We show that, for any prime p, there exist absolutely simple abelian varieties over
$\mathbb {Q}$
with arbitrarily large p-torsion in their Tate-Shafarevich groups. To prove this, we construct explicit
$\mu _p$
-covers of Jacobians of curves of the form
$y^p = x(x-1)(x-a)$
which violate the Hasse principle. In the appendix, Tom Fisher explains how to interpret our proof in terms of a Cassels-Tate pairing.