Born in 1908, in The Patch, Chicago, Giancana joined the Forty-Two gang of lawless juvenile punks in 1921 and quickly proved himself as a skilled 'wheel man' (or getaway driver), extortionist and vicious killer. Called up to the ranks of the Outfit, he reputedly held talks with the CIA about assassinating Fidel Castro, shared a girlfriend with John F. Kennedy and had friends in high places, including Sammy Davis Jr., Frank Sinatra, Shirley MacLaine, Marilyn Monroe and, some say, the Kennedys, although he fell out with them.The story of Sam Giancana will overturn many of your beliefs about America during the Kennedy era. If you want to know Giancana's role in the brother's deaths, and more of the intrigue surrounding that of Marilyn Monroe, this book will fill you in on the murky lives of many shady characters who really ruled the day, both in Chicago and elsewhere.

    Led by Pedro Carmona and Carlos Ortega, the opposition represented a cross-section of society furious with Chavez's economic policies, specifically his mishandling of the Venezuelan oil industry. But as the day progressed the march turned violent, sparking a military revolt that led to the temporary ousting of Chavez. Over the ensuing, turbulent seventy-two hours, Venezuelans would confront the deep divisions within their society and ultimately decide the best course for their country —and its oil—in the new century.An exemplary piece of narrative journalism, The Silence and the Scorpion provides rich insight into the complexities of modern Venezuela.

    On board were thirty barely clad black men, armed with cutlasses, and two white men - Spanish slave owners with an incredible story to tell. A month earlier, the Amistad had set sail from Havana with a valuable cargo of slaves and $40,000 worth of gold doubloons. She was headed for the Cuban coastal town of Puerto Principe - but in a matter of days, the captain and the cook were dead, and the ship was in the control of the slaves. Thus began "the Amistad affair," which, writes Mary Cable, "was to bedevil the diplomatic relations of the United States, Spain, and England for a generation; intensify bitterness over the question of slavery; and lead an ex-president (John Quincy Adams) to go before the Supreme Court and castigate the administration in an eloquent plea for the slaves' freedom. In her fascinating and carefully researched account, Cable takes us right to the heart of these complex matters, dramatically replaying an incredible series of events that converged to form a uniquely exciting and challenging chapter in American history.

    His revised, in-depth account of the region reveals dynamic societies more concerned about corruption and climate change, the uncertainties of a Donald Trump-led United States, and a political cycle that, in many cases, is turning from left-wing populism to center-right governments. This essential new edition provides important insights into the sweeping changes that have occurred in Latin America in recent years and indicates priorities for the future.

    The Wind That Swept Mexico, originally published in 1943, was the first book to present a broad account of that revolution in its several different phases. In concise but moving words and in memorable photographs, this classic sweeps the reader along from the false peace and plenty of the Díaz era through the doomed administration of Madero, the chaotic years of Villa and Zapata, Carranza and Obregón, to the peaceful social revolution of Cárdenas and Mexico's entry into World War II. The photographs were assembled from many sources by George R. Leighton with the assistance of Anita Brenner and others. Many of the prints were cleaned and rephotographed by the distinguished photographer Walker Evans. Anita Brenner, author of Idols behind Altars and a number of children's books, was born in Mexico and lived there for many years. During the Spanish Civil War she wrote dispatches from Spain for the New York Times and the Nation and for many years she edited the magazine Mexico This Month.

    The long poem was the beginning of Cesaire's quest for negritude, and it became an anthem of Blacks around the world. With its emphasis on unusual juxtapositions of object and metaphor, manipulation of language into puns and neologisms, and rhythm, Cesaire considered his style a "beneficial madness" that could "break into the forbidden" and reach the powerful and overlooked aspects of black culture. Clayton Eshleman and Annette Smith achieve a laudable adaptation of Cesaire's work to English by clarifying double meanings, stretching syntax, and finding equivalent English puns, all while remaining remarkably true to the French text. Their treatment of the poetry is marked with imagination, vigor, and accuracy that will clarify difficulties for those already familiar with French, and make the work accessible to those who are not. Andre Breton's introduction, A Great Black Poet, situates the text and provides a moving tribute to C saire. Notebook of a Return to the Native Land is recommended for readers in comparative literature, post-colonial literature, African American studies, poetry, modernism, and French.

    . . . Iweala never wavers from a gripping, pulsing narrative voice. . . . He captures the horror of ethnic violence in all its brutality and the vulnerability of youth in all its innocence.”  —Entertainment Weekly  (A)The harrowing, utterly original debut novel by Uzodinma Iweala about the life of a child soldier in a war-torn African countryAs civil war rages in an unnamed West-African nation, Agu, the school-aged protagonist of this stunning novel, is recruited into a unit of guerilla fighters. Haunted by his father’s own death at the hands of militants, which he fled just before witnessing, Agu is vulnerable to the dangerous yet paternal nature of his new commander.While the war rages on, Agu becomes increasingly divorced from the life he had known before the conflict started—a life of school friends, church services, and time with his family, still intact. As he vividly recalls these sunnier times, his daily reality continues to spin further downward into inexplicable brutality, primal fear, and loss of selfhood. In a powerful, strikingly original voice, Uzodinma Iweala leads the reader through the random travels, betrayals, and violence that mark Agu’s new community. Electrifying and engrossing, Beasts of No Nation announces the arrival of an extraordinary writer.

    In this memoir, he shares the remarkable story of his culinary coming-of-age. Growing up in the Bronx and Nigeria (where he was sent by his mother to "learn respect"), food was Onwuachi's great love. He launched his own catering company with twenty thousand dollars he made selling candy on the subway, and trained in the kitchens of some of the most acclaimed restaurants in the country. But the road to success is riddled with potholes. As a young chef, Onwuachi was forced to grapple with just how unwelcoming the world of fine dining can be for people of color, and his first restaurant, the culmination of years of planning, shuttered just months after opening. -Notes from a Young Black Chef is one man's pursuit of his passions, despite the odds.

    Linda Heywood offers the first full-length study in English of Queen Njinga's long life and political influence, revealing how this Cleopatra of central Africa skillfully navigated--and ultimately transcended--the ruthless, male-dominated power struggles of her time.In 1626, after being deposed by the Portuguese, she transformed herself into a prolific slave trader and ferocious military leader, waging wars against the Portuguese colonizers and their African allies. Surviving multiple attempts to kill her, Njinga conquered the neighboring state of Matamba and ruled as queen of Ndongo-Matamba. At the height of her reign in the 1640s Njinga ruled almost one-quarter of modern-day northern Angola. Toward the end of her life, weary of war, she made peace with Portugal and converted to Christianity, though her devotion to the new faith was questioned.Who was Queen Njinga? There is no simple answer. In a world where women were subjugated by men, she repeatedly outmaneuvered her male competitors and flouted gender norms, taking both male and female lovers. Today, Njinga is revered in Angola as a national heroine and honored in folk religions, and her complex legacy continues to resonate, forming a crucial part of the collective memory of the Afro-Atlantic world.

    A firsthand exploration of war and the people who survive it in three of the most war-ravaged countries on earth: Sierra Leone, Chechnya, and Bougainville.

    Doctors stymied by mysterious symptoms of the killer: soaring temperature, painful backache, swelling of the throat and neck, discolored skin! Latest victim airlifted to special isolation ward at New York's Columbia Presbyterian Hospital, blood samples rushed to Yale's Arborvirus Laboratory, all-out search launches to discover an antidote. U. S. Public Health officials alarmed, virus has the potential to decimate the whole population, aviation officials consider cancellation of all jet travel to critical world areas.

    The dos and don'ts of travelling and staying in Iceland. Five chapters with multiple tips in each one explain what is expected of you as a traveller - as well as some bonus tips on what you can do.

    But how did the rise in banana consumption in the United States affect the banana-growing regions of Central America? In this lively, interdisciplinary study, John Soluri integrates agroecology, anthropology, political economy, and history to trace the symbiotic growth of the export banana industry in Honduras and the consumer mass market in the United States.Beginning in the 1870s when bananas first appeared in the U.S. marketplace, Soluri examines the tensions between the small-scale growers, who dominated the trade in the early years, and the shippers. He then shows how rising demand led to changes in production that resulted in the formation of major agribusinesses, spawned international migrations, and transformed great swaths of the Honduran environment into monocultures susceptible to plant disease epidemics that in turn changed Central American livelihoods. Soluri also looks at labor practices and workers' lives, changing gender roles on the banana plantations, the effects of pesticides on the Honduran environment and people, and the mass marketing of bananas to consumers in the United States. His multifaceted account of a century of banana production and consumption adds an important chapter to the history of Honduras, as well as to the larger history of globalization and its effects on rural peoples, local economies, and biodiversity.

    Frommer paints Shoeless Joe as a baseball natural ("Joe Jackson hit the ball harder than any man ever to play baseball"-Ty Cobb), an illiterate hick (his table untemsils consisted of knife and fingers), and an innocent man snared by the greatest scandal in baseball history.

    Barriers of communication and transportation were being overcome and giants such as Andrew Carnegie, John D. Rockefeller, and William Randolph Hearst walked the land. The nation’s game was baseball, and its giant was Honus Wagner. In 1996, a baseball card depicting Honus Wagner sold for $640,500 - the largest sum ever paid at auction for a sports artifact. What could possibly make that piece of cardboard, approximately one-and-a-half by two-and-a-half inches, worth more than half a million dollars? The DeValerias tell the unique story behind this now-famous baseball card and the man depicted on it. In doing so, they accurately present the local, regional, and national context so readers gain a thorough understanding of Wagner’s times.Wagner’s gradual emergence from the pack into stardom and popularity is described here in rich detail, but the book also reveals much of Wagner’s family and personal life - his minor leauge career, his values, his failed business ventures during the Depression, and his later years. Neither the “rowdy-ball” ruffian nor the teetotal saint constructed of legend, Wagner is presented here in a complete portrait - one that offers a vivid impression of the era when baseball was America’s game and the nation was evolving into the world’s industrial leader.