One climbed to the very top of the social ladder, the otherchose to live among tramps. One was a celebrity at twenty-three,the other virtually unknown until his dying days. One wasright-wing and religious, the other a socialist and an atheist.Yet, as this ingenious and important new book reveals, at the heartof their lives and writing, Evelyn Waugh and George Orwell wereessentially the same man. Orwell is best known for "Animal Farm"and "1984," Waugh for "Brideshead Revisited" and comic novels like"Scoop" and "Vile Bodies." How ever different they may seem, thesetwo towering figures of twentieth-century literature are linked forthe first time in this engaging and unconventional biography, whichgoes beyond the story of their amazing lives to reach the core oftheir beliefs-a shared vision that was startlingly prescient aboutour own troubled times. Both Waugh and Orwell were born in 1903,into the same comfortable stratum of England's class-obsessedsociety. But at first glance they seem to have lived

An enraged man abducts his estranged wife and child, holes upin a secluded mountain cabin, threatening to kill them both. Aright wing survivalist amasses a cache of weapons and resists callsto surrender. A drug trafficker barricades himself and his familyin a railroad car, and begins shooting. A cult leader in Waco,Texas faces the FBI in an armed stand-off that leaves many dead ina fiery blaze. A sniper, claiming to be God, terrorizes the DCmetropolitan area. For most of us, these are events we hear abouton the news. For Gary Noesner, head of the FBI’s groundbreakingCrisis Negotiation Unit, it was just another day on the job. In Stalling for Time, Noesner takes readers on a heart-poundingtour through many of the most famous hostage crises of the pastthirty years. Specially trained in non-violent confrontation andcommunication techniques, Noesner’s unit successfully defused manypotentially volatile standoffs, but perhaps their most hard-wonvictory was earning the recognition and respect of the

Originally published in six volumes, Sandburgs Abraham Lincolnwas called the greatest historical biography of our generation.Sandburg distilled this work into one volume that became thedefinitive life of Lincoln. Index; photographs.

When twentysomething reporter Miranda Kennedy leaves herjob in New York City and travels to India with no employmentprospects, she longs to immerse herself in the turmoil andexcitement of a rapidly developing country. What she quickly learnsin Delhi about renting an apartment as a single woman—it’s next toimpossible—and the proper way for women in India to ridescooters—perched sideways—are early signs that life here is lessWesternized than she’d counted on. Living in Delhi for more than five years, and finding acity pulsing with possibility and hope, Kennedy experiencesfriendships, love affairs, and losses that open a window onto theopaque world of Indian politics and culture—and alter her ownattitudes about everything from food and clothes to marriage andfamily. Along the way, Kennedy is drawn into the lives of severalIndian women, including her charismatic friend Geeta—aself-described “modern girl” who attempts to squeeze herself intothe traditional role of wife and mother; R

A highly original, stirring book on Mahatma Gandhi that deepensour sense of his achievements and disappointments—his success inseizing India’s imagination and shaping its independence struggleas a mass movement, his recognition late in life that few of hisfollowers paid more than lip service to his ambitious goals ofsocial justice for the country’s minorities, outcasts, and ruralpoor. Pulitzer Prize–winner Joseph Lelyveld shows invivid, unmatched detail how Gandhi’s sense of mission, socialvalues, and philosophy of nonviolent resistance were shaped onanother subcontinent—during two decades in South Africa—and thentested by an India that quickly learned to revere him as a Mahatma,or “Great Soul,” while following him only a small part of the wayto the social transformation he envisioned. The man himself emergesas one of history’s most remarkable self-creations, a prosperouslawyer who became an ascetic in a loincloth wholly dedicated topolitical and social action. Lelyveld leads us step-

This is the captivating story behind Schindler’s List, theBooker Prize–winning book and the Academy Award–winning Spielbergfilm. Keneally tells the tale of the unlikely encounter thatpropelled him to write about Oskar Schindler and of the impact ofhis extraordinary account on people around the world. Thomas Keneally met Leopold “Poldek”Pfefferberg, the owner of a Beverly Hills luggage shop, in 1981.Poldek, a Polish Jew and a Holocaust survivor, had a tale he wantedthe world to know. Charming, charismatic, and persistent, heconvinced Keneally to relate the incredible story of “theall-drinking, all-screwing, all-black-marketeering Nazi, OskarSchindler. But to me he was Jesus Christ.” Searching for Schindler is the engrossingchronicle of Keneally’s pursuit of one of history’s mostfascinating and paradoxical heroes. Traveling throughout the UnitedStates, Germany, Israel, Poland, and Austria, Keneally and Poldekinterviewed people who had known Schindler and uncovered theirindelible memor

Through never-before-seen photographs and intriguing personaldiaries, this beautiful book provides an intimate glimpse into thelives of Countess Sophia Tolstoy and her husband, Leo Tolstoy—oneof the greatest authors of all time—set against the grand andterrifying backdrop of aristocratic Russia on the brink of itsdemise. Between 1885 and 1910, Countess Tolstoy made more than a thousandphotographs representing her entire world—from artists toaristocrats to peasants to family, from the Crimea to Moscow to thefamily estate 100 kilometers to the south. She also kept detaileddiaries, which sweep us into fashionable balls and localgossip...magical scenes of winter in Russia...and devastatingfamine in the countryside. Sophia's works deepen our understandingof the era as well as of this amazing woman, who had thirteenchildren, battled a troubled marriage, and, though blessed with acreative life of her own, was so devoted to her husband's careerthat she hand-copied his great works Anna Karenina and War andPeac