Balans is an independent publisher of quality non-fiction in the areas of history, politics, economy, biography, science, nature writing, memoirs, current affairs, religion and psychology. With our dedicated team, we publish approximately 40 new titles per year.
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Zeng Guofan is a long historical novel elaborately created by Tang Haoming. Based on real history, the novel describes the process of Zeng Guofan's mobilization from the Xiang Army to the victory of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom and then becoming a minister. This book exclusively includes Mr. Tang Haoming's 1000-minute video. Readers can scan the two-dimensional code in the book to get an exclusive video. Through the video, readers can understand the historical context of Zeng Guofan's time, the world, the social customs, etc.
Changeling is a rebellious novel about creativity, youth and the raging intensity of teenage emotional life. The gripping story plunges the reader into the depths of a mystical town, a haunting and haunted place, where boundaries between the real and the otherworldly become dangerously blurred. A strange and electrifying tale of teenage disenchantment, Changeling is a work of stunning emotional force that captures the twisted complexities of family relationships and friendships, first love, and the quest for self-definition. Guided by short introductions to Baltic mythology, readers will find themselves in an urban landscape steeped in pagan and post-Soviet history.
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Mira dreams about the sea, but it is so far away! One day an unusual guest visits her, and suddenly Mira begins an unexpected journey. Will it be adventurous? What will happen to Mira on the way? Will she manage to reach the sea? This bilingual Ukrainian-English picturebook tells a story of friendship, imagination, and what happens when one faces life's exciting and sometimes uneasy dilemmas. from 3 to 6 years, 1160 words (Ukrainian and English). Rightsholders: Oksana Luchchevska, olushchevska@gmail.com
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This large-size wimmel-boardbook in leporello format can be opened to a length of nearly three-and-a-half metres. It invites you on an immersive journey through the marine world. On the one side, dozens of stories that take place on the beach and on the surface of the sea, while turning it submerges us to the bottom of the ocean to explore marine fauna and flora, as well as submarines and ships that hide treasures and adventures under 10 flaps. Back cover has a quote from Jacques Cousteau.
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"The Classic of Mountains and Seas (Picture Version)" is a children's traditional cultural enlightenment book with a fresh perspective. Selected representative and interesting chapters in "The Classic of Mountains and Seas" were drawn into the book, which depicts a series of images in "The Classic of Mountains and Seas" such as water systems, mountains, vegetations, trees, mountain gods, sacred beasts, water monsters, etc. In this imaginative picture book, images are vivid and the story theme is ups and downs. The author extracts nourishment from the profound ancient myths, and then creates new stories that children can understand. The whole book takes a retro and creative form with concise and simple text and simple and freehand ink painting through the mountain and sea scriptures, depicting a mythical world where the heavens and the earth are prevalent and the gods and monsters are in chaos.
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Dry Up the Sea is according to the folktales of Cambodia. There were many sunk merchant ships on the bottom of the sea. Many treasures and gold and silver contained in these ships also laid on the seabed along with these ships. The two friends acted together and wanted to dry the sea to gain the treasure of the sea. However, a Dragon King lived in the Crystal Palace on the bottom of the sea. The Dragon King for sure wanted to stop them.
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Jingwei Fills Up the Sea tells one of China’s legends back in the ancient times. It has long been regarded as a representative story of perseverance and tenacity.
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Over fifty years after Jamaican and Trinidadian independence, Imagining Caribbean womanhood examines the links between beauty and politics in the Anglophone Caribbean, providing a first cultural history of Caribbean beauty competitions, spanning from Kingston to London. It traces the origins and transformation of female beauty contests in the British Caribbean from 1929 to 1970, through the development of cultural nationalism, race-conscious politics and decolonisation. The beauty contest, a seemingly marginal phenomenon, is used to illuminate the persistence of racial supremacy, the advance of consumer culture and the negotiation of race and nation through the idealised performance of cultured, modern beauty. Modern Caribbean femininity was intended to be politically functional but also commercially viable and subtly eroticised.
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This story is full of a cheeky sense of humor that little readers will adore. In this book they can find funny poems and beautiful watercolor illustrations to give them the feeling of diving in the ocean. This unique and amazing book was created by the famous Ukrainian writer Yuriy Nikitinskiy and by the fabulous illustrator Marichka Ruban. From 3 to 8 years, 422 words Rightsholders: kovalenko@artbooks-publishing.com
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Your Letter from the Sea is a children’s literature work with the theme of marine scientific research that presents the brilliant achievements made by China in its marine technology. From the shallow sea to the deep sea under ten thousand meters, from the near sea to the far sea and to the polar regions, China has secured remarkable achievements in marine scientific research after more than 60 years of continuous development. The book begins with a letter from the scientific expedition team member of China’s first marine research vessel “Dongfanghong” to his daughter, and ends with a letter from the retired captain of the icebreaker “Xuelong” to his old partner. With all these warmhearted letters, all these abundant true scientific research stories, the book vividly reveals with full details the development of marine scientific research vessels and the portrait of several generations of Chinese marine scientists.
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‘Sea Level’ is a creative celebration of Zanzibar’s rich and fascinating heritage as seen today. Captured in drawings by artist and designer Sarah Markes, this is a unique and personal portrait of Stone Town’s colourful streets, and a portrayal of the island’s natural beauty and culture. It is also a plea for recognition of the threats posed to Zanzibar’s heritage and the inestimable value of conserving it.This is the second book in the series, following ‘Street Level - A collection of drawings and creative writing inspired by Dar es Salaam’. Now in its third edition, ‘Street Level’ was described by MG Vassanji as “A truly delightful book, a must for those who love Dar and care about its history.”
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The Secret Life of Animals - Ocean: Minik's Departure Into the Wide Sea (Vol. 1) „THE SECRET LIFE OF ANIMALS” comes up as the first series of realistic children's books for readers ages 8 and up, divided into several subseries sorted by the Earth's habitats. Each book can be read independently.What happens in OCEAN, Vol. 1:Driven by his curiosity, the seal Minik embarks on a journey out into the vast ocean. He wants to know everything, understand everything. But the Baltic Sea holds many things: unknown and threatening. When the whale Lottatwo gets stranded on a sandbank, the two friends leave the shallow waters and make their way up north. This is just the beginning of Minik's journey - something new and great is about to begin in the strange ocean. • Realistic animal adventures for children ages 8 and up and the whole family• ‘Popular Entertaining Storytelling’ meets Animal Documentaries, the successful non-fiction trend translated into narrative – for the first time!• Semi-annual publication sequence of sub-series in different habitats: Forest, Ocean, Savannah• Renowned duo of author and illustrator: wonderfully beautiful narrative voices meet touching black-and-white illustrations
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Bulgaria, 1942. Boris III must hand over 20,000 Jews to the Nazis for extermination, but the king and his people do not intend to yield. Likewise, little Alberto, only six years old, resists when SS officers forcibly take his father away. Now he is the man of the family, and he must take care of his younger brother and his mother, who seeks to keep her children safe from the horrors of the war and not lose hope of being with her beloved husband once more. Based on real events, The Garden by the Sea tells, through the eyes of a child, the previously untold story of the unique fate of Bulgarian Jews during World War II
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Colouring the Caribbean offers the first comprehensive study of Agostino Brunias's intriguing pictures of colonial West Indians of colour - so called 'Red' and 'Black' Caribs, dark-skinned Africans and Afro-Creoles, and people of mixed race - made for colonial officials and plantocratic elites during the late-eighteenth century. Although Brunias's paintings have often been understood as straightforward documents of visual ethnography that functioned as field guides for reading race, this book investigates how the images both reflected and refracted ideas about race commonly held by eighteenth-century Britons, helping to construct racial categories while simultaneously exposing their constructedness and underscoring their contradictions. The book offers provocative new insights about Brunias's work gleaned from a broad survey of his paintings, many of which are reproduced here for the first time.
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Two boys look at the crescent moon in the sky: Orkhan sees in it a Muslim symbol, and young Petrus — a Cossack chaika (boat). The events of The Crescent over Kinburn date back to the time when there were constant clashes between the Christian and Muslim worlds on the Kinburn Foreland near the Black Sea. Everyone has their own truth and their own path to freedom, so this story teaches mercy and acceptance because the path of revenge and violence can only bring more offence and mistrust in the world. From 5 to 8 years, 4819 words Rightsholders: a.makhnyk@portalbooks.com.ua
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Jack Tar to Union Jack examines the intersection between empire, navy, and manhood in British society from 1870 to 1918. Through analysis of sources that include courts-martial cases, sailors' own writings, and the HMS Pinafore, Conley charts new depictions of naval manhood during the Age of Empire, a period which witnessed the radical transformation of the navy, the intensification of imperial competition, the democratisation of British society, and the advent of mass culture. Jack Tar to Union Jack argues that popular representations of naval men increasingly reflected and informed imperial masculine ideals in Victorian and Edwardian Britain. Conley shows how the British Bluejacket as both patriotic defender and dutiful husband and father stood in sharp contrast to the stereotypic image of the brave but bawdy tar of the Georgian navy. This book will be essential reading for students of British imperial history, naval and military history, and gender studies.
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In François Truffaut's opinion The Innocents was 'the best English film after Hitchcock goes to America'. Tennessee Williams said of The Great Gatsby: 'a film whose artistry even surpassed the original novel'. The maker of both films was Jack Clayton, one of the finest English directors of the post-war era and perhaps best remembered for the trail-blazing Room at the Top which brought a new sexual frankness and social realism to the British screen. This is the first full-length critical study of Clayton's work. The author has been able to consult and quote from the director's own private papers which illuminate Clayton's creative practices and artistic intentions. In addition to fresh analyses of the individual films, the book contains new material on Clayton's many unrealised projects and valuably includes his previously unpublished short story 'The Enchantment' - as poignant and revealing as the films themselves. This is a personal and fascinating account of the career and achievement of an important, much-loved director that should appeal to students and film enthusiasts.
