Unforgettable Books
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Peacemaker: U Thant and the Forgotten Quest for a Just World: U Thant and the Forgotten Quest for a Just World
In the early 1960s, a peaceful world was an imaginable goal. The still-young United Nations was widely respected and regarded as humankind's best hope for resolving global conflicts. African and Asian nations, having recently won their freedom from colonial domination, sought dignity and influence on the world stage. At the helm of their international efforts was U Thant, a practicing Buddhist from a remote town in Burma who, as the UN's first non-Western secretary-general, became the Cold War era's preeminent ambassador of peace.From the moment of his predecessor's mysterious death in 1961, Thant faced a deluge of violent conflicts in Congo, Yemen, Cyprus, and Nigeria, as well as one between India and Pakistan, that threatened larger conflagrations.Crucially, during the Cuban Missile Crisis, he played an indispensable role--virtually hidden until now--in defusing tensions and helping both superpowers find a way back from nuclear confrontation. For years Thant also challenged Washington over its war in Vietnam, identifying paths to peace that could have saved the lives of millions.Drawing on newly declassified documents, Thant's grandson, historian Thant Myint-U, gives a riveting account of how his grandfather's gentle yet willful disposition shaped his determination to avoid a third world war, give voice to the newly decolonized world, create a fairer international economy, and safeguard the environment. Rather than a vestige of an idealistic past, U Thant's fight for peace is central to a fresh understanding of our world today.
$35.00
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Beyond the Wall: A History of East Germany: A History of East Germany
AN INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER - From the ashes of the Second World War to the fall of the Berlin Wall, "an expansive and generous history" of East Germany (New Republic) In 1990, a country disappeared. When the Iron Curtain fell, East Germany ceased to be. For over forty years, from the ruin of the Second World War to the cusp of a new millennium, the German Democratic Republic presented a radically different Germany than what had come before and what exists today. Socialist solidarity, secret police, central planning, barbed wire: this was a Germany forged on the fault lines of ideology and geopolitics. In Beyond the Wall, acclaimed historian Katja Hoyer sets aside the usual Cold War caricatures of the GDR to offer a kaleidoscopic new vision of this vanished country, revealing the rich political, social, and cultural landscape that existed amid oppression and hardship. Drawing on a vast array of never-before-seen interviews and documents, this is the definitive history of the other Germany, beyond the Wall.
$21.99
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Bacardi and the Long Fight for Cuba: The Biography of a Cause: The Biography of a Cause
In this widely hailed book, NPR correspondent Tom Gjelten fuses the story of the Bacardi family and their famous rum business with Cuba's tumultuous experience over the last 150 years to produce a deeply entertaining historical narrative. The company Facundo Bacardi launched in Cuba in 1862 brought worldwide fame to the island, and in the decades that followed his Bacardi descendants participated in every aspect of Cuban life. With his intimate account of their struggles and adventures across five generations, Gjelten brings to life the larger story of Cuba's fight for freedom, its tortured relationship with America, the rise of Fidel Castro, and the violent division of the Cuban nation.
$20.00
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Avenue of Spies: A True Story of Terror, Espionage, and One American Family's Heroic Resistance in Nazi-Occupied Paris: A True Story of Terror, Espionage, and One American Family's Heroic Resistance in Nazi-Occupied Paris
The best-selling author of The Liberator brings to life the incredible true story of an American doctor in Paris, and his heroic espionage efforts during World War II. The leafy Avenue Foch, one of the most exclusive residential streets in Nazi-occupied France, was Paris's hotbed of daring spies, murderous secret police, amoral informers, and Vichy collaborators. So when American physician Sumner Jackson, who lived with his wife and young son Phillip at Number 11, found himself drawn into the Liberation network of the French resistance, he knew the stakes were impossibly high. Just down the road at Number 31 was the "mad sadist" Theodor Dannecker, an Eichmann protégé charged with deporting French Jews to concentration camps. And Number 84 housed the Parisian headquarters of the Gestapo, run by the most effective spy hunter in Nazi Germany. From his office at the American Hospital, itself an epicenter of Allied and Axis intrigue, Jackson smuggled fallen Allied fighter pilots safely out of France, a job complicated by the hospital director's close ties to collaborationist Vichy. After witnessing the brutal round-up of his Jewish friends, Jackson invited Liberation to officially operate out of his home at Number 11--but the noose soon began to tighten. When his secret life was discovered by his Nazi neighbors, he and his family were forced to undertake a journey into the dark heart of the war-torn continent from which there was little chance of return. Drawing upon a wealth of primary source material and extensive interviews with Phillip Jackson, Alex Kershaw recreates the City of Light during its darkest days. The untold story of the Jackson family anchors the suspenseful narrative, and Kershaw dazzles readers with the vivid immediacy of the best spy thrillers. Awash with the tense atmosphere of World War II's Europe, Avenue of Spies introduces us to the brave doctor who risked everything to defy Hitler.
$19.00
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The Predicament: A Gabriel Dax Novel: A Gabriel Dax Novel
"Boyd is one of my favorite authors."--Kate AtkinsonFrom the internationally bestselling author, a thrilling novel starring the travel writer-turned-reluctant spy Gabriel Dax, who finds himself implicated in a dangerous conspiracy with global consequences1963, Guatemala. The country is in turmoil, with a presidential election looming and a charismatic, left-wing ex-priest and trade union leader predicted to win. United Fruits, a giant American corporation responsible for a large percentage of the country's GNP, meanwhile, is not pleased by this prospect. Neither is the CIA. Amid the uncertainty, Gabriel Dax arrives on orders from his MI6 handler Faith Green, who has tasked him with assessing the fallout from the election.Upon arrival, Gabriel meets Frank Sartorius, the local CIA agent. Despite Sartorius's genial manner, Gabriel suspects something untrustworthy brewing under the surface. Soon, a political assassination with suspicions of Mafia involvement leads to riots, and Dax escapes to Europe, thinking he will finally return to his normal life as a travel writer. But when Green compels him to investigate some shady characters in West Berlin, it becomes clear that an even greater danger is afoot as the magnetic young President Kennedy prepares to arrive for a state visit. A gripping novel of politics and spy craft with dramatic twists and turns, The Predicament shows Boyd to be one of our most masterful contemporary storytellers.
$28.00
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Brazzaville Beach
"Utterly engaging....A novel of ideas, of big themes....William Boyd is a champion storyteller." - New York Times Book Review William Boyd's classic Brazzaville Beach has been called as a "bold seamless blend of philosophy and suspense... [that] nevertheless remains accessible to general readers on a level of pure entertainment." (Boston Globe). Released to coincide with Boyd's latest novel, Ordinary Thunderstorms, Brazzaville Beach tells the story of a British primate-researcher who relocates to war-torn Africa in the wake of her husband's tragic descent into mental illness. Intense, exhilarating, and engrossing, Brazzaville Beach is "rich in action and thought," and William Boyd "a writer who allows the scope of his work to expand to the point of bursting." (Los Angeles Times Book Review)
$14.99
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Wish You Well
Following a family tragedy, siblings Lou and Oz must leave New York and adjust to life in the Virginia mountains--but just as the farm begins to feel like home, they'll have to defend it from a dark threat in this New York Times bestselling coming-of-age story. Precocious twelve-year-old Louisa Mae Cardinal lives in the hectic New York City of 1940 with her family. Then tragedy strikes--and Lou and her younger brother, Oz, must go with their invalid mother to live on their great-grandmother's farm in the Virginia mountains. Suddenly Lou finds herself growing up in a new landscape, making her first true friend, and experiencing adventures tragic, comic, and audacious. When a dark, destructive force encroaches on her new home, her struggle will play out in a crowded Virginia courtroom...and determine the future of two children, an entire town, and the mountains they love.
$19.99
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The Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings Boxed Set: The Hobbit / The Fellowship of the Ring / The Two Towers / The Return of the King: The Hobbit / The Fellowship of the Ring / The Two Towers / The Return of the King
Immerse yourself in J.R.R. Tolkien's epic masterworks The Hobbit and the three volumes of The Lord of the Rings (The Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Towers, and The Return of the King) with this stunning four-volume, deluxe paperback boxed set.In The Hobbit, Bilbo Baggins is whisked away from his comfortable, unambitious life in Hobbiton by the wizard Gandalf and a company of dwarves. He finds himself caught up in a plot to raid the treasure hoard of Smaug the Magnificent, a large and very dangerous dragon. The Lord of the Rings tells of the great quest undertaken by Frodo Baggins and the Fellowship of the Ring: Gandalf the wizard; the hobbits Merry, Pippin, and Sam; Gimli the dwarf; Legolas the elf; Boromir of Gondor; and a tall, mysterious stranger called Strider. Tolkien's three volume masterpiece is at once a classic myth and a modern fairy tale--a story of high and heroic adventure set in the unforgettable landscape of Middle-earth.
$78.00
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The Briar Club
"Quinn evocatively balances the outward cheerfulness of the 1950s with historical observations exploring racism, misogyny, homophobia and political persecution in this sharply drawn, gripping novel." - People MagazineThe New York Times bestselling author of The Diamond Eye and The Rose Code returns with a haunting and powerful work of historical fiction, a story of female friendships and secrets in a Washington, DC, boardinghouse during the McCarthy era.In this gripping women's fiction novel, everyone keeps to themselves at Briarwood House, a down-at-the-heels all-female boardinghouse in the heart of the nation's capital where secrets hide behind white picket fences. But when the lovely, mysterious widow Grace March moves into the attic room, she draws her oddball collection of neighbors into unlikely friendship: poised English beauty Fliss, whose facade of perfect wife and mother covers gaping inner wounds; policeman's daughter Nora, who finds herself entangled with a shadowy gangster; frustrated baseball star Beatrice, whose career has come to an end along with the women's baseball league of WWII; and poisonous, gung-ho Arlene, who has thrown herself into McCarthy's Red Scare.Grace's weekly attic-room dinner parties and window-brewed sun tea become a healing balm on all their lives, but she hides a terrible secret of her own. When a shocking act of violence tears the house apart, the Briar Club women must decide once and for all: who is the true enemy in their midst?Capturing the paranoia of the McCarthy era and evoking the changing roles for women in postwar America, The Briar Club is an intimate and thrilling historical mystery of secrets and loyalty put to the test.A beautiful, foil cover, first edition.
$30.00
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Gabriel's Moon: A Gabriel Dax Novel: A Gabriel Dax Novel
From the internationally bestselling author beloved by readers everywhere, William Boyd offers his most exhilarating novel yet, following a reluctant spy drawn into the shadows of espionage and obsessionGabriel Dax is a young man haunted by the memories of a fire that took his mother's life. Every night, when sleep finally comes, he dreams about his childhood home in flames. His days are spent on the move as an acclaimed travel writer, capturing the changing landscapes of Europe in the grip of the Cold War. When he is offered the chance to interview Patrice Lumumba, newly elected president of the People's Republic of the Congo, he finds himself drawn into a web of duplicities and betrayals.Falling under the spell of Faith Green, an enigmatic and ruthlessly efficient MI6 handler, he becomes "her spy," unable to resist her demands. But amid the peril, paranoia, and passion consuming Gabriel's new covert life, there will also be revelations closer to home that may change his own story, and the fates of those around him.Traveling from the vibrant streets of sixties London to the sun-soaked cobbles of Cadiz and the frosty squares of Warsaw, Gabriel's Moon is a remarkable accomplishment from one of our greatest storytellers.
$28.00
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Hondschoote (1896)
Hondschoote (1896) est un livre �����crit par Arthur Chuquet. Il s'agit d'une �����tude historique d�����taill�����e de la bataille de Hondschoote, qui a eu lieu en 1793 pendant la R�����volution fran�����aise. Le livre explore les �����v�����nements qui ont conduit ������ la bataille, les tactiques et les strat�����gies utilis�����es par les forces fran�����aises et alli�����es, ainsi que les cons�����quences de la bataille pour les deux camps. Chuquet utilise des sources primaires et des t�����moignages de premi�����re main pour �����clairer les d�����tails de la bataille et fournir une analyse approfondie de son importance historique. Le livre est une ressource pr�����cieuse pour les historiens et les �����tudiants int�����ress�����s par la R�����volution fran�����aise et les conflits militaires du 18�����me si�����cle.This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of the old original and may contain some imperfections such as library marks and notations. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment for protecting, preserving, and promoting the world's literature in affordable, high quality, modern editions, that are true to their original work.
$48.95
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The History Of C Battery: Late C Battery, A Brigade, Formerly C Troop, Royal Horse Artillery (1893): Late C Battery, A Brigade, Formerly C Troop, Royal Horse Artillery (1893)
The History of C Battery: Late C Battery, A Brigade, Formerly C Troop, Royal Horse Artillery (1893) is a historical book written by Francis Arthur Whinyates. The book provides a comprehensive account of the history of C Battery, which was previously known as C Troop, Royal Horse Artillery. The author covers the period from the formation of the Battery in 1793 to its reorganization as a Brigade in 1893.The book is divided into several chapters, each of which covers a specific period in the Battery's history. The author provides detailed information about the Battery's role in various military campaigns, including the Napoleonic Wars, the Crimean War, and the Boer War. He also discusses the Battery's organization, equipment, and training.Throughout the book, the author includes numerous anecdotes and personal accounts from members of the Battery, which provide a unique insight into the experiences of soldiers during this period. The book also includes maps, illustrations, and photographs, which help to bring the history of the Battery to life.Overall, The History of C Battery: Late C Battery, A Brigade, Formerly C Troop, Royal Horse Artillery (1893) is a fascinating and informative book that will appeal to anyone with an interest in military history, particularly the history of the Royal Horse Artillery.This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of the old original and may contain some imperfections such as library marks and notations. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment for protecting, preserving, and promoting the world's literature in affordable, high quality, modern editions, that are true to their original work.
$49.95
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