Scratching Shed Publishing

Although BBC rugby league commentator and former St. Helens and Widnes forward Ray French represented his country at both codes of rugby and has, for the past thirty years, written and broadcast extensively on the sport, his latest book is far more than a look back at his life in the game. In Ray French… and Rugby, he presents the story of a man who has for the past six decades straddled and enjoyed both oval ball codes as a spectator, player, coach, administrator and commentator. He calls upon his experiences on and off the pitch to consider the problems facing both sports, the relationship between them, the values and appeal of both games, and offers his strong, passionate and controversial opinions on their future. Naturally concentrating on rugby league, the passion in his life, he provides an abundance of humorous anecdotes and stories surrounding incidents and the characters within the game. Already the author of seven titles, Ray French looks upon this as being the definitive book on his career and everything associated with it.

This is the story of Iby Knill, whose inspirational and moving account of holocaust survival was featured recently on the BBC television series My Story. In her book, Iby tells of her early childhood in Czechoslovakia and of how her parents – alarmed at the persecution of Jews in Germany – smuggled her over the border to Hungary. The Woman Without A Number also reveals how she was caught by the security police and then imprisoned and tortured, not only as a result of her Jewish connections but for having entered Hungary illegally and for aiding the resistance movement. Eventually, Iby was sent to the infamous Auschwitz-Birkenau camp. In June 1944, Iby Knill left Auschwitz-Birkenau by volunteering to travel as a nurse with a slave labour transport of 500 women. Once transported to Lippstadt, she was put in charge of a hospital unit and risked her life protecting the weak and helpless from the gas chambers. Appearing for the first time in print, The Woman Without A Number is a truly remarkable tale that has waited sixty years to be told.

A lifetime of policing the streets, but that was only the beginning… For years, PC David Watson was a policeman of the old school. He patrolled the towns and cities of England’s north by car and on foot, where a fight against crime lurked around every corner. Until, one day, disaster struck – albeit from an unexpected direction. A near fatal encounter in the Scottish Highlands left the Yorkshire bobby inches away from death and with just about every bone in his body shattered. Indeed, had it not been for a miracle intervention, his story would have already been over. As it was, and initially from his hospital bed, he embarked on a physical and psychological battle for survival. He rebuilt a life that had once been so active, step by painful step. Out of the Blue is the inspirational story of that fightback and more. It gives an inside take on British policing at the sharp end – the dangers, the frustrations, the thrills and the humour. And it shows how overwhelming odds can be beaten by hope, courage, determination, medical skill and family support..

From the making of Melinda Messenger to the dramatic rescue of England’s most over-achieving football club Doncaster Rovers, entrepreneur, pioneer and self-made millionaire John Ryan continues to live his dream. Raised on a modest council estate, Ryan was a driving force in the transformation of cosmetic surgery from controversial luxury to one of Britain’s fastest-expanding industries. As such, he helped to put smiles on thousands of female faces and has seen more breasts than the editor of The Sun. And, remarkably, he did it all in order to fulfil a promise to become the most successful chairman in the history of a football club that had, at best, long been the butt of jokes and, at worst, on the verge of extinction. In typically amusing and endearingly honest style, John Ryan reveals how seeing beyond hugely difficult circumstances has been key to almost unprecedented success in two very different fields; along with creating his own personal paradise. Laced with genuine, heart-warming tributes from some of the biggest names in the beautiful game, Ryan pulls no punches with his forthright views on a sport in which the gulf between players and fans grows almost daily. His message will resonate with the thoughts of huge numbers of supporters throughout the land who worry where the game is leading. Dare to Dream carries a special health warning: it may make you fall back in love with football – and life!

When Gunner George Norman Davison returned to his hometown of Sheffield, England, upon the conclusion of the Second World War, he used the diary he had carried with him to write a vivid first-hand account of his experiences. These included the former insurance clerk’s initial training in the UK and posting to North Africa; his immediate separation from Irene, his newlywed wife; his subsequent capture and imprisonment in the desert camps of Libya; the seemingly endless, lonely and hungry minutes dreaming of food and home; his re-transportation to Italy; the cruelty and kindness of his captors there; and – finally – his escape with the aid of the Italian resistance across the border on Lake Como into Switzerland. Job done, Davison then put his remarkable story to one side before typing it up in manuscript form shortly before his death in 1986, whereupon it was rediscovered in a dusty attic by his only son, John. Alongside it was a battered old suitcase which contained yet more fascinating items, including each and every letter that Norman and Irene Davison had written to one another in those dark days from 1939 to 1946. Here, published for the very first time, Norman Davison’s story is finally given the public attention that it deserves. The result – In The Prison of his Days – is a singular tale of extraordinary times, that is by turns moving, amusing, informative and thrilling.