She wrote of three day blizzards, forty ton trains stuck in the snow, houses buried in snowdrifts and a town that nearly starved.Was Laura's story just fiction, or was that one winter stranger than fiction? Was that winter really that bad, or was it just a typical old time winter stretched a bit to make a good tale?Author Dan L. White examines the reality of the long, hard winter. White uses contemporary newspaper articles, autobiographies and historical accounts of those who lived through that time to weave a fascinating story of the incredible winter of 1880-81.

    Joshua Hempstead was a well-respected farmer and tradesman in New London, Connecticut. As his remarkable diary—kept from 1711 until 1758—reveals, he was also a slave owner who owned Adam Jackson for over thirty years. In this engrossing narrative of family life and the slave experience in the colonial North, Allegra di Bonaventura describes the complexity of this master/slave relationship and traces the intertwining stories of two families until the eve of the Revolution. Slavery is often left out of our collective memory of New England’s history, but it was hugely impactful on the central unit of colonial life: the family. In every corner, the lines between slavery and freedom were blurred as families across the social spectrum fought to survive. In this enlightening study, a new portrait of an era emerges.

    Here are four of the most notable narratives: The Life of Olaudah Equiano; The History of Mary Prince; Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass; and Incidents in the Life of Slave Girl.

    Their devotion so intense they wed each other not once, but twice. In the first book to focus on both Natalie Wood and Robert Wagner, the author of the bestseller Gable & Lombard and the critically acclaimed book Cary Grant gives us a scintillating portrait of this glamorous and exciting couple from their early years working for the studio system to the final, shattering hours before Natalie Wood's life tragically ended. We follow them on their roller-coaster ride of the ups and downs and the magic and the madness of this couple who became Hollywood royalty.

    Through the eyes of seven principal characters including the bombers, the wounded, a cop, and a doctor, Boston Globe reporters Helman and Russell trace the paths that brought them together.

    Set against a colonial backdrop teeming with radicals and reactionaries, visionaries, spies, and salty sea captains, Sons of Providence is the biography of John and Moses Brown, two classic American archetypes bound by blood yet divided by the specter of more than half a million Africans enslaved throughout the colonies. John is a profit-driven robber baron running slave galleys from his wharf on the Providence waterfront; his younger brother Moses is an idealist, a conscientious Quaker hungry for social reform who—with blood on his own hands—strikes out against the hypocrisy of slavery in a land of liberty.Their story spans a century, from John's birth in 1736, through the Revolution, to Moses' death in 1836. The brothers were partners in business and politics and in founding the university that bears their name. They joined in the struggle against England, attending secret sessions of the Sons of Liberty and, in John's case, leading a midnight pirate raid against a British revenue cutter. But for the Browns as for the nation, the institution of slavery was the one question that admitted no middle ground. Moses became an early abolitionist while John defended the slave trade and broke the laws written to stop it. The brothers' dispute takes the reader from the sweltering decks of the slave ships to the taverns and town halls of the colonies and shows just how close America came to ending slavery eighty years before the conflagration of civil war.This dual biography is drawn from voluminous family papers and other primary sources and is a dramatic story of an epic struggle for primacy between two very different brothers. It also provides a fresh and panoramic view of the founding era. Samuel Adams and Nathanael Greene take turns here, as do Stephen Hopkins, Rhode Island's great revolutionary leader and theorist, and his brother Esek, first commodore of the United States Navy. We meet the Philadelphia abolitionists Anthony Benezet and James Pemberton, and Providence printer John Carter, one of the pioneers of the American press. For all the chronicles of America's primary patriarch, none documents, as this book does, George Washington's sole public performance in opposition to the slave trade.Charles Rappleye brings the skills of an investigative journalist to mine this time and place for vivid detail and introduce the reader to fascinating new characters from the members of our founding generation. Raised in a culture of freedom and self-expression, Moses and John devoted their lives to the pursuit of their own visions of individual liberty. In so doing, each emerges as an American archetype—Moses as the social reformer, driven by conscience and dedicated to an enlightened sense of justice; John as the unfettered capitalist, defiant of any effort to constrain his will. The story of their collaboration and their conflict has a startlingly contemporary feel. And like any good yarn, the story of the Browns tells us something about ourselves.

    The conspirators were part of a pro-Southern secret society that didn’t want an anti-slavery President in the White House. They planned an elaborate scheme to assassinate the brand new President in a Baltimore train station as Lincoln’s inauguration train passed through en route to the Capital. The plot was investigated by famed detective Allan Pinkerton, who infiltrated the group with undercover agents, including one of the first female private detectives in America. Had the assassination succeeded, there would have been no Lincoln Presidency, and the course of the Civil War and American history would have forever been altered.The bestselling team that brought you The First Conspiracy now turns their attention to the story of the secret society that tried to kill Abraham Lincoln and the undercover detectives who foiled their plans.

    An hour and a half later, she killed her father the same way. Although the story has been told by those least qualified to do so -- outsiders and men. Now, for the first time, this famous American crime is examined by someone with all the proper credentials: Victoria Lincoln, a native of Fall River and thus knows the never-revealed 'inside' story of the crime that insular community regarded as its private disgrace; she is a woman, and as she convincingly demonstrates, the Borden murders -- and their solution -- can be fully understood only by a fellow woman.Miss Lincoln comes up with startling new findings in her penetrating analysis of the crime. Among them: the hitherto unknown motive for the killings (a secret no one but an inhabitant of Fall River, Massachusetts, ever could possibly disclose); a startling new hypothesis to account for Lizzie's celebrated 'peculiar spells' that casts new light on how the crime was committed; and the place where Lizzie hid the dress she was wearing at the time of the murders -- a mystery that has been plaguing criminologists for years.

    As Frederick Douglass wrote: "When John Brown stretched forth his arm ... the clash of arms was at hand." DuBois's biography brings Brown stirringly to life and is a neglected classic.

    The book is a detailed account of this very important but controversial figure in American history. The story is a “classic rags to riches” one and begins with his childhood in the British West Indies. Though his life is filled with tragedy and he is very poor, Hamilton manages to distinguish himself through his writing and his business skills. Eventually, he leaves the West Indies and immigrates to North America where he receives a first rate education. Later, he becomes a hero in the Revolutionary War and is appointed to be General George Washington’s right hand man. Because of his service to Washington, Hamilton becomes the Secretary of the Treasury when Washington is elected President. As a member of the new government, Hamilton makes significant contributions including setting up a banking system and a currency system which are still used today. He also plays a major role in the ratification of the United States Constitution. While Alexander Hamilton: Founding Father primarily focuses on Hamilton’s great contributions, it also presents his dark side. Though Hamilton married a wealthy woman and became a member of the aristocracy, he was also involved in a scandalous affair and ultimately died in a duel defending his honor.

    Douglas in the coming presidential race. Douglas, after all, led the only party that bridged North and South. But the Democrats would split over the issue ofslavery, leading Southerners in the party to run their own presidential slate. This opened the door for the upstart Republicans, exclusively Northern, to steal the Oval Office. Dark horse Abraham Lincoln, not the first choice even of his own party, won the presidency with a record-low 39.8 percent of the popular vote.Acclaimed scholar Douglas R. Egerton chronicles the contest with a historian's keen insight and a veteran political reporter's eye for detail. Vividly, Egerton re-creates the cascade of unforeseen events that confounded political bosses, set North and South on the road to disunion, and put not Stephen Douglas, but his greatest rival, in the White House.We see Lincoln and his team outmaneuvering more prominent Republicans, like New York's grandiose William Seward, while Democratic conventions collapse in confusion. And we see the gifted, flawed Douglas marking his finest hour in defeat, as he strives, and fails, to save the Union. Year of Meteors delivers a teeming cast of characters, minor and major, and a breakneck narrative of this most momentous year in American history.

    His private life was as glamorous and romantic as it was privileged. This first full-scale biography since 1934 is a reflection of American history from the Civil War to the emergence of the nation as a world power as Woodrow Wilson is about to take office.Much of what we know about Lincoln’s years in the White House is drawn from the writings of the young John Hay, the president’s secretary, who was with Lincoln at the Gettysburg Address and at his bedside when he died.Afterward, Hay successfully worked to elect fellow Ohioans James Garfield, Rutherford B. Hayes, and William McKinley for president. As McKinley’s Secretary of State, he plotted the nation’s emergence as a world power after the Spanish-American War. Hay arranged the annexation of the Philippines, the treaty for a canal across Panama, the Open Door policy for China.After McKinley’s assassination, Theodore Roosevelt persuaded the aging Hay to stay on. The relationship between Hay and Roosevelt, which has not been explored, is of lasting interest. If Lincoln was a second father to Hay, Hay was a second father to TR—Roosevelt the bully wielder of the big stick; Hay the polished, urbane diplomat who walked softly, carried out TR’s policies, and helped him win the Nobel Peace Prize.Hay is one of the most pivotal figures in American public life. But, as Taliaferro writes, that is only half the story. He knew everybody from Mark Twain to Henry James, and every president and world leader. He was best friends with Henry Adams, and the two were in love with the same married woman, Lizzie Cameron, the Madame X of Washington Society. Both wrote her voluminous letters.All the Great Prizes chronicles a life that reflects the story of America from the devastation of the Civil War to its emergence as a world leader and power.

    In this new biography, Webster is seen as a major player in American politics in the era between the War of 1812 and the beginning of the Civil War, involved with every significant issue confronting the new nation. Webster had no equal as an orator, then or since. Whether in the Senate, before the Supreme Court, or on the political stump, he was a golden-tongued spellbinder, often holding audiences in thrall for hours. In his lifelong defense of the Constitution, and as a constant upholder of the Union, Webster won love and respect. He was often referred to as "the Godlike Daniel". But he was also referred to as "Black Dan" because of his questionable dealings with men of wealth and power, his political conniving, his habitual nonpayment of debts, and perhaps even his somewhat roving eye.

    Fearless spy for the Confederacy, glittering Washington hostess, legendary beauty and lover, Rose Greenhow risked everything for the cause she valued more than life itself. In this superb portrait, biographer Ann Blackman tells the surprising true story of a unique woman in history. “I am a Southern woman, born with revolutionary blood in my veins,” Rose once declared–and that fiery spirit would plunge her into the center of power and the thick of adventure. Born into a slave-holding family, Rose moved to Washington, D.C., as a young woman and soon established herself as one of the capital’s most charming and influential socialites, an intimate of John C. Calhoun, James Buchanan, and Dolley Madison. She married well, bore eight children and buried five, and, at the height of the Gold Rush, accompanied her husband Robert Greenhow to San Francisco. Widowed after Robert died in a tragic accident, Rose became notorious in Washington for her daring–and numerous–love affairs.But with the outbreak of the Civil War, everything changed. Overnight, Rose Greenhow, fashionable hostess, become Rose Greenhow, intrepid spy. As Blackman reveals, deadly accurate intelligence that Rose supplied to General Pierre G. T. Beauregard written in a fascinating code (the code duplicated in the background on the jacket of this book). Her message to Beauregard turned the tide in the first Battle of Bull Run, and was a brilliant piece of spycraft that eventually led to her arrest by Allan Pinkerton and imprisonment with her young daughter. Indomitable, Rose regained her freedom and, as the war reached a crisis, journeyed to Europe to plead the Confederate cause at the royal courts of England and France. Drawing on newly discovered diaries and a rich trove of contemporary accounts, Blackman has fashioned a thrilling, intimate narrative that reads like a novel. Wild Rose is an unforgettable rendering of an astonishing woman, a book that will stand with the finest Civil War biographies.

    McPhee unravels the complex story behind the public facts of the Boston Marathon bombing. She examines the bombers' roots in Dagestan and Chechnya, their struggle to assimilate in America, and their growing hatred of the United States—a deepening antagonism that would prompt federal prosecutors to dub Dzhokhar Tsarnaev “America's worst nightmare.” The difficulties faced by the Tsarnaev family of Cambridge, Massachusetts, are part of the public record. Circumstances less widely known are the FBI's recruitment of the older brother, Tamerlan Tsarnaev, as a “mosque crawler” to inform on radical separatists here and in Chechnya; the tracking down and killing of radical Islamic separatists during the six months he spent in Russia—travel that raised eyebrows, since he was on several terrorist watchlists; the FBI's botched deals and broken promises with regard to his immigration; and the disenchantment, rage, and growing radicalization of Tamerlan and Dzhokhar, along with their mother, sisters, and Tamerlan's wife, Katherine.Maximum Harm is also a compelling examination of the Tsarnaev brothers' movements in the days leading up to the Boston Marathon bombing on April 15, 2013, the subsequent investigation, the Tsarnaevs' murder of MIT police officer Sean Collier, the high-speed chase and shootout that killed Tamerlan, and the manhunt in which the authorities finally captured Dzhokhar, hiding in a Watertown backyard. McPhee untangles the many threads of circumstance, coincidence, collusion, motive, and opportunity that resulted in the deadliest attack on the city of Boston to date.“McPhee nails it. Happiness, fear, tragedy, anger, heroism, and hope are all on display in this riveting new book about terror in Boston. A must-read, so we never forget, and learn from, the lessons of that historic day.”—Scott Brown, former United States senator and author of Against All Odds: My Life of Hardship, Fast Breaks, and Second Chances“Maximum Harm is a riveting, eye-opening page-turner that takes you into the real world of international terrorism and the difficulties for local, state, and federal law enforcement. . . . It raises the question: Are we prepared?”—Bernard B. Kerik, New York City police commissioner (retired)“No single reporter has covered the Boston bombing as thoroughly as Michele McPhee. She knows Boston—its streets, its cops, and its corridors of power. Maximum Harm is riveting—a tribute to the first responders, and, startlingly, a troubling exposé of the FBI’s botched handling of the Tsarnaev brothers. You may think you know this story, but until you read this book, you don’t.”—T. J. English, New York Times–bestselling author of Where the Bodies Were Buried and The Westies“In Maximum Harm, Michele McPhee uncovers shocking new truths about the Boston Marathon bombers and those in government, law enforcement, and their own community who gave them free rein to plot and execute one of the most vicious terror attacks ever carried out on American soil. This book will grab you, shake you, and will not let you go!”—Casey Sherman, New York Times–bestselling author of The Finest Hours and Boston Strong<