Michael Heatley

Frank Hopkinson

The Real Stories Behind 50 Classic Pop Songs

Girl in the Song

London Then and Now – People and Places takes an amazing cross-section of vintage photographs of London from the 1850s through to the 1960s, and pairs them up with the same view as it looks today. The great tourist destinations are all included: Buckingham Palace, Tower of London, Houses of Parliament, Whitehall, Trafalgar Square, Covent Garden, the British Museum, St. Pauls Cathedral and Hyde Park, along with classic London pubs, famous theatres, the grand stations, and Carnaby Street and the Kings Road. The book travels along the Thames through Hammersmith, Barnes and Richmond out to Hampton Court, plus we get a fleeting glimpse of Chuck Berry and the Rolling Stones posing on Park Lane and walking out of court in Southcombe Street. There are Dickensian street scenes, plus 'The Old Curiosity Shop' and coaching inns that Dickens visited. Sites include: Albert Hall, Albert Memorial, Bank of England, Grosvenor Square, Chelsea, Cleopatra's Needle, Selfridges, Earls Court, Fleet Street, Soho, Haymarket, Kensington High Street, Kew Gardens, Leicester Square, Oxford Street, Paddington, Piccadilly Circus, Savoy Hotel, V&A, Natrual History Museum, National Theatre, Festival Hall, Waterloo and much more.

People and Places

London Then and Now®

A visitor’s guide to Midsomer, pinpointing the most popular real-world locations used for filming the series. ‘Midsomer Murders’ was an immediate success from its very first episode ‘The Killing at Badger's Drift’, aired in 1997. With this guide, fans of the show can pinpoint the most popular locations used for filming the series, including familiar pubs, churches, villages and countryside that are open for visits. The guide features: Famous pubs such as The Lions at Bledlow, which has been five different pubs in its Midsomer lifetime, and The Crown in Sydenham, which can claim at least three. Villages clustered around the Oxfordshire/Buckinghamshire border – Turville, Hambleden, Fingest, Haddenham and Long Crendon, all favourite backdrops in the show. Grand country houses including the Mapledurham Estate, Chenies Manor House and Dorney Court, all open to the public. Ancient churches to admire, quite often the scene of grisly goings on in the vestry. Short profiles on the two DCI Barnabys, John Nettles and Neil Dudegon, along with the five Detective Sergeants and Sykes the dog. With all episodes available on BritBox, fans of the show can watch old episodes with the Midsomer Murders Location Guide in hand and spot exactly where Inspector Barnaby brings the sometimes unlikely villains to book.

Discover the villages, pubs and churches behind the hit TV series

Midsomer Murders Location Guide

The Girl in the Song tells the stories of 50 women who have inspired classic rock songs. Who was Emily in Pink Floyd's See Emily Play? What happened to Suzanne Verdal, immortalised in Leonard Cohen's Suzanne? Did life change for Prudence Farrow after John Lennon penned Dear Prudence? And whatever happened to 'the girl with mousy hair', an ex-girlfriend Bowie sings about in Life on Mars? This fascinating book explains how each song came about, when it was released, the impact it had on the charts and then gives a mini-biography of the song's muse. Suzanne Verdal was living a bohemian lifestyle by the river in Montreal when Cohen wrote his poem Suzanne, which he subsequently set to music. Later in life she tried to get in touch with the star who blanked her backstage at a gig. She was last heard of living in a car in California. Apart from songs, the book features sidebars on the performers who wrote about the women in their life - Syd Barrett famously included four girls in the same song. Other examples include:Under My Thumb - The Rolling Stones (Chrissie Shrimpton),She's Leaving Home - The Beatles, Layla - Derek and the Dominoes (Patti Boyd), Peggy-Sue - Buddy Holly (Peggy-Sue Gerron), Maggie May - Rod Stewart, Light of Day - Bruce Springsteen (Julianna Phillips), Sweet Caroline - Neil Diamond (Caroline Kennedy).

Frank Hopkinson

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