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Daunt Books Children's Short Story Competition 2013

Southern & Mediterranean Europe

• Italy
• Spain
• Portugal
• Greece
• Balkans

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  Florence & Tuscany by Eyewitness Guides

  Price: £13.99    Add to Basket

  Glossy sightseeing companion full of colour illustrations and maps supported by first-rate writing. Practical travel information is included, albeit scarcely, in the back pages.

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  Homage to Catalonia by George Orwell

  Price: £7.99    Add to Basket

  Originally published in 1938, this is Orwell's classic account of his experiences during the Spanish Civil War. In what is one of his finest books he describes the calamity and humanity of a chaotic war.

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  The Imperfectionists by Tom Rachman

  Price: £7.99    Add to Basket

  A hugely entertaining novel centred around a failing newspaper in Rome. The eccentric employees seek venal distractions as their lives and livelihoods slowly disintegrate.

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  Go Slow Italy by Alastair Sawday

  Price: £19.99    Add to Basket

  A wonderful guide to 46 Italian hotels where the owners put time and affection into everything they do. Specialises in the environmentally responsible, regional and community-focused places to stay.

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  The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco

  Price: £7.99    Add to Basket

  Eco's masterpiece is a labyrinthine historical murder story in which a 14th century monk turns detective. A remarkable illumination of the Middle Ages as well as a cracking mystery.

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  If On a Winter's Night a Traveller by Italo Calvino

  Price: £8.99    Add to Basket

  By some distance Calvino's most popular work, this is an highly cerebral work of metafiction that seems to fold in on itself so often that the reader must cling on for dear life. Thankfully the remarkably inventive exercise is founded on a great sense of absurd humour, and is shot through with enough warmth and humanity to justify its twists and turns. Unique and worthy of investigation.

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  Rome by Insight Fleximap

  Price: £4.99    Add to Basket

  A laminated map covering the centre of the city with a useful street index. Scale 1:12,500

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  Rome by Companion Guide

  £16.99 Price: £15.29    Add to Basket

  A fantastic, well-written cultural guide to Rome with notes on history, art and architecture and the culture of the city. Highly recommended.

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  That Awful Mess on the Via Merulana by Carlo Emilio Gadda

  £8.99 Price: £8.09    Add to Basket

  A sublimely unusual detective story that presents a scathing picture of fascist Italy, Gadda's much-loved classic is also a rich baroque social novel. Wonderful.

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  Rubicon: The Triumph and Tragedy of the Roman Republic by Tom Holland

  £9.99 Price: £8.99    Add to Basket

  A singular book by one of our favourite historians, 'Rubicon' is ambitiously conceived and exquisitely realised. Lucid and pacy, it charts the last century of the Roman Republic, culminating in its catastrophic demise. Brilliant.

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  Rome 2012 by Time Out

  Price: £7.99    Add to Basket

  Increasingly Time Out's main focus, the annually-updated Shortlist gives a brief introduction to the city then cuts right to the chase, directing you to the best sights, bars, restaurants and so on. Pocket-sized and perhaps all you need for a weekend visit.

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  A Civilized Traveller's Guide to Turin by Eugenia Bell

  Price: £10.00    Add to Basket

  An unusual and insightful guide with a strong personal touch, as the author leads us through her favourite haunts, illuminating as she does so the rich cultural history of the city.

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  Italian Riviera & Piedmont by Cadogan Guides

  Price: £14.99    Add to Basket

  Authors Dana Facaros and Michael Pauls have written dozens of first-rate guides for Cadogan, and this one is another success. In highly readable prose they explore the region honestly and insightfully, balancing practical know-how with wider context. Aimed mid-range for a relatively comfortable trip.

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  Milan by Wallpaper Guides

  Price: £4.95    Add to Basket

  Designed for stylish citybreakers seeking the very best that Milan has to offer.

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  The Stones of Venice by John Ruskin

  Price: £12.99    Add to Basket

  A careful selection of John Ruskin's famously wonderful essays on Venice.

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  Venice PopOut Map by Berlitz

  Price: £3.99    Add to Basket

  A handy pop-out map of Venice, perfect for slipping in your pocket for a stroll around the city.

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  Don't Look Now and Other Stories by Daphne du Maurier

  Price: £8.99    Add to Basket

  Perhaps the most terrifying and haunting story ever penned, 'Don't Look Now' renders Venice an eerie and spectral backdrop to a magnificently chilling exploration of grief. 'Not After Midnight' and 'The Breakthrough', also included here among others, are equally potent.

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  A History of Venice by John Julius Norwich

  Price: £14.99    Add to Basket

  Modestly titled, this is as far as we are concerned the only history of Venice worth reading. Norwich approaches his subject with great knowledge and passion, and tells its story with consummate skill. Monumental in scope, rich in detail and brilliant in execution, this is a truly fine book.

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  Tuscany by Blue Guides

  Price: £18.00    Add to Basket

  Setting the standard as ever for historical and cultural coverage, this formidable guide offers deeply detailed insight into sights across the region, with colour photographs and the odd hotel and restaurant recommendation.

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  Florence, a Delicate Case by David Leavitt

  Price: £9.99    Add to Basket

  Part of Bloomsbury's marvellous 'The Writer & The City' series, Leavitt's fine exploration of expatriate life in Florence is evocative, measured and insightful in the utmost.

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  The Stones of Florence / Venice Observed by Mary McCarthy

  Price: £8.99    Add to Basket

  Two fantastically rich portraits of two great cities, in which the considerable artistic and architectural splendours of the past persist in the daily spectacle of carnival and commerce. The quality of McCarthy's writing is astonishing - utterly hypnotic - and it cannot be recommended highly enough.

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  Gomorrah: Italy's Other Mafia by Roberto Saviano

  Price: £8.99    Add to Basket

  A gritty, graceless, unflinching account of the Camorra, the Naepolitan mafia-esque crime organization that Saviano believes is destroying one of Italy's great cities. Brutal but utterly brilliant.

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  The Law by Roger Vailland

  £13.99 Price: £12.59    Add to Basket

  A scintillating, sensual novel of immoral behaviour and criminality played out in the taverns of southern Italy. Underrated French novelist won the 1957 Prix Goncourt for this, his finest achievement.

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  Naples '44: An Intelligence Officer in the Italian Labyrinth by Norman Lewis

  Price: £9.99    Add to Basket

  Not only one of the great pieces of Italian travel writing, but one of the great journalistic works of the twentieth century. This brilliant book beautifully evokes a city falling apart at the end of the war, as well as capturing the heat and complexity of Southern Italian culture. An absolute classic.

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  Naples by Time Out Guides

  Price: £12.99    Add to Basket

  Two thirds of the book is devoted to the city itself, highlighting the best sights, bars, restaurants and so on, giving a great flavour of the place. The remainder covers surrounding spots like Sorrento, Capri, Pompeii and the Amalfi Coast.