Showing results by narrator "Robert Fass" in All Categories

No event in American history was more pivotal---or more furiously contested---than Congress's decision to declare independence in July 1776. Even months after American blood had been shed at Lexington and Concord, many colonists remained loyal to Britain. John Adams, a leader of the revolutionary effort, said bringing the fractious colonies together was like getting "thirteen clocks to strike at once."

True stories of sudden death in the classic collection by a master of American journalism “Reporters love murders,” Calvin Trillin writes in the introduction to Killings. “In a pinch, what the lawyers call ‘wrongful death’ will do, particularly if it’s sudden.” Killings, first...

From bestselling author and beloved New Yorker writer Calvin Trillin, a deeply resonant, career-spanning collection of articles on race and racism, from the 1960s to the present In the early sixties, Calvin Trillin got his start as a journalist covering the Civil Rights Movement in the South...

It coulda been worse. That's the "working epitaph" of 15-year-old Moon Landing. Not that Moon's death is imminent--far from it--but his thoughts have turned to gallows humor, as his world disintegrates along with his parents' marriage. His older brother skateboards through life with ease, but Moon is deeply troubled. Just as he is solving for romantic unknowns with a gorgeous older girl, Moon must contend with his dad's sudden absence, his mom-gone-wild's sexcapades, and his best friends' curious penchant for self-destruction. Not to mention his newfound role in agitating to end an African guerrilla's bloody rampage. To make sense of it all, Moon embarks on a quest to unravel the riddle of God's injustice to man.

New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice A riveting narrative about the biggest earthquake in North American recorded history—the 1964 Alaska earthquake that demolished the city of Valdez and swept away the island village of Chenega—and the geologist who hunted for clues to explain how...

Are GMOs really that bad? A prominent environmental journalist takes a fresh look at what they actually mean for our food system and for us. In the past two decades, GMOs have come to dominate the American diet. Advocates hail them as the future of food, an enhanced method of crop breeding that...

A brilliant novel about the power of politics and personal memory from one of South America's literary stars, the New York Times bestselling author of The Sound of Things Falling. Javier Mallarino is a living legend. He is his country's most influential political cartoonist, the consciousness of...

Who are you, Malone? Just a little while ago you were a cop. That was before the two punks and their girl hit town. That was before they boosted a payroll and shot down a man and took your nine-year-old daughter as insurance to cover their getaway. Now you’re just a man. Scared. Not for yourself - that would be easy. But for your child, the only thing in the world you love enough to make you play ball with the kind of scum you’ve hated all your life.

Long before Superman or Batman made their first appearances, there was Zorro. Born on the pages of the pulps in 1919, Zorro fenced his way through the American popular imagination, carving his signature letter Z into the flesh of evildoers in Old Spanish California. Zorro is the original caped crusader, the first hero to have a band called the Avengers, and the character who laid the blueprint for the modern American superhero. In Zorro's Shadow, historian and Latin American studies expert Stephen J. C. Andes investigates the legends behind the mask of Zorro.

In July 1776 a pair of Franciscan friars, Francisco Atanasio Dominguez and Silvestre Velez de Escalante, were charged by the governor of New Mexico with discovering a route across the unknown Southwest to the new Spanish colony in California. They had other goals as well, some of them secret: converting the indigenous natives along the way to the true faith, discovering a semi-mythical paradise known as Teguayo, hunting for sources of gold and silver, and paving the way for Spanish settlements from Santa Fe to Monterey. In strict terms, the expedition failed.

On June 16, 1918, America’s leading voice of conscience, Eugene Victor Debs, stepped onto a stage in Canton, Ohio, and gave a soul-stirring speech against American intervention in WWI. He did so knowing the cost would be severe: Debs was charged with violating the Espionage Act of 1917 and sentenced to 10 years in a federal penitentiary for sedition. It has never been easy for any man to risk everything - from his possessions, his family, his freedom, or his health - to do what he knows is right. Debs’ crisis is dramatized in Debs in Canton.

The untold story of how America once created the most successful economy the world has ever seen—and how we can do it again. The American economy glitters on the outside, but the reality is quite different. Job opportunities and economic growth are increasingly concentrated in a few crowded...

In The Ape's Wife and Other Stories - Kiernan's 12th collection of short fiction since 2001 - she displays the impressive range that characterizes her work. With her usual disregard for genre boundaries, she masterfully navigates the territories that have traditionally been labeled dark fantasy, sword and sorcery, science fiction, steampunk, and neo-noir.

Maddie Carter moves to Maverick Key to start over and open her own veterinary clinic, hoping a new beginning will help her cope with the loss of her brother, Nathan. Exploring the small seaside town and being near the ocean they both loved makes her feel closer to him, even if it also reminds her of everything she’s lost. She doesn’t expect to find a circle of unforgettable friends or to be drawn to Scott, the brooding, protective ex-military cave diver who’s exploring the underwater cave system where Nathan lost his life.

Celebrated novelist Francisco Goldman married a beautiful young writer named Aura Estrada in a romantic Mexican hacienda in the summer of 2005. The month before their second anniversary, during a long-awaited holiday, Aura broke her neck while body-surfing. Francisco, blamed for Aura’s death by her family and blaming himself, wanted to die, too.

Where is Harlan James? He is the indicted, bail-jumping leader of Banbury's militant Black Hearts who has gone underground… but whose rage, still heard on tape, is edging the city toward interracial terror. Harlan James calls for violence - for black protests, demonstrations, drastic political action against the city's white leaders. But did he also call for - or commit - murder?

Celebrated CUNY philosopher Massimo Pigliucci investigates the practical applications of Cicero’s skepticism, weaving together ancient wisdom, personal narrative, and practical insights to help readers find meaning through doubt You may have picked up this book because you’re searching for a...

From one of America’s greatest, most creative novelists comes Again and Again, a poignant and endlessly surprising story about love lost, found, and redeemed Eugene “Geno” Miles is living out his final days in a nursing home, bored, curmudgeonly, and struggling to connect with his new...

In the vein of The Boy in the Striped Pajamas and Number the Stars, this fusion of fairy tales, folklore, and World War II history eloquently illustrates the power of love and the inherent will to survive even in the darkest of times. In the land of dolls, there is magic. In the land of humans...

The preeminent historian of the American Revolution explains why it remains the most significant event in our history. More than almost any other nation in the world, the United States began as an idea. For this reason, Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Gordon S. Wood believes that the American...