by public transport.
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THE UPSTART GARDENER When writer and broadcaster David Arscott took over a plot of wasteland in Sussex he looked for an experienced gardener to help him develop it. In Bert Winborne he found not only a champion grower, but a man steeped in the traditions of the old country houses where he’d worked, man and boy, from the early 1920s. This engaging book includes tales of the old days at the big houses, when her ladyship demanded violets every day of the year and the wily head gardener buttered up the fearsome cook; countless ‘wrinkles’ on the sowing, planting and growing of vegetables; and an unfolding drama as our intrepid pair enter the local horticultural show and strive to grow winning specimens on ground choked with bindweed, horseshoes, spark plugs and old false teeth.
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