Apparently the Greeks (we are talking about the Ancient variety) were a rather groovy bunch. The boys didn't start school until they were seven, and girls didn't have to go at all. Greek children invented all manner of cool games just for something to do, and the grown-ups invented the Olympic Games and made the men run naked. But as this Horrible History shows you, things were not always quite so jolly... and some of the things the Groovy Greeks...

When Daphne is summoned by her cousin, Sophie, to a Greek island, she is instructed to tell no one where she is going. Daphne finds a haven of tranquility, but as Sophia's guests begin to assemble, violence and death threaten all.

Look, I didn't want to be a half-blood. I never asked to be the son of a Greek god. I was just a normal kid, going to school, playing basketball, skateboarding. The usual. Until I accidentally vaporized my maths teacher. That's when things started really going wrong. Now I spend my time fighting with swords, battling monsters with my friends and generally trying to stay alive. This is the one where Zeus, God of the Sky, thinks I've stolen his lightning...

Can Percy Jackson and the Half-blood Heroes succeed on their quest to find The Doors of Death or will the Greek Gods of chaos win their battle to stop them? Percy and his fellow demi-gods face the most important quest of all - the Prophecy of Seva. Originally published: New York: Disney Hyperion, 2012

The Durrell family are immortalised in Gerald Durrell's My Family and Other Animals and its ITV adaptation, The Durrells. But what of the real life Durrells? Why did they go to Corfu in the first place - and what happened to them after they left? The real story of the Durrells is as surprising and fascinating as anything in Gerry's books, and Michael Haag, with his first hand knowledge of the family, is the ideal narrator, drawing on diaries, letters...