Radio 4 Book of the Week

First broadcast from 2008.07.07 to 2008.07.11



Based on her hugely popular blog, the story of Judith O'Reilly's decision to give up her glamorous London lifestyle and make a new life for her family in the North of England.



Read by Felicity Montagu

Rough Storyline:
Cryostasis takes place in 1981 on a nuclear ice breaker called
the North Wind, which has become shipwrecked near the North Pole.
The main character, Alexander Nesterov is a Russian meteorologist
who must investigate what happened onboard the ship.

his is the story of a young hero boy on Christmas Eve who boards on a powerful magical train that's headed to the North Pole and Santa Claus's home. What unfolds is an an adventure which follows a doubting boy, who takes an extraordinary train ride to the North Pole; during this ride, he embarks on a journey of self-discovery which shows him that the wonder of life never fades for those who believe.

In a parallel world ruled by The Magisterium where people's souls have animal shapes, the orphan Lyra Belaqua is educated in the Jordan College, and her uncle and Professor Lord Asriel is her tutor. Lyra accidentally overhears a conversation about a research of Lord Asriel in the North Artic and the existence of a powerful Dust that unites different worlds. When her best friend Roger is kidnapped by the evil Gobblers, Lyra promises to rescue him. She is invited to go to the North with the influent Mrs. Coulter and the Jordan's Vice-Chancellor secretly gives her a magic golden compass capable of revealing the truth. When Lyra finds that Mrs. Coulter is the leader of the Gobblers, she escapes from her house and the runaway girl begins an amazing adventure in a war to save her friend and other missing children with her allied Gyptians, Witches and the strong Armored Bear Iorek Byrnison.

Book Description :

The Encyclopedia of Social Welfare History in North America is a unique reference work that provides readers with basic information about the history of social welfare in Canada, Mexico, and the United States. The intent of the encyclopedia is to provide readers with information about how these three nations have dealt with social welfare issues, some similar across borders, others unique, as well as to describe important events, developments, and the lives and work of some key contributors to social welfare developments. In choosing a continental focus, editors John M. Herrick and Paul H. Stuart encourage readers to explore cross-national and comparative work in the development of social welfare history.

The Encyclopedia defines social welfare broadly to include education, informal mutual assistance, the development of the social work profession, and voluntary charitable activities as well as state supported public welfare activities. The coverage is therefore broad and interdisciplinary, including the fields of anthropology, health sciences, history, political science, social work, and sociology.

Editors include specialists in the social welfare history of each nation, and they have collaborated with scholars from a variety of academic disciplines to prepare entries of varying length addressing these issues. Associate editors for Canada and Mexico, both authorities in the history of social welfare in those countries, were responsible for recruiting expert contributors in their fields.

No other reference work takes this unique continental approach, and as such this will be a much needed acquisition for any academic or large public library with a social science collection. Beginning students as well as established scholars will find this an invaluable starting point for investigations into new areas of inquiry.