WILL STONE fact-checks the colourful life of Ozzy Osbourne
A lyrical evocation of pre-industrial Calderdale
END OF AN EPOCH: The earliest known image of a cotton mill dates to 1746. Mills like this one - converted from a corn mill in Northampton - proliferated through the valleys of Calderdale
[Public Domain] 
JAMES CROSSLEY applauds a lucid biography of the German radical preacher who reemerged as a hero in the GDR
Prizes all round: the Bard hands plaudits to the Miners Gala, OT&JC, Joe Solo, Black Sabbath’s frontman and the Lionesses
Star cartoonist JAMIE BRITTON is in awe of a graphic novel of epic proportions that explores class, religion and globalisation via the strange cultivation of Ginseng in the US Midwest
GUILLERMO THOMAS is intrigued by a history of the Middle East that demonstrates how promising post colonial beginnings were snuffed out by Western imperialist interests
MARIA DUARTE recommends the intricate study of a high-performance and highly dysfuntional German family
Where the Skylark Sings
By Lee Garratt
Dimensionfold Publishing, £12.99
IN THIS slim novel, Lee Garratt takes us on a historical journey through the hills and valleys of Calderdale in Yorkshire and introduces us to the people who lived there.
He begins in 1790, and through the lives of one weaving family, he charts the devastating destruction of the old-style cottage weaving industry with the coming of mass production mills during the late 1700s and early 1800s.
Despite the attempts of the cottage weaving families in the area to prevent the mills destroying their livelihoods and way of life, the inexorable march of the wealthy mill owners is relentless.
More from this author
JOHN GREEN is fascinated by a very readable account of Britain’s involvement in South America
JOHN GREEN is stirred by an ambitious art project that explores solidarity and the shared memory of occupation
JOHN GREEN applauds an excellent and accessible demonstration that the capitalist economy is the biggest threat to our existence
JOHN GREEN isn’t helped by the utopian fantasy of a New York Times bestseller that ignores class struggle and blames the so-called ’progressives’
