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Lincoln Unbound: How an Ambitious Young Railsplitter Saved the American Dream--and How We Can Do It Again
Author/Actors/Director/etc.: Rich Lowry
Format: Hardcover
Publisher: Broadside Books (2013, Jun 11th).
Pages: 288
Lincoln Unbound is a thoughtful mix of history and politics from Rich Lowry, the New York Times bestselling author and editor of National Review, which traces Abraham Lincoln’s ambitious climb from provincial upstart to political powerhouse.Revered across the political spectrum, President Lincoln believed in a small but active government in a nation defined by aspiration. He embraced the market and the amazing transportation and communications revolutions beginning to take hold. He helped give birth to the modern industrial economy.Abraham Lincoln’s vision of an upwardly mobile society that rewards and supports individual striving was wondrously realized. Now, it is under threat. To meet these challenges, conservative columnist Rich Lowry draws us back to the lessons of Lincoln. more
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Drawing from the City
Author/Actors/Director/etc.: Teju Behan
Format: Hardcover
Publisher: Tara Books (2012, Oct 16th).
Pages: 28
“Art and design take center stage in this carefully crafted, elegant, artisanal book. This stunning autobiographical art book recounts self-taught artist Tejubehan’s journey from an impoverished childhood in rural India, through her family’s efforts to improve their lot in a tent city in Mumbai, and into her adulthood, when she lived as a singer and artist with her husband. The direct, unadorned text has an immediacy that reveals its roots as an orally narrated life story… As a physical artifact, it draws attention to its creation with stiff pages and fragrant, tactile inks… A unique offering that presents readers with arresting artwork and a compelling life story.” Starred Review, Kirkus Reviews"...more exquisite and born out of a more moving personal story than just about any book I’ve come across. more
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The Devouring Dragon: How China's Rise Threatens Our Natural World
Author/Actors/Director/etc.: Craig Simons
Format: Hardcover
Publisher: St. Martin's Press (2013, Mar 12th).
Pages: 304
China’s rise is assaulting the natural world at an alarming rate. In a few short years, China has become the planet’s largest market for endangered wildlife, its top importer of tropical trees, and its biggest emitter of greenhouse gases. Its rapid economic growth has driven up the world’s very metabolism: in Brazil, farmers clear large swaths of the Amazon to plant soybeans; Indian poachers hunt tigers and elephants to feed Chinese demand; in the United States, clouds of mercury and ozone drift earthward after trans-Pacific jet-stream journeys. Craig Simons’ The Devouring Dragon looks at how an ascending China has rapidly surpassed the U.S. and Europe as the planet’s worst-polluting superpower. It argues that China’s most important 21st-century legacy will be determined not by jobs, corporate profits, or political alliances, but by how quickly its growth degrades the global environment and whether it can stem the damage. more
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The Birth of the West: Rome, Germany, France, and the Creation of Europe in the Tenth Century
Author/Actors/Director/etc.: Paul Collins
Format: Hardcover
Publisher: PublicAffairs (2013, Feb 12th).
Pages: 496
The tenth century dawned in violence and disorder. Charlemagne’s empire was in ruins, most of Spain had been claimed by Moorish invaders, and even the papacy in Rome was embroiled in petty, provincial conflicts. To many historians, it was a prime example of the ignorance and uncertainty of the Dark Ages. Yet according to historian Paul Collins, the story of the tenth century is the story of our culture’s birth, of the emergence of our civilization into the light of day.The Birth of the West tells the story of a transformation from chaos to order, exploring the alien landscape of Europe in transition. It is a fascinatingnarrative that thoroughly renovates older conceptions of feudalism and what medieval life was actually like. The result is a wholly new vision of how civilization sprang from the unlikeliest of origins, and proof that our tenth-century ancestors are not as remote as we might think. more
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Blood Sisters: The Women Behind the Wars of the Roses
Author/Actors/Director/etc.: Sarah Gristwood
Format: Hardcover
Publisher: Basic Books (2013, Feb 26th).
Pages: 432
To contemporaries, the Wars of the Roses were known collectively as a “cousins’ war.” The series of dynastic conflicts that tore apart the ruling Plantagenet family in fifteenth-century England was truly a domestic drama, as fraught and intimate as any family feud before or since. As acclaimed historian Sarah Gristwood reveals in Blood Sisters, while the events of this turbulent time are usually described in terms of the male leads who fought and died seeking the throne, a handful of powerful women would prove just as decisive as their kinfolks’ clashing armies. These mothers, wives, and daughters were locked in a web of loyalty and betrayal that would ultimately change the course of English history. In a captivating, multigenerational narrative, Gristwood traces the rise and rule of the seven most critical women in the wars: from Marguerite of Anjou, wife of the Lancastrian Henry VI, who steered the kingdom in her insane husband’s stead; to Cecily Neville, matriarch of the rival Yorkist clan, whose son Edward IV murdered his own brother to maintain power; to Margaret Beaufort, who gave up her own claim to the throne in favor of her son, a man who would become the first of a new line of Tudor kings. more
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The Enlightenment: And Why It Still Matters
Author/Actors/Director/etc.: Anthony Pagden
Format: Deckle Edge]
Publisher: Random House (2013, Apr 23rd).
Pages:
One of our most renowned and brilliant historians takes a fresh look at the revolutionary intellectual movement that laid the foundation for the modern world. Liberty and equality. Human rights. Freedom of thought and expression. Belief in reason and progress. The value of scientific inquiry. These are just some of the ideas that were conceived and developed during the Enlightenment, and which changed forever the intellectual landscape of the Western world. Spanning hundreds of years of history, Anthony Pagden traces the origins of this seminal movement, showing how Enlightenment concepts directly influenced modern culture, making possible a secular, tolerant, and, above all, cosmopolitan world. Everyone can agree on its impact. more
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The Secret Lives of Baked Goods: Sweet Stories & Recipes for America's Favorite Desserts
Author/Actors/Director/etc.: Clare Barboza
Format: Hardcover
Publisher: Sasquatch Books (2013, May 7th).
Pages: 192
Have you ever wondered where the ideas for baking red velvet cupcakes, brownies, birthday cake, Girl Scout cookies, and other dessert recipes came from? Discover the history behind America's most popular and nostalgic desserts with popular CakeSpy blogger and self-proclaimed "dessert detective" Jessie Oleson Moore. Moore has put her sweet-sleuthing skills to work uncovering the fascinating histories and tastiest recipes for America's favorite sweets, including whoopee pies, chocolate chip cookies, Baked Alaska, and New York cheesecake. From romantic musings on how desserts got their names to sugar-fueled scandals, these classic recipes and photographs are guaranteed to offer food for thought and leave you with plenty of room for dessert. . more
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The Astronaut Wives Club: A True Story
Author/Actors/Director/etc.: Lily Koppel
Format: Hardcover
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing (2013, Jun 11th).
Pages: 384
As America's Mercury Seven astronauts were launched on death-defying missions, television cameras focused on the brave smiles of their young wives. Overnight, these women were transformed from military spouses into American royalty. They had tea with Jackie Kennedy, appeared on the cover of Life magazine, and quickly grew into fashion icons.Annie Glenn, with her picture-perfect marriage, was the envy of the other wives; platinum-blonde Rene Carpenter was proclaimed JFK's favorite; and licensed pilot Trudy Cooper arrived on base with a secret. Together with the other wives they formed the Astronaut Wives Club, meeting regularly to provide support and friendship. Many became next-door neighbors and helped to raise each other's children by day, while going to glam parties at night as the country raced to land a man on the Moon. more
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Johnson's Life of London: The People Who Made the City that Made the World
Author/Actors/Director/etc.: Boris Johnson
Format: Paperback
Publisher: Riverhead Trade; Reprint edition (2013, May 7th).
Pages: 400
The exhilarating story of how London came to be one of the most exciting and influential places on earth—from the city’s colorful, witty, and well-known mayor. Once a swampland that the Romans could hardly be bothered to conquer, over the centuries London became an incomparably vibrant metropolis that has produced a steady stream of ingenious, original, and outsized figures who have shaped the world we know. Boris Johnson, the internationally beloved mayor of London, is the best possible guide to these colorful characters and the history in which they played such lively roles. Erudite and entertaining, he narrates the story of London as a kind of relay race. Beginning with the days when “a bunch of pushy Italian immigrants” created Londinium, he passes the torch on down through the famous and the infamous, the brilliant and the bizarre—from Hadrian to Samuel Johnson to Winston Churchill to the Rolling Stones—illuminating with unforgettable clarity the era each inhabited. more
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No Buddy Left Behind: Bringing U.S. Troops' Dogs and Cats Safely Home from the Combat Zone
Author/Actors/Director/etc.: Cynthia Hurn
Format: Paperback
Publisher: Lyons Press; 1 Reprint edition (2012, Nov 6th).
Pages: 264
How the love of a stray dog or cat rescued in the combat zone helps U.S. troops deal with thetrauma of war, and how one woman risks everything to bring these soldiers’ buddies home. more
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