Books published by Oldcastle Books Ltd

Situated at the crossroads of three continents, the Middle East has confounded the ambition of conquerors and peacemakers alike. Christianity, Judaism and Islam all had their genesis in the region but with them came not just civilisation and religion but also some of the great struggles of history....

The Knights Templar were the most powerful military religious order of the Middle Ages. Formed to protect pilgrims in the Holy Land, they participated in the Crusades and rapidly gained wealth, lands and influence and were answerable to none save the Pope himself....

A no-nonsense, direct down-the-lens look at the television industry written from the point of view of a television drama producer who's been there, done it, fought some battles and won the odd award....

Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou.... Oh wait, he's hanging around in the garden again. Will young Romeo and his Juliet ever be able to express their raging hormones? Or will their feuding families make this romance blossom into a poisoned flower? Either way, both their houses are totally plagued!...

On the seventieth anniversary of independence, A Short History of India traces the fascinating path from the India of ancient empires and powerful kingdoms to the flourishing, vibrant nation that it is today. India is a land where a multitude of diverse cultures have coexisted since ancient times, where some of...

A Short History of China provides an absorbing introduction to more than 4,000 years of Chinese history, telling the stories of the tyrants, despots, femmes fatales, artists, warriors and philosophers who have shaped this fascinating and complex nation. It describes the amazing technological advances that her scientists and...

Africa. The cradle of civilisation. From the dawn of human time in prehistoric Africa right through to the so-called 'Arab Spring' of 2011, Gordon Kerr offers a comprehensive introduction to the sprawling history of this enormous continent....

Script Readers play a crucial role in the film industry, often responsible for determining whether a script is even looked at by a producer or development executive; yet those accountable for reading can be on the first rung of the industry ladder and have had little or no training for the task. This user-friendly 'how-to' guide written...

On 8 March, 1965, 3,500 United States Marines of the 9th Marine Expeditionary Brigade made an amphibious landing at Da Nang on the south central coast of South Vietnam, marking the beginning of a conflict that would haunt American politics and society for many years, even after the the signing of the Paris Peace Accords in January 1973....

Every award-winning short film begins life with a clever idea, a good story and a screenplay. Patrick Nash analyses the process of writing short film screenplays and gives advice on all aspects essential to the development of a successful screenplay. The book also includes a number of award-winning scripts and interviews, advice and...

Gnosticism - derived from the Greek word gnosis, to know - is the name given to various religious schools that proliferated in the first centuries after Christ and, at one time, it almost became the dominant form of Christianity. Yet some Gnostic beliefs derive from the older Mystery traditions of Greece and...

A sports agent. In its simplest form, a sports agent is an individual or company who represents a sportsperson. They try to get them a better contract, a better endorsement, a better sponsorship, a better deal. Nothing wrong with that, is there? Or is there? The problem, inevitably, is money. So much money now sloshing around in...

For more than 2,000 years utopian visionaries have sought to create a blueprint of the ideal society: from Plato to HG Wells, from Cloudcuckooland to Shangri-La, the utopian impulse has generated a vast body of work, encompassing philosophy and political theory, classical literature and science fiction. And yet these utopian dreams have...

You've got TV, internet, phone, radio, movies, music, magazines and newspapers - and that's just the tip of the iceberg. Unless we live on a desert island, there is no escape from media communications of one sort or another. So how do we begin to understand today's all-embracing media culture?...

Few people manage to make money from gambling; fewer still make a living from it. Written for hardened and novice sports bettors alike, Joseph Buchdahl's Fixed Odds Sports Betting examines, through various numerical techniques, how fixed odds punters may learn to beat the bookmaker, protect profits through a sensible approach to risk...

Kurtz might be the apple of every brutish imperialist's eye, but his God complex is getting wildly out of hand in the depths of the jungle. What on earth will Marlow find when he finally gets downriver? Devil worship? Savages? Heads on sticks? Or just another nutty white man with his knickers in a twist?...