Non-Secondhand Books

The legendary ex-US Secretary of State on the world's foremost emerging superpower In 1971 Henry Kissinger took the historic step of reopening relations between China and the West, and since...

The astonishing story of the Sassoons, one of the nineteenth century's pre-eminent commercial families and 'the Rothschilds of the East' The Sassoons were one of the great business dynasties of...

A magisterial history of the Indian subcontinent The Indian subcontinent might seem a self-contained world. Protected by vast mountains and seas, it has created its own religions, philosophies and social...

The untold story of the first nomadic empire and the making of China. 'Man does for the reader that most difficult of tasks- he conjures up an ancient people in...

The untold story of one of WW2's most extraordinary and significant battles which marked the turning of the tide of the war in the jungles of Burma 'A thrilling blow-by-blow...

Viewed in the West as a time of self-confident progress, the Victorian period was experienced by Asians as a catastrophe. Pankaj Mishra's provocative account of how China, India and the...

A magical, substantially true narrative of piracy, zoology, anthropology, danger and adventure in the seventeenth-century Caribbean, Pacific and East Indies The first great English-language travel book, A New Voyage Round...

A both definitive and highly enjoyable book on how modern Japan works - now fully updated to 2020 and the new 'Reiwa' Era Despite years of stagnation, Japan remains one...

Runciman's great Crusades trilogy reissued in Penguin Modern Classics ''The whole tale is one of faith and folly, courage and greed, hope and delusion.' The Christian and Muslim empires of...

A magical cultural history of modern Japan Japan Story is a fascinating, surprising account of Japan's culture, from the 'opening up' of the country in the mid 19th century to...

Gandhi's non-violent struggles against racism, violence, and colonialism in South Africa and India had brought him to such a level of notoriety, adulation that when asked to write an autobiography...

The first history for a general audience of one of Asia's most fascinating and complex countries As more and more visitors come to Vietnam, there has been for some years...

VINTAGE VOYAGES- A world of journeys, from the tallest mountains to the depths of the mind Colin Thurbon's beautiful prose unfolds along the Silk Road, unearthing a richly layered past...

The first major history of the Himalaya - an epic story of peoples, cultures and the world's highest mountains 'Magnificent ... this book is unlikely to be surpassed' Telegraph This...

A major new biography from the internationally bestselling author of Wild Swans, Mao and Empress Dowager Cixi- a gripping story of sisterhood, revolution and betrayal, and three women who helped...

The untold story of the world's greatest empire and the creation of modern China Genghis Khan is one of history's immortals- a leader of genius, driven by an inspiring vision...

An authoritative rethinking of global history by a leading Yale professor When did globalization begin? Most observers have settled on 1492, the year Columbus discovered America. But as celebrated Yale...

The essential book for anyone visiting Bangkok - a wonderful mixture of history and culture - from the author of Lost Japan One of Asia's most extraordinary cities, Bangkok is...

From the bestselling author of Wild Swans and Mao- The Unknown Story, the extraordinary story of the woman who single-handedly dragged China into the modern age Discover the extraordinary story...

Murakami tells the true story behind an act of terrorism that turned an average Monday morning into a national disaster Murakami tells the true story behind an act of terrorism...

Hmong story cloths provide a visual documentation of the historical and cultural legacy of the Hmong people from the country of Laos. The Hmong first began making the story cloths...

THE CHINESE "LORD OF THE RINGS" - NOW IN ENGLISH FOR THE FIRST TIME.THE SERIES EVERY CHINESE READER HAS BEEN ENJOYING FOR DECADES - 100 MILLION COPIES SOLD."Jin Yong's work,...

The ordeals of the POWs put to slave labour by their Japanese masters on the 'Burma Railway' have been well documented yet never cease to shock. It is impossible not...

In 1829, three women and three men were paraded through Osaka and crucified. Placards set up at the execution ground proclaimed their crime: they were devotees of the "pernicious creed"...

From the time of the Crimean War through the fall of the Tsar, the question of what to do about the Russian empire's large Muslim population was a highly contested...

The ordeals of the POWs put to slave labour by their Japanese masters on the 'Burma Railway' have been well documented yet never cease to shock. It is impossible not...

"Winter Soldiers is an immensely valuable contribution to the history of the Vietnam War. It brings to life, through the words of the veterans themselves, the journey each individual made,...

From 1625 to 1627 scholar-officials belonging to a militant Confucianist group known as the ""Donglin Faction"" suffered one of the most gruesome political repressions in China's history. Many were purged...

The Kharijites were the first sectarian movement in Islamic history, a rebellious splinter group that separated itself from mainstream Muslim society and set about creating, through violence, an ideal community...

"The Island of Seven Cities" unveils the first tangible proof that the Chinese settled in the New World before Columbus. In the summer of 2003, architect Paul Chiasson decided to...

The Story of Nuncomar and the Impeachment of Sir Elijah Impey (1885) examines some of the most controversial events of 18th century English colonial legal history from the point of...

A moving portrait of the lives of six poor city-dwellers, set in early twentieth century colonial Saigon Historian Haydon Cherry offers the first comprehensive social history of the urban poor...

In eighteenth-century China, a remarkable intellectual transformation took place, centered on the ascendance of philology. Its practitioners were preoccupied with the reliability of sources as evidence for restoring ancient texts...

While there have been many fine books covering escapes from German POW camps (The Wooden Horse, Great Escape, Colditz etc), the exploits of those POWs in Japanese captivity have been...

The history of the book in Tibet involves more than literary trends and trade routes. Functioning as material, intellectual, and symbolic object, the book has been an instrumental tool in...

This innovative study of ethics in Meiji Japan (1868-1912) explores the intense struggle to define a common morality for the emerging nation-state. In the Social Darwinist atmosphere of the time,...

A detailed portrait of the Turkic people explores events since World War I that have rendered the nation a vital NATO ally and the site of a secular Islamic democracy,...

Scholar-officials of late medieval China were not only enthusiastic in amateur storytelling, but also showed unprecedented interest in recording stories on different aspects of literati life. These stories appeared in...

A three-thousand-year history of the Yellow River and the legacy of interactions between humans and the natural landscape From Neolithic times to the present day, the Yellow River and its...

This inaugural volume in the Ohio University Press Series in Ecology and History is the paperback edition of Conrad Totman's widely acclaimed study of Japan's environmental policies over the centuries....

'Vivid, atmospheric, packed with brilliant story-telling' - Humphrey Hawksley, former BBC Beijing, Hong Kong and Asia Correspondent'[An] entertaining guide, rich in anecdote and understanding for an early globalised world that...

'Lawrence James is the doyen of Empire historians' The Spectator'James' writing is always full of energy and animation; he has an excellent eye for revealing detail' William Dalrymple'James has a...

In December 1880 a French expedition attempted to map a route for a railway that would stretch from their colony in Algeria right across the Sahara desert to reach their...

'Vivid, atmospheric, packed with brilliant story-telling' - Humphrey Hawksley, former BBC Beijing, Hong Kong and Asia Correspondent'[An] entertaining guide, rich in anecdote and understanding for an early globalised world that...

In this book, leading art experts, art historians, and critics review the life, career, and artistic development of New York based Chinese artist Zhang Hongtu. A pioneer in contemporary Chinese...

In the past two decades, scholars have transformed our understanding of the interactions between India and the West since the consolidation of British power on the subcontinent around 1800. While...

In the late eighteenth century two expansive Eurasian empires met formally for the first time-the Manchu or Qing dynasty of China and the maritime empire of Great Britain. The occasion...

In this remarkable account of imperial citizenship, Sukanya Banerjee investigates the ways that Indians formulated notions of citizenship in the British Empire from the late nineteenth century through the early...