Lewis Lockwood sketches the turbulent personal, historical, political, and cultural frameworks in which Beethoven worked and examines their effects on his music. "The result is that rarest of achievements, a profoundly humane work of scholarship that will—or at least should—appeal to specialists and generalists in equal measure" (Terry Teachout, Commentary). Finalist for the Pulitzer Prize.  "Lewis Lockwood has written a biography of Beethoven in which the hours that Beethoven spent writing music—that is, his methods of working, his interest in contemporary and past composers, the development of his musical intentions and ideals, his inner musical life, in short—have been properly integrated with the external events of his career. The book is invaluable." —Charles Rosen "Lockwood writes with poetry and clarity—a rare combination. I especially enjoyed the connection that he makes between the works of Beethoven and the social and political context of their creation—we feel closer to Beethoven the man without losing our wonder at his genius." —Emanuel Ax "The magnum opus of an illustrious Beethoven scholar. From now on, we will all turn to Lockwood's Beethoven: The Music and the Life for insight and instruction." —Maynard Solomon "This is truly the Beethoven biography for the intelligent reader. Lewis Lockwood speaks in his preface of writing on Beethoven's works at 'a highly accessible descriptive level.' But he goes beyond that. His discussion of the music, based on a deep knowledge of its context and the composition processes behind it, explains, elucidates, and is not afraid to evaluate; while the biographical chapters, clearly and unfussily written, and taking full account of the newest thinking on Beethoven, align closely with the musical discussion. The result is a deeply perceptive book that comes as close as can be to presenting the man and the music as a unity."—Stanley Sadie, editor, The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians "Impressive for both its scholarship and its fresh insights, this landmark work—fully accessible to the interested amateur—immediately takes its place among the essential references on this composer and his music."—Bob Goldfarb, KUSC-FM 91.5 "Lockwood writes like an angel: lucid, enthusiastic, stirring and enlightening. Beethoven has found his ablest interpreter."—Jonathan Keates, The Spectator  "There is no better survey of Beethoven's compositions for a wide audience."—Michael Kimmelman, The New York Times Book Review

    It was fought at a place thousands of miles from land, by hundreds of planes over distances of hundreds of miles. It saw four massive Japanese aircraft carriers pitted against three similarly huge American carriers in a battle for domination of the Pacific. The battle is the story of the young Japanese empire seeking to challenge the established industrial power of America. Japan had smashed America at Pearl Harbour, shaken her at Coral Sea. Now she was ready to risk all in one mighty attempt to drive the United States Navy from the Pacific Ocean. Japan’s admirals put to sea confident that they could take the Americans by surprise, take the Midway atoll and destroy the American carriers. American espionage ensured that Admiral Nimitz had full knowledge of the planned attack, so turning a Japanese trap into an American ambush. The battle that followed raged over three days, full of set backs and disaster for each side. But Admirals Yamamoto and Nagumo had over-reached themselves and suffered the greatest naval defeat in history. America entered Midway on the defensive, still a hesitant participant in the war. She left the battle as the world’s first super power. Richard Freeman graduated in mathematics before following a career in distance education. He now writes on naval history. His other books include 'The Great Edwardian Naval Feud'. Endeavour Press is the UK's leading publisher of digital books.

    Who were these 15 to 17 year-old Hitler Youth soldiers, why were they so fanatical, and how could they be cleanly defeated? The Allied mood turned to bitterness and hatred as the brutal cunning and sheer ruthlessness of the boy soldiers and their adult leaders became clear. This book assembles a range of astonishing eyewitness testimony to the ferocious combat between Hitler Youth panzer troops, snipers and infantry against British and Canadian forces after D-Day. There are the disturbing combat experiences of surviving 12th SS Panzer fighters themselves, recorded after the war; eyewitness accounts from Allied soldiers who fought tank-to-tank and hand-to-hand against these opponents in the hedgerows, fields and streets of Normandy; and accounts too from terrified French civilians caught up in the firefights. The accounts featured are: The Tank Destroyer (Jagdpanzer IV) The Bocage Ambush (British Sergeant) The Battle for the Bunkers (12th SS Panthers) The Flail Tanks (French Civilian) The Panzerfaust Fighters (Hitlerjugend Panzergrenadiers) The Sniper (Canadian Captain) The War Crimes (12th SS Panzer Radio Operator) Panthers in the Smoke (British Cromwell Commander) Thunderbolts, Typhoons and Flak (12th Panzer Flak Unit) These are graphic and often shocking accounts of one of the strangest phases of the second world war in the west, and one that left a dreadful mark on so many who were involved in it. Sprech Media is an independent researcher and publisher of eyewitness testimonies to armed conflict in the 20th century.

    Teams were losing games very suspiciously during the regular season to enhance their draft position. And who wouldn't, when the draft featured four future members of the Top 50 NBA Players of All Time team-Hakeem Olajuwon, Charles Barkley, John Stockton, and Michael Jordan. But this draft is most often remembered as the one where Michael Jordan slipped to third and was a reason the lottery system was introduced the next year. How could the experts have been so wrong and, even more astoundingly, how could the Portland Trailblazers, who held the second pick, pass on Jordan and choose the injury-prone Sam Bowie? Filip Bondy sets out to answer that question and many more. Talking to general managers, coaches, and players, Bondy provides the entire back story of the draft: trades that were never made; wrong-headed assessments of players like Charles Barkley and John Stockton, and how Bobby Knight, coach of the 1984 U.S. Olympic team, played a major role in advising certain teams about key players.

    A biography of the Saudi Arabian king who ruled from 1964 until his assassination in 1975 and who became, during his reign, an important world leader through his control of his country's vast oil resources.

    But it is Stella’s voice, the amazing way that she tells her story, that makes this Holocaust story so unique, powerful and endearing. The reader listens to Stella’s stunning simplicity of expression, her use of Polish and Yiddish phrases, her humor, her all-so-frequent grammatical errors – and is charmed. It is a story that only Stella Yollin can tell, and it can only be told in Stella’s sweet and incomparable way.

     Hours after the fateful attack on Pearl Harbor, the Imperial Japanese Army invades Luzon. The allies retreat to the Bataan Peninsula and the ensuing bloody battle sets the tone for the entirety of the war in the Pacific. Far from home and abandoned, the brave GIs and Filipinos fight the Japanese to a standstill. Long months of bloody fighting take their toll on both sides, however, the Japanese have reserves, the allies don’t. Sergeant Tarkington and the soldiers of the 1st platoon are put to the ultimate test. With dwindling supplies and constant harassment from the battle-hardened Japanese, the GIs must adapt and become a cohesive fighting unit if they hope to survive. Tark’s Ticks is the first book in a gritty WWII series. Pick up your copy today.

    A family--father, mother, and their son--approaches, unarmed and defenseless. The young men step into the moonlight and claim their manhood by killing the adults. The boy escapes.The Spartans have no idea how terrible an enemy they have called forth. Nothing could have prepared them for the boy, Protos, whose name means “destined,” whose cunning and inborn skill with weapons renders his enemies almost defenseless, and whose heart knows no pity. The Spartans have oppressed his people for centuries, and to break their power is to free all those they hold in subjection. As Protos grows to manhood, he begins to understand that his private war against his parents’ murderers is also a struggle for liberation.

    Moreover, he was as legendary a figure on the streets of New York as on the streets of London.Pearson persuaded the mysterious criminal leader to talk to him - and the result was a story even more extraordinary than that of the Kray twins. Here Pearson reveals the true story of the Englishman who became the adopted son of Joey Pagano, the head of one of the major New York crime families. Here the Englishman tells the story that no-one else dared to tell.

    In this compelling study of true crime, Liverpool's most popular author Tom Slemen recounts some of the most intriguing and baffling murders of Merseyside such as:• The baffling case of the Victorian canned corpse• The magistrate's beautiful granddaughter who was killed by a crazed admirer• The condemned man who was hanged twice• Frederick Deeming - the Rainhill psychopath who wiped out his own family and danced on their grave with his next victim• The bizarre link between a South Seas cult and the housewife who was stabbed fourteen times in her Knotty Ash home by a killer who struck under the cover of a fog• The unsolved case of the superintendent and his son who died of gunshot wounds under mysterious circumstances - in a police station• The enigmatic murder of Julia Wallace - and a very credible solution• The only assassination of a British prime minister - by a Liverpool businessman Plus many more fascinating murder cases.This fascinating book is a must for all readers of true crime in general and Liverpudlians and Merseysiders in particular.

    Whether one is interested in literature or art, philosophy or law, mythology or science, intimate details of daily life or broad cultural and historical trends, the OCD is the first place to turn for clear, authoritative information on ancient culture. This newly revised and completely up-to-date third edition of this historic reference adequately reflects the recent expansion in the scholarship and scope of classical studies. Here, in over six thousand entries ranging from long articles to brief identifications, readers can find information on virtually any topic of interestathletics, bee-keeping, botany, magic, Roman law, religious rites, postal service, slavery, navigation, and the reckoning of time. The Dictionary profiles every major figure of Greece and Rome-and lesser known figures not found in other references-from Homer and Virgil, to Plato and Aristotle, to Julius Caesar and Alexander the Great. Readers will find entries on mythological and legendary figures, on major cities, famous buildings, and important geographical landmarks, and on legal, rhetorical, literary, and political terms and concepts, as well as extensive thematic articles that offer superb coverage of topics of interest to both scholars and general readers, exploring everything from medicine and mathematics to music, law, and marriage. With contributions and guidance from some of the finest classical scholars in the world, the Oxford Classical Dictionary has no equal in any language. It is the definitive summation of classical scholarship as it stands today. The Dictionary covers: politics, government, economy - from political figures to systems, terms and practices, histories of major states and empires, economic theory, agriculture, artisans and industry, trade and markets religion and mythology - deities and mythological creatures, beliefs and rituals, sanctuaries and sacred buildings, astrology and magic law and philosophy - from biographies of lawgivers and lawyers to legal terms and procedures, from major and minor philosophers to philosophical schools, terms, and concepts science and geography - scientists and scientific theory and practice, doctors and medicine, climate and landscape, natural disasters, regions and islands, cities and settlements, communications languages, literature, art, and architecture - languages and dialects, writers and literary terms and genres, orators and rhetorical theory and practice, drama and performance, art, painters and sculptors, architects, buildings and materials archaeology and historical writing - amphorae and pottery, shipwrecks and cemeteries, historians, and Greek and Roman historiography military history - generals, arms and armour, famous battles, attitudes to warfare social history, sex, and gender - women and the family, kinship, peasants and slaves, attitudes to sexuality

    Barbara Ravage has fashioned an enlightening, invaluable book.” —Stewart O’Nan, author of The Circus Fire: A True Story of an American TragedyThough each of us is just a spark away from being a burn victim, the public knows little and understands less about the world that patients inhabit. Pulling the curtains back on this private and sterile environment, Burn Unit is a riveting account of the frontline efforts—both modern-day and historical—to save lives devastated by fire. With unflinching urgency, Barbara Ravage follows an extraordinary team of healers at Massachusetts General Hospital, the cradle of modern burn treatment and the site of one of the best burn units in the world. From Boston’s Cocoanut Grove fire of 1942 to the treatment of the victims of the Rhode Island nightclub fire in early 2003, we watch everyday heroes do their incredible but punishing work against the backdrop of history. Both a moving human drama and an engrossing scientific exploration of this little-known field of medicine, Burn Unit is an unforgettably powerful read.

    Although it is usually seen as an unqualified success, the Battle for Normandy was actually a much more closely fought affair. In The D-Day Deception the author and journalist Alex Gerlis explores whether it would have been won at all without the Allied deception operation. It was not until the 1970s that details began to emerge the Allies’ top secret and audacious deception plan. Operation Fortitude succeeded in confusing the Germans about where the Allies were going to land: would it be Normandy, or the Pas de Calais? The D-Day Deception looks at the part the deception played in the eventual Allied victory and asks to what extent it may have been helped by those in the German High Command and intelligence organizations who by 1944 wanted to see a swift end to the war. Alex Gerlis was born in Grimsby, Lincolnshire and now lives with his family in West London. He was a BBC journalist for over 25 years, leaving in 2011 to concentrate on his writing. He is the author of The Best of Our Spies, a highly acclaimed espionage thriller based on D-Day and especially the deception operation that played a big part in its success. The Best of Our Spies was published in December 2012, since when it has featured prominently in the Amazon Kindle Spy best-selling lists and has over 180 Amazon reviews.

    

    Author and historian Albert Buchanan recreates the engagements of the Pacific and Atlantic combat theaters with near clinical detail, from the Pearl Harbor Attack to the Japanese surrender aboard the USS Missouri. Interwoven within these aerial combat narratives is background information on technological innovations, production methods, training programs, and the important players involved. This new edition of The Navy's Air War: A Mission Completed includes annotations and photographs from World War 2. *Annotations. *Images.