Independent Book shop in Downham Market
Upcoming Events
The Life Affirming Magic of Birds - Charlie Bingham
Thursday 1st May 6.30pm
Free event but please register your attendance by emailing info@wordsandwonderbooks.com, by phoning or calling in the shop
Charlie Bingham will be celebrating and discussing her first book The Life Affirming Magic of Birds
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In The Life-Affirming Magic of Birds, writer and conservationist Charlie Bingham opens your eyes to the fascinating and diverse world of birds and nature. Have you ever heard an unfamiliar birdsong and asked yourself where it came from? Or felt inspired by the stoicism of trees in difficult times? If so, then this is the book for you. Join Charlie on this essential journey of discovery and learn how nature can offer a way to engage with your surroundings for anyone who wants to experience it. In this beautiful, captivating book, you’ll discover an alternative way to appreciate nature. Through twelve insightful lessons, you’ll see the power that nature has to help us through turbulent times. If you’ve ever struggled to find motivation to get through the daily grind, this book reveals how birds— and the simple act of noticing nature—can guide us through even the most challenging moments.
Charlie Bingham is a UK based nature writer. After completing a degree in archaeology at the University of York, Charlie began to reconnect with nature in her mid 20’s. She found that birds especially seemed to have the ability to help her through difficult times and made it her life’s mission to share her love and passion with a wide audience. Charlie’s passion for the natural world shines across her social media platforms and in her work as a digital communications specialist and event manager for nature-based charities. Charlie has written for various platforms and publications including Conker Magazine, Bird Table, The Guardian and Bald Hiker.
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The Lancaster Story - Dr Sarah Louise Miller
Sunday 11th May 3pm ​
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​This event is free but please register your attendance by emailing info@wordsandwonderbooks.com or by phoning or calling into the shop.
Dr. Sarah Louise Miller will be joining us to for a talk about The Lancaster Story which will be new in paperback.
The Lancaster Story takes readers on a remarkable journey through the history of an aviation icon. Between its introduction in 1942 and the end of the Second World War, the Avro Lancaster flew more than 150,000 sorties, dropped more than 600,000 tons of explosives and took the Allied fight to Nazi Germany.
The true workhorse of the RAF’s bomber corps, the ‘Lanc’ featured on some of the most daring and celebrated missions of the war, including the heroic Dambusters raid and the Operation Hydra bombing. These and many other successes came at a significant cost, however: almost half of the 7,377 Lancasters deployed into service were lost in action.
Using archival documents, letters and first-hand accounts, The Lancaster Story delivers a dramatic and vividly rendered account of the most successful RAF bomber of the Second World War and the lives of the men and women who flew, designed, constructed and maintained it. Combining individual stories into a gripping, panoramic narrative, it paints a complete portrait of the battle over Europe, and the Lancaster’s unique and decisive role in it.
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Dr Sarah-Louise Miller is a historian of war and conflict, specialising in air and sea power, military intelligence and defence and security. She is a lecturer at the Defence Studies Department at King’s College London, and teaches military education courses at the Defence Academy of the UK. She is also a visiting scholar at the University of Oxford’s Faculty of History, and is a member of Kellogg College, Oxford. Sarah received her PhD from the Department of War Studies, King’s College London, in July 2022. She is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society and was elected as a Member of the Royal Aeronautical Society in January 2024. Sarah is the author of several books, and appears regularly on British television and radio, having featured on various documentaries for the BBC, ITV, Channel 4, Channel 5, Sky History, National Geographic and PBS.
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Alison Bruce - Because She Looked Away
Thursday 22nd May 6.30pm
This event is FREE, but please register your attendance by email, phone or popping in the shop!
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Alison Bruce will be joining us to talk about and read from her new in paperback crime novel, set in Cambridge.
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After the sudden death of her sister, devastated detective DS Ronnie Blake relocates to Cambridge to help her brother Alex raise their sister's young son, Noah. She reports for her first day but instead finds herself being questioned by a special investigations unit, nicknamed the DEAD Team.
With a small group of six, led by DI Fenton, the once-successful DEAD team has a single outstanding case, Operation Byron, and the failure to resolve it threatens the unit's existence. Their most promising lead is an anonymous note linking three seemingly unconnected people: a convicted fraudster, a dead academic... and Ronnie's sister Jodie.
When Ronnie is denied information about Operation Byron, she follows a lead slipped to her by Malachi, the youngest member of the team, and makes a discovery which links Operation Byron to a disturbing unsolved murder. She is rapidly drawn into an intricate web of deceit, buried secrets and tragedy and the discovery that her connection to Cambridge is far darker than she could ever have guessed.
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'A powerful and absorbing story that stayed with me long after I'd finished reading. A writer at the top of her game' Elly Griffiths
'Alison Bruce always delivers. Her latest is tense, twisty, terrific' Ian Rankin
Poetry with Legs - Ian Whybrow
Wednesday 4th June 6.30pm
​This event is free but please email us, or pop in the shop to register your attendance.
Join us for a fun evening of interactive poetry reading with the wonderful and renowned children's author Ian Whybrow as he recalls the 'Poem A day' he wrote during lockdown for the charity Stand.ngo.
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It is his proud boast that for 20 years running Ian was recorded as one of the top ten most borrowed authors from British libraries. In his funny and engaging children’s books, he has been essential reading for millions of children for generations - in 29 languages.
Since July 2020, Ian has been engaged upon a poem-a-day marathon for or charity. While sharing with us some of his fondest memories of working and talking with publishers and children, he will be entertaining us with a selection of these witty, bracing, sometimes quirky, always thought-provoking pieces about experiences we all share.
He likes, he says, to come at things “aslant” as Emily Dickinson or Stevie Smith did, and like Blake, he looks for the world in a grain of sand. Expect to emerge from this encounter encouraged to write for your own pleasure and - who knows? - even to devote a bit of time to reading poetry.
Proceeds for the event will be donated to Stand.ngo – a brilliant little Bristol-based company that converts for reuse prosthetic limbs that would otherwise be thrown away. They have changed lives in countries all over Africa. More than ever - now that there’s an arms race on and less Overseas Aid - it needs support.
As a rough guide, £20-25 will provide a prosthetic refashioned to meet the needs of an amputee, although anything you can afford will be welcome and put to good use for the care of people in desperate need.
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