The extraordinary story of Andrew Jackson—the colorful,dynamic, and forceful president who ushered in the Age of Democracyand set a still young America on its path to greatness—told by thebestselling author of The First American. The most famous American of his time, Andrew Jackson is a seminalfigure in American history. The first “common man” to rise to thepresidency, Jackson embodied the spirit and the vision of theemerging American nation; the term “Jacksonian democracy” isembedded in our national lexicon. With the sweep, passion, and attention to detail that made TheFirst American a Pulitzer Prize finalist and a national bestseller,historian H.W. Brands shapes a historical narrative that’s asfast-paced and compelling as the best fiction. He follows AndrewJackson from his days as rebellious youth, risking execution tofree the Carolinas of the British during the Revolutionary War, tohis years as a young lawyer and congressman from the newly settledfrontier state of Tennessee

Theodore Rex is the story—never fully toldbefore—of Theodore Roosevelt’s two world-changing terms asPresident of the United States. A hundred years before thecatastrophe of September 11, 2001, “TR” succeeded to power in theaftermath of an act of terrorism. Youngest of all our chiefexecutives, he rallied a stricken nation with his superhumanenergy, charm, and political skills. He proceeded to combat theproblems of race and labor relations and trust control while makingthe Panama Canal possible and winning the Nobel Peace Prize. Buthis most historic achievement remains his creation of a nationalconservation policy, and his monument millions of acres ofprotected parks and forest. Theodore Rex ends with TRleaving office, still only fifty years old, his future reputationsecure as one of our greatest presidents.

Plutarch's Lives, written at the beginning of the secondcentury A.D., is a brilliant social history of the ancient world byone of the greatest biographers and moralists of all time. In whatis by far his most famous and influential work, Plutarch revealsthe character and personality of his subjects and how they ledultimately to tragedy or victory. Richly anecdotal and full ofdetail, Volume I contains profiles and comparisons of Romulus andTheseus, Numa and Lycurgus, Fabius and Pericles, and many morepowerful figures of ancient Greece and Rome. The present translation, originally published in 1683 inconjunction with a life of Plutarch by John Dryden, was revised in1864 by the poet and scholar Arthur Hugh Clough, whose notes andpreface are also included in this edition.

An astonishing and at times outright comic memoir that marksthe brilliant debut of a writer raised in a creative, bohemianhousehold characterized by extreme privilege tinged withneglect. Born into one of the most celebrated Anglo-Irish families, theGuinnesses, Ivana Lowell tells a stunning story of coming to termswith her blue-blood heritage and her own childhood traumas. It isalso the story of her intense relationship with her formidablyintelligent and complicated mother, the writer Caroline Blackwood.A keen observer with an incisive eye, a wicked sense of humor, andno self-pity, Lowell sets a wide range of scenes with a trulyunexpected, almost madcap cast of characters, introducing us tosuch eccentric figures as her maternal grandmother, Maureen, theMarchioness of Dufferin and Ava. She takes us from themarchioness’s annual ball for her idol and old friend, the QueenMother, to Maureen’s stately Irish home, Clandeboye (where themarchioness hopes to die), to summers in Dufferin’s villa inSar

Hard Driving is the dramatic story of one man’s doggeddetermination to live the life he loved, and to compete, despitedaunting obstacles, at the highest level of his sport.Wendell Scottfigured he was signing up for trouble when he became nascar’sversion of Jackie Robinson in the segregated 1950s. Some speedwaysrefused to let him race. “Go home, nigger,” spectators yelled. Andafter a bigoted promoter refused to pay him, Scott appealeddirectly to the sport’s founder, nascar czar Bill France Sr.Francemade a promise Scott would never forget – that nascar would nevertreat him with prejudice.For the next two decades, Scott chased adream whose fulfillment depended on France backing up that promise.Persevering through crashes, health problems, and money troubles,Scott remained convinced he had the talent to become one ofnascar’s best. Hard Driving documents a previously untold chapterin the history of integration, politics, and sports in America. Itreveals how France, founder of the multibillion-

Robert Hughes, who has stunned us with comprehensive works onsubjects as sweeping and complex as the history of Australia (TheFatal Shore), the modern art movement (The Shock of the New), thenature of American art (American Visions), and the nature ofAmerica itself as seen through its art (The Culture of Complaint),now turns his renowned critical eye to one of art history’s mostcompelling, enigmatic, and important figures, Francisco José deGoya y Lucientes. With characteristic critical fervor and sure-eyedinsight, Hughes brings us the story of an artist whose life andwork bridged the transition from the eighteenth-century reign ofthe old masters to the early days of the nineteenth-centurymoderns. With his salient passion for the artist and theart, Hughes brings Goya vividly to life through dazzling analysisof a vast breadth of his work. Building upon the historicalevidence that exists, Hughes tracks Goya’s development, as man andartist, without missing a beat, from the early works commissionedby the

The first dual biography of two of the world’s most remarkablewomen—Elizabeth I of England and Mary Queen of Scots—by one ofBritain’s “best biographers” ( The Sunday Times ). In a rich and riveting narrative, Jane Dunn reveals theextraordinary rivalry between the regal cousins. It is the story oftwo queens ruling on one island, each with a claim to the throne ofEngland, each embodying dramatically opposing qualities ofcharacter, ideals of womanliness (and views of sexuality) anddivinely ordained kingship. As regnant queens in an overwhelmingly masculine world, they weredeplored for their femaleness, compared unfavorably with each otherand courted by the same men. By placing their dynamic andever-changing relationship at the center of the book, Dunnilluminates their differences. Elizabeth, inheriting a weak,divided country coveted by all the Catholic monarchs of Europe, isrevolutionary in her insistence on ruling alone and inspired in heruse of celibacy as a political tool—yet also possessed of

Founder of the largest indigenous Christian church inAmerican history, Joseph Smith published the 584-page Book ofMormon when he was twenty-three and went on to organize a church,found cities, and attract thousands of followers before his violentdeath at age thirty-eight. Richard Bushman, an esteemed culturalhistorian and a practicing Mormon, moves beyond the popularstereotype of Smith as a colorful fraud to explore his personality,his relationships with others, and how he receivedrevelations . An arresting narrative of the birth of theMormon Church, Joseph Smith: Rough Stone Rolling alsobrilliantly evaluates the prophet’s bold contributions to Christiantheology and his cultural place in the modern world.