Polk's Folly is William Polk's captivating investigation ofhis impressive family tree and of the broader American tale itnarrates. Growing up in Texas in the late 1930s, listening to hisgrandmother's memories of her childhood amidst the Civil War, Polkbecame fascinated by tales of his family's engagement in monumentalmoments of our nation's history. Beginning when Robert Pollok fledIreland in the 1680s, Polk's saga includes an Indian trader, anearly drafter of the Declaration of Independence, one of ourgreatest presidents, heroes and rascals on both sides of the CivilWar, Indian fighters, a World War I diplomat, and Polk's ownbrother, a journalist who reported on the Nuremberg Trials. Full ofstunning detail and based on primary historical documents, Polk'sFolly is a grand American chronicle that allows history to includethe lives that made it happen.

In this lively and engaging history, Stephen Puleo tells thestory of the Boston Italians from their earliest years, when alargely illiterate and impoverished people in a strange landrecreated the bonds of village and region in the cramped quartersof the North End. Focusing on this first and crucial Italianenclave in Boston, Puleo describes the experience of Italianimmigrants as they battled poverty, illiteracy, and prejudice;explains their transformation into Italian Americans during theDepression and World War II; and chronicles their rich history inBoston up to the present day.

In the spring of 2003, acclaimed journalist Anne Nivat set offfrom Tajikistan on a six-month journey through the aftermath of theAmerican invasion and occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq. Nivatfelt compelled to meet and write about the lives of everydaypeople, whom she allows to speak in their own voices, in their ownwords--words of hope, sadness, anger, and, above all, theuncertainty that fills their everyday lives. Her new Preface forthe paperback edition looks at the situation in Iraq today.

Here in a single volume are the documents, speeches and lettersthat have forged American history, accompanied by interpretationsof their significance by noted historian and broadcaster Richard D.Heffner. The book includes the complete text of the Declaration ofIndependence, the complete Constitution of the United States, theEmancipation Proclamation, FDR's ""Four Freedoms"" speech, JFK'sinaugural address, Martin Luther King's ""I Have a Dream"" speech,documents relating to 9/11 and Barack Obama's inauguraladdress.

This is the story of a small group of soldiers from the 101stAirborne Division’s fabled 502nd Infantry Regiment—a unit known as“the Black Heart Brigade.” Deployed in late 2005 to Iraq’sso-called Triangle of Death, a veritable meat grinder just south ofBaghdad, the Black Hearts found themselves in arguably thecountry’s most dangerous location at its most dangerous time. Hit by near-daily mortars, gunfire, and roadside bomb attacks,suffering from a particularly heavy death toll, and enduring achronic breakdown in leadership, members of one Black Heartplatoon—1st Platoon, Bravo Company, 1st Battalion—descended, overtheir year-long tour of duty, into a tailspin of poor discipline,substance abuse, and brutality. Four 1st Platoon soldiers would perpetrate one of the mostheinous war crimes U.S. forces have committed during the IraqWar—the rape of a fourteen-year-old Iraqi girl and the cold-bloodedexecution of her and her family. Three other 1st Platoon soldierswould be overrun at