This in-depth exploration of the English language covers every nuance and curiosity of this constantly evolving linguistic pastiche. It is estimated that every year 800 neologisms are added to the English language, and include acronyms (NIMBY, Not In My Backyard), blended words (motel), and those taken from foreign languages (savoir-faire). Laid out in an a-to-z format with detailed cross-references and written to appeal equally to students, etymologists, and nonnative speakers, this historical guide is an invaluable resource for this truly global lingua franca.

So much to do, so little time, so best to start early. Full of things to make, achieve, learn (and some things you shouldn't learn) this is the perfect handbook for any child who wants to revel in being young and not-boring. Can you Make an origami crane? Lie convincingly? Operate as a spy? Parents may need these skills (not origami) to wrest their child's copy from them and indulge in all the fun they should have had.

Mr and Mrs Brown are always having great difficulty with their numerous and incredibly naughty children. They try all the agencies but the nurses, governesses and nannies never stay long with the Brown children. 'The person you want is Nurse Matilda', they are told. And when Nurse Matilda does arrive very strange things begin to happen. Brought together in one volume are the three remarkable tales of Nurse Matilda — Nurse Matilda, Nurse Matilda Goes to Town and Nurse Matilda Goes to Hospital. Having delighted generations of readers since their first publication in the sixties, the books have now formed the inspiration for the newly-released and fabulous Nanny McPhee, written and adapted for the big screen by Emma Thompson who stars as Nanny McPhee opposite Colin Firth as Mr Brown. This collection of stories from Christianna Brand is sure to charm and entertain all readers new and old.

It's almost graduation and the lives of New York's private high school elite are really heating up. Everyone's got into college and it's clearly time to party — not that they haven't been doing plenty of that already. This is the eighth book in this series.

Lucy, Hermione and Sam offer to accompany the captain and his dog, Biscuit on the next trip to keep a lookout for danger. But danger is exactly what they run into! The pirates aren't just after more popcorn they want new recruits too! Will three children — and a dog — defeat the greediest gang of grub-guzzling pirates ever to sail the high seas?

Twelve-year-old Harriet is doing her best to grow up, which is not easy as her mother is permanently on medication, her father has silently moved to another city, and her serene sister rarely notices anything. All of them are still suffering from the shocking and mysterious death of her brother Robin twelve years earlier, and it seems to Harriet that the family may never recover. So, inspired by Captain Scott, Houdini, and Robert Louis Stevenson, she sets out with her only friend Hely to find Robin's murderer and punish him. But what starts out as a child's game soon becomes a dark and dangerous journey into the menacing underworld of a small Mississippi town.

Billy, Nicola and Mr Gopal are off to India in a flying boat to solve a baffling mystery! The gum that comes from the wonderful bubblegum trees that grow in the Indian jungle has not been delivered for two months. Without this secret ingredient, there'll be no more Gopal's Best Pink Bubblegum, and even more importantly, no more Bubblegummies — the people who live in the trees and harvest the gum. It's not an easy mystery to solve — and soon the friends are involved in a bungee-jumping, tiger-trouncing, woodcutter-walloping, bubblegum-blowing adventure!

Jim and his friends are upset to hear that their school janitor's car has been stolen, and just before he's due to retire too. So Jim comes up with a bright idea for a way to help raise money to buy a new car: selling doughnuts. They start by making their own very delicious doughnuts to sell, but run into problems when demand exceeds supply. That's when Jim has another brainwave and decides the only way to make enough is to write a chain letter asking people to make more doughnuts. The doughnuts start rolling in and rolling in and soon Jim is up to his ears in them. It takes another inspired business idea to rescue a situation which is rapidly getting out of hand. This is the inspiring story of a boy with a big heart and big business ideas, from bestselling author, Alexander McCall Smith.

The summer holidays are dragging on and Harry Potter can't wait for the start of the school year. It is his fourth year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry and there are spells to be learnt and (unluckily) Potions and Divination lessons to be attended. But Harry can't know that the atmosphere is darkening around him, and his worst enemy is preparing a fate that it seems will be inescapable... With characteristic wit, fast-paced humour and marvellous emotional depth, J.K. Rowling has proved herself yet again to be a master story-teller.

The French Connection is a heart-stopping account of an extraordinary narcotics case told as it actually happened. The story is spread over many suspense-filled months and involves plush Manhattan night clubs, dark tenements in Brooklyn and the Bronx, tree-lined suburbs on the upper East Side, Paris, Marseilles and Palermo. The case involves both American and French criminals, including Jean Jehan, director of the world's largest heroin network, and Jacques Angelvin, a famous French television star.

A hurricane is building over the Gulf of Mexico, threatening the coastal town of Bois Sauvage, Mississippi, and Esch's father is growing concerned. A hard drinker, largely absent, he doesn't show concern for much else. Esch and her three brothers are stocking food, but there isn't much to save. Lately, Esch can't keep down what food she gets; she's fourteen and pregnant. Her brother Skeetah is sneaking scraps for his prized pitbull's new litter, dying one by one in the dirt. While brothers Randall and Junior try to stake their claim in a family long on child's play and short on parenting. As the twelve days that comprise the novel's framework yield to the final day and Hurricane Katrina, the unforgettable family at the novel's heart — motherless children sacrificing for each other as they can, protecting and nurturing where love is scarce — pulls itself up to struggle for another day. A wrenching look at the lonesome, brutal, and restrictive realities of rural poverty, Salvage the Bone is muscled with poetry, revelatory, and real.

1919. Emily Ehrlich watches as two young airmen, Alcock and Brown, emerge from the carnage of the First World War to pilot the very first non-stop transatlantic flight from Newfoundland to the west of Ireland. Among the letters being carried on the aircraft is one which will not be opened for almost a hundred years. 1998. Senator George Mitchell criss-crosses the ocean in search of an elusive Irish peace. How many more bereaved mothers and grandmothers must he meet before an agreement can be reached? 1845. Frederick Douglass, a black American slave, lands in Ireland to champion ideas of democracy and freedom, only to find a famine unfurling at his feet. On his travels he inspires a young maid to go to New York to embrace a free world, but the land does not always fulfill its promises for her. From the violent battlefields of the Civil War to the ice lakes of northern Missouri, it is her youngest daughter Emily who eventually finds her way back to Ireland. Can we pass from the new world to the old? How does the past shape the future? In TransAtlantic, National Book Award-winning Colum McCann has achieved an outstanding act of literary bravura. Intricately crafted, poetic and deeply affecting it weaves together personal stories to explore the fine line between what is real and what is imagined, and the tangled skein of connections that make up our lives.

Every morning a very large and very snappy crocodile shouts this selfish message: 'Stay away from my river! It's MY river! If you come in my river, I'll eat you all!' The animals in the forest don't know what to do. They are frightened of the crocodile. Even the fish, tadpoles, frogs, crabs and crayfish stay out of the water. Until one day the creatures are woken by a loud groaning sound which turns out to be the selfish crocodile in a lot of pain, and the smallest of them all, a little mouse, finds a way to solve their snappy dilemma! Astoundingly bright, bold illustrations bring to life all the wonderful creatures of the forest in a rainbow of colours. The Author: Faustin Charles is a renowned poet and story-teller. His collection of Afro-Caribbean rhymes was published to great success by Puffin. This is his first picture book text. Bloomsbury Children's Books are also publishing his first poetry collection in October 1998, establishing Faustin as a Bloomsbury author across the board. Faustin spends much time in schools and libraries story-telling, and is also Library Buyer for Enfield. He lives in North London. The Illustrator: Mike Terry is most well-known for his wonderful cover illustrations for Dick King-Smith, including The Hodgeheg and The Sheep-Pig (the basis for the successful film Babe). This is his first picture book. Mike lives in Hythe, Kent.

This new edition defines the language we use in the 21st century and brings English to life. It includes over 12,000 new terms, over 400,000 words, phrases and meanings, and extensive help to solve spelling and language problems.

It's February and most cities are a cold, grey wasteland, but not New York. Everyone who's anyone has sent in their college application and now it's time to run a little wild! Could it be that Serena is smitten with Blair's stepbrother or will the Fashion Week parties pull her away from true love? Dan and Vanessa are mad about each other and pursuing their creative dreams — but be careful of what you wish for. Nate hits an all-time low as Blair's Yale interview with a tall, handsome man takes an unexpected turn and Jenny makes a new friend who gets a little too close for comfort. Wintertime has never been hotter in NYC as things steam up all over Fifth Avenue.

It's the Spring break and love is in the air. Or is that a blend of Chanel no 9 and Gucci Rush? Blair moves in with Serena and they're back to being best friends. But will the love-fest last or will they end up tearing out one another's newly highlighted hair? Nate is on the straight and narrow with his crazy girlfriend, Georgie. And Vanessa, wait, is that Vanessa shopping at Barneys with a guy in a Lacoste shirt? The long cold winter is over and the sun is finally shining along Fifth Avenue. The trees are in bloom and NYC's most fabulous are ready for a truly outrageous vacation!

Also... the moment of truth has finally arrived. Everyone's back from a week of apres-ski hot tub fun in Sun Valley and cream-coloured envelopes from the Ivy League are beginning to drop all over Fifth Avenue doorsteps. The question is: are the envelopes thick or thin? Has Nate's devotion to his misbehaving heiress dimmed his chances of getting into Brown? Is Blair too busy daydreaming in Eric's old pinstriped Oxfords to remember her real mission in life — Yale?? Hopefully Serena can snap her newest-and-oldest best friend out of it. That is, if Serena hasn't already become too much of a vapid, celery-eating supermodel to even care. But we know that Serena is made of sterner stuff ... don't we?

Harry Potter is due to start his fifth year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizadry. He is desperate to get back to school and find out why his friends Ron and Hermione have been so secretive all summer. However, what Harry is about to discover in his new year at Hogwarts will turn his whole world upside down ... But before he even gets to school, Harry has an unexpected and frightening encounter with two Dementors, has to face a court hearing at the Ministry of Magic and has been escorted on a night-time broomstick ride to the secret headquarters of a mysterious group called 'The Order of the Phoenix'. And that is just the start. A gripping and electrifying novel, full of suspense, secrets, and — of course — magic.

Harry Potter is due to start his fifth year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizadry. He is desperate to get back to school and find out why his friends Ron and Hermione have been so secretive all summer. However, what Harry is about to discover in his new year at Hogwarts will turn his whole world upside down ... But before he even gets to school, Harry has an unexpected and frightening encounter with two Dementors, has to face a court hearing at the Ministry of Magic and has been escorted on a night-time broomstick ride to the secret headquarters of a mysterious group called 'The Order of the Phoenix'. And that is just the start. A gripping and electrifying novel, full of suspense, secrets, and — of course — magic.

Harry Potter is a wizard. He is in his second year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. As Harry and Ron embark on their journey to Hogwarts in a flying Ford Anglia, little do they know that this year will be just as eventful as the last as ghosts from Hogwarts past return to haunt the school corridors. The texts of the Harry Potter adult editions are identical to that of the standard editions; only the jacket illustrations vary.