History
New Book Alerts is a free online service that showcases the newest titles purchased by your local library. You can select to receive alerts via email and/or RSS feeds. If you see a new title that you are interested in, just click "check catalog" to place a hold on the item right away.
Previous | Last 30 days
-
Robert Oppenheimer: His Life and Mind (A Life Inside the Center)
Author/Actors/Director/etc.: Ray Monk
Format: Hardcover
Publisher: Random House (2013, May 14th).
Pages: 848
Robert Oppenheimer was among the most brilliant and divisive of men. As head of the Los Alamos Laboratory, he oversaw the successful effort to beat the Nazis in the race to develop the first atomic bomb—a breakthrough that was to have eternal ramifications for mankind and that made Oppenheimer the “Father of the Atomic Bomb.” But with his actions leading up to that great achievement, he also set himself on a dangerous collision course with Senator Joseph McCarthy and his witch-hunters. In Robert Oppenheimer: A Life Inside the Center, Ray Monk, author of peerless biographies of Ludwig Wittgenstein and Bertrand Russell, goes deeper than any previous biographer in the quest to solve the enigma of Oppenheimer’s motivations and his complex personality. more
More Info | Google Books | Check Availability
-
End of The Good Life: How the Financial Crisis Threatens a Lost Generation--and What We Can Do About It
Author/Actors/Director/etc.: Riva Froymovich
Format: Paperback
Publisher: Harper Perennial; Original edition (2013, Apr 23rd).
Pages: 240
Financial journalist Riva Froymovich has good reason to be anxious about the financial turmoil facing Generation Y. This is her generation.Indeed, Generation Y has suffered the brunt of the financial crisis and great recession. For those in the U.S. born after 1976, the American dream is a is becoming a nightmare. Swamped in student loan debt they’re postponing marriage and buying homes, unable to save money, and delaying having children.The End of the Good Life: How the Financial Crisis Threatens a Lost Generation--and What We Can Do About It examines short-sighted government policies and initiatives that will wreak havoc on our youth. In addition to offering concrete policy suggestions, this book is driven by the touching personal stories of Americans and other young people around the globe affected by the financial crisis. more
More Info | Google Books | Check Availability
-
The Great War: A Combat History of the First World War
Author/Actors/Director/etc.: Peter Hart
Format: Hardcover
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA (2013, May 9th).
Pages: 544
World War I altered the landscape of the modern world in every conceivable arena. Millions died; empires collapsed; new ideologies and political movements arose; poison gas, warplanes, tanks, submarines, and other technologies appeared. "Total war" emerged as a grim, mature reality. In The Great War, Peter Hart provides a masterful combat history of this global conflict. Focusing on the decisive engagements, Hart explores the immense challenges faced by the commanders on all sides. He surveys the belligerent nations, analyzing their strengths, weaknesses, and strategic imperatives. Russia, for example, was obsessed with securing an exit from the Black Sea, while France--having lost to Prussia in 1871, before Germany united--constructed a network of defensive alliances, even as it held a grudge over the loss of Alsace-Lorraine. more
More Info | Google Books | Check Availability
-
The Philadelphia Chromosome: A Mutant Gene and the Quest to Cure Cancer at the Genetic Level
Author/Actors/Director/etc.: Jessica Wapner
Format: Hardcover
Publisher: The Experiment (2013, May 14th).
Pages: 320
One of Publishers Weekly’s Top Ten Spring 2013 Science BooksPhiladelphia, 1959: A scientist scrutinizing a single human cell under a microscope detects a missing piece of DNA. That scientist, David Hungerford, had no way of knowing that he had stumbled upon the starting point of modern cancer research—the Philadelphia chromosome. This book charts not only that landmark discovery, but also—for the first time, all in one place—the full sequence of scientific and medical discoveries that brought about the first-ever successful treatment of a lethal cancer at the genetic level.The significance of this mutant chromosome would take more than three decades to unravel; in 1990, it was recognized as the sole cause of a deadly blood cancer, chronic myeloid leukemia, or CML. more
More Info | Google Books | Check Availability
-
Helga's Diary: A Young Girl's Account of Life in a Concentration Camp
Author/Actors/Director/etc.: Helga Weiss
Format: Hardcover
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company; 1 edition (2013, Jan 21st).
Pages: 208
The remarkable diary of a young girl who survived the Holocaust—appearing in English for the first time.In 1939, Helga Weiss was a young Jewish schoolgirl in Prague. Along with some 45,000 Jews living in the city, Helga’s family endured the first wave of the Nazi invasion: her father was denied work; she was forbidden from attending regular school. As Helga witnessed the increasing Nazi brutality, she began documenting her experiences in a diary. In 1941, Helga and her parents were sent to the concentration camp of Terezín. There, Helga continued to write with astonishing insight about her daily life: the squalid living quarters, the cruel rationing of food, and the executions—as well as the moments of joy and hope that persisted in even the worst conditions. more
More Info | Google Books | Check Availability
-
From Stone to Flesh: A Short History of the Buddha (Buddhism and Modernity)
Author/Actors/Director/etc.: Donald S. Lopez Jr.
Format: Hardcover
Publisher: University Of Chicago Press (2013, Apr 19th).
Pages: 304
We have come to admire Buddhism for being profound but accessible, as much a lifestyle as a religion. The credit for creating Buddhism goes to the Buddha, a figure widely respected across the Western world for his philosophical insight, his teachings of nonviolence, and his practice of meditation. But who was this Buddha, and how did he become the Buddha we know and love today? Leading historian of Buddhism Donald S. Lopez Jr. tells the story of how various idols carved in stone—variously named Beddou, Codam, Xaca, and Fo—became the man of flesh and blood that we know simply as the Buddha. He reveals that the positive view of the Buddha in Europe and America is rather recent, originating a little more than a hundred and fifty years ago. more
More Info | Google Books | Check Availability
-
The Hunt for Hitler's Warship
Author/Actors/Director/etc.: Patrick Bishop
Format: Hardcover
Publisher: Regnery History; Reprint edition (2013, Apr 8th).
Pages: 416
Winston Churchill called it "the Beast." It was said to be unsinkable. More than thirty military operations failed to destroy it. Eliminating the Tirpitz, Hitler's mightiest warship, a 52,000-ton behemoth, became an Allied obsession.In The Hunt for Hitler's Warship, Patrick Bishop tells the epic story of the men who would not rest until the Tirpitz lay at the bottom of the sea. In November of 1944, with the threat to Russian supply lines increasing and Allied forces needing reinforcements in the Pacific, a raid as audacious as any Royal Air Force operation of the war was launched, under the command of one of Britain's greatest but least-known war heroes, Wing Commander Willie Tait.Patrick Bishop draws on decades of experience as a foreign war correspondent to paint a vivid picture of this historic clash of the Royal Air Force's Davids versus Hitler's Goliath of naval engineering. more
More Info | Google Books | Check Availability
-
In the Kingdom of the Sick: A Social History of Chronic Illness in America
Author/Actors/Director/etc.: Laurie Edwards
Format: Hardcover
Publisher: Walker & Company; 1 edition (2013, Apr 9th).
Pages: 256
Thirty years ago, Susan Sontag wrote, "Everyone who is born holds dual citizenship in the kingdom of the well and the kingdom of the sick ... Sooner or later each of us is obliged, at least for a spell, to identify ourselves as citizens of that other place." Now more than 133 million Americans live with chronic illness, accounting for nearly three-quarters of all health care dollars, and untold pain and disability. There has been an alarming rise in illnesses that defy diagnosis through clinical tests or have no known cure. Millions of people, especially women, with illnesses such as irritable bowel syndrome, chronic pain, and chronic fatigue syndrome face skepticism from physicians and the public alike. And people with diseases as varied as cardiovascular disease, HIV, certain cancers, and type 2 diabetes have been accused of causing their preventable illnesses through their lifestyle choices. more
More Info | Google Books | Check Availability
-
The Dispensable Nation: American Foreign Policy in Retreat
Author/Actors/Director/etc.: Vali Nasr
Format: Hardcover
Publisher: Doubleday (2013, Apr 23rd).
Pages: 336
Former State Department advisor for Afghanistan and Pakistan and bestselling author Vali Nasr delivers a sharp indictment of America's flawed foreign policy and outlines a new relationship with the Muslim world and with new players in the changing Middle East. In this essential new book, Vali Nasr argues that the Obama administration had a chance to improve its relations with the Middle East, but instead chose to pursue its predecessor's questionable strategies there. Nasr takes readers behind the scenes at the State Department and reveals how the new government's fear of political backlash and the specter of terrorism crippled the efforts of diplomatic giants, like Richard Holbrooke and Hillary Clinton, to boost America's foundering credibility with world leaders. more
More Info | Google Books | Check Availability
-
Who Was Dracula?: Bram Stoker's Trail of Blood
Author/Actors/Director/etc.: Jim Steinmeyer
Format: Hardcover
Publisher: Tarcher (2013, Apr 4th).
Pages: 336
An acclaimed historian sleuths out literature’s most famous vampire, uncovering the source material – from folklore and history, to personas including Oscar Wilde and Walt Whitman – behind Bram Stoker’s bloody creation. In more than a century of vampires in pop culture, only one lord of the night truly stands out: Dracula. Though the name may conjure up images of Bela Lugosi lurking about in a cape and white pancake makeup in the iconic 1931 film, the character of Dracula—a powerful, evil Transylvanian aristocrat who slaughters repressed Victorians on a trip to London—was created in Bram Stoker’s 1897 novel of the same name, a work so popular it has spawned limitless reinventions in books and film.But where did literature’s undead icon come from? What sources inspired Stoker to craft a monster who would continue to haunt our dreams (and desires) for generations? Historian Jim Steinmeyer, who revealed the men behind the myths in The Last Greatest Magician in the World, explores a question that has long fascinated literary scholars and the reading public alike: Was there a real-life inspiration for Stoker’s Count Dracula?Hunting through archives and letters, literary and theatrical history, and the relationships and events that gave shape to Stoker’s life, Steinmeyer reveals the people and stories behind the Transylvanian legend. more
More Info | Google Books | Check Availability