The Latest Books
The following books were published by The Copper Beech in 2009. They can be purchased through Amazon.com or at CreateSpace or directly from John Graham at a discount.
Read an excerpt by clicking on the image of the cover.
In a house overlooking the Sea
In this autobiography you meet a person who has been successively a mathematician, a chess player, a family man, a marathon runner, a writer, a world traveler, a leader in science and again a family man (40 years after the first family). It has been a full and exciting life … so far. Nuclear science, especially the mathematics of it, was an early passion practiced in three countries. However writing: articles, editing a number of magazines, handbooks and novels have overlapped those scientific years.
In this book he draws on his experience and offers his opinions. They are sometimes controversial but are always strongly held. Buy the book and see if you agree.
264 pages 6" x 9" softback with a stiff cover. $13.00
Shapers of our Age
The author grew up believing that Marconi invented radio, Westinghouse invented alternating current, Talbot invented photography and Edward Jenner invented vaccination. He grew up to think that Aristotle was dull. None of these are true.
Innovators and inventors are wonderful thinkers but they are often poor communicators and business people. For that reason, even if the change that they brought about altered or enhanced society, oftentimes they were forgotten, they did not receive public recognition or some other person might take their credit. Sometimes the true innovators were not recognized for hundreds of years and, I suspect, sometimes never.
This book tells the stories of 16 of these people in a manner that illustrates their lives as well as their achievements. 282 pages 6" x 9" $15.00
The Copper Beech
The following four books were published by The Copper Beech in 2008.
A Short History of Painting
A Short History of Painting discusses and illustrates those influences that have affected painting over the course of history from Paleolithic times to the present. Materials and their availability, religious and social changes, the markets for paintings, changing styles and the public acceptance of subject matter and certain landmark painters have all changed painting as techniques evolved.
The book is well researched and is fully illustrated in color. 55 pages 6" x 9" softback with a stiff cover. $17.00
The Returning - a novel of expectations
We meet Lim Yok, the son of a Kowloon farmer, Cindy Rogerson, daughter of a British banking firm, Su Wu, a child of the harbor, and Peter Marshall, an Australian activist who is now a lecturer. These young people live in Hong Kong as the time approaches for the territories to be returned to the People's Republic of China. As they become politically active they each go through their own trials and tribulations and meet eachother in exciting times.
The book follows their lives up to the fatal day of the Returning on July 1st 1997. The story starts in 1985 and revisits the scene in 1991, 1995 and 1997.
257 pages 6" x 9" with a still full color cover. $23.00
Versmissen - a 16th Century love affair with Art
This is the story of a Flemish painter, Petrus Versmissen and his son, Jacobus, and daughter, Ambrosia. It is an adventure story set in a period following the Reformation … a turbulent time when Western Europe was torn by innumerable wars. The reader will discover what it was like to live, love, paint and travel in those times when the art of paitning reached its peak around Antwerp.
The book is well researched and it provides a bibliography of the period. 197 pages 6" x 9" with a full-color stiff cover. $23.00
Tweak a Dragon's Tail - an adventure in China.
An engineer, Toby, from Hong Kong, follows his mentally disturbed brother into China. He fears the worst: illegal entry without a passport to be sure but perhaps also an act planned against the People's Republic. Toby's colleague, Donna, his lover, helps in his quest while a mysterious college student, Kathy, invades the scene.
The path leads deep into China. The story is a vivid picture of what the country and its people were like in the seventies: full of intrigue under a totalitarian regime.
Guangzhou, Guillin, the unbridled Yangtze and Chongking lead to Beijing and a triple-whammy ending.
296 pages 6" x 9" with a full color stiff cover. $23.00