A fascinating biography of the man who helped launch the Russian Revolution, which uses the personal - including Lenin's key relationships with the women in his life - to shed light on the political.Since the birth of Soviet Russia, Vladimir Lenin has been viewed as a controversial figure, both revered and reviled for his rigid political ideals. Still, he continues to fascinate as a man who made history, and who created the first Communist state, a model that would later be imitated by nearly half the countries in the world. Drawing on new research, including the diaries, memoirs, and personal letters of both Lenin and his friends, Victor Sebestyen's unique biography - the first in English in nearly two decades - is not only a political examination of one of the most important historical figures of the twentieth century, but a portrait of Lenin the man. Unexpectedly, Lenin was someone who loved nature, hunting, and fishing, and could identify hundreds of species of plants; a despotic ruler whose closest ties and friendships were with women. The long-suppressed story of the complex love triangle Lenin had with his wife, Nadezhda Krupskaya, and his mistress and comrade, Inessa Armand, reveals a different character to the coldly one-dimensional figure of the legend.Sebestyen also reveals Lenin as a ruthless and single-minded despot and a "product of his time and place: a violent, tyrannical and corrupt Russia." He seized power in a coup, promised a revolution, a socialist utopia for the people, offered simple solutions to complex issues and constantly lied; in fact, what he created was more "a mirror image of the Romanov autocracy." He authorized the deaths of thousands of people, and created a system based on the idea that political terror against opponents was justified for the greater ideal. One of his old comrades who had once admired him said he "desired the good... but created evil." And that would include his invention of Stalin, who would take Lenin's system of the gulag and the secret police to new heights. Bringing Lenin to life for the first time as a complex human being, Sebestyen casts a new light on the Russian Revolution, one of the great turning points of modern history.
Pantheon
|
9781101871638
|
Hardcover
Slaying the Dragon
By Riggs, Ben
Role-playing game historian Ben Riggs unveils the secret history of TSR -- the company that unleashed imaginations with Dungeons & Dragons, was driven into ruin by disastrous management decisions, and then saved by their bitterest rival.Co-created by wargame enthusiasts Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson, the original Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game released by TSR (Tactical Studies Rules) in 1974 created a radical new medium: the role-playing game. For the next two decades, TSR rocketed to success, producing multiple editions of D&D, numerous settings for the game, magazines, video games, New York Times bestselling novels by Margaret Weis, Tracy Hickman, and R. A. Salvatore, and even a TV show! But by 1997, a series of ruinous choices and failed projects brought TSR to the edge of doom -- only to be saved by their fiercest competitor, Wizards of the Coast, the company behind the collectible card game Magic: The Gathering.
St. Martin's Press
|
9781250278043
|
Hardcover
The Ultimate Evil
By Terry, Maury
On August 10, 1977, the NYPD arrested David Berkowitz for the Son of Sam murders that had terrorized New York City for over a year. Berkowitz confessed to shooting sixteen people and killing six with a .44 caliber Bulldog revolver, and the case was officially closed. Journalist Maury Terry was suspicious of Berkowitz's confession. Spurred by conflicting witness descriptions of the killer and by the Queens District Attorney, who was convinced Berkowitz didn't act alone, Terry spent decades researching, gathering evidence, and interviewing those involved in the case. He released his initial findings in the original publication of The Ultimate Evil in 1987, in which he presented his theory that Berkowitz was a member of the Process Church of the Final Judgment, a cult responsible for the Son of Sam murders, as well as other ritual murders across the country.
Quirk Books
|
9781683692843
|
Paperback
Texas Rising
By Moore, Stephen L.
The official nonfiction companion to HISTORY's dramatic series Texas Rising (created by the same team that made the ratings record-breaker Hatfields & McCoys): a thrilling new narrative history of the Texas Revolution and the rise of the legendary Texas Rangers who patrolled the violent western frontierMarch 1836: The Republic of Texas, just weeks old, is already near collapse. William Barret Travis and his brave defenders of the Alamo in San Antonio have been slaughtered. Hundreds more Texan soldiers have surrendered at Goliad, only to be marched outside the fortress and executed by order of the ruthless Mexican general Santa Anna, a dictator denying Texans their freedom and liberty.General Sam Houston - a hard-drinking, hot-tempered opportunist - remains in command of a small band of volunteer colonists, mercenaries, and the newly organized Texas Rangers.
William Morrow; First Edition edition
|
9780062394309
|
Hardcover
And Soon I Heard a Roaring Wind
By Streever, Bill
A thrilling exploration of the science and history of wind from the bestselling author of Cold.Scientist and bestselling nature writer Bill Streever goes to any extreme to explore wind--the winds that built empires, the storms that wreck them--by traveling right through it. Narrating from a fifty-year-old sailboat, Streever leads readers through the world's first forecasts, Chaos Theory, and a future affected by climate change. Along the way, he shares stories of wind-riding spiders, wind-sculpted landscapes, wind-generated power, wind-tossed airplanes, and the uncomfortable interactions between wind and wars, drawing from natural science, history, business, travel, as well as from his own travels. AND SOON I HEARD A ROARING WIND is an effortless personal narrative featuring the keen observations, scientific rigor, and whimsy that readers love. You'll never see a breeze in the same light again.
Little Brown and Company
|
9780316410601
|
Print book
Connected
By Cassedy, Steven
Between the end of the nineteenth century and the beginning of the twentieth, Americans underwent a dramatic transformation in self-conception: having formerly lived as individuals or members of small communities, they now found themselves living in networks, which arose out of scientific and technological innovations. There were transportation and communication networks. There was the network of the globalized marketplace, which brought into the American home exotic goods previously affordable to only a few. There was the network of standard time, which bound together all but the most rural Americans. There was the public health movement, which joined individuals to their fellow citizens by making everyone responsible for the health of everyone else.
Stanford University Press
|
9780804763721
|
Book
The Girls Who Fought Crime
By Eder, Mari
For fans of Margot Lee Shetterley and Liza Mundy comes an inspiring feminist tale of a woman who dedicated her entire life to the New York Police Department, upending the patriarchy and the status quo for women working in public service.Corsets, Crime, and the Woman to Change Modern Policing ForeverMary "Mae" Foley was a force to be reckoned with. On one hip she held her makeup compact, on the other, her NYPD badge. When women were fighting for the vote, Mae was fighting crime in the heart of New York City - taking down rapists, boot-leggers, Nazis, and serial killers. One of the first women to be sworn into the police force, Mae not only fought crime in the city that never sleeps, but also did something much bigger - challenged the patriarchal systems that continually tried to shut her and other women down.
Sourcebooks
|
9781728271798
|
Hardcover
Lioness
By Klagsbrun, Francine
The definitive biography of Golda Meir: the iron-willed leader, chain-smoking political operative, and tea-and-cake-serving grandmother who became the fourth prime minister of Israel and one of the most notable women of our time. Golda Meir was a world figure unlike any other. Born in czarist Russia in 1898, she immigrated to America in 1906 and grew up in Milwaukee, where from her earliest years she displayed the political consciousness and organizational skills that would eventually catapult her into the inner circles of Israel's founding generation. Moving to mandatory Palestine in 1921 with her husband, the passionate socialist joined a kibbutz but soon left and was hired at a public works office by the man who would become the great love of her life. A series of public service jobs brought her to the attention of David Ben-Gurion, and her political career took off. Fund-raising in America in 1948, secretly meeting in Amman with King Abdullah right before Israel's declaration of independence, mobbed by thousands of Jews in a Moscow synagogue in 1948 as Israel's first representative to the USSR, serving as minister of labor and foreign minister in the 1950s and 1960s, Golda brought fiery oratory, plainspoken appeals, and shrewd deal-making to the cause to which she had dedicated her life - the welfare and security of the State of Israel and its inhabitants. As prime minister Golda negotiated arms agreements with Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger, agonized over the mixed signals being sent by newly installed Egyptian president Anwar Sadat, and had dozens of clandestine meetings with Jordan's King Hussein in the unsuccessful pursuit of a land-for-peace agreement with Israel's neighbors. But her time in office ended in tragedy, when Israel was caught off guard by Egypt and Syria's surprise attack on Yom Kippur in 1973. Resigning in the war's aftermath, Golda spent her final years keeping a hand in national affairs and bemusedly enjoying international acclaim. Francine Klagsbrun's superbly researched and masterly recounted story of Israel's founding mother gives us a Golda for the ages.
Schocken
|
9780805242379
|
Hardcover
The Handy American History Answer Book
By Hudson, David L.
Early civilizations, Native Americans, the English colonies, slavery, the American Revolution, the Declaration of Independence, and the Bill of Rights begin the journey and lay the foundation for the United States of today. The Handy American History Answer Book takes a walk through the economic, political, and social forces, as well as the military conflicts that created, changed, and built the United States. It explains the impact of the biggest events, the wars, the presidents, lesser-known personalities and figures, sports, music, and much more. This handy primer is a captivating, concise, and convenient history of America and Americans.From Washington to the microchip, Columbus to modern terrorist threats, the Anasazi to the iPhone, The Handy American History Answer Book traces the development of the nation, including the impact of the Civil War, the discovery of gold in California, the inventions, the political and economic crises, and the technology transforming modern culture today.
Visible Ink Pr
|
9781578594719
|
Paperback
Three Days at the Brink
By Baier, Bret
From the #1 bestselling author of Three Days in Moscow and anchor of Fox News Channel's Special Report with Bret Baier, a gripping history of the secret meeting that set the stage for victory in World War II - the now-forgotten 1943 Tehran Conference, where Franklin D. Roosevelt, Winston Churchill, and Joseph Stalin plotted the war's endgame, including the D-Day invasion.November 1943: World War II teetered in the balance. The Nazis controlled nearly all of the European continent. Japan dominated the Pacific. Allied successes at Sicily and Guadalcanal had gained modest ground but at an extraordinary cost. On the Eastern Front, the Soviets had already lost millions of lives.That same month in Tehran, with the fate of the world in question, the "Big Three" - Franklin D. Roosevelt, Winston Churchill, and Joseph Stalin - secretly met for the first time to chart a strategy for defeating Hitler. Over three days, this trio - strange bedfellows united by their mutual responsibility as heads of the Allied powers - made essential decisions that would direct the final years of the war and its aftermath. Meanwhile, looming over the covert meeting was the possible threat of a Nazi assassination plot nicknamed "Operation Long Jump," heightening the already dramatic stakes.Before they left Tehran, the three leaders agreed to open a second front in the West, spearheaded by an invasion of France at Normandy the following June. They also discussed what might come after the war, including dividing Germany and establishing the United Nations - plans that laid the groundwork for the postwar world order and the Cold War.Bret Baier's new epic history Three Days at the Brink centers on these crucial days in Tehran, the medieval Persian city on the edge of the desert. Baier makes clear the importance of Roosevelt, who stood apart as the sole leader of a democracy, recognizing him as the lead strategist for the globe's future - the one man who could ultimately allow or deny the others their place in history. With new details found in rarely seen transcripts, oral histories, and declassified State Department and presidential documents from the FDR Library, Baier illuminates the complex character of Roosevelt, revealing a man who grew into his role and accepted the greatest calling of the last century.Weaving a fresh narrative of FDR's rise as a war president and his world-altering relationships with Churchill and Stalin during the decisive turning point in World War II, Baier has produced the biggest book yet in his acclaimed Three Days series.Three Days at the Brink includes approximately twenty-five black-and-white illustrations.
Lenin
By Sebestyen, Victor
A fascinating biography of the man who helped launch the Russian Revolution, which uses the personal - including Lenin's key relationships with the women in his life - to shed light on the political.Since the birth of Soviet Russia, Vladimir Lenin has been viewed as a controversial figure, both revered and reviled for his rigid political ideals. Still, he continues to fascinate as a man who made history, and who created the first Communist state, a model that would later be imitated by nearly half the countries in the world. Drawing on new research, including the diaries, memoirs, and personal letters of both Lenin and his friends, Victor Sebestyen's unique biography - the first in English in nearly two decades - is not only a political examination of one of the most important historical figures of the twentieth century, but a portrait of Lenin the man. Unexpectedly, Lenin was someone who loved nature, hunting, and fishing, and could identify hundreds of species of plants; a despotic ruler whose closest ties and friendships were with women. The long-suppressed story of the complex love triangle Lenin had with his wife, Nadezhda Krupskaya, and his mistress and comrade, Inessa Armand, reveals a different character to the coldly one-dimensional figure of the legend.Sebestyen also reveals Lenin as a ruthless and single-minded despot and a "product of his time and place: a violent, tyrannical and corrupt Russia." He seized power in a coup, promised a revolution, a socialist utopia for the people, offered simple solutions to complex issues and constantly lied; in fact, what he created was more "a mirror image of the Romanov autocracy." He authorized the deaths of thousands of people, and created a system based on the idea that political terror against opponents was justified for the greater ideal. One of his old comrades who had once admired him said he "desired the good... but created evil." And that would include his invention of Stalin, who would take Lenin's system of the gulag and the secret police to new heights. Bringing Lenin to life for the first time as a complex human being, Sebestyen casts a new light on the Russian Revolution, one of the great turning points of modern history.
Slaying the Dragon
By Riggs, Ben
Role-playing game historian Ben Riggs unveils the secret history of TSR -- the company that unleashed imaginations with Dungeons & Dragons, was driven into ruin by disastrous management decisions, and then saved by their bitterest rival.Co-created by wargame enthusiasts Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson, the original Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game released by TSR (Tactical Studies Rules) in 1974 created a radical new medium: the role-playing game. For the next two decades, TSR rocketed to success, producing multiple editions of D&D, numerous settings for the game, magazines, video games, New York Times bestselling novels by Margaret Weis, Tracy Hickman, and R. A. Salvatore, and even a TV show! But by 1997, a series of ruinous choices and failed projects brought TSR to the edge of doom -- only to be saved by their fiercest competitor, Wizards of the Coast, the company behind the collectible card game Magic: The Gathering.
The Ultimate Evil
By Terry, Maury
On August 10, 1977, the NYPD arrested David Berkowitz for the Son of Sam murders that had terrorized New York City for over a year. Berkowitz confessed to shooting sixteen people and killing six with a .44 caliber Bulldog revolver, and the case was officially closed. Journalist Maury Terry was suspicious of Berkowitz's confession. Spurred by conflicting witness descriptions of the killer and by the Queens District Attorney, who was convinced Berkowitz didn't act alone, Terry spent decades researching, gathering evidence, and interviewing those involved in the case. He released his initial findings in the original publication of The Ultimate Evil in 1987, in which he presented his theory that Berkowitz was a member of the Process Church of the Final Judgment, a cult responsible for the Son of Sam murders, as well as other ritual murders across the country.
Texas Rising
By Moore, Stephen L.
The official nonfiction companion to HISTORY's dramatic series Texas Rising (created by the same team that made the ratings record-breaker Hatfields & McCoys): a thrilling new narrative history of the Texas Revolution and the rise of the legendary Texas Rangers who patrolled the violent western frontierMarch 1836: The Republic of Texas, just weeks old, is already near collapse. William Barret Travis and his brave defenders of the Alamo in San Antonio have been slaughtered. Hundreds more Texan soldiers have surrendered at Goliad, only to be marched outside the fortress and executed by order of the ruthless Mexican general Santa Anna, a dictator denying Texans their freedom and liberty.General Sam Houston - a hard-drinking, hot-tempered opportunist - remains in command of a small band of volunteer colonists, mercenaries, and the newly organized Texas Rangers.
And Soon I Heard a Roaring Wind
By Streever, Bill
A thrilling exploration of the science and history of wind from the bestselling author of Cold.Scientist and bestselling nature writer Bill Streever goes to any extreme to explore wind--the winds that built empires, the storms that wreck them--by traveling right through it. Narrating from a fifty-year-old sailboat, Streever leads readers through the world's first forecasts, Chaos Theory, and a future affected by climate change. Along the way, he shares stories of wind-riding spiders, wind-sculpted landscapes, wind-generated power, wind-tossed airplanes, and the uncomfortable interactions between wind and wars, drawing from natural science, history, business, travel, as well as from his own travels. AND SOON I HEARD A ROARING WIND is an effortless personal narrative featuring the keen observations, scientific rigor, and whimsy that readers love. You'll never see a breeze in the same light again.
Connected
By Cassedy, Steven
Between the end of the nineteenth century and the beginning of the twentieth, Americans underwent a dramatic transformation in self-conception: having formerly lived as individuals or members of small communities, they now found themselves living in networks, which arose out of scientific and technological innovations. There were transportation and communication networks. There was the network of the globalized marketplace, which brought into the American home exotic goods previously affordable to only a few. There was the network of standard time, which bound together all but the most rural Americans. There was the public health movement, which joined individuals to their fellow citizens by making everyone responsible for the health of everyone else.
The Girls Who Fought Crime
By Eder, Mari
For fans of Margot Lee Shetterley and Liza Mundy comes an inspiring feminist tale of a woman who dedicated her entire life to the New York Police Department, upending the patriarchy and the status quo for women working in public service.Corsets, Crime, and the Woman to Change Modern Policing ForeverMary "Mae" Foley was a force to be reckoned with. On one hip she held her makeup compact, on the other, her NYPD badge. When women were fighting for the vote, Mae was fighting crime in the heart of New York City - taking down rapists, boot-leggers, Nazis, and serial killers. One of the first women to be sworn into the police force, Mae not only fought crime in the city that never sleeps, but also did something much bigger - challenged the patriarchal systems that continually tried to shut her and other women down.
Lioness
By Klagsbrun, Francine
The definitive biography of Golda Meir: the iron-willed leader, chain-smoking political operative, and tea-and-cake-serving grandmother who became the fourth prime minister of Israel and one of the most notable women of our time. Golda Meir was a world figure unlike any other. Born in czarist Russia in 1898, she immigrated to America in 1906 and grew up in Milwaukee, where from her earliest years she displayed the political consciousness and organizational skills that would eventually catapult her into the inner circles of Israel's founding generation. Moving to mandatory Palestine in 1921 with her husband, the passionate socialist joined a kibbutz but soon left and was hired at a public works office by the man who would become the great love of her life. A series of public service jobs brought her to the attention of David Ben-Gurion, and her political career took off. Fund-raising in America in 1948, secretly meeting in Amman with King Abdullah right before Israel's declaration of independence, mobbed by thousands of Jews in a Moscow synagogue in 1948 as Israel's first representative to the USSR, serving as minister of labor and foreign minister in the 1950s and 1960s, Golda brought fiery oratory, plainspoken appeals, and shrewd deal-making to the cause to which she had dedicated her life - the welfare and security of the State of Israel and its inhabitants. As prime minister Golda negotiated arms agreements with Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger, agonized over the mixed signals being sent by newly installed Egyptian president Anwar Sadat, and had dozens of clandestine meetings with Jordan's King Hussein in the unsuccessful pursuit of a land-for-peace agreement with Israel's neighbors. But her time in office ended in tragedy, when Israel was caught off guard by Egypt and Syria's surprise attack on Yom Kippur in 1973. Resigning in the war's aftermath, Golda spent her final years keeping a hand in national affairs and bemusedly enjoying international acclaim. Francine Klagsbrun's superbly researched and masterly recounted story of Israel's founding mother gives us a Golda for the ages.
The Handy American History Answer Book
By Hudson, David L.
Early civilizations, Native Americans, the English colonies, slavery, the American Revolution, the Declaration of Independence, and the Bill of Rights begin the journey and lay the foundation for the United States of today. The Handy American History Answer Book takes a walk through the economic, political, and social forces, as well as the military conflicts that created, changed, and built the United States. It explains the impact of the biggest events, the wars, the presidents, lesser-known personalities and figures, sports, music, and much more. This handy primer is a captivating, concise, and convenient history of America and Americans.From Washington to the microchip, Columbus to modern terrorist threats, the Anasazi to the iPhone, The Handy American History Answer Book traces the development of the nation, including the impact of the Civil War, the discovery of gold in California, the inventions, the political and economic crises, and the technology transforming modern culture today.
Three Days at the Brink
By Baier, Bret
From the #1 bestselling author of Three Days in Moscow and anchor of Fox News Channel's Special Report with Bret Baier, a gripping history of the secret meeting that set the stage for victory in World War II - the now-forgotten 1943 Tehran Conference, where Franklin D. Roosevelt, Winston Churchill, and Joseph Stalin plotted the war's endgame, including the D-Day invasion.November 1943: World War II teetered in the balance. The Nazis controlled nearly all of the European continent. Japan dominated the Pacific. Allied successes at Sicily and Guadalcanal had gained modest ground but at an extraordinary cost. On the Eastern Front, the Soviets had already lost millions of lives.That same month in Tehran, with the fate of the world in question, the "Big Three" - Franklin D. Roosevelt, Winston Churchill, and Joseph Stalin - secretly met for the first time to chart a strategy for defeating Hitler. Over three days, this trio - strange bedfellows united by their mutual responsibility as heads of the Allied powers - made essential decisions that would direct the final years of the war and its aftermath. Meanwhile, looming over the covert meeting was the possible threat of a Nazi assassination plot nicknamed "Operation Long Jump," heightening the already dramatic stakes.Before they left Tehran, the three leaders agreed to open a second front in the West, spearheaded by an invasion of France at Normandy the following June. They also discussed what might come after the war, including dividing Germany and establishing the United Nations - plans that laid the groundwork for the postwar world order and the Cold War.Bret Baier's new epic history Three Days at the Brink centers on these crucial days in Tehran, the medieval Persian city on the edge of the desert. Baier makes clear the importance of Roosevelt, who stood apart as the sole leader of a democracy, recognizing him as the lead strategist for the globe's future - the one man who could ultimately allow or deny the others their place in history. With new details found in rarely seen transcripts, oral histories, and declassified State Department and presidential documents from the FDR Library, Baier illuminates the complex character of Roosevelt, revealing a man who grew into his role and accepted the greatest calling of the last century.Weaving a fresh narrative of FDR's rise as a war president and his world-altering relationships with Churchill and Stalin during the decisive turning point in World War II, Baier has produced the biggest book yet in his acclaimed Three Days series.Three Days at the Brink includes approximately twenty-five black-and-white illustrations.