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Piers Paul Read

Biography

Piers Paul Read

Piers Paul Read, FRSL (born 7 March 1941) is an award-winning English novelist, historian and biographer. He was first noted for a book of reportage Alive: The Story of the Andes Survivors, later adapted as a feature-film and a documentary. This was followed by some well-acclaimed novels that criticised English middle-class ethics from the less-usual viewpoint of a right-wing practising Catholic, with sin and redemption as recurring themes. Among his most popular works are The Professor's Daughter, A Married Man, and A Season in the West. Read is also a dramatist and TV scriptwriter.

Piers Paul Read

Books by Piers Paul Read

by Piers Paul Read - Fiction, History

In the late 18th century, Sicilian nobleman Vitello Scarpia finds himself penniless and disgraced on the streets of Rome. After being expelled from the Spanish royal guard, he is left to seek his fortune in Italy, a fortunate bound to the Pope, whose rule is threatened by the French Revolution. Scarpia enrolls in the papal army and is soon taken up by a countess, eager to have a handsome officer at her side. She introduces him to Roman society, and he meets the beautiful singer Floria Tosca on a mission to Venice. Exploring the lives of figures from Puccini’s famous opera, SCARPIA shines light on war and revolution during France’s advance into Italy. 

by Piers Paul Read - Adventure, Biography, Travel

On October 12, 1972, an Uruguayan Air Force plane carrying a teamof rugby players crashed in the remote snowy peaks of the Andes. Ten weeks later, only sixteen of the forty-five passengers were found alive. This is the story of those ten weeks spent in the shelter of the plane's fuselage without food and with scarcely any hope of a rescue. The survivors protected and helped one another, and came to the difficult conclusion that to live meant doing the unimaginable. Confronting nature at its most furious, two brave young men risked their lives to hike through the mountains looking for help -- and ultimately found it.

by Piers Paul Read - Fiction

It is 1913 when Alice meets Edward Cobb, the eligible son of a baronet. When Alice's father, a radical publisher, gets involved in a scandal, Edward breaks off their engagement, unaware that Alice is expecting his child. Desperate, she travels to Russia to serve as a governess for charming Baron Rettenberg, as the Russian Revolution and World War I rage on.