Sell The Pig And Buy Me Out

A cast of sturdy characters' existentialist of the working classes' -senior ordinary seaman O'Rourke 'Western Ocean man and would be hard knock'; the murderous Captain Jake; Busti the elderly Egyptian galley boy; drunken Chief Mate Cartrite; Dingbat the ancient alcoholic Welsh engineer; Hesta the Padre's wife, and Clarrie the ancient and classically camp chief steward re seen through the eyes of first trip apprentice James Howard and his dotty inspiration Prudence back in Britain as James picks up the ethics of his nautical trade.

Raised by a single mother on welfare during the 1930's depression and World War II in the Scottish Highlands, Ian spends his childhood trying to get enough to eat and stay warm. During an adolescence apprenticed to a drunken blacksmith, he also begins a lifelong love affair with music-making while wavering between the strictures of the Salvation Army and the "worldly pleasures" of the outside world. Life begins to improve when Ian enters the Royal Air Force, serving five years as an aircraft engine mechanic and bandsman in the United Kingdom and then Egypt. In the latter, he experiences the consequences of the Arab "walkouts" that eventually led to the Suez Canal crisis. Most hilarious is his tale "Jig-a-Jig in the Desert" when the small military water treatment plant he supervises is invaded by Arab prostitutes. Returning to Britain, he marries his pen-pal, Mary, completes his military career and enters into civilian life, finally settling on his lifetime career as a machinist. Two daughters are born, one of whose life is saved at birth by a bottle of Scotch whisky. Despite getting established in Scotland, Ian gets "itchy feet" and thinks of emigrating. Misled by the inflated promises of an unscrupulous Government of Ontario official to choose Canada over Australia, Ian, Mary and the girls endure a winter sailing over the Atlantic in 1965, including a collision in the St. Lawrence Seaway. Ian and Mary struggle to adjust and to learn and speak "Canadian." Their daughters, however, are sounding like Canadian children within a few weeks! Misadventures in finding and keeping jobs and a suitable place to live in Canada lead Ian to conclude that he has only moved "from poverty to poverty." Will he be able to survive and eventually thrive in this new land?

A catch phrase is a well-known, frequently-used phrase or saying that has `caught on' or become popular over along period of time. It is often witty or philosophical and this Dictionary gathers together over 7,000 such phrases.

This is the story of T.E. Lawrence (Lawrence of Arabia) as Aircraftman T.E. Shaw at RAF College Cranwell in Lincolnshire from August 1925 - December 1926.

A wonderful collection of some of the best stories by this master writer.

In a sunlit, secret valley in the green mountains of central Italy, two people meet away from the horrors and clamour of battle. David Hopkins, a young fisherman from west Wales and Kate Medhurst, from a genteel town in the Thames Valley, embark upon an idyllic love affair away from the conflict that surrounds them. However, they cannot escape the war forever, and when they are targeted by a single enemy aeroplane their dreams are destroyed. Weeks later, Hopkins wakes up in a Russian hospital in Vienna where he's slowly recovering from serious wounds - with no recollection of the past. Eventually, transferred to an American hospital and then repatriated to Britain, Hopkins reluctantly returns to Wales. And there, alone and haunted by the months he cannot remember, Hopkins embarks upon a journey of rediscovery...

Winner of the CWA Historical Dagger Award The North-West Frontier, 1910. The screams of a wounded British officer abandoned at the bottom of a dark ravine are heard by a young Scottish subaltern. Ignoring the command to retreat back to base the Highlander sets out alone, with dagger in hand, to rescue his fellow officer from the Pathan tribesmen who are slowly torturing him to death. Over a dozen years later the backwash of this tragedy threatens to engulf Joe Sandilands. After a skirmish which results in the death of a Pathan prince and the taking of hostages, Joe is given seven days in which to identify, arrest and execute the killer before the frontier erupts into war. Drawing on all his courage and detective skills Joe must find out who the murderer is before more bloody deaths occur, the legacy of a bitter feud with its roots hidden deep in the past.