On the morning of April 2, 1865, Jefferson Davis, president of the Confederacy, received a telegram from General Robert E. Lee. There is no more time—the Yankees are coming, it warned. Shortly before midnight, Davis boarded a train...

Originally published in 1979, the first volume of the bestselling 'Gonzo Papers' is now back in print. The Great Shark Hunt is Dr. Hunter S. Thompson's largest and, arguably, most important work, covering Nixon to napalm, Las Vegas to...

Who says women don’t go to war? From Vikings and African queens to cross-dressing military doctors and WWII Russian fighter pilots, these are the stories of women for whom battle was not a metaphor. The woman warrior is alway...

This fascinating "what if" book will have you pondering how easily history could have been swayed differently.Ever wondered what would have happened if the Confederates had won the Civil War? This book not only says that it ...

For two hundred years after the French Revolution, the Republican tradition celebrated the execution of princes and aristocrats, defending the Terror that the Revolution inflicted upon on its enemies. But recent decades have brought a...

The Mongol queens of the thirteenth century ruled the largest empire the world has ever known. Yet sometime near the end of the century, censors cut a section from The Secret History of the Mongols, leaving a single tantalizing quote ...

In his first work of nonfiction, bestselling novelist James Webb tells the epic story of the Scots-Irish, a people whose lives and worldview were dictated by resistance, conflict, and struggle, and who, in turn, profoundly influenced ...

There are a few books that belong on the shelf of every Civil War buff: James M. McPherson's Battle Cry of Freedom, one of the better Abraham Lincoln biographies, something on Robert E. Lee, perhaps Shelby Foote's massive trilogy The ...

This book tackles the messy details, reclaims disregarded heroes, and sets the record straight. It also explains why July 4th isn't really Independence Day.

From the bestselling author of In the Heart of the Sea -- winner of the National Book Award -- the startling story of the Plymouth Colony. From the perilous ocean crossing to the shared bounty of the first Thanksgiving, the Pilgrim...

Throughout the centuries, royal mistresses have been worshiped, feared, envied, and reviled. They set the fashions, encouraged the arts, and, in some cases, ruled nations. Eleanor Herman's Sex with Kings takes us into the throne rooms...

Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas is the best chronicle of drug-soaked, addle-brained, rollicking good times ever committed to the printed page. It is also the tale of a long weekend road trip that has gone down in the annals of America...

Keckley was a former slave who became a successful Washington, D.C., dressmaker — and a confidante of Mary Todd Lincoln. This intimate bond allowed her to witness the happy times as well as the tragic events that unfolded within...

In January 2002, Rory Stewart survived a walk across Afghanistan by his wits, his knowledge of Persian dialects and Muslim customs, and the kindness of strangers. In this memoir, he writes about heroes and rogues, tribal elders and te...

Surveying a broad landscape through a narrow lens, 1215 sweeps readers back eight centuries in an absorbing portrait of life during a time of global upheaval, the ripples of which can still be felt today. At the center of this fascina...

Step into the perfumed parlors of the Everleigh Club, the most famous brothel in American history. Culminating in a dramatic last stand between brothel keepers and crusading reformers, this audiobook presents a vivid snapshot of Ameri...

In the early morning hours of June 6, 1944, a small detachment of British airborne troops stormed the German defense forces and paved the way for the Allied invasion of Europe. Pegasus Bridge was the first engagement of D-Day, the tur...

A historical overview of the marijuana debate recounts how cannabis became outlawed throughout the western world, describing the medical, religious, political, legal, and social factors that contributed to current opinions while revea...

A sixtieth anniversary of the classic documentary of the December 7, 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor describes the events of the surprise Japanese campaign, its impact on American history, and people's reaction to it, based on eyewitness ...

In this riveting account, historian Stephen Ambrose continues where he left off in his #1 bestseller D-Day. Ambrose again follows the individual characters of this noble, brutal, and tragic war, from the high command down to the ordin...

Traces the discovery of the cure for scurvy by three determined individuals, including a navy surgeon, a sea captain, and a charismatic gentleman, tracing the recorded history of the disease while discussing the factors that challenge...

An award-winning historian takes a close-up look at seven extraordinary nineteenth-century engineering accomplishments that transformed the history of the modern world, including the construction of the London sewers, the Panama Canal...

On Nov. 28, 1858, a ship called the Wanderer slipped silently into a coastal channel and unloaded a cargo of over 400 African slaves onto Jekyll Island, Georgia, fifty years after the African slave trade had been made illegal. It was ...

When the apprentices of a Paris printing shop in the 1730s held a series of mock trials and then hanged all the cats they could lay their hands on, why did they find it so hilariously funny that they choked with laughter when they ree...

In February 1959, a group of nine experienced hikers in the Russian Ural Mountains died mysteriously on an elevation known as Dead Mountain. Eerie aspects of the incident— unsettling and unexplained causes of death, a strange final ...

Tales Behind the Tombstones tells the stories behind the deaths (or supposed deaths) and burials of the Old West's most nefarious outlaws, notorious women, and celebrated lawmen. Readers will learn the story behind Calamity Jane's wis...

The Little Ice Age tells the story of the turbulent, unpredictable, and often very cold years of modern European history, how this altered climate affected historical events, and what it means for today's global warming. Building on r...

This epic story opens at the hour the Greatest Generation went to war on December 7, 1941, and follows four U.S. Navy ships and their crews in the Pacific until their day of reckoning three years later with a far different enemy: a de...

Told in the first person by a woman who lived the hard life as a cook in a number of England's country houses, this is the true story of what life was really like below the stairsPeople talk about feeling as if the modern world is s...

This newest book by Pulitzer Prize winner Justin Kaplan is a sparkling combination of biography, social history, architectural appreciation, and pure pleasure Endowed with the largest private fortunes of their day, two heirs of arch-...