Ian Marchant Libri

A time-travelling, genealogical adventure, bringing pre-industrial, rural, eighteenth-century England vividly to life on the page.

Ian Marchant, bon viveur, pub singer and writer, sets off to map the British landscape in drink. This mission takes Ian and his friend Perry on a gruelling month-long pub crawl, from the Turk's Head on the Scilly Isles to the Baa Bar in the Shetlands, taking in many of the British Isles' 60,000 pubs. This British travelogue charts this trip.

For 175 years the British have lived with the railway, and for a long while it was a love affair - the grandeur of the Victorian heyday, the glorious age of steam, the romance of Brief Encounter. Then the love affair turned sour - strikes, bad food, delays, disasters...Parallel Lines tells the story of these two railways: the real railway and the railway of our dreams. Travelling all over Britain, Ian Marchant examines the history of the British railway and meets those who still hold the railways close to their hearts - the model railway enthusiasts, the train-spotters and bashers (a hybrid of train-spotting where the individual - usually male - has to travel behind a certain locomotive in order to catalogue it), the steam enthusiasts. He swaps stories with commuters at the far reaches of London suburbia, he travels to deserted railway museums, and smokes cigarettes on remote, windswept stations in the furthest corners of Scotland, turning his characteristic eye for character, humour and surprise to one of the great shared experiences of the British nation.

A group of mismatched animal friends embarks on a whimsical adventure to uncover the mystery of the handkerchiefs flooding their home, The Bed. Their journey takes them to the distant pillow mountains, where they must act quickly to save their town. Filled with excitement, ballooning escapades, and an abundance of tea, this charming tale promises fun for the entire family.

Set on the beleaguered planet of Albatross, a small-town sheriff faces an absurd influx of visitors, including off-worlders and bizarre creatures, all with questionable motives. Amidst the chaos, the presence of Space Monkeys adds a comedic twist to the sheriff's challenges. As he navigates the mayhem, the story explores the humorous side of intergalactic intrigue and the peculiar reasons behind the sudden interest in his town, far from its culinary delights.

It's a story of why you know your birth sign, why you have friends called Willow, why sex and drugs and rock'n'roll once mattered more than money, why dance music stopped the New-Age Travellers from travelling, and why you need to think twice before taking the brown acid.