An avid member of the Hitler Youth in 1940s Vienna, Johannes Betzler discovers his parents are hiding a Jewish girl named Elsa behind a false wall in their home. His initial horror turns to interest—t
Global bee populations have been rapidly declining for years, and it’s not just our honey supply that’s at stake: bees’ contribution to the pollination of various crops is essential to human survival.
Spring 1941 was a high point for the Axis war machine. Western Europe was conquered; southeastern Europe was falling, Great Britain on its heels; and Rommel’s Afrika Korps was freshly arrived to drive
After a ferocious early springtime storm, young Norwegian sailor Hans Lyngstrand is shipwrecked in the English Channel near the coastal Kent town of Dengate; he is one of few survivors. Soon after, as
Across the West, anti-immigration populists are tearing a path through the usual politics of left and right. Immigration is remaking Europe and North America: over half of American babies are non-whit
Susan Hill—the Man Booker Prize nominee and winner of the Whitbread, Somerset Maugham, and John Llewellyn Rhys awards—returns with a hair-raising new novel, the ninth book in one of the most acclaimed
The summer of 1958 was a nerve-racking time. Ever since the Soviet Union proved that it possessed an operational intercontinental ballistic missile with the launch of Sputnik, the world watched anxiou
Most people don’t expect wood to flavor their food beyond the barbecue, if at all, and gastronomists rarely discuss the significance that wood has on ultimate taste. But trees and wood have a far grea
Before Call of Duty, before World of Warcraft, before even Super Mario Bros., the video game industry exploded in the late 1970s with the advent of the video arcade. Leading the charge was Atari Inc.,
In his illuminating new book, Douglas McWilliams argues that inequality is largely driven not by a conspiracy of the rich, as Thomas Piketty suggests, but by technology and globalization tat have led
The first title in Arthur Ransome's classic series, Swallows and Amazons was originally published in 1930 and remains to this day an intrepid story of sailing, exploration, and friendship for children
Two minutes into boiling an egg, the white isn’t set and the yolk is totally raw. After five minutes however, the white is fully set and the yolk slightly runny—a perfectly spoonable, soft-boiled egg.
Sue Hubbard, whose peerless and enduring voice combines the emotional intensity of John Banville and the lyrical evocation of Anne Enright, delivers in Rainsongs an affecting story of transformation.
In 1535, England is hardly a wellspring of gender equality; it is a grim and oppressive age where women—even the privileged few who can read and write—have little independence. In The Butcher’s Daught
In his latest historical novel Ike and Kay, acclaimed author James MacManus brings to life an unbelievably true and controversial romance and the poignant characters and personalities that shaped the
In this vividly fashioned debut, Rachel Halliburton draws from the sordid details of a genuine scandal that deceived the British Royal Academy to deliver a stirring tale on the elusive goal of achievi
When First Lady Michelle Obama approached the podium at the 2016 Democratic National Convention, nobody could have predicted that her rousing and emotional “When they go low, we go high” speech would
In the arc of western history, Ancient Greece is at the apex, owing to its grandeur, its culture, and an intellectual renaissance to rival that of Europe. So important is Greece to history that figure
Boston, 1870. Photographer Edward Moody runs a booming business capturing the images of the spirits of the departed in his portraits. He lures grieving widows and mourning mothers into his studio with
In the sphere of modern international politics, few regions have been as hotly contested as Asia, an area that President Trump now defines as the Indo-Pacific. Across the 1.5 million square mile expan
Dr. Dudley Allen Buck was a brilliant young scientist on the cusp of fame and fortune when he died suddenly on May 21, 1959, at the age of 32. He was the star professor at MIT and had done stints with
There have been numerous books about the why, when, and where of slavery in America, but there is a dearth of material exposing what slavery was actually like. In The Great Stain, researcher Noel Rae
Our Woman in Havana chronicles the past several decades of U.S.-Cuba relations from the bird’s-eye view of State Department veteran and longtime Cuba hand Vicki Huddleston, our top diplomat on the gro
We live in the age of the individual. Every day, we’re bombarded with depictions of the beautiful, successful, slim, socially conscious, and extroverted individual that our culture has decided is the
Our systems are failing. Old models—for education, healthcare and government, food production, energy supply—are creaking under the weight of modern challenges. As the world's population heads towards
Few small towns in America have as colorful a history as that of Woodstock in Ulster County, New York. Set in a countryside of exceptional natural beauty, Woodstock from the first embodied the most en
The History of the Hudson River Valley, first published in two authoritative and handsome volumes, is now available as a deluxe boxed set to create the complete portrait of this fascinating and cultur
How do you apply game theory to select who should be on your Christmas shopping list? What equations should you use to decorate the Christmas tree? Will calculations show Santa is getting steadily thi
Richard Wagner’s Ring of the Nibelung is one of the greatest works of art created in modern times, and has fascinated both critics and devotees for over a century and a half. No recent study has exami
Since its first publication in 2008, The Secret History of the World has sold over 250,000 copies and established itself as the authoritative text on the subject of esoteric belief systems and secret
Scandinavia is the epitome of cool: we fill our homes with Nordic furniture; we envy their humane social welfare system and their healthy outdoor lifestyle; we glut ourselves on their crime fiction; e
A red fox stands poised at the edge of a woodchuck den, his ears perked for danger as two pudgy fox cubs frolic nearby. A mother black bear and her cubs hibernate beneath a felled tree. A barred owl s
Noir—as genre, style, movement, or sensibility—has its roots in the hardboiled detective fiction of the likes of Hammett and Chandler; the works of these authors were among the wave of post-WWII Holly
Called “thoroughly informative and approachable” by The New York Times, Vernon Benjamin’s The History of the Hudson River Valley: From Wilderness to the Civil War presented nearly 250 years of the Hud
In his illuminating and always original text, Gary Schwartz, an art historian with an abiding interest in the cultural context of art and its reception, provides concise interpretations of every work,
The MarinesA1 march up to Baghdad, ShermanA1s trail of destruction in Georgia, an army of Missouri volunteers trekking across the Great Plains to MexicoA Starting with the Iraq War, Tim Rood turns ba
Upon reading an early draft of Nathaniel Lande's novel, William Styron called it "a lovely confection of unforgettable characters, a gem of a story full of smiles." The Life and Times of Homer Sincer
The Wodehouse series continuesA-a sparkling story collection from the master of hijinks and social comedy These early stories, first published together in 1917, show Wodehouse perfecting his craft. C
Year of the Horse is a tale of Western America, with a difference. Yen Tzu-lu, a child of immigrants unwillingly pressed into unsavory service beside a gang of roughnecks bent on stealing a gold mine
P. G. Wodehouse is recognized as the greatest English comic writer of the twentieth century. His characters and settings have entered our language and our mythology. Launched on the twenty-fifth anni
