And as mother to the House of Lancaster's last hope, she cannot give up on her son-even when England turns against them. This gripping tale of a queen forced to stand strong in the face of overwhelming odds is at its heart a tender tale of love.

    Through the eyes of this black woman, we see a wide range of historical figures and events of the antebellum South, the Washington of the Civil War years, and the final stages of the war.

    In The Death of Trotsky, Cecelia Holland brings this fated and fatal day to life, from its quotidian beginnings to its dramatic close. Between Trotsky’s waking and his final rest, she probes the outer-workings and inner thoughts of those who were with him till the end, illuminating a man who exited life as he lived it: defiantly. Cecelia Holland, author of more than 30 books and articles, lives in northern California with her family.Cover Design by Adil Dara.

    William Boyd's novel Any Human Heart is his disjointed autobiography, a massive tome chronicling "my personal rollercoaster"--or rather, "not so much a rollercoaster", but a yo-yo, "a jerking spinning toy in the hands of a maladroit child." From his early childhood in Montevideo, son of an English corned beef executive and his Uraguayan secretary, through his years at a Norfolk public school and Oxford, Mountstuart traces his haphazard development as a writer. Early and easy success is succeeded by a long half-century of mediocrity, disappointments and setbacks, both personal and professional, leading him to multiple failed marriages, internment, alcoholism, and abject poverty.Mountstuart's sorry tale is also the story of a British way of life in inexorable decline, as his journey takes in the Bloomsbury set, the General Strike, the Spanish Civil War, 1930s Americans in Paris, wartime espionage, New York avant garde art, even the Baader-Meinhof gang--all with a stellar supporting cast. The most sustained and best moment comes mid-book, as Mountstuart gets caught up in one of Britain's murkier wartime secrets, in the company of the here truly despicable Duke and Duchess of Windsor. Elsewhere Boyd occasionally misplaces his tongue too obviously in his cheek--the Wall Street Crash is trailed with truly crashing inelegance--but overall Any Human Heart is a witty, inventive and ultimately moving novel. Boyd succeeds in conjuring not only a compelling 20th century but also, in the hapless Logan Mountstuart, an anti-hero who achieves something approaching passive greatness. --Alan Stewart, Amazon.co.uk

    Twelve brief accounts by Stefan Zweig (1881-1942) of decisive historical moments in which an individual's will to discover, create and transcend the limits imposed by the temporal and physical environment conflicts with the individual's inability to escape from the realities of their own nature.

     Che’s first encounter with Fidel Castro in Mexico, when he immediately commits himself to join the guerrilla expedition to Cuba. The dramatic moment when Che has to decide his future either as a doctor or a guerrilla fighter, symbolized by the choice of two backpacks: one with medicine, the other with ammunition. Che’s poetic letter to his parents before he sets out on the fateful Bolivia mission. Maps, chronology, and a useful glossary. Thirty-six pages of original photos from the period and stills from the movie. Movie tie-in cover. Blurbs by Benicio del Toro and Steven Soderbergh. Also published in English this season is Che: Guerrilla Diaries, 978-1-920888-93-0.

    In this edition, the original collection is supplemented with the 20 volume Harvard Shelf of Fiction, a selection of the greatest works of fiction. Content: The Harvard Classics: V. 1: Franklin, Woolman & Penn V. 2: Plato, Epictetus & Marcus Aurelius V. 3: Bacon, Milton, Browne V. 4: John Milton V. 5: R. W. Emerson V. 6: Robert Burns V. 7: St Augustine & Thomas á Kempis V. 8: Nine Greek Dramas V. 9: Cicero and Pliny V. 10: The Wealth of Nations V. 11: The Origin of Species V. 12: Plutarchs V. 13: Æneid V. 14: Don Quixote V. 15: Bunyan & Walton V. 16: 1001 Nights V. 17: Folklore & Fable V. 18: Modern English Drama V. 19: Goethe & Marlowe V. 20: The Divine Comedy V. 21: I Promessi Sposi V. 22: The Odyssey V. 23: Two Years Before the Mast V. 24: Edmund Burke V. 25: J. S. Mill & T. Carlyle V. 26: Continental Drama V. 27 & 28: English & American Essays V. 29: The Voyage of the Beagle V. 30: Scientific Papers V. 31: The Autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini V. 32: Literary and Philosophical Essays V. 33: Voyages & Travels V. 34: French & English Philosophers V. 35: Chronicle and Romance V. 36: Machiavelli, Roper, More, Luther V. 37: Locke, Berkeley, Hume V. 38: Harvey, Jenner, Lister, Pasteur V. 39: Prologues V. 40–42: English Poetry V. 43: American Historical Documents V. 44 & 45: Sacred Writings V. 46 & 47: Elizabethan Drama V. 48: Blaise Pascal V. 49: Saga V. 50: Reader's Guide V. 51: Lectures The Shelf of Fiction: V. 1 & 2: The History of Tom Jones V. 3: A Sentimental Journey & Pride and Prejudice V. 4: Guy Mannering V. 5 & 6: Vanity Fair V. 7 & 8: David Copperfield V. 9: The Mill on the Floss V. 10: Irving, Poe, Harte, Twain, Hale V.11: The Portrait of a Lady V. 12: Notre Dame de Paris V. 13: Balzac, Sand, de Musset, Daudet, de Maupassant V. 14 & 15: Goethe, Keller, Storm, Fontane V. 16–19: Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Turgenev V. 20: Valera, Bjørnson, Kielland

    But this book takes the reader on a journey that starts before her marriage, before she came to be seen as the static icon of the age that bears her name. From her isolated childhood at Kensington Palace, where her daily life was controlled by a man who plotted to one day seize power through her, Victoria emerged shortly after her 18th birthday as a fully-fledged Queen, a young woman who gloried in her newfound power and freedom. Over the next twenty years, she fell in love—twice, if the rumors are to be believed—bore nine children, and kept a daily diary which recorded her private, inward struggles: how to reconcile her role as monarch with her duties as a wife and mother, how to protect her country and her throne in an age of revolution. Ultimately, readers of this book will discover how Queen Victoria redefined the monarchy for her own age—and afterwards.

    For most ordinary Englishmen, venturing off into the depths of unexplored America would have been a once in a lifetime adventure: but not for Stephen. By the time he turned forty, he had already survived a hurricane, been shipwrecked in the Bermuda Triangle, been written into a Shakespearean play, witnessed the famine and abandonment of Jamestown Colony, and participated in the marriage of Pocahontas. He was once even sentenced to death! He got himself and his family onto the Pilgrims' Mayflower, and helped found Plymouth Colony. He signed the Mayflower Compact, lodged the famous Squanto in his house, participated in the legendary Thanksgiving, and helped guide and govern the early colonists. Yet Stephen was just an ordinary man, with a wife, three sons, seven daughters, a small house, some farmland for his corn, and cows named Motley, Sympkins, Curled, and Red. These are the extraordinary adventures of an ordinary man.

     One of today's premier historical novelists, Margaret George dazzles here as she tackles her most difficult subject yet: the legendary Elizabeth Tudor, queen of enigma-the Virgin Queen who had many suitors, the victor of the Armada who hated war; the gorgeously attired, jewel- bedecked woman who pinched pennies. England's greatest monarch has baffled and intrigued the world for centuries. But what was she really like? In this novel, her flame-haired, lookalike cousin, Lettice Knollys, thinks she knows all too well. Elizabeth's rival for the love of Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, and mother to the Earl of Essex, the mercurial nobleman who challenged Elizabeth's throne, Lettice had been intertwined with Elizabeth since childhood. This is a story of two women of fierce intellect and desire, one trying to protect her country, and throne, the other trying to regain power and position for her family and each vying to convince the reader of her own private vision of the truth about Elizabeth's character. Their gripping drama is acted out at the height of the flowering of the Elizabethan age. Shakespeare, Marlowe, Dudley, Raleigh, Drake-all of them swirl through these pages as they swirled through the court and on the high seas. This is a magnificent, stay-up-all-night page-turner that is George's finest and most compelling novel and one that is sure to please readers of Alison Weir, Philippa Gregory, and Hilary Mantel.

    There have been various translations made over the years, and it enjoys an audience considerably broader than only that of martial artists and people across East Asia: for instance, some foreign business leaders find its discussion of conflict and taking the advantage to be relevant to their work in a business context. The modern-day Hyōhō Niten Ichi-ryū employs it as a manual of technique and philosophy.Musashi establishes a "no-nonsense" theme throughout the text. For instance, he repeatedly remarks that technical flourishes are excessive, and contrasts worrying about such things with the principle that all technique is simply a method of cutting down one's opponent. He also continually makes the point that the understandings expressed in the book are important for combat on any scale, whether a one-on-one duel or a massive battle. Descriptions of principles are often followed by admonitions to "investigate this thoroughly" through practice rather than trying to learn them by merely reading.Musashi describes and advocates a two-sword fencing style (nitōjutsu): that is, wielding both katana and wakizashi, contrary to the more traditional method of wielding the katana two-handed. However, he only explicitly describes wielding two swords in a section on fighting against many adversaries. The stories of his many duels rarely refer to Musashi himself wielding two swords, although, since they are mostly oral traditions, their details may be inaccurate. Musashi states within the volume that one should train with a long sword in each hand, thereby training the body and improving one's ability to use two blades simultaneously(wikipedia)

    With numerous illustrations. In this volume is told the story of the first crusaders. It begins with their setting out, and it ends with the death of the last survivor. Eight hundred and thirty-five years have passed since then, and the lines of these men are known to us only by the chronicles of their days. Several of these chronicles were written by men who marched with the crusaders, by two chaplains and an unknown soldier. Two other narratives were finished in Beyond the Sea after the march, and we have accounts of others who saw the crusaders pass, a princess of Byzantium, an Armenian patriarch. There is also the testimony of Arab travelers and historians of the period, and the notes of Genoese sea traders, and the saga of a Norse king. Upon these original chronicles the story in this book is based. It does not deal with the legends that grew up after the crusades. It is not history rewritten. It is the story of a dozen men, most of them leaders, who started out on that long journey-what they saw on the road, and what they did, and what befell them at the Sepulcher of Christ.

    Brown the hotelier, Smith the innocent American, and Jones the confidence man—these are the “comedians” of Greene’s title. Hiding behind their actors’ masks, they hesitate on the edge of life. They are men afraid of love, afraid of pain, afraid of fear itself...

    There is a user-friendly table of contents for easy interaction. The following are included:1. 1215 - The Magna Carta2. 1606 - The First Virginia Charter3. 1620 - The Mayflower Compact4. 1676 - The First Thanksgiving Proclamation5. 1765 - Resolutions of the Stamp Act6. 1775 - Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death7. 1776 - Declaration of Independance8. 1777 - Articles of Confederation9. 1783 - The Paris Peace Treaty of 178310. 1787 - The Constitution of the United States of America and the Amendments11. 1796 - George Washington's Farewell Address12. 1823 - The Monroe Doctrine13. 1862 - The Emancipation Proclamation14. 1863 - The Gettysburg Address15. 1941 - The Four FreedomsThese documents and speeches provided a solid reference foundation for any class in United States history or government.All of Unique Classics ebooks have an improved navigation system which includes a linked table of contents. The works are formatted for easy reading and triple-checked for quality assurance. Our illustrated ebooks contain the best related works of art for the material which make the story reading experience much more pleasant and memorable.

    Includes genealogical tables, coats of arms, and royal heraldry.