Nelson Lankford draws upon Civil War-era diaries, letters,memoirs, and newspaper reports to vividly recapture the experiencesof the men and women, both black and white, who witnessed thetumultuous fall of Richmond. In April 1865 General Robert E. Leerealized that his army must retreat from the Confederate capitaland that Jefferson Davis's government must flee. As the Southernsoldiers moved out they set the city on fire, leaving a blazingruin to greet the entering Union troops. The city's fall ushered inthe birth of the modern United States. Lankford's exploration ofthis pivotal event is at once an authoritative work of history anda stunning piece of dramatic prose.

The illuminating national bestseller: "Vertiginouslyexciting…vibrantly imagined….[Krauss is] a prodigioustalent."—Janet Maslin, New York Times A long-lost book reappears, mysteriously connecting an old mansearching for his son and a girl seeking a cure for her widowedmother's loneliness. Leo Gursky is just about surviving, tapping his radiator eachevening to let his upstairs neighbor know he's still alive. Butlife wasn't always like this: sixty years ago, in the Polishvillage where he was born, Leo fell in love and wrote a book. Andthough Leo doesn't know it, that book survived, inspiring fabulouscircumstances, even love. Fourteen-year-old Alma was named after acharacter in that very book. And although she has her handsfull—keeping track of her brother, Bird (who thinks he might be theMessiah), and taking copious notes on How to Survive in theWild—she undertakes an adventure to find her namesake and save herfamily. With consummate, spellbinding skill, Nicole Kraussgradually draws

There is no story in twentieth-century history more important tounderstand than Hitler’s rise to power and the collapse ofcivilization in Nazi Germany. With The Coming of the Third Reich,Richard Evans, one of the world’s most distinguished historians,has written the definitive account for our time. A masterfulsynthesis of a vast body of scholarly work integrated withimportant new research and interpretations, Evans’s historyrestores drama and contingency to the rise to power of Hitler andthe Nazis, even as it shows how ready Germany was by the early1930s for such a takeover to occur. The Coming of the ThirdReich is a masterwork of the historian’s art and the book bywhich all others on the subject will be judged.

Did Eisenhower avoid a showdown with Stalin by not takingBerlin before the Soviets? What might have happened if JFK hadn'tbeen assassinated? This new volume in the widely praised seriespresents fascinating "what if..." scenarios by such prominenthistorians as: Robert Dallek, Caleb Carr, Antony Beevor, JohnLukacs, Jay Winick, Thomas Fleming, Tom Wicker, Theodore Rabb,Victor David Hansen, Cecelia Holland, Andrew Roberts, Ted Morgan,George Feifer, Robert L. O'Connell, Lawrence Malkin, and John F.Stacks. Included are two essential bonus essays reprinted from theoriginal New York Times bestseller What If? (tm)-DavidMcCullough imagines Washington's disastrous defeat at the Battle ofLong Island, and James McPherson envisions Lee's successfulinvasion of the North in 1862.

Immediately after Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor, PresidentFranklin D. Roosevelt sought to restore the honor of the UnitedStates with a dramatic act of vengeance: a retaliatory bombing raidon Tokyo. On April 18, 1942, eighty brave young men, led by thefamous daredevil Jimmy Doolittle, took off from a navy carrier inthe mid-Pacific on what everyone regarded as a suicide mission butinstead became a resounding American victory and helped turn thetide of the war. The First Heroes is the story of thatmission. Meticulously researched and based on interviews withtwenty of the surviving Tokyo Raiders, this is a true account thatalmost defies belief, a tremendous human drama of great personalcourage, and a powerful reminder that ordinary people, when facedwith extraordinary circumstances, can rise to the challenge ofhistory.

The first complete history of the Caribbean islands--updatedthrough the year 2000. This comprehensive volume takes the reader and student throughmore than five hundred years of Caribbean history, beginning withColumbus's arrival in the Bahamas in 1492. A Brief History of theCaribbean traces the people and events that have marked thisconstantly shifting region, encompassing everything from economicbooms and busts to epidemics, wars, and revolutions, and bringingto life such important figures as Sir Francis Drake, Blackbeard,Toussaint Louverture, Fidel Castro, the Duvaliers, andJean-Bertrand Aristide. This superbly written history, revised and updated, with newchapters that reflect the islands' most recent social, economic,and political developments, is a work of impeccable scholarship.Featuring maps, charts, tables, and photographs, it remains theideal guide to the region and its people. "A veritable sourcebook of information . . . analysis,de*ion, interpretation . . . interesting and

In this widely praised history of an infamous institution,award-winning scholar Marcus Rediker shines a light into thedarkest corners of the British and American slave ships of theeighteenth century. Drawing on thirty years of research in maritimearchives, court records, diaries, and firsthand accounts, TheSlave Ship is riveting and sobering in its revelations,reconstructing in chilling detail a world nearly lost to history:the “floating dungeons” at the forefront of the birth of AfricanAmerican culture.

In this audacious recasting of the American Revolution,distinguished historian Gary Nash offers a profound new way ofthinking about the struggle to create this country, introducingreaders to a coalition of patriots from all classes and races ofAmerican society. From millennialist preachers to enslavedAfricans, disgruntled women to aggrieved Indians, the people sovividly portrayed in this book did not all agree or succeed, butduring the exhilarating and messy years of this country’s birth,they laid down ideas that have become part of our inheritance andideals toward which we still strive today.

In his previous landmark book on youth culture and teenangst, the award-winning England's Dreaming , Jon Savagepresented the "definitive history of the English punk movement"( The New York Times ). Now, in Teenage , he exploresthe secret prehistory of a phenomenon we thought we knew, in amonumental work of cultural investigative reporting. Beginning in1875 and ending in 1945, when the term "teenage" became an integralpart of popular culture, Savage draws widely on film, music,literature high and low, fashion, politics, and art and fusespopular culture and social history into a stunning chronicle ofmodern life.

Undeniably one of Rome's most important historians, Tacituswas also one of its most gifted. The Agricola is both aportrait of Julius Agricola-the most famous governor of RomanBritain and Tacitus's respected father-in-law-and the first knowndetailed portrayal of the British Isles. In the Germania ,Tacitus focuses on the warlike German tribes beyond the Rhine,often comparing the behavior of "barbarian" peoples favorably withthe decadence and corruption of Imperial Rome.

As the peerless warrior who brought the U.S. Army to its kneesat the Battle of Little Bighorn, Crazy Horse remains one of themost perennially fascinating figures of the American West. NowJoseph Marshall—a masterful storyteller, historian, and descendantof the same Lakota community that raised Crazy Horse—goes beyondthat image in this one-of-a-kind portrait of the legendary leader.Drawing on extensive research and a rich oral tradition that israrely shared outside the Native American community, Marshall givesus a uniquely complete portrait of Crazy Horse, from the powerfulvision that spurred him into battle to the woman he loved but lostto circumstance. The Journey of Crazy Horse celebrates along-standing community’s enduring culture and gives vibrant lifeto its most trusted and revered hero.

Essential reading for anyone interested in the leaders whoshaped our nation. Popular interest in the Founding Fathers has surged over the pastdecade and is beginning to rival interest in the Civil War. Peopleare increasingly looking back to the generation that invented thiscountry's political ideas and institutions for help in today'scomplex political world. The Complete Idiot's Guide(r) to theFounding Fathers presents the Founding Fathers through the issuesthat defined them-issues that are with the country today.

Pliny's "Natural History" is an astonishingly ambitious workthat ranges from astronomy to art and from geography to zoology.Mingling acute observation with often wild speculation, it offers afascinating view of the world as it was understood in the firstcentury AD, whether describing the danger of diving for sponges,the first water-clock, or the use of asses' milk to removewrinkles. Pliny himself died while investigating the volcaniceruption that destroyed Pompeii in AD 79, and the natural curiositythat brought about his death is also very much evident in the"Natural History" - a book that proved highly influential right upuntil the Renaissance and that his nephew, Pliny the younger,described 'as full of variety as nature itself'.

"In A Grave in Gaza, Omar Yussef and his boss, Magnus Wallender,travel to the Gaza Strip for a routine inspection of the UN schoolsin the Gaza refugee camps.Upon their arrival they meet James Cree,the UN security officer for Gaza, who informs them that a teacherat one of their schools has been accused of spying and imprisoned.As they try to free the teacher and keep a lid on an explosivepolitical situation, they are pulled into a confrontation withGaza's warring government factions and the criminal gangs withwhich they are connected.Omar Yussef confronts the dark elements ofGaza--dirty politics, bribery, assassination, and kidnapping--inhis struggle to free the innocent and honor the dead.

With What's So Great About America , Dinesh D'Souza isnot asking a question, but making a statement. The former WhiteHouse policy analyst and bestselling author argues that in theaftermath of September 11, 2001, American ideals and patriotismshould not be things we shy away from. Instead he offers thegrounds for a solid, well-considered pride in the Western pillarsof "science, democracy and capitalism," while deconstructingarguments from both the political Left and political Right. As an"outsider" from India who has had amazing success in the UnitedStates, D'Souza defends not an idealized America, but America as itreally is, and measures America not against an utopian ideal, butagainst the rest of the world in a provocative, challenging, andpersonal book.

Draw ing on an unprecedented range and variety of originalresearch, Hitler's Empire sheds new light on how the Nazisdesigned, maintained, and lost their European dominion-and offers achilling vision of what the world would have become had they wonthe war. Mark Mazower forces us to set aside timeworn opinions ofthe Third Reich, and instead shows how the party drew inspirationfor its imperial expansion from America and Great Britain. Yet theNazis' lack of political sophistication left them unequal to thetask of ruling what their armies had conquered, despite a shockinglevel of cooperation from the overwhelmed countries. A work asauthoritative as it is unique, Hitler's Empire is a surprising-andcontroversial- new appraisal of the Third Reich's rise and ultimatefall.

Shed some light on one of history?’s darkest periods. The Complete Idiot?’s Guide? to the Middle Ages givesreaders the beginning, middle, and end of the era, starting withthe fall of the Roman Empire in the year 550 and ending with theRenaissance in 1500?— and covers some uncomfortable similaritiesbetween the so-called ?“Dark Ages?” and today?’s ?“modernworld.?” ??A fascinating, fact-filled book that delivers more than athousand years of history in easy-to-understand chapters ??Many AP European History students are urged to read an overviewof medieval Europe to aid in their understanding of modern Europe,and a number of high schools have adopted elective courses inmedieval history ??Complete with a timeline, a who?’s who, and guides to furtherreading and the Middle Ages in film

A Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter examines the truehistory of the discord between Israel and Palestine with surprisingresults Though the origins of the Arab-Israeli conflict have traditionallybeen traced to the British Mandate (1920-1948) that ended with thecreation of the Israeli state, a new generation of scholars hastaken the investigation further back, to the Ottoman period. Thefirst popular account of this key era, Jerusalem 1913 showsus a cosmopolitan city whose religious tolerance crumbled beforethe onset of Z ionism and its corresponding nationalism on bothsides-a conflict that could have been resolved were it not for theonset of World War I. With extraordinary skill, Amy Dockser Marcusrewrites the story of one of the world's most indelibledivides.

You’re no idiot, of course. You’re aware that WallStreet crashed in 1929, leading to a financial disaster that lastedmore than a decade. But despite what you’ve heard about“Black Tuesday,” the Great Depression didn’t happen overnight orbecause of one bad day on Wall Street. The Complete Idiot’s Guide to the Great Depression will show youexactly how the economy collapsed – and how the United Statessurvived it. In this Complete Idiot’s Guide, you get: The causes in the 1920s that led to the Black Tuesday marketcrash on October 29, 1929 How the administration under President Herbert Hoover attemptedto manage the nationwide crisis. Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s election, his formation of the BrainTrust, and his reassuring fireside chats. Soup kitchens, bread lines, homelessness, and other hardshipsAmericans faced during the Depression. How Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor brought the country’s economicwoes and the Great Depression to an end.

Provides a comprehensive look at both sides of the Vietnam Warthrough a collection of personal tales and delves into thepolitical and military events in the United States and elsewherethat originally caused the war and the brought it to an end.Reprint. TV tie-in."

The Iranians explores Iran in the context of its old andcomplex culture, for throughout its history Iran has struggled withtwo warring identities-one evolving from the values, socialorganization, and arts of ancient Persia, the other from Islam. Byexamining the relationship between these two identities, TheIranians explains how the revolution of 1979 came about, why theIslamic Republic has failed, and how Iran today is on the brink ofchaos. In this defining portrait of a troubled nation and theforces that shape it, Iranian history and religion becomeaccessible to the nonspecialist. Combining impeccable scholarshipwith the human insight of firsthand observations, The Iraniansprovides vital understanding of this unique and pivotalnation. ? Plume edition will contain a new epilogue by Sandra Mackey,reflecting on the results of the spring 1997 Iranianelections. ? Hardcover edition received enormous press coverage andincreased Mackey's already prominent visibility. ? Highly readable and ai