As a shepherdess in sixteenth-century Italy, Virginia’s possibilities are doubly limited by her peasant class and her gender. Yet while she tends her flock, Virginia is captivated by the daring equestrian feats of the high-spirited Isabella de’ Medici, who rides with the strength and courage of any man, much to the horror of her brother, the tyrannical Gran Duca Francesco de’ Medici.Inspired, the young shepherdess keeps one dream close to her heart: to race in Siena’s Palio. Twenty-six years after Florence captured Siena, Virginia’s defiance will rally the broken spirit of the Senese people and threaten the pernicious reign of the Gran Duca. Bringing alive the rich history of one of Tuscany’s most famed cities, this lush, captivating saga draws an illuminating portrait of one girl with an unbreakable spirit.

     Lighthearted and fiercely loyal, Alec spent his days as his brother's right-hand man while avidly thwarting the matchmaking attempts of the king and his mother's desire that he join the priesthood. But on one stormy night, a mysterious crone and a chance meeting on the moors bring his fate full circle. To escape a Montgomery raid as a wee lass, Sorcha Cunningham and her mother fled into the forest and stumbled upon the refuge of Heather House with its ancient stone circle. The dreams came to Sorcha that night, dreams that would portend the horrors of her future, forcing her to face a destiny written in the stars. As the age-old feud between the Montgomery and Cunningham clans ignite, Alec and Sorcha walk a precipice of desire and danger as King James VI of Scotland ushers in the age of witch-hunting and the North Berwick Witch Trials threaten to rip them apart.

    John and their charismatic Grand Master, Jean de Valette. The Knights had been expelled from Rhodes by the Ottoman sultan, Suleiman the Magnificent, and now stood as the last bastion against a Muslim invasion of Sicily, southern Italy, and beyond. The siege force of Turks, Arabs, and Barbary corsairs from across the Muslim world outnumbered the defenders of Malta many times over, and its arrival began a long hot summer of bloody combat, often hand to hand, embroiling knights and mercenaries, civilians and slaves, in a desperate struggle for this pivotal point in the Mediterranean.Bruce Ware Allen's The Great Siege of Malta describes the siege's geopolitical context, explains its strategies and tactics, and reveals how the all-too-human personalities of both Muslim and Christian leaders shaped the course of events. The siege of Malta was the Ottoman empire's high-water mark in the war between the Christian West and the Muslim East for control of the Mediterranean. Drawing on copious research and new source material, Allen stirringly recreates the two factions' heroism and chivalry, while simultaneously tracing the barbarism, severity, and indifference to suffering of sixteenth-century warfare.The Great Siege of Malta is a fresh, vivid retelling of one of the most famous battles of the early modern world--a battle whose echoes are still felt today.

    Williams unearths Lucy by working her own mojo of intelligent vengeance and a dual aesthetic of inquiry and minimal, tour de force exegesis. Travel with Williams through the sublime racial moments of famous sonnets to a cultural critique of the work of Mr. Whiteness Him Bad Bard Self, William Shakespeare. Lucy as radical muse. Lucy as newly-freed verse news. Move over Othello, no more easy getting' ovah, Lucy Negro aka Black Luce has, double-brilliantly and double inventively, fully arrived on fire!Thomas Sayers Ellis, Co-Founder--Dark Room Collective, Author, Skin, Inc.

    But her obligatory marriage to Henry is rife with the threat of violence and the lure of deceit; her secret liaisons with Thom, her husband’s former brother-in-law, could send her to an early grave; and her devotion to the education and equal rights of Henry’s daughters is putting an even bigger strain on her marriage. Does Kate risk her life to gain authority in both her relationship and her political career? Which love will she be led to if she follows her heart? And what kind of future is there for her children if she makes a crucial mistake?“Here is a playwright who is taking on the big themes of feminism with a restless, probing intelligence and political savvy. Her characters are living, breathing, messy human beings who reach for the stars and who stumble in the dirt. These are not mouthpieces for politically correct punditry, but people whose emotions cause chaos and whose ideas drive their passion. In short, this is the best kind of playwriting: thoughtful, full-bodied, and redolent of the stuff of life.” —Bob White, Director of New Plays, Stratford Festival

    The very next day she is due to be executed at the hand of a swordsman. Nothing can change the tragic outcome. England will have a new queen before the month is out. And yet…What if events conspired against Henry VIII and his plans to take a new wife? What if there were things that even Thomas Cromwell couldn’t control, things which would make it impossible for history to go to plan?The year is 1536.History is about to be changed forever. The old Anne Boleyn is dead.The new Anne is a cold and calculating woman.Between Two Kings.

    Her youngest daughter Marguerite, the glamorous "Queen Margot," was a passionate free spirit, the only adversary whom her mother could neither intimidate nor control.When Catherine forces the Catholic Marguerite to marry her Protestant cousin Henry of Navarre against her will, and then uses her opulent Parisian wedding as a means of luring his followers to their deaths, she creates not only savage conflict within France but also a potent rival within her own family.Rich in detail and vivid prose, Goldstone's narrative unfolds as a thrilling historical epic. Treacherous court politics, poisonings, inter-national espionage, and adultery form the background to a story that includes such celebrated figures as Elizabeth I, Mary, Queen of Scots, and Nostradamus. The Rival Queens is a dangerous tale of love, betrayal, ambition, and the true nature of courage, the echoes of which still resonate.

    In this lyrical weaving of history and myth, the adventurer takes his four-year-old daughter Teresa from her home in coastal Texas to travel with him as a companion. But once Cabeza de Vaca reaches the outposts of New Spain and prepares to return overseas, politics compel him to leave the young girl behind. Her new life is that of a servant in the kitchen of a Spanish official.Teresa grows up estranged from the magic she knew as a child, when she could speak to the earth and listen to animals. When a new epidemic of measles devastates the area, sixteen-year-old Teresa sets off in pursuit of a wisewoman she once met, a woman with secrets—a possible mentor. The girl befriends a warhorse, abandoned by a Spanish soldier grieving the death of his family, and a Mayan boy, a werejaguar who cannot control his shape-shifting. Because the boy and Teresa carry the measles virus, they are chased by Plague, another shape-shifter who takes on many human forms: Teresa’s dead mother, the housekeeper from the Spanish kitchen, and finally Cabeza de Vaca himself. Plague tries to trick Teresa into entering northern villages to further spread the epidemic.To save herself and others, she is forced to listen to the earth again, sinking underground, swimming through limestone and fossil beds, looking for the means to outwit Plague, tame the jaguar in the Mayan boy, and find her own place in the New World.Winner of Arizona Author's Award for Fiction, finalist for New Mexico Book Award for Children's Literature and the May Sarton Award for Children's Literature.

    It is his own poetic vision of heaven, but the reality is hellish: his death, the day before his twentieth birthday, has separated him from the love of his life and his heart has left him. Consequently, he is condemned to spend all of eternity in this soulless place. Sam's meddling guardian angel, Athena, is desperate to atone for her role in his heavenly imprisonment and although she can't send him back to his own life, she breaks all the rules by allowing him to be reincarnated again and again - as many times as it takes for him to find Fizz, the love of his life. Sam's fate, however, was written by a higher power and death will continue to stalk him through every one of his incarnations. Only when he has solved the mystery of his original death and avoided the same fate in his new life can he and Fizz finally live in peace.

    This vastly enjoyable account of his impact on Christian Europe from 1520 to the 1560s shows him battering the gates of Vienna, engaged in running battles with the Hungarians and the Knights of St John and in constant conflict with the navies of the Mediterranean powers.

    From the thundering hooves of Mongol or Cossack cavalry across the steppes to the clanking of tanks on parade in Moscow or Beijing, elements of this system still cast a shadow on the region at the heart of Earth’s largest continent. By tracing the evolution of Central Asian warfare and diplomacy through a series of historical examples, ranging from the ancient Xiongnu people and medieval Mongol Empire to the fall of the Soviet Union, historian Christopher Mott argues that the original system of informal relationships, indirect rule, and rapid military movement did not entirely fade from the region with the eclipse of the nomadic powers during the Middle Ages. In fact, many states like China, Iran, and Russia had already been influenced by nomadic people, and in so doing adapted their own diplomatic and military policies accordingly. The Formless Empire: A Short History of Diplomacy and Warfare in Central Asia is an engaging study of the nature of non-Western imperialism and great-power strategy. In addition, the book demonstrates that regional histories can show us the variety of political possibilities in the past and how they were adapted to changing circumstances—a point made even more important by the rapid changes facing global security and new forms of empire building. “Christopher Mott’s extremely erudite and wide-ranging examination of the history of Central Asia shows us that we have been far too narrow-minded and Eurocentric in thinking about power and how the global system changes historically. Given the current interest in ‘caliphates’ we need to reflect on the history of the areas of the world that dance to a different historical drum than we do in the West.” —Andrew John Williams, author of France, Britain, and the United States in the Twentieth Century

    A vivid and fast-moving tale of political intrigue and heartache, Dacre's War is set against the backdrop of the Scottish and English borders, a land where there is never any chance of peace.

    Using a wide range of original sources - including private letters, portraits, verse, drama, and state papers - Susan Doran provides a vivid and often dramatic account of political life in Elizabethan England and the queen at its centre, offering a deeper insight into Elizabeth's emotional and political conduct - and challenging many of the popular myths that have grown up around her. It is a story replete with fascinating questions. What was the true nature of Elizabeth's relationship with her father, Henry VIII, especially after his execution of her mother? What was the influence of her step-mothers on Elizabeth's education and religious beliefs? How close was she really to her half-brother Edward VI - and were relations with her half-sister Mary really as poisonous as is popularly assumed? And what of her relationship with her Stewart cousins, most famously with Mary Queen of Scots, executed on Elizabeth's orders in 1587, but also with Mary's son James VI of Scotland, later to succeed Elizabeth as her chosen successor? Elizabeth's relations with her family were crucial, but almost as crucial were her relations with her courtiers and her councillors (her 'men of business'). Here again, the story unravels a host of fascinating questions. Was the queen really sexually jealous of her maids of honour? What does her long and intimate relationship with the Earl of Leicester reveal about her character, personality, and attitude to marriage? What can the fall of Essex tell us about Elizabeth's political management in the final years of her reign? And what was the true nature of her personal and political relationship with influential and long-serving councillors such as the Cecils and Sir Francis Walsingham?

    Today, they’re known as the Lost Colony of Roanoke—America’s most vexing and enduring mystery.On July 23, 1587, 117 colonists landed on Roanoke Island, in present day North Carolina. Barely a month later, amid rapidly-deteriorating circumstances, Governor John White sailed back to England for additional supplies and colonists. War with Spain delayed his return to Roanoke until 1590, when he discovered the colony had vanished. A young, 21st-century woman unexpectedly dreams an ongoing series of mysterious, lifelike dreams of New World settlers. She eventually deduces she’s witnessing the gripping saga of the Lost Colony of Roanoke through the heart, mind, and tribulations of a young colonist named Emily Colman. Along the way, she develops a compelling emotional intimacy with Emily; but also discovers a dangerous dark side to her dreams and that there may be far more to her bond with the Lost Colony than she ever imagined.Emily and the colonists begin their struggle for survival against mounting adversity—internal dissent erupts, two suitors seek Emily’s favor, the powerful Powhatan chiefdom plans the colony’s demise, and four warriors from a tribe to the distant north arrive to trade with tribes near the colony. The subplots converge amidst the excruciating drama of the colony’s waning fortunes, and Emily faces terrifying, life-threatening perils that ultimately force her to make an agonizing choice that will shape and define her remaining life.

    Drawing on a wide range of sources, including personal diaries, medical texts, and devotional literature, the author enters the sickrooms of a diverse sampling of early modern Britons. The resulting stories of sickness reveal how men and women of the era viewed and managed their health both similarly and differently, as well as the ways prevailing religious practices, medical knowledge, writing conventions, and everyday life created and supported those varying perceptions.   A unique cultural history of illness, Weisser’s groundbreaking study bridges the fields of patient history and gender history. Based on the detailed examination of over fifty firsthand accounts, this fascinating volume offers unprecedented insight into what it was like to live, suffer, and inhabit a body more than three centuries ago.

    marked the disintegration of order and security in Europe. It would be twelve centuries of trial and error before a successor political system--the nation-state--emerged to fill the void. The Eastern Roman Empire survived for a thousand years after the Western Empire's fall, shielding the West from the encroachment of militant Islam. During the same millennium, the Catholic Church unsuccessfully tried to resurrect a universal empire in the West. During the period of the Renaissance, Reformation and Thirty Years' War, the nation-state arose as Rome's successor. This is the story of those 1,200 years, an era that transformed the Western outlook from one bound to faith amidst chaos to one armed with reason and a belief in progress.

    Drawing on sources in a variety oflanguages and on the evidence of archaeology, anthropology, and history, the volume outlines the transformations that the acquisition of the horse wrought on a diverse range of groups within these four continents. It explores key topics such as changes in subsistence, technology, and belief systems, the horse's role in facilitating the emergence of more hierarchical social formations, and the interplay between ecology, climate, and human action in adopting the horse, as well as considering how far equestrian lifestyles were ultimately unsustainable.

    The chandimangal of kavikankan mukundaram chakravarti is an exemplary work of epic scale that recounts the story of the goddess chandi's constant battle to establish her cult among humans. Through the three books of the kavya-the book of the gods, the book of the hunter and the book of the merchant-we are introduced to chandi in all her manifestations, from the benevolent to the wrathful, from abhaya to chamunda. Mukundaram's captivating tales and vivid imagery bring together the enchanting world of the gods with the more challenging world of the mortals while critiquing sixteenth-century bengali society. In his exquisite rendering of the chandimangal, edward yazijian manages to capture not only the performative and humorous but also the reverent aspects of the text.

    

    Once a new, exciting, and frightening concept, “the world” was transformed in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. But how could one envision something that no one had ever seen in its totality?  The Worldmakers moves beyond histories of globalization to explore how “the world” itself—variously understood as an object of inquiry, a comprehensive category, and a system of order—was self-consciously shaped by human agents. Gathering an international cast of characters, from Dutch cartographers and French philosophers to Portuguese and English poets, Ramachandran describes a history of firsts: the first world atlas, the first global epic, the first modern attempt to develop a systematic natural philosophy—all part of an effort by early modern thinkers to capture “the world” on the page.

    Although various laws and decrees outlawed indio enslavement, several loopholes allowed the practice to continue. In Global Indios Nancy E. van Deusen documents the more than one hundred lawsuits between 1530 and 1585 that indio slaves living in Castile brought to the Spanish courts to secure their freedom. Because plaintiffs had to prove their indio-ness in a Spanish imperial context, these lawsuits reveal the difficulties of determining who was an indio and who was not—especially since it was an all-encompassing construct connoting subservience and political personhood and at times could refer to people from Mexico, Peru, or South or East Asia. Van Deusen demonstrates that the categories of free and slave were often not easily defined, and she forces a rethinking of the meaning of indio in ways that emphasize the need to situate colonial Spanish American indigenous subjects in a global context.