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DRIVING Home For Christmas singer Chris Rea left a £12million final gift to his family, documents show.

The hitmaker, who died three days before Christmas last year aged 74, passed the sum into a trust for his wife Joan.

Court records seen by The Sun show Rea left £14,435,894, reduced to £12,063,178 after taxes, debts and costs were removed.

A grant was issued by the High Court earlier this week.

He had signed his final will in October 2025, just two months before his death.

In the 19-page document, Rea asked to be cremated.

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Joan will also collect all of her husband’s personal belongings and future royalties from her husband’s hits being played on the radio.

Rea was born in Middlesbrough in 1951 to an Italian father and Irish mother.

He joined local band Magdalene in 1973 before launching his solo career by performing in local bars and clubs.

His 1978 debut album, Whatever Happened to Benny Santini?, spawned the US hit Fool (If You Think It’s Over), which landed him a £15,000 payday and a Grammy nomination for best new artist.

Rea produced 25 studio albums in a lengthy career, scoring two UK Number Ones – The Road to Hell in 1989 and follow-up album Auberge in 1991.

But it was his festive track, 1978’s Driving Home for Christmas, that made him a household name.

Rea had been dumped by his manager and banned from driving when his then-girlfriend Joan was forced to drive down to London in a Mini to drive him back up north.

He later recalled coming up with the melody and lyrics during the lengthy trip home.

The track only reached Number 53 when originally released in 1986, but has since become a staple of the festive season.

It has returned to the UK Singles Chart every year since 2007 and peaked at Number 10 in 2021.

Rea was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer at just 33 and went through nine operations in a decades-long health battle, spending more than 32 weeks in hospital.

He lost his pancreas, gallbladder and part of his liver to surgeries, and later developed type 1 diabetes.

At one stage, the star was taking 34 pills a day.

He suffered a stroke in 2016, prompting him to give up cigarettes, before collapsing on stage in Oxford the following year.

Chris said of his health battles: “The original illness hit me hard. I almost had a nervous breakdown with the shock of it. That was the Mount Everest to climb.

“When they said it was pancreatic cancer, I could not believe it. It seemed that if your DNA says you are going to have cancer, then you can.

“They did not think I would recover from the first operation, but I was determined to do so for my wife and the girls.”

The star continued performing despite his illnesses, and made his final TV appearance in a 2020 Christmas special of Mortimer & Whitehouse: Gone Fishing, filmed in his home city of Middlesbrough.

Chris met wife Joan when they were both teenagers growing up in Teesside and they stayed married for 57 years.

They had two daughters, Josephine, born in 1983, and Julia, born in 1989.

Comic Mortimer and TV host Jools Holland led tributes to Chris after his death last year.

Bob, recorded a cover of Rea’s Let’s Dance with Middlesbrough FC in 1997, wrote: “A lovely brilliant funny giant of a bloke… RIP Chris.”

His record label, BMG, said: “Over a remarkable career spanning more than four decades, Chris Rea created an extraordinary and deeply human body of work, defined by emotional honesty, restraint, and craft.”

Sound engineer Stuart Epps, who worked with the singer for decades, remembered him as “an amazing guy and an amazing musician”.

And Squeeze pianist Holland said: “Sad we’ve lost dear Chris Rea. A brilliant musician and the kindest of men.”

HELEN Flanagan thrilled her fans as she ditched her bra and unbuttoned her jeans in a very sexy snap, while admitting she missed her old home.

The stunning actress, 35, is known for her saucy snaps, and her latest one sent her followers into meltdown.

Taking to Instagram, the former Coronation Street star was seen perched on a kitchen worktop with pink cabinets on display in the background.

Flashing her dazzling smile, Helen was seen wearing a white crop top that showed off her toned tum.

To add extra spice, she went braless and had also unbuttoned her jeans seductively.

As well as a sizzling photo, the soap star shared a short clip where she pulled various sexy poses.

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Helen then revealed the shots had been taken in her former family home that she once shared with her ex Scott Sinclair, 37, that she recently had to move out of.

Captioning her latest sexy post, the Celebs Go Dating star wrote: “Miss my pink utility.”

Fans went wild for her latest pics, with one saying: “You’re absolutely stunning!”

Another added: “Wowww Helen you really are breathtaking!”

Helen and her ex Scott moved into their dream family home shortly before calling time on their 13-year romance.

Though in January, The Sun revealed how the footballer was keen to get the home sold, while Helen wasn’t in any rush to move out.

A friend of the actress’ said at the time: “Scott pays for the house and all the bills and he’s decided a six-bedroom place is way too big for Helen on her own with the kids.”

Helen then moved out of the home in May, along with her three kids that she shares with Scott.

PEREZ Hilton has been rushed to hospital after worrying reports he was seen self-harming during a TikTok livestream.

Police raced to the celebrity blogger and TV star’s home in Miami after concerned fans made “multiple” 911 calls reporting Hilton’s worrying behaviour and saying he was covered in blood.

Distressing footage from Hilton’s TikTok account appeared to show the media personality covered in blood with with several marks on his body.

Fans of Hilton, whose real name is Mario Armando Lavandeira Jr, reported the video and managed to get it taken down by TikTok.

The Miami-Dade Sheriff’s Office confirmed they received several 911 calls about an individual livestreaming acts of self-harm on social media.

Deputies found Hilton, 48, inside the house alone and quickly assessed he wasn’t a risk to others but needed medical help.

A police spokesperson said: “Deputies tactically disengaged while continuing to monitor the situation.”

He was “safely recovered” and taken to a local hospital to receive treatment.

Hilton’s family have been in contact with the cops and helped provide statements.

Hilton’s representatives, Golden Artists Entertainment Co-CEOs Dante Rusciolelli and Rebekah Kochan told TMZ they “are aware of the concerning content circulating online”.

Their statement added: “At this time, we have not been able to make direct contact with him, despite our ongoing efforts to reach him.

“Our primary concern is Perez’s health and well-being, as well as the well-being of his family.

“Until we have confirmed information, we will not speculate or comment further.”

If you or someone you know is affected by any of the issues raised in this story, call or text the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline at 988, chat on 988lifeline.org, or text Crisis Text Line at 741741.

Miami authorities on Tuesday night responded to a residence after a disturbing video was posted on social media that appeared to involve celebrity blogger Perez Hilton.

The Times has not confirmed the authenticity of the video. But the Miami-Dade Sheriff’s Office said in an emailed statement that authorities had received an influx of calls on Tuesday reporting that an individual was livestreaming acts of self-harm on social media.

After surrounding the Miami residence of a man who was not named, the Sheriff’s Office said around 9 p.m. that he had been “safely recovered and transported by Miami-Dade Fire Rescue to a local hospital, where he is receiving medical attention.”

Deputies had arrived earlier and said they spoke with family members at the scene and confirmed that the man was alone inside the home.

“In many incidents involving a person experiencing a mental health crisis or actively harming themselves, deputies prioritize de-escalation by creating time, distance and opportunities for communication,” the statement read. “Unless there is an immediate threat to others, slowing the situation and utilizing crisis intervention techniques can reduce the likelihood of a suicide-by-cop encounter and minimize the risk of injury to the individual, deputies and the public.”

Authorities said they had “tactically disengaged while continuing to monitor the situation.” In their later update, the Sheriff’s Office said that after the man had been transported to a hospital, mental health professionals were at the scene “providing support and resources to the individual’s family.”

A representative for Hilton did not immediately respond to The Times’ request for comment.

In the TikTok live video, a person who seems to be in distress harms himself. The video has since been removed from the platform.

Police and fire personnel converged on the Miami home Tuesday night. NBC6 News reported that some neighbors said Hilton lived at the home, but police would not confirm that.

Hilton, born Mario Lavandeira Jr., has been a pop culture personality since the early aughts when he launched his eponymous celebrity gossip rag. The venture garnered the columnist social status but also made him persona non grata among many celebrities who weren’t fans of his controversial coverage, which was often deemed disparaging, especially toward women.

Chad le Clos says his apartment in South Africa was destroyed by a fatal fire – the night after the swimmer became the most decorated athlete in Commonwealth Games history.

Le Clos picked up his 21st medal to overtake Australia’s Emma McKeon as the athlete with the most medals in Commonwealths history, when South Africa took bronze in the men’s 4x100m medley relay in Glasgow last week.

It was the 34-year-old’s third medal of the 2026 Games, having won silver in the mixed 4×100 ⁠medley and bronze in the men’s 4×100 freestyle relays.

Only days later, Le Clos has revealed that a fire destroyed his home of more than a decade in Sea Point, Cape Town and killed one of his neighbours.

“It has taken me a while to process this heartbreaking tragedy,” the 2012 Olympic gold medallist wrote on Instagram, external.

“On the evening of 30 July, amid breaking the all-time Commonwealth record, a fire started in my apartment block, which quickly spread to my home. Sadly my home, where I’ve lived for more than a decade, burnt down and there is nothing left to salvage.”

In the post, Le Clos also paid tribute to his “neighbour of many years” who died in the fire, offering his “deepest and most sincere condolences” to the victim’s family and friends.

“No words can truly ease a loss like this, but I hope the family knows that the thoughts of an entire community are with them,” the Durban-born swimmer said.

According to reports, external, a 93-year-old resident died in the incident.

Le Clos added: “To my fellow neighbours whose homes and lives have been severely affected by this fire, please know that you are not alone. This is a tight-knit community and it is in moments like these that we lean on one another.”

Le Clos, who famously beat Michael Phelps to win 200m butterfly gold at the London Olympics in 2012, said he has launched a fundraising campaign to help his neighbours affected by the blaze.

Phelps was a 14-time Olympic champion and had not lost in the event since 2001 when the United States icon was beaten by Le Clos.

The South African won his first Commonwealth medal in Delhi in 2010 at the age of 18 and now has seven gold, five silver and nine bronze medals across five editions of the Games.

Over his career, he has won four Olympic medals, 16 world titles, seven Commonwealth golds and 10 African titles.

A FAMILY has been left distraught after they missed their flight – but it wasn’t their fault.

A father along with his family including his severely disabled teenage daughter has claimed that they were abandoned by budget airline Ryanair.

Daniel Laws, from Bournemouth commented that Ryanair told them to make their own way home after waiting in the wrong airport for hours, adding that the treatment from the airline’s staff was “abominable”.

When at Alicante Airport, the special assistance bus took the family to the wrong plane and resulted in them missing their flight back to Bournemouth.

According to the Bournemouth Echo, Daniel said: “I said to them this is the wrong plane, this is a TUI plane.”

However, by the time the family were back at the terminal, their plane had left without them.

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The family was then taken to the Ryanair help desk, where they were left “sitting on the floor for two hours”.

After waiting for a few hours, the family was then told they could be rebooked onto a flight that would head to Stansted Airport.

He added: “I responded would they also be able to help us get back to Bournemouth and they seemed to laugh at that and walk away from the window.”

After landing back in London, the family headed to the Ryanair desk at the airport to seek further assistance to travel back to Bournemouth.

After an hour of waiting passed, the staff hadn’t spoke to the family and when they eventually did, they told the family that “Ryanair believe it has nothing to do with them and we must organise our own way home”.

To make matters worse, the family hadn’t eaten since breakfast.

Daniel added: “We were abandoned in Stanstead and none of us had eaten.”

The family eventually travelled home via train, but have stated that they want a refund for the flights and all expenses incurred.

He added: “It was a life changing event for them [the children]….they were so worried about my eldest.”

A Ryanair spokesperson said: “Special assistance services at Alicante Airport (and all other airports) are provided by the airport but are paid for by Ryanair.

“We regret that Alicante Airport’s special assistance provider, Alyzia, failed to bring these passengers to the aircraft prior to this flight from Alicante to Bournemouth departing on 31 July.

“Following Alyzia’s error, Ryanair reaccommodated these passengers free of charge onto the next available flight from Alicante to Stansted, which departed later that the same day.

“We are working with Alicante Airport to ensure this does not recur.”

MEGAN McKenna was violently attacked in her own home by three machete wielding thugs who tore her jewellery off her hand as she begged them not to kill her.

The three men left the TV star fleeing the UK for Germany with her now husband, Union Berlin footballer Oliver Burke.

Megan, who is mum to 22-month-old Landon, reveals she confronted the robbers after they used a baseball bat to break into her locked bedroom and pleaded with them to leave.

Speaking on Jamie Laing’s Good Company podcast, Megan said: “I was robbed really badly in my own home.”

The incident happened in 2024, with the men going on trial last year.

Opening up about the robbery, Megan said to sleep alone in her home in London while Oliver was away in Germany.

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Megan, 33, explained: “I must have fallen asleep within the first 15 minutes.

“I woke up to my whole house shaking. I was such a disorientated mess.

“They were inside my house, but I lock my bedroom door every night because I always worry about something happening to me when I’m on my own.

“The next thing I know, my mirror has come off my wall, and they’re hacking a hole through my wall with a baseball bat.

“They’re three masked men with machetes and baseball bats, and they managed to hack a hole in my wall because it was a fake wall going onto my dressing room, linked to my bedroom

“ And if my door wasn’t locked, actually, they probably would have woken me up and probably killed my dog.”

Megan immediately called the police who told her not to speak to the masked raiders.

But fearing for her dog, Megan said she confronted them.

She added: I went over to them. I was naked.

“I was talking to this man in a balaclava, and he grabbed my hand and he took jewelry off of me.

“Like I actually was holding hands with the robber, and they had a conversation outside the wall, and they made a phone call.

“I was shaking. I’d cut my foot. There was blood everywhere. It was like a bloody murder scene.

“And then I’m standing naked, and they just left with nothing, with nothing else.”

Megan said she believes the men had always planned to attack her.

She said: “It was obviously targeted.

“[The police] wanted me to go on trial.

“And I just said to them, like, I actually can’t physically do that. Go through it.”

Despite the men being jailed, Megan said she was horrified to learn they had been released not long after being locked up.

Megan explained: “They got caught, and then they went on trial, and then a year later, they just got let out.

“They’re just roaming the roads.”

Megan, who found fame on Towie and Celebrity Big Brother before pursuing a career as a singer, said she will now not stay in the UK alone.

She added: “It scared me so much to be in the UK and to live in the UK on my own, because obviously Ollie’s in Germany.”

‘I miss my camels. I miss the sun. I miss the vast emptiness of the desert plains …” These are my thoughts as I trudge through thick conifer plantations and my fifth consecutive hour of rain at the start of the Affric Kintail Way in the Scottish Highlands.

My last big adventure was a world first. I became the first recorded person to walk the full length of Saudi Arabia, north to south, from Jordan to Yemen. It took three years to organise, then 112 days of walking half a marathon a day, and I had a backup team plus Juicy and Lulu, my naughty but nice camels.

It was a fantastic, life-enhancing, often brutal, endeavour but it is over. Adventurers have got to adventure though, and I was looking for something cheap in my own country that needed little organisation or backup. I am a proud Scot and, even though I spend so much time away, I feel a strong emotional pull to my homeland, an almost physical attachment to the landscape and the thousands of ancestors who have walked it before me.

There are an abundance of long-distance walking trails in Scotland, and after many happy hours checking out the options on Walk Highlands, I settle on the Affric Kintail Way. It’s a doable distance – 44 miles (71km) in four days; easy to get to and from by bus from Edinburgh; and according to my brother, Robbie, Glen Affric is one of the most beautiful areas of the country.

Preparations are simple. I buy a map, read all the information on the dedicated website, download the route on the AllTrails app and pack my rucksack. I’m doing it solo, self-supported and wild camping, so need to take everything with me but also keep my pack as light as possible. In the end it weighs around 12kg, which is not bad. My luxury is four Ferrero Rocher chocolates given to me by my mum – one for each evening.

The bus drops me off at Drumnadrochit and I walk straight up into the forests. The rain is constant, but I enjoy the sharp smell of the conifers and the sound of the cuckoos. There’s plenty of up, but the way is easy to follow along the Forestry Commission tracks. I keep checking my weather app, which promises a half-hour break in the rain, as it is so much better to pitch a tent in the dry. It comes to 6pm and I get my tent up just before the rain starts again. I’ve done a respectable 5 miles or so since the bus dropped me off, in about four hours.

The next morning, I drop down into Cannich and history is waiting for me after a long pull up out of the village. My plan is to walk about 11 miles today. Comar Wood Dun is about 250m off the path. It is a jumble of stones perched at a lookout point over the strath. Once, it was a drystone fortified house and home to a family and their animals between 400BCE and 200AD. Life must have been so hard. It is cold and wet even in June. Barley was the main crop, grown in small clearances in the wood, augmented with meat and milk from the livestock.

One of the great pleasures for me of walking in these wild places, whether it is the Highlands of Scotland or the deserts of the Arabian peninsula, is finding these echoes from the past and wondering what life was like then. Were the people happy? Were there compensations for this hard life? How did they deal with all the extremes of nature that we have managed to smooth out with our air conditioning and heating? By hiking and camping, I am trying to get closer to them in some way.

I spend the night beside Dog Falls and the morning is another haul through the forests. Sitting in my midge net at the Glen Affric car park overlooking the inlet to Loch Beinn a’Mheadhoin, hunger kicks in and I wolf down a roll, a big bag of Revels and my emergency veggie sausage rolls – a large chunk of my provisions.

I’ve been walking steadily up and down through woodlands, interspersed with farmland. This area is one of the UK’s most ancient natural woodlands – more than 10,000 years old – and is dominated by gnarly Scots pines and silvery birch.

My heart yearns for the open spaces, though, and I’m glad when it starts to open up and I see the hills rise on either side of Loch Affric. I’m alone almost all of the time: in four days, I meet just eight people. It’s just me and the green of the hills and the deep black of the loch between them. My heavy pack hurts my shoulders, and my feet are sore from the hard tracks, but I feel so alive. I relish the adventure of being on my own, self-reliant and with no one to worry about or answer to.

When the rain stops and the sun comes out, the grassy uplands glow almost neon-bright. I stop to drink peaty water from a burn and fantasise about living in the tiny wooden hut on the sandy shores of the loch. It’s my third night of camping and the best so far, just me and the geese, but I feel completely safe and relaxed within nature.

The next day, my fourth on the trail, I’m on a mission. I need to get some provisions from the Glen Affric hostel and do a solid 10 miles so that I only have a shortish walk the day after to catch the bus. I hike as fast as I can until I finally see the hostel ahead – this tiny outpost is among Scotland’s most remote hostels. I put out my tent to dry on their fence and get to the door. “Shut between 10.00 and 17.00”.

Disconsolate, I sit at the side and contemplate my life choices. Then, a woman shrieks as she sees me unexpectedly – Chrissie, who runs the hostel and kindly lets me in to buy chocolate, crisps and a fizzy drink. Sugar and fat consumed, I feel whole again and happily share a story of camels and Saudi hospitality for the sound art project she is doing. She is recording poems, stories and songs from people who stay in the hostel for an exhibition.

I continue onwards, struggling on the ups. With a couple of miles to go, my pack feels as if it’s full of rocks. I try to focus on the waterfalls all around me, dashing loudly down the rocks to meet the rivers Affric and Croe.

I walk down to a small, flat clearing beside one of them. It’s the perfect camp spot, but if I stop now I’ve failed to reach my 10-mile goal. The sun comes out and I see there’s even a flat rock to sit on. I throw my manufactured goals and failure guilt to the wind and pitch my tent.

No billionaire is richer than I am that night in that place. I sit on my rock looking out over the peaks and listening to the music of the water. Tomorrow, I will eat my porridge and walk out by the river to the bus and everyday life. But for tonight I am queen of the world.

For more information visit: Walk Highlands, the Affric Kintail Way website and alltrails.com. The bus from Inverness goes to Drumnadrochit and picks up at The Pit Stop cafe at Kintail (citylink.co.uk)

Alice’s website is alicemorrison.co.uk; she is also on Instagram

“The Exorcist” star Linda Blair had her property searched by law enforcement officers who were investigating and inspecting her kennel operation with more than 100 dogs.

Friday’s operation was carried out by the Los Angeles County Department of Animal Care and Control and the Los Angeles County Department of Regional Planning, according to a statement shared with People.

“The goal is to inspect this property for buildings and structures associated with a kennel operation reported to have more than 100 dogs,” the department said in the statement.

Blair, whose IMDb site lists dozens of movies and television shows dating back to 1968, founded the Linda Blair WorldHeart Foundation in 2003 to rehabilitate and rescue abandoned and abused animals.

Blair’s kennel facility’s permits expired in 2023, and she allegedly didn’t respond to attempts by the Los Angeles County Department of Animal Care and Control to contact her, People reported.

“The warrant allows us to lawfully access the property and verify compliance with County codes,” the department said. The operation is intended to evaluate “animal care, safety conditions, and overall welfare of the dogs housed on the property.”

County officials could not immediately be reached to comment about the findings of the inspection.

“Our priority is the safety and well-being of both the animals on the property and the people who may be working or residing here,” the department said in the statement. “This inspection will help us determine whether conditions meet required standards.”

Blair wrote about the incident in an July 31 Instagram post, saying that the animals were “good in lieu of our surprise visit in 105° heat.”

“Turns out we just have some paperwork to do and some diagrams but as everybody knows, I’m looking to move so I can be more educational and help more animals,” Blair wrote. “I’d rather move forward.”

After he took his first win in Estonia, Pajari made it back-to-back WRC victories to move into second in the standings behind Evans.

Pajari was the beneficiary when nine-time champion Sebastien Ogier crashed out of the lead on Saturday’s penultimate stage on a high-speed right-hand corner on the fast gravel roads.

Both Ogier and co-driver Julien Ingrassia were taken to hospital after the accident but the French driver posted on social media on Saturday night that the pair would remain in hospital overnight as a precaution but “we both feel okay, which is the most important”.

Oliver Solberg, who was battling back pain on the fast jumps on the stages, and co-driver Elliott Edmondson finished in second place to complete a Toyota lock-out of the podium places.

The Hyundai duo of Adrien Fourmaux and Thierry Neuville were fourth and fifth, while Takamoto Katsuta and Northern Ireland co-driver Aaron Johnston crashed into trees on the final stage but recovered to finish in sixth place.

After the issues for Katsuta and Ogier, Pajari is now second in the standings behind Evans ahead 11th round of the season in Paraguay from 27-30 August.

Motorsport Ireland driver Josh McErlean finished the rally in seventh position as the best of the M-Sport Ford drivers.

Team-mate Martins Sesks crashed heavily on Saturday to drop out of fifth place, while Jon Armstrong’s chances of a strong result came to an end on Friday after he spun and got stuck in a ditch.

“It’s been a crazy weekend in terms of all the crews,” McErlean said.

“A lot of new stages, a lot of new pace notes and whenever you come to a rally this fast it is super-difficult to get right.

“So we have to be pleased to get through cleanly”.

Rally Finland results

1. Sami Pajari FIN/Marko Salminen FIN (Toyota) 2:27.358.0

2. Oliver Solberg SWE/Elliott Edmundson GB (Toyota) +26.7 seconds

3. Elfyn Evans GB/Scott Martin GB (Toyota) +1:19.5

4. Adrien Fourmaux FRA/Alex Coria FRA (Hyundai) +1:35.4

5. Thierry Neuville BEL/Martijn Wydaeghe BEL (Hyundai) +3:52.5

6. Takamoto Katsuta JPN/Aaron Johnston IRL (Toyota) +4:18.2

7. Josh McErlean IRL/Eoin Treacy IRL (M-Sport Ford) +4:32.7

….

43. Martins Sesks LAT/Francis Renars LAT (M-Sport Ford) +51:52.4

47. Jon Armstrong IRL/Shane Byrne IRL (M-Sport Ford) +1:21.39.6

DNF. Sebastien Ogier FRA/Julian Ingrassia FRA (Toyota)

DNF. Esapekka Lappi FIN/Enni Malkonen FIN (Hyundai)

World Rally Championship standings (after round 10/14)

1. Elfyn Evans GB (Toyota) 201 points

2. Sami Pajari FIN (Toyota) 171

3. Takamoto Katsuta JPN (Toyota) 160

4. Oliver Solberg SWE (Toyota) 156

5. Sebastien Ogier FRA (Toyota) 139

6. Adrien Fourmaux FRA (Hyundai) 129

7. Thierry Neuville BEL (Hyundai) 125

8. Esapekka Lappi FIN (Hyundai) 25

9. Hayden Paddon NZL (Hyundai) 21

10. Josh McErlean IRL (M-Sport Ford) 21

If your summer could use a little energy boost, forget the complicated smoothie — turn to one of these fresh book releases instead. From fast-paced World War II history to a slow-burn rescue in rural Wyoming, along with an art-world mystery and a punchy look at modern America, you’ll find something to galvanize your bedside book stack. Happy reading!

FICTION:

Appraisals: A Novel
By Claire Boyles
W. W. Norton: 288 pp., $30
(Aug. 4)

While Boyles’ debut novel ostensibly follows the fate of an Eastern Colorado family farm, its deeper purpose involves showing how dire water resources are for all agricultural endeavors in the region. Maggie and her husband Fish have inherited their land from her grandparents, but they and their teenage daughter Ozzie all know that without irrigation, even defeating big development plans won’t make much of a difference to locals.

The Seekers of Deer Creek: A Novel
By Thao Thai
Mariner Books: 320 pp., $30
(Aug. 4)

Vietnamese American sisters Vivi and Calla are also a curator and an artist. When their father dies and leaves behind a sketch that might be the work of renowned Vietnamese painter K.P. Lý, the siblings embark on a quest to find out whether Lý had connections to their family. Along the way they reexamine their difficult upbringing and find new ways to communicate that matter more than any artwork.

Etna: A Novel
By Paul Yoon
Scribner: 208 pp., $28
(Aug. 4)

Anyone who has seen “The Odyssey” with Matt Damon or is anticipating “Heart of the Beast” with Brad Pitt (about a veteran and his war dog), should pick up Yoon’s remarkable tale of a combat survivor in an alternate present who happens to be a former military dog named Etna. His adventures traversing a broken land of haunted people and animals may be less the stuff of future myth and more about trauma, but Yoon brilliantly creates voices for human and canine that make both more whole.

A Tender Age: A Novel
By Chang-Rae Lee
Riverhead: 368 pp., $30
(Aug. 11)

Jeon-Gi, known as J-G, is a relatively happy 10-year-old in 1976, until a neighbor’s attack on him fuels his own violent ideas. Although he gets a relatively easy sentence after threatening a classmate, J-G’s parents decide to send him to a Christian summer camp. Incidents there that might be sweet nostalgia for other kids only remind him of how different and lonely he feels inside. However, it’s J-G’s adult reason for sharing his experience that hits home.

Sunrise: A Novel
By Téa Obreht
Random House: 368 pp., $29
(Aug. 11)

Many, so so many, historical novels seek to tie a contemporary protagonist to a long-ago event or story; so so many fail to make the connections mean anything. That’s why Obreht’s superb and fascinating new book should earn a place on your 2026 reading list: She not only meaningfully connects the stories of a stranded young woman, an early-20th-century gunslinger, and a historical reenactor, but manages to make them illuminate each other.

NONFICTION:

Triage
By Claudia Rankine
Graywolf: 192 pp., $28
(Aug. 4)

The book’s epigraph says a great deal: “Any attempt to name and describe our lives will always seem unstable because all language is a form of triage.” Rankine’s new attempt at triage focuses on her long friendship with a person identified only as “the theorist.” Anecdotes and analysis are interspersed with photos of all sorts of sofas and couches, calling into question ideas about where and how we find respite and support — or not.

Your Fellow Americans: Dispatches Across the Country We Call Home
By Peter Santenello
Simon & Schuster: 336 pp., $30
(Aug. 4)

Santenello has over 4 million subscribers on YouTube, where he posts videos about every kind of place in America — rich and poor, renowned and hidden, busy and abandoned. Love or hate the author’s self-described nonpartisan approach, you’ll find this book surprising, particularly as it reveals how geography, climate and infrastructure affect community and communication. Think Anthony Bourdain crossed with Michael Moore.

Empire of Ashes: Truman, Hirohito, and the Descent into Total War
By James M. Scott
W. W. Norton & Co.: 528 pp., $42
(Aug. 4)

Historian Scott (“Black Snow”) creates a propulsive read about the last days of World War II, in which America’s development of the atomic bomb pushed against Japan’s aggressive majority, with tragic results that many — including the author — believe necessary. The contrast between President Harry S. Truman, who had been in office for a matter of weeks, and Emperor Hirohito, whose military seemed unstoppable, remains shocking.

The People’s Historian: The Outsized Life of Howard Zinn
By Dave Zirin
Dutton: 320 pp., $33
(Aug. 4)

Recently a friend showed me a list of books recommended by a pundit and asked which one to read first. Without hesitation I told her she should pick up “A People’s History of the United States” by Howard Zinn, first published in 1980 and still the most comprehensive remedial tonic to received wisdom I know. Zirin’s lively biography of this activist should remind everyone that history isn’t just about facts and figures but also context and compassion.

The Rise and Fall of the Artificial State
By Jill Lepore
Liveright Publishing Corp.: 336 pp., $30
(Aug. 25)

Hannah Arendt, one of the 20th century’s defining political thinkers, posited that modern life was making “being human superfluous”; her learned successor Lepore warns that our present bears out that idea. One day scholars will teach Lepore’s work alongside Arendt’s, seeing that Lepore interrogates not simply a modern moment, but traces our current machine age back to the 17th-century conceit for artifice as improvement. According to her, the way out is to get back to nature. Meet you in the woods.

THE Sopranos star Vincent Pastore has been found dead at the age of 80.

Cops have launched an investigation into his death, as tributes flood in for the well-loved actor.

Vincent played a number of mobster characters in film and TV in a long and illustrious career.

He was found dead on August 1 in his Bronx home by a neighbour, according to sources.

Vincent had not been heard from in three days before being discovered on Saturday, reports say.

The circumstances surrounding his death are being investigated.

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Pastore’s manager Robert Attermann said in a statement: “I had the privilege of representing Vinny for more than 30 years, long before The Sopranos made him a household name.

“To the world, he will always be remembered as the unforgettable ‘Big Pussy,’ but to those of us who knew him, he was so much more.”

He added: “Vinny was one of the kindest, most generous people I have ever known. “He treated everyone with warmth and respect, never turning down a fan who wanted a photograph or an autograph.”

Vincent’s manager continued saying that Pastore “genuinely appreciated the people who supported him and always made them feel valued.

“He loved being an actor. He was passionate about his craft and was always encouraging, respectful, and generous with young actors, taking the time to offer guidance and support whenever he could.”

Atterman wrote that losing Pastore was “deeply personal.”

“Over more than three decades, I had the honour of watching not only his remarkable career but also the incredible person he was,” he went on. “I will miss his friendship, his loyalty, his humour, and his heart.”

He ended his personal statement by saying: “My deepest condolences go out to his family, friends, colleagues, and the countless fans whose lives he touched.

“He leaves behind a legacy that extends far beyond his memorable performances. He will be greatly missed and never forgotten.”

Vincent was born in the Bronx, New York City, on July 14, 1946.

He fought in the Vietnam war before going to graduate with a degree in drama from Pace University.

Vincent had a number of small parts in films such as Goodfellas, Carlito’s Way and Men of Respect in the 1990s.

He came to wider attention though in The Jerky Boys: The Movie in 1995 and the HBO TV movie Gotti, the following year, where he appeared alongside future Sopranos co-stars Tony Sirico, Frank Vincent, and Dominic Chianese.

Vincent though became a household name in David Chase’s 1999 drama The Sopranos, where he played Big Pussy, Tony Soprano’s, played by James Gandolfini, longtime best friend and mob enforcer turned FBI Informant

His extensive credits also include Mickey Blue Eyes, Shark Tale, Once Upon a Time in Brooklyn and Guy Ritchie’s Revolver.

Vincent also made a number of appearances on reality TV shows, including Celebrity Apprentice, Celebrity Family Feud, Dancing With the Stars, Shark Tank and Celebrity Fit Club.

Pastore is survived by his daughter, Renee.

George and Amal Clooney evacuated their 425-acre Provence wine estate in southeastern France amid the wildfires spreading across Europe.

The “Jay Kelly” star revealed the news in a letter to Didier Bremond, the mayor of the town of Brignoles, east of Marseille.

“Dear Didier, [a]t this point we have no idea whether our beautiful home makes it through this terrible moment,” the letter read.

“As we evacuate Brignoles we want to emphasise 2 things, first we hope you and the people of our city are safe and second that Amal and [I] are committed to making sure that whatever happens to our village, we are part of this community and we’ll be part of making it whole.

“We love Brignoles and our friends who live there.”

The fire near Brignoles sparked on Wednesday and burned about 250 acres. The Brignoles fire was significantly smaller than the massive wildfire that recently ravaged southwestern France near Bordeaux, where 84,000 evacuees were allowed to return home Thursday as firefighters gained control over flames that had burned an area four times the size of Paris.

In December, the French government announced that the Clooneys, including their 9-year-old twins, Ella and Alexander, were awarded citizenship.

The Clooneys bought property in France — a farm, he recently told Esquire — in August 2021 for $8.3 million, when their twins were 4. He said it was a “much better life” there for the children.

“Yeah, we’re very lucky. … A good portion of my life growing up was on a farm, and as a kid I hated the whole idea of it. But now, for them, it’s like — they’re not on their iPads, you know?” he said in the interview, published in the magazine’s October/November issue.

“I was worried about raising our kids in L.A., in the culture of Hollywood. I felt like they were never going to get a fair shake at life. France — they kind of don’t give a s— about fame. I don’t want them to be walking around worried about paparazzi. I don’t want them being compared to somebody else’s famous kids.”

George Clooney and Amal Alamuddin, a human-rights lawyer, tied the knot in September 2014 in Venice, Italy.

The Associated Press and former Times staff writer Christie D’Zurilla contributed to this report.

Ted Lasso star Annette Badland played villain Babe Smith in EastEnders for three years, and her portrayal was so convincing that the BBC received serious death threats on her behalf

BBC bosses issued a rare “red alert” safety warning to former EastEnders actress Annette Badland after a crazed fan sent death threats that were deemed credible by security experts.

The individual behind the chilling threats was never definitively identified, Annette said. Speaking on Sally Lindsay’s podcast, Annette explained on Sally Lindsay’s podcast: “Because I was leaving, they racked up my villainy and I actually got thrown out of, literally, thrown out of the pub by Danny and cursed them.

“But I had death threats. I got the call from the BBC security saying, ‘We’re getting death threats. There are red alert code words in this, so we have to take it seriously’.”

She was warned that she should only leave her house if it was absolutely necessary, and that if she did go out, she shouldn’t tell anyone where she was going.

Annette says she was effectively under house arrest throughout the six-week investigation: “They eventually traced it to just outside Liverpool. It was in a school, but they didn’t think it was a child. But because it was a public computer they didn’t feel they could get much further.”

Despite that harrowing conclusion to her EastEnders tenure, Annette says she cherished her time on the BBC soap. She holds particularly warm memories of Danny Dyer, whom she describes as “bright, kind-hearted…and daft.”

She recalled Danny’s extraordinary generosity, revealing he taught her to “say the C-word,” which proved tremendously useful when she moved on to Ted Lasso and was handed a script riddled with crude language. She joked: “I said to myself, ‘I’ve worked with Danny Dyer, I can do this’.”

Ironically, however, that “very funny” scene ended up on the cutting-room floor and has never been seen by the public.

It was an unscripted moment, early in her EastEnders stint, that made the show’s writers recognise that in Babe Smith, they had the foundations of a truly iconic villain: “I had a scene with Tim [Timothy West, who played Stan Carter on the show] and he was watching the television.

“I’d been in love with him when I was young and he’d married my sister and I didn’t like that – that was the cause of all my pain and anguish.

“It wasn’t scripted,” Annette added, “but I picked up the remote control and turned the television off. I told him what I thought, put the telly back on, and left. And I think they thought, ‘Ooh, she can be nasty’.”

What followed was three years packed with drama, reaching its peak when Babe was locked inside a freezer and left for dead by an unknown attacker, who was ultimately unmasked as Lorna Fitzgerald’s Abi Branning.

In a dramatic farewell, Babe was caught red-handed stealing from the Queen Vic’s safe, but it was her savage outburst at Linda [Kellie Bright] – branding her a “stuck-up cow” – that saw Mick Carter finally remove her from the pub, and banish her from Walford for good.

In a summer of Gen Z-driven blockbusters and ancient Greek juggernauts, the 38th entry in the Marvel universe can’t help smelling like your uncle’s sweaty Comic-Con ball cap. At least the core ensemble of “Spider-Man: Brand New Day” is still young, even after four “Spider-Man” movies together in nine years — unlike the mature super squad in last summer’s “The Fantastic Four: First Steps,” who boasted an average age of 42.

“Brand New Day” stars buzzy A-listers Tom Holland and Zendaya as Peter Parker and MJ Jones-Watson, sweethearts estranged after he was forced to save the multiverse by wiping all memories of his existence at the end of 2021’s “Spider-Man: Far From Home”. Adding drama to the couple’s onscreen breakup, the actors recently got married in real life. So kudos to the extras who steal scenes from them in the background, flailing like avant-garde dancers when a vicious mental parasite leaps from grandmothers to joggers to security guards on a quest to find something awful. Choreographed by Nathan Kim, the practical effect looks fantastic.

Fittingly for a film with body-snatching, director Destin Daniel Cretton (“Short Term 12,” “Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings”) has made a story about letting people in. New York City’s brain-barging antagonist (“Stranger Things’” Sadie Sink in a fun character reveal) disrespects personal boundaries. Meanwhile, Peter, scarred by the murder of his dear Aunt May (Marisa Tomei) in 2021’s “Spider-Man: Far From Home,” keeps to himself in fear of revealing his secret identity. Forced to skip college while his former high school friends MJ and Ned (a lovable Jacob Batalon) attend MIT, this Spider-Man endures the rise-and-grind routine of an anonymous gig worker. His phone app pings; he puts on his protective mask and heads out wearily to fight crime. It’s a living. Barely.

Peter’s only physical connection to humanity is via webs and fists. Otherwise, he’s restricted to impersonal helpers — a detective (Liza Colón-Zayas) willing to take his phone calls, an AI assistant (ew) and a network of facial recognition cameras (double ew). He’s so isolated that his closest friend is a frenemy: Jon Bernthal’s Punisher, an equally lonely brute.

Screenwriters Chris McKenna and Erik Sommers add too much padding with their need to include the Hulk (Mark Ruffalo), the new Black Widow (Florence Pugh) and the government’s increasingly radicalized Department of Damage Control before this December’s “Avengers: Doomsday.” Perversely for a film with a two-hour-and-25-minute running time, the climax still feels rushed.

Cretton must shoulder an overburdened franchise. His film is likable as heck but never quite achieves liftoff. The soundtrack’s needle drops of Tame Impala and Bad Bunny add swagger. Better, Cretton seizes small moments to put his stamp on this installment. Just as Zendaya’s aspirationally chill MJ insists she won’t work for some “soulless corporation,” he’s quietly made a humanist super-flick: A shot of agents in black SUVs separating a telekinetic family could come right from the news. Likewise, Cretton allows the Punisher his rage while silently noting that the vigilante’s gun-toting tactics usually make things worse.

Peter’s inner despair gets externalized when he invents a genetic inhibitor neck implant to tamp down his sensitivity. The arachnid hormones in his body are surging, causing his pupils to turn black and his temper to explode. His emotions — and that sticky goo in his wrists — are about to burst. On a related note, between this second spider-puberty and Holland’s supporting turn as a mother-henned Telemachus in Christopher Nolan’s “The Odyssey,” will Hollywood ever allow 30-year-old Holland to play a grown man? I suppose when he proves he can carry his own movie. For now, he keeps squandering his Marvel breaks on whiffs like “Cherry” and “Uncharted.”

At least he’s an earnest, open-faced hero — the best live-action Spider-Man of the bunch. Holland holds onto his buoyancy even as his character battles the blues. His Peter fends off despair by insisting that he’s fine. The bruises on his body disagree. So does the glowing inhibitor on his spine, which seems to ask if we’re too quick to prescribe medication for our problems.

Cretton is the rare former indie filmmaker who pushes himself to stage clever action sequences. The web-slinging scenes in “Brand New Day” are designed to let the audience ride Peter’s mood swings. When he’s up, we soar from girder to girder in a tight POV that allows us to barely make out the tips of his boots. When he’s unsteady, every leap is perilously close to a free fall.

During the best fight scene, Peter takes on a squadron of gravity-defying ninjas in a brawl that takes place as much in the air as on the ground. Brett Pawlak’s camera spins a cartwheel alongside a flying kick, then plunges into the eye of a tornado of bad guys trapped in a web. Overall, there’s too much use of hurled rubble. But I dug how Cretton gooses our spidey senses with dramatic sound effects. The thud of a hammering Hulksmash rattles our seats; later, a cocked rifle is so crisp we perk up like a dog hearing the mailman.

“Brand New Day” manages a few strong images: a dive-bombing pigeon, a cityscape at dusk, a close-up of headstrong MJ getting yanked through the sky, still determined not to let a stranger sweep her off her feet. And, of course, there’s that army of extras each making the most of their five seconds of fame. After order is restored just enough to prod us to a sequel, Cretton circles back to those civilians in an end credits montage of normal New Yorkers hanging out on stoops and playing chess in the park. These faces couldn’t matter less to the plot. But Cretton’s affection for people over pixels is his entire point.

COLUMBIA, S.C. — The Washington powerbroker Sen. Lindsey Graham returned home to South Carolina for the last time Wednesday for his funeral and burial.

After Graham was eulogized Tuesday in the nation’s capital as an indefatigable dealmaker by the president, vice president and others, mourners in Columbia prepared to remember him Wednesday as the son of pool hall owners who never forgot his roots.

Graham seemed to know every small-town mayor and police chief and the location of every Chick-fil-A across South Carolina. His PAC made sure Republicans had money to run in legislative and local elections across the state.

Graham died suddenly on July 11 at his home in Washington, likely of an aortic tear, according to preliminary findings. He had just returned from a whirlwind trip to a NATO summit in Turkey, where he celebrated his 71st birthday, and a visit to Ukraine as he negotiated punishing sanctions against Russia. Senators voted late Tuesday to advance the package as a final gesture for their colleague.

Wednesday’s funeral was at First Baptist, the giant downtown church where his predecessor Republican Sen. Strom Thurmond was honored 23 years ago.

Graham’s body was first brought to the South Carolina Statehouse, where he started his political career in 1993, for a law enforcement ceremony and a flyover by military jets. A horse-drawn caisson then carried his casket to the church, where his family followed members of his family carrying it inside.

Graham’s burial Wednesday near his home in Pickens County was planned as a private ceremony.

On Tuesday, Graham’s flag-draped casket was at the U.S. Capitol, where the Republican spent more than 30 years talking and laughing and badgering his colleagues into action.

President Trump then joined foreign leaders at the Washington National Cathedral, a testament to Graham’s stature on the global stage.

Trump called Graham “a giant of the United States Senate, a true American original who left us much too soon.”

Graham’s death has created opportunities for change in South Carolina. Graham had already won the Republican nomination as he ran for a fifth term. Gov. Henry McMaster named his younger sister Darline to hold his seat until January. Darline Graham then surprised many by deciding to run for the full six-year term herself.

State law has Republicans holding a special primary in two weeks to decide the new nominee. Eight others are competing, including former Gov. Mark Sanford and U.S. Reps. Ralph Norman and Russell Fry.

Kinnard and Collins write for the Associated Press.

The picturesque town is dubbed the ‘Jewel of the Weald’ and boasts award-winning wineries

If you’re after a UK destination to visit that’s away from the usual tourist trail, look no further than this underrated town. Like many British market towns, this spot has seen businesses come and go, but it has generally remained resilient thanks to tourism and its emphasis on independent retailers.

New cafés, salons and professional services have continued to open in recent years, helping maintain a lively town centre despite the wider challenges facing UK high streets. Its high street is often described as one of the most attractive market-town high streets in Kent.

Rather than being dominated by chain stores, it has retained a strong independent character, with a broad, tree-lined layout that makes it feel more like a promenade than a conventional shopping street.

When it comes to independent shopping you’ll find boutiques, gift shops, bookshops, galleries, jewellers, delicatessens, cafés and specialist retailers alongside a handful of familiar national brands. This mix has helped the town remain a shopping destination for both locals and visitors.

Walking along the high street today, you’ll pass several historic landmarks, including St Mildred’s Church, whose origins date back to the 12th century and the 1792 Town Hall, an elegant Georgian building.

Kent town

Nicknamed the “Jewel of the Weald” by locals, the picturesque town of Tenterden in Kent is easily accessible and boasts arts and folk festivals, restaurants and award-winning wineries and historic architecture.

Although the population is only around 8,200, Tenterden serves a much wider rural area. People from dozens of surrounding villages come into town for shopping, healthcare, banking and cafés, so it often feels busier than its size would suggest.

For a relatively small place, Tenterden has a busy calendar. Annual events include:

• May Fair
• Folk Festival
• Christmas Market
• Classic car gatherings
• Steam railway events
• Food and drink festivals

Many of these take place on or around the high street, making it the perfect spot for locals and visitors to get together.

History

One of Tenterden’s most fascinating stories is its unexpected maritime past. Although the town now lies several miles inland, it was once closely connected to the sea.

During the Middle Ages, ships could sail up the River Rother to the nearby port of Small Hythe, which became an important centre for shipbuilding.

Over time, the river silted up and the coastline gradually shifted, leaving Tenterden inland.

The Kent & East Sussex Railway is one of Britain’s best-loved heritage railways and an integral part of Tenterden’s character.

Stretching 17 km between Tenterden Town and Bodiam, the line takes passengers for “a nostalgic journey” through the scenic Rother Valley to view a 14th-century structure, Bodiam Castle, which is regarded as “one of the best loved and best known castles in England”.

Combining rich railway history with some of the finest countryside in Kent and East Sussex, it remains one of the region’s most popular visitor attractions.

The town is home to Chapel Down Winery, which provides tours and tastings of its award-winning wines, ciders, and spirits, according to WorldAtlas. The town also regularly plays host to arts and crafts fairs and folk festivals, amongst them a free-entry community festival taking place this summer.

Tenterden is a popular base for exploring both Kent and East Sussex, and within 20 minutes, you can also reach:

• Rye
• Romney Marsh
• Bodiam Castle
• Great Dixter
• Sissinghurst Castle Garden
• Camber Sands

WASHINGTON — Sen. Lindsey Graham, the son of pool hall owners who rose to become one of his generation’s more influential U.S. politicians at home and abroad, is being eulogized Tuesday as a “swashbuckling” public servant and “true American original” during memorial services in Washington.

Graham’s remains arrived at the U.S. Capitol, where the Republican served for more than 30 years as an indefatigable dealmaker who talked and laughed and badgered his colleagues into action. His flag-draped casket was carried inside by an armed forces team, in recognition of his military service.

Later, a funeral will be held at Washington National Cathedral with lawmakers and foreign leaders, a testament to his stature on the global stage.

“Lindsey was a towering figure,” said Senate Majority Leader John Thune, adding there was “no one more capable of cracking up a room.”

“I look forward to the days when you make us all laugh again,” said Thune (R-S.D.), choking back tears.

President Trump is expected to deliver remarks at the cathedral, alongside Fox News Channel’s Sean Hannity and other conservative leaders.

Israel’s Benjamin Netanyahu and Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelenskyplan to be in attendance, a nod to Graham’s role as a foremost believer in the power of the U.S. and its military to intervene in the world’s problems.

It’s the start of two days of services, with burial Wednesday in Graham’s home state of South Carolina. Joint Base Charleston will be renamed in his honor, the White House said.

Graham died suddenly on July 11 at his home in Washington of a likely aortic tear, according to preliminary findings. He had just returned from a whirlwind trip to a NATO summit in Turkey, where he celebrated his birthday, and a visit to Ukraine. He was 71.

A place of honor to ‘say our final goodbyes’

The morning service in the Capitol Rotunda provided a place of tribute where former presidents and military leaders and other prominent Americans have been memorialized.

Vice President JD Vance along with several Cabinet officials and former senators, including Markwayne Mullin, the Homeland Security secretary, were in attendance, as was acting Atty. Gen. Todd Blanche, who faces a rocky Senate confirmation for the job.

Vance described Graham as a “swashbuckling” figure — “who swashbuckled into the Senate” with his suit jacket open — and was impossible not to like.

“A true American original,” Vance said.

First elected to Congress in the 1994 Republican revolt that swept the GOP to power, Graham was part of a new era of conservatives to take their seats in the House — and among the first Republicans from his Southern state since Reconstruction.

Mascaro, Kinnard and Jalonick write for the Associated Press. Associated Press writer Michelle L. Price contributed to this story.

Nearly four years after being extradited to the United States for a drug-trafficking trial, former Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernandez returned home after a pardon by US President Donald Trump at the end of last year.

Trump claimed the trial was a “set up” orchestrated by former President Joe Biden’s administration.

Hernandez still faces corruption charges in Honduras but returned on Sunday after an arrest warrant against him was cancelled.

Human rights activists and lawyers fear a trial on home soil, where his party holds the presidency, would be a sham.

So why did Trump pardon and release the former president of Honduras despite abducting and arresting Venezuela’s Nicolas Maduro on drug and gun charges in January?

Why did Hernandez return to Honduras?

Hernandez was able to return after being pardoned by Trump, released from a US prison and then having an arrest warrant against him suspended last month.

He arrived at Palmerola International Airport, where he was greeted by his family and supporters of his National Party.

Hernandez led his country from 2014 to 2022, during which, according to US prosecutors, he once boasted he would “shove the drugs right up the noses of the gringos”, referring to Americans.

Shortly after leaving office, he was extradited to the US, where he was found guilty by a federal jury and sentenced to 45 years in prison for involvement in a scheme to export cocaine to the US.

Prosecutors described the scheme as “one of the largest and most violent drug trafficking conspiracies in the world”. He was convicted of accepting millions of dollars in bribes from violent drug-trafficking organisations over 18 years, which he was alleged to have used to fuel his rise in politics.

“During his political career, Hernandez abused his powerful positions and authority in Honduras to facilitate the importation of over 400 tons of cocaine into the US,” the US Department of Justice said after he was sentenced last year.

During his trial, Hernandez denied taking bribes from drug dealers, arguing he in fact cracked down on the narcotics trade and citing his administration’s cooperation with the US military.

“I cannot deny the profound emotion and joy I feel in my heart to be returning home,” Hernandez wrote on social media earlier this month, saying he was counting down the days to see his family.

“It wasn’t easy. The process has been extremely difficult … and what I experienced in prison, I truly wouldn’t wish on anyone,” he added.

Hernandez is expected to appear in court on August 3 to face the Honduran corruption charges.

Why did Trump pardon him?

Under the US Constitution, a president may offer two types of clemency for federal crimes: pardons, which forgive defendants their federal charges and restore their civil liberties, and commutations, which reduce people’s punishment without addressing their convictions.

Hernandez was pardoned by Trump in December. The US president said Hernandez had not received a fair trial and had been “set up” by the Biden administration.

Trump added that Hernandez was “treated very harshly and unfairly”.

At the same time, Trump also threw his weight behind right-wing candidate Nasry “Tito” Asfura, a member of Hernandez’s party. He ran in November’s presidential election and was declared the winner a month later in the close race after delays and allegations of fraud. He took office in January.

A Pandora Papers corruption investigation also accused Hernandez of diverting nearly $11m in state funds to political campaigns from 2010 to 2013.

Why a pardon for some but jail for others?

The Trump administration has faced criticism at home for pardoning the Honduran leader while at the same time abducting former President Maduro of Venezuela and his wife, Cilia Flores, in January on similar charges.

Maduro and Flores were seized in Caracas by the US military and flown to New York, where he is facing a range of guns and drugs charges and accusations of being a “narcoterrorist”.

At the time of Maduro’s abduction and since then, the Trump administration has targeted small boats in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific that it claims, without providing evidence, are involved in drug trafficking. More than 220 people have been killed in more than 60 such strikes on small boats in what many lawyers and activists have deemed extrajudicial killings.

Since taking office for a second term in January 2025, Trump has ordered more than 1,800 acts of clemency benefitting a range of personalities, including cryptocurrency billionaires, disgraced politicians and hundreds of political allies.

Some of the most controversial beneficiaries are supporters of his Make America Great Again (MAGA) movement, including hundreds of rioters who attacked the US Capitol on January 6, 2021, in a bid to prevent the certification of Biden’s electoral victory over Trump two months earlier.

Legal experts have argued that while the president’s clemency power is broad, using it for allegedly corrupt purposes, such as to protect political allies or obstruct justice, could form the basis for impeachment proceedings.

US constitutional expert Bruce Fein told Al Jazeera that the US Constitution’s framers “understood the abuse of the pardon power to shelter political or personal friends to constitute an impeachable high crime and misdemeanour justifying the removal of the president through the impeachment process”.

“If Democrats gain control of Congress in the midterm elections, Trump will be in impeachment jeopardy for pardoning Hernandez,” Fein said, referring to elections in November.

Cyprus continues to draw British holidaymakers and expats, helped by flights from £34 and a flight time of around 4hrs 43mins – and one couple are glad they “took the leap”

A British couple who uprooted from the UK and moved to a cheaper country less than five hours away have spotted two problems. With flights for as little as £34 and a 4-hour, 43-minute flight time, Cyprus is a firm favourite among British holidaymakers and expats alike; Donna Curley and husband Nick were similarly drawn to the eastern Mediterranean nation.

After building a life in Derbyshire, Donna Curley and her second husband, Nick, realised their future might be in Cyprus.

The turning point came in 2013, when they bought a one-bedroom holiday home in Kapparis. They returned two or three times a year and, each trip, the island’s slower pace — and the “tranquillity” they felt there — made quite the impression.

Donna, 49, worked as a fitness instructor, including roles at a Derby gym and as a Weight Watchers coach, before switching to online teaching during the Covid pandemic. Nick, who was born at RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus, served as an Army reservist.

When Nick’s children from his first marriage reached their twenties, the couple decided the time was right to start again. They sold their home in Holbrook, bought a base in Avgorou and began laying plans for a wellness retreat — although they admit the move hasn’t been without its challenges.

Donna told The Times: “A lot of the expats here have well-established friendship groups so it’s harder to make new friends than I thought, though there are a lot of British people moving out here now for the tax benefits as well as the lifestyle.”

She went on to say: “Our move to Cyprus was designed so we could spend more time together, which has happened but not quite as much as we hoped – yet.

“I think with any big move you have to adapt and accept that there might be a few hurdles – along with the Greek ‘siga siga’ [slowly slowly]. I am glad that we took the leap.”

The couple’s new base is a two-bedroom bungalow with a swimming pool and 3,000sqm of land. But while they lay the foundations for their wellness business, Nick and Donna have also been juggling other jobs to keep money coming in.

Donna says the cost of everyday life is usually lower in Cyprus, even if food can be surprisingly expensive. They’ve also cut out some major overheads by relying on solar power and using water from their own well, rather than paying standard utility bills.

The colder months are the main exception. When winter sets in, they turn to a wood-burner for heat and sometimes have to fire up a back-up generator.

Their experience follows another British family who recently spoke about relocating to Cyprus. Former educator Sarah and IT specialist James said they moved after becoming fed up with long working weeks, soaring bills and concerns about crime.

Sarah said: “In the UK schools, there is so much pressure on the kids and they were both unhappy. And James and I were working such long hours but life is so expensive in the UK. James applied for a job in Cyprus almost on a whim.

“We thought if it didn’t work out, we’d call it an adventure and then move back home. But everything is amazing and the place is absolutely beautiful. It’s a dream I never thought would be possible.”

Sumaya Yaghi returns to what’s left of her destroyed home in southern Lebanon after Israeli troops withdrew from her ‘pilot zone’ village under a US-backed agreement.

Some people don’t need an introduction.

Joe Torre, for one.

You know him. Baseball icon. Hall of Famer. The only big leaguer with 2,000 hits as a player and 2,000 wins as a manager, he steered the New York Yankees to four World Series championships — and the Dodgers to consecutive National League West crowns and NLCS appearances in 2008 and 2009.

So you’re well-versed on Torre’s baseball bonafides, but you might not be aware of the most meaningful part of his legacy: He’s spent the past 24 years helping people who actually would need to be introduced to him.

Kids who are too young to know Torre the player, manager, color commentator — but who can, unfortunately, relate with what he went through when he was their age. Kids who, like him, are growing up afraid and anxious because of domestic violence at home, and who need what Torre didn’t have — somewhere safe to go to for help.

Since 2002, Torre and his wife, Ali, have been behind the expanding the Joe Torre Safe at Home Foundation. Across the nation, they’ve set up safe spaces in schools, specialized classrooms that feel more like living rooms and that are manned by professional counselors trained in domestic violence intervention.

San Francisco Giants assistant manager Ron Washington hugs Joe Torre before a game at Dodger Stadium on May 14.

(Gina Ferazzi/Los Angeles Times)

They’re at schools in New York, Cincinnati, Tahiti and in L.A., at Bellflower Middle/High School and John Adams Middle School, John H. Glenn High and McKinley Elementary School, Palisades Charter High, Santa Monica High, Waite Middle School and Washington Preparatory High.

And they’re open to all, whether you’re a kid experiencing violence or you want to be able to help peers who are.

This past year, the foundation says it reached more than 28,000 students. And since it began, more than 425,000 young people, families, schools, and communities.

These Safe at Home spaces are all named “Margaret’s Place,” in honor of Joe’s mom, who was for years the victim of his father’s violent ire.

“It’s a tough subject to talk about,” Joe Torre said. “But you can’t run away from it.”

He did, though. He’s 85 now, but until he was 54, Torre didn’t reveal that baseball had been his refuge when he was growing up. He didn’t tell anyone that when he was a kid, if he saw his dad’s car in front of his house, Joe would go to a friend’s house and wait until he left for his job as a New York police detective. Joe didn’t share memories like he would later, of seeing his big sister, armed with a knife, standing between their mother and their father, who was going for his pistol.

St. Louis Cardinals third baseman Joe Torre poses swinging a bat prior to a game in 1971.

(Dave Pickoff / Associated Press)

He didn’t recognize what those traumatic experiences he’d tried to bury did to him, not until he started to talk about them.

“I thought I was born with this shyness and this nervousness,” Torre said before a Dodgers game in May, when the club introduced him and Ali and players and coaches wore T-shirts during batting practice that read: “Everyone deserves to be safe at home.”

“During my playing career,” Torre continued, “if we lost a game and I didn’t get any hits, I’d beat myself up. I was fortunate, I had a good career, but there was always something missing. I really probably could have enjoyed it a lot more than I did.”

That didn’t change until 1995, when he started talking about the domestic violence he experienced. He was surprised, he said, to find himself sharing his story, opening up for the first time at a “Life Success” seminar in Cincinnati, Ali’s hometown.

“Ali, she says, ‘You want to go to this Life Success symposium with me?’” Joe said. “And she’s eight months pregnant with our daughter and I’m not about to say no to anything she asks me to go. So we go in and they separate you, and they put you in groups of six strangers — and I’d just been named manager of the Yankees, so I’m very self-conscious.

“But after a day or so, you’re in it, you know? And then we went home and I called my sisters and asked them questions. Because they always tried to protect me, so I had to drag it out of them … ‘Did dad hit mom?’

“The biggest thing for me was knowing that my dad bringing fear down on the home was what caused my feelings that I was embarrassed to have. Once I went through that, I was able to go deeper.”

Yankees manager Joe Torre bumps fists with catcher Jorge Posada after a win in April 2004.

(Brian Kersey / Associated Press)

Speaking about what was previously unspeakable helped him cope with his trauma. He said it made him a more empathetic manager and a more confident man. It also made him want to speak out publicly and to encourage others to do the same, to break the cycle of silence.

So they’re getting the word out at — where else? — ballparks. There was the stop at Dodger Stadium in May, and before that, in 2025, seven major league teams had activations at games, as did 63 minor league clubs who hosted a “Safe At Home Awareness Game.”

Because often we do need an introduction, to connect kids with people who can keep them safe, who can assure them they’re not the only ones in their position.

“He’s talked about this many times: If he had access to a program like Margaret’s Place, he wouldn’t have felt like he had to carry this burden alone,” said Rose Robles, the foundation’s senior director of programs. “That was one thing he’s really stressed, he felt he was the only one that was going through this.

“And he would have had some options, some choices for how to respond to what he was experiencing and how to understand it. One thing that we say is that violence thrives in silence, and that is basically what he was experiencing.”

Forty-four percent of the kids Margaret’s Place counselors helped in 2024-25 were dealing with some form of violence at home. Twenty-seven percent have experienced some form of relationship or dating violence. They also help kids who’ve been exposed to community violence or other traumatic events, or who are grieving a traumatic loss.

Dodgers manager Joe Torre pauses for a moment while answering questions in August 2010.

(Jae C. Hong / Associated Press)

At Bellflower Middle and High School, Principal Jessica Cummings said a Teen Dating Violence Awareness Week and parent workshops focused on fostering healthy relationships increased awareness on her campus.

“We are grateful,” she wrote in an email, “for this partnership and the positive impact it has had.”

Of the students surveyed after receiving services, Safe at Home indicated that 99% reported feeling safer and 93% said they used the tools they learned in counseling.

Torre has absorbed decades of anecdotal feedback too — the knowing nods he sees in the crowd when he’s talked to groups of kids about this, the cameraman who slipped him $20 to put toward the foundation, the interviewer who shared his account of having grown up in a violent household.

“Anyone can become a victim,” Ali Torre said, “Our goal is to intervene and prevent. There are little boys we can have conversations with: ‘You don’t have to repeat the cycle.’ To little girls, ‘There’s an option for you…’

“And Joe has opened a lot of doors for us.”

When you think of Joe Torre, it’s as a former Dodgers skipper. A nine-time All-Star and the 1971 National League Most Valuable Player.

You should also think of him as a champion of children who now know that they aren’t alone, and that they have people who will go to bat for them.