Knowledge = Power

In this inspiring, horrifying, and accessible collection of short,  entertaining, and vivid life stories, Simon Sebag Montefiore—one of our  pre-eminent historians and a prizewinning writer—presents the giant  characters who have changed the course of world history.  These titans of history—encompassing queens, empresses, and actresses,  kings, sultans, and conquerors, as...

This definitive  biography of one of history's most influential father-son duos tells the  story of two rulers who gripped the world -- and their rise and fall  from power. Alexander the Great's  conquests staggered the world. He led his army across thousands of  miles, overthrowing the greatest empires of his time and building a new  one in their place. He claimed to...

An award-winning historian plumbs the depths of Hitler and Stalin's  vicious regimes, and shows the extent to which they brutalized the world  around them. Two 20th century tyrants stand apart from all  the rest in terms of their ruthlessness and the degree to which they  changed the world around them. Briefly allies during World War II,  Adolph Hitler and Josef Stalin the...

Suetonius  - The Twelve Caesars

Alexander was born into the royal family of Macedonia, the kingdom  that would soon rule over Greece. Tutored as a boy by Aristotle,  Alexander had an inquisitive mind that would serve him well when he  faced formidable obstacles during his military campaigns. Shortly after  taking command of the army, he launched an invasion of the Persian  Empire, and continued his conqu...

Mao's Great Famine: The History of China's Most Devastating Catastrophe, 1958-1962 The Tragedy of Liberation: A History of the Chinese Revolution 1945-1957 The Cultural Revolution: A People's History, 1962—1976

"Fascinating, shrewd . . . The book deftly traces the rhythms and patterns of Chinese history."—Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times In  this sweeping and insightful history, Henry Kissinger turns for the  first time at book length to a country he has known intimately for  decades and whose modern relations with the West he helped shape. On China illuminates the inner workings of Ch...

A primer on Democratic Socialism for those who are extremely skeptical of it. America is witnessing the rise of a new generation of socialist  activists. More young people support socialism now than at any time  since the labor movement of the 1920s. The Democratic Socialists of  America, a big-tent leftist organization, has just surpassed 50,000  members nationwide. In the fal...

In early nineteenth-century Russia, the threat of Napoleon’s invasion looms, and the lives of millions are about to be changed forever. This includes Pierre Bezúkhov, illegitimate son of an aristocrat; Andrew Bolkónski, ambitious military scion; and Natásha Rostóva, compassionate daughter of a nobleman. All of them are unprepared for what lies ahead. Alongside their fellow compatriots - a catalog...

Ged was the greatest sorcerer in all Earthsea, but once he was called Sparrowhawk, a reckless youth, hungry for power and knowledge, who tampered with long-held secrets and loosed a terrible shadow upon the world. This is the tale of his testing, how he mastered the mighty words of power, tamed an ancient dragon, and crossed death's threshold to restore the balance. An exciting re-launch of the cl...

Basic Economics_A Citizen's Guide to the Economy - Thomas Sowell Black Rednecks and White Liberals - Thomas Sowell The Housing Boom and Bust

Pulitzer Prize- and National Book Award-winning author Richard Rhodes  reveals the fascinating history behind energy transitions over time—wood  to coal to oil to electricity and beyond. People have lived and  died, businesses have prospered and failed, and nations have risen to  world power and declined, all over energy challenges. Ultimately, the  history of these challe...

Hidden deep within the daily workings of governments and civilizations is a secret world of mystery, danger, and intrigue. A world where deception is a form of art. Where people are never who they say they are. Where the tiniest observation has the power to save an empire or spark a global war. Welcome to the world of the spy—a world that most of us associate with popular fiction and film but the...

The definitive history of nuclear weapons and the Manhattan Project. From the turn-of-the-century discovery of nuclear energy to the dropping of the first bombs on Japan, Richard Rhodes’s Pulitzer Prize–winning book details the science, the people, and the sociopolitical realities that led to the development of the atomic bomb. This sweeping account begins in the 19th century, with the discovery o...

“Nothing short of a masterpiece.”―NPR Books A New York Times and Washington Post Notable Book of the Year In the most ambitious one-volume American history in decades,  award-winning historian Jill Lepore offers a magisterial account of the  origins and rise of a divided nation. Widely hailed for its “sweeping, sobering account of the American past” ( New York Times Book Review ),  ...

Know thy enemy. That's what the wisdom of history teaches us. And Adolf Hitler was surely the greatest enemy ever faced by modern civilization. Over half a century later, the horror and fascination still linger. No one is better able to explain the unexplainable about this man and his movement than Professor Thomas Childers. In these lectures, you will see what great teaching is all about.

The first riveting examination of the shocking infiltration of the US government by Stalin’s Soviet intelligence networks during WWII. Until now, many sinister events that transpired in the clash of the world's superpowers at the close of World War II and the ensuing Cold War era have been ignored, distorted, and kept hidden from the public. Through a careful survey of primary sources and disclosu...

The New York Times best-selling author of The Six Wives of Henry VIII and The War of the Roses ,  historian Alison Weir crafts fascinating portraits of England’s  infamous House of Tudor line. Here Weir focuses on Elizabeth I, also  known as the Virgin Queen, who ascended to the throne at age 25 and  never married, yet ruled for 44 years and steered England into its  Golde...

THE ROMAN EMPIRE STANDS as the greatest political achievement in the  history of Western civilization. From its humble beginnings as a tiny  kingdom in central Italy, Rome grew to envelope the entire Mediterranean  until it ruled an empire that stretched from the Atlantic to Syria and  from the Sahara to Scotland. Its enduring legacy continues to define the  modern world....

Best-selling author Adrian  Goldsworthy turns his attention to the Pax Romana, the famous peace and  prosperity brought by the Roman Empire at its height in the first and  second centuries AD. Yet the Romans were conquerors, imperialists who  took by force a vast empire stretching from the Euphrates to the  Atlantic coast. Ruthless, Romans won peace not through coexistence...

Prophet Muhammad

A riveting account of ancient  Rome's imperial bodyguard, the select band of soldiers who wielded the  power to make - or destroy - the emperors they served. Founded by Augustus around 27 BC, the elite Praetorian Guard was  tasked with the protection of the emperor and his family. As the  centuries unfolded, however, Praetorian soldiers served not only as  protectors and e...

A classic of Japanese history, this audiobook is the preeminent work on the history of Japan. Newly revised and updated, A History of Japan is a single-volume complete history of the nation of Japan. Starting in ancient Japan during its early pre-history period, A History of Japan covers every important aspect of history and culture through feudal  Japan to the post-Cold War period and collap...

No religion in the modern world is as feared and misunderstood as Islam.  It haunts the popular imagination as an extreme faith that promotes  terrorism, authoritarian government, female oppression, and civil war.  In a vital revision of this narrow view of Islam and a distillation of  years of thinking and writing about the subject, Karen Armstrong’s short  history demons...

John Brockman (editor) - The Universe