Dennis Rodman shoots from the lip as he talks about everythingfrom the NBA and his game, his sexuality, dating, his wild flingwith superstar Madonna, and morality. Reprint."

A bestseller since 1880... The classic saga of the Roman Empire From a thrilling sea battle to its famouschariot race to the agony of the Crucifixion, this is the epic taleof a prince who became a slave and by a twist of fate and his ownskill-won a chance at freedom.

From October to December of 1888, Paul Gauguin shared a yellowhouse in the south of France with Vincent van Gogh. They were theodd couple of the art world -- one calm, the other volatile -- andthe denouement of their living arrangement was explosive. Makinguse of new evidence and Van Goghs voluminous correspondence, MartinGayford describes not only how these two hallowed artists paintedand exchanged ideas, but also the texture of their everyday lives.Gayford also makes a persuasive analysis of Van Goghs mentalillness -- the probable bipolar affliction that led him to commitsuicide at the age of thirty-seven. The Yellow House is a singularbiographical work, as dramatic and vibrant as the work of thesebrilliant artists.

Tony Blair has dominated British political life for more thana decade. Like Margaret Thatcher before him, he has changed theterms of political debate and provoked as much condemnation asadmiration. At the end of his era in power, this book presents awide-ranging overview of the achievements and failures of the Blairgovernments. Bringing together Britain's most eminent academics andcommentators on British politics and society, it examines theeffect of the Prime Minister and his administration on themachinery of government, economic and social policy and foreignrelations. Combining serious scholarship with clarity andaccessibility, this book represents the authoritative verdict onthe impact of the Blair years on British politics andsociety. Covers the full term of Blair's leadership of Labour ? AnthonySeldon is a recognized authority on British Prime Ministers, andTony Blair in particular ? Uniquely authoritative with a superbcollection of contributors including John Curtice, Vernon Bogdanor,Sir La

Einstein believed in humanity, in a peaceful world of mutualhelpfulness, and in the high mission of science. Intended as a pleafor these beliefs, this book, like no other provides a complete keyto the understanding of this distinguished man's personality.

Who are the pivotal figures in American history, the men andwomen who have helped shape us as a people and have influenced howwe perceive ourselves as Americans? In this companion to hispopular 1001 Events That Made America, Alan Axelrod looks into allareas of our collective past and highlights the famous as well asthe infamous, the virtuous as well as the notorious, from thenation’s earliest days to the present. Serving up history in lively, accessible bites, the book presentsa Who’s Who in American politics, arts, science, business,religion, and pop culture, along with concise explanations of eachfigure’s historical significance. Featured personalities range fromJesse James to Al Capone, Harriet Beecher Stowe to Betty Friedan,George Washington to George W. Bush, Harriet Tubman to MartinLuther King, Jr., Stephen Foster to Elvis, John L. Sullivan toMuhammad Ali, Edwin Booth to Marlon Brando, Washington Irving toThomas Pynchon, and John Jacob Astor to Bill Gates. Packed with informatio

Book De*ion Here, firmly rooted in her own social setting for the first time,is the real Jane Austen--the shy woman willing to challengeconvention, the woman of no pretensions who nevertheless calledherself "formidable," a woman who could be frivolous and yet sufferfrom black depressions, who showed unfailing loyalty and, in theconduct of her own life, unfailing bravery. In an act ofunderstanding and brilliant synthesis, Claire Tomalin reveals JaneAusten with a clarity never before achieved, one which makes uslook upon her novels with fresh and even greater admiration. The world she wrote about--that place of civility and reassuringstability--was never quite her own. As Tomalin shows, Jane Austen'sfamily existed on the very fringe of the world she described in herfiction, struggling to get ahead with little money and no land inthe competitive society of Georgian England, sometimes succeedingbut often failing with painful consequences. New research in familypapers has yielded a rich, tragico

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

A fascinating history--. Literate andauthoritative--.Marvelously exciting. --The New York Times BookReview Jonathan Weiner, winner of the Pulitzer Prizefor The Beak of the Finch, brings his brilliant reporting skills tothe story of Seymour Benzer, the Brooklyn-born maverick scientistwhose study of genetics and experiments with fruit fly genes hashelped revolutionize or knowledge of the connections between DNAand behavior both animal and human. How much of our fate is decided before we areborn? Which of our characteristics is inscribed in our DNA? Weinerbrings us into Benzer's Fly Rooms at the California Institute ofTechnology, where Benzer, and his asssociates are in the process offinding answers, often astonishing ones, to these questions. Partbiography, part thrilling scientific detective story, Time, Love,Memory forcefully demonstrates how Benzer's studies are changingour world view--and even our lives.

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.

The epic life and times of one of the most important politicalfigures in our history. He was the Great Compromiser, a canny and colorful legislator andleader whose life mirrors the story of America from its foundinguntil the eve of the Civil War. Speaker of the House, senator,secretary of state, five-time presidential candidate, and idol tothe young Abraham Lincoln, Henry Clay is captured in full at lastin this rich and sweeping biography that vividly portrays all thedrama of his times. David S. Heidler and Jeanne T. Heidler present Clay in his earlyyears as a precocious, witty, and optimistic Virginia boy, raisedon a farm, who at the age of twenty transformed himself frombumpkin to attorney—a shrewd and sincere defender of the ordinaryman who would be his eventual political base. The authors revealClay’s tumultuous career in Washington, one that transformed thecapital and the country. Nicknamed “the Western Star,” Clay becamethe youngest Speaker of the House shortly before the War of 1812and tran

Meredith Hall's moving but unsentimental memoir begins in1965, when she becomes pregnant at sixteen. Shunned by her insularNew Hampshire community, she is then kicked out of the house by hermother. Her father and stepmother reluctantly take her in, hidingher before they finally banish her altogether. After giving herbaby up for adoption, Hall wanders recklessly through the MiddleEast, where she survives by selling her possessions and finally herblood. She returns to New England and stitches together a life thatencircles her silenced and invisible grief. When he is twenty-one,her lost son finds her. Hall learns that he grew up in grittypoverty with an abusive father—in her own father's hometown. Theirreunion is tender, turbulent, and ultimately redemptive. Hall'sparents never ask for her forgiveness, yet as they age, she offersthem her love. What sets Without a Map apart is the way in whichloss and betrayal evolve into compassion, and compassion intowisdom.

The author tells the story as told to him of Anne Hobbs, awoman who went to Alaska in the 1920's to teach, but who hadtrouble due to her kindness to the Indians there.

THE LIBRARY OF CONTEMPORARY THOUGHT is a groundbreaking serieswhere America's finest writers and most brilliant minds tackletoday's most provocative, fascinating, and relevant issues.Striking and daring, creative and important, these original voiceson matters political, social, economic, and cultural, willenlighten, comfort, entertain, enrage, and ignite healthy debateacross the country.

At sixteen, Edward Beauclerk Maurice impulsively signed upwith the Hudson's Bay Company -- the company of GentlemanAdventurers -- and ended up at an isolated trading post in theCanadian Arctic, where there was no communication with the outsideworld and only one ship arrived each year. But he was not alone.The Inuit people who traded there taught him how to track polarbears, build igloos, and survive ferocious winter storms. Helearned their language and became completely immersed in theirculture, earning the name Issumatak, meaning “he who thinks.” In The Last Gentleman Adventurer, Edward Beauclerk Mauricerelates his story of coming of age in the Arctic and transports thereader to a time and a way of life now lost forever.

“Buried as a g while tha whole world remembers me” –Tupac Shakur, from “Until the End ofTime” Tupac Shakur was larger than life. A giftedrapper, actor, and poet, he was fearless, prolific, andcontroversial–and often said that he never expected to live pastthe age of thirty. He was right. On September 13, 1996, he died ofgunshot wounds at age twenty-five. But even ten years after Tupac’stragic passing, the impact of his life and talent continues toflourish. Lauded as one of the greatest hip-hop artists of alltime, Tupac has sold more than sixty-seven million recordsworldwide, making him the top-selling rapper ever. How Long Will They Mourn Me? celebrates Tupac’sunforgettable life–his rise to fame; his tumultuous dark sidemarked by sex, drugs, and violence; and the indelible legacy heleft behind. Although Tupac’s murder remains unsolved, the spiritof this legendary artist is far from forgotten. How long will wemourn him? Fans worldwide will grieve his untimely death for a longti

Anna Quindlen first visited London from a chair in hersuburban Philadelphia home—in one of her beloved childhood mysterynovels. She has been back to London countless times since, throughthe pages of books and in person, and now, in Imagined London, shetakes her own readers on a tour of this greatest of literarycities. While New York, Paris, and Dublin are also vividly portrayed infiction, it is London, Quindlen argues, that has always been thestar, both because of the primacy of English literature and thespecificity of city de*ions. She bases her view of the city onher own detailed literary map, tracking the footsteps of herfavorite characters: the places where Evelyn Waugh's bright youngthings danced until dawn, or where Lydia Bennett eloped with thedastardly Wickham. In Imagined London, Quindlen walks through the city, movingwithin blocks from the great books of the 19th century to thedetective novels of the 20th to the new modernist tradition of the21st. With wit and cha

Fidel Castro is perhaps the most charismatic and controversialhead of state in modern times. A dictatorial pariah to some, he hasbecome a hero and inspiration for many of the world's poor,defiantly charting an independent and revolutionary path for Cubaover nearly half a century. Numerous attempts have been made to get Castro to tell his ownstory. But only now, in the twilight of his years, has he beenprepared to set out the details of his remarkable biography for theworld to read. This book is nothing less than his living testament.As he told reporters, his desire to finish checking its text wasthe one thing that kept him going through his recent illness. Hepresented a copy of the book in its Spanish edition to his compadrePresident Hugo Chávez of Venezuela. In these pages, Castro narrates a compelling chronicle thatspans the harshness of his elementary school teachers; the earlyfailures of the revolution; his intense comradeship with CheGuevara and their astonishing, against-all-odds victory over thedic

“Powerful. . . . A challenging, disturbing portrait of ademocratic hero, and an equally challenging case study of thedemocratic system.” —The New York Times “Rich in insight into Jackson’s personality. . . . Burstein makesfair on his promise to look dispassionately at this most passionateof presidents. . . . A very readable, insightful analysis into thecharacter and evolution of the American republic.” —PlainDealer “Excellent. . . . A must-read for anyone interested in thepresidency or early American history.” –Flint Journal “A useful, persuasively critical account of the development ofJackson’s self-image as an honorable patriarch and champion ofrighteous government..” —The Washington Post Book World “Impressive. . . . Persuasive. . . . Argues that the times shapedJackson and thrust him into the White House as the first ‘commoner’elected president because he so personified the young nation’sbold, brash spirit and s