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Showing 1 - 20 of 34395 items
By Michael D Gordin. 2009
On August 29, 1949, the first Soviet test bomb, dubbed "First Lightning", exploded in the deserts of Kazakhstan. This surprising…
international event marked the beginning of an arms race that would ultimately lead to nuclear proliferation beyond the Soviet Union and the United States. Using newly opened archives, Gordin follows a trail of espionage, secrecy, deception, political brinksmanship, and technical innovation to provide a fresh understanding of the nuclear arms race. 2009.By Erik Orsenna. 2005
By Bernard Henri Lévy. 2006
Où va l'amérique ? Devant ce pays colossal et blessé, contradictoire et protéiforme, devant ce pays-concept dont les emblèmes, nobles…
ou infamants, tournent à n'en pas finir sur le manège médiatique mondial, chacun est pris de vertige. American Vertigo ? Un livre-enquête mobile et chaleureux. Un reportage conceptuel et un " road book " sensuel, cérébral, drôle, véridique. La perspicacité du philosophe. L'oeil et le style du romancier. 2006.By Joël Michel. 2008
"Le 7 juin 1998, on découvre, devant le plus vieux cimetière noir de la ville de Jasper, Texas, les restes…
d'un homme ; les genoux et les organes génitaux ont été rabotés, la tête et le bras droit arrachés. Les traces de sang permettent de retrouver un dentier, des clés et, un kilomètre plus loin, le bras et la tête dans un fossé. C'est un lynchage, celui de James Byrd, le dernier exemple de lynchage traditionnel. Il est l'oeuvre de trois hommes, qui veulent venger un Blanc assassiné en donnant une leçon à tous les Noirs. Depuis la guerre de Sécession, Jasper est, selon la communauté noire du lieu, "un endroit où les choses arrivent longtemps après leur temps". Aux États-Unis, le racisme ne se cantonne pas aux ghettos urbains. Dans le Sud profond, il ressurgit parfois, avec une violence qu'on voulait croire oubliée. Précis dans ses références, pointu dans ses analyses, effrayant dans ses descriptions, cet essai s'appuie sur les publications récentes d'historiens américains : jusque dans les années 1990, le lynchage était un sujet tabou. En France, c'est le premier livre qui lui est consacré." -- 4e de couv.By Stacy Schiff, William Olivier Desmond. 2006
Le temps est exécrable en ce 3 décembre de l'an 1776 sur les côtes bretonnes lorsque débarque, d'un frêle esquif,…
un vieillard perclus de rhumatismes. Son arrivée se fait dans le plus grand secret - il s'agit pourtant d'un homme célèbre et respecté dans le monde entier, et qui lors de son séjour français, changera le cours de l'histoire de l'Amérique. Son nom : Benjamin Franklin. Sa mission : rallier la France de l'Ancien Régime à la cause de la Révolution américaine. Et au vu des mille péripéties qui jalonneront cette première aventure franco-américaine au cours des mois suivants, c'est miracle qu'il y soit parvenu ! [...] Cette extraordinaire biographie historique, couronnée par de nombreux prix, se lit comme un roman picaresque, bourré d'intrigues entrecroisées, de quiproquos, de rebondissements inattendus et de personnages inouïs. Dans une prose étincelante, pleine d'humour et de saveur, tissant la toile fabuleuse des mille petites histoires qui font la grande, Stacy Schiff déroule la saga de l'homme qui, presque à lui seul, permit aux futurs États-Unis de gagner leur indépendance. -- 4e de couv. Titre uniforme: The great improvisation.By Donald E Graves, J. Mackay Hitsman. 1999
An account of the causes of the war of 1812 and of the campaigns and battles that raged on land…
and water, from the Great Lakes to the Gulf of Mexico. Hitsman describes the life and role of the soldiers - both the regulars and the militia - and the difficulties of waging war in largely trackless territory, where rivers and lakes were the main means of transport. Some descriptions of violence. 1999.By Rosemary Sadlier. 1997
A biography of Harriet Tubman, who helped slaves escape to freedom. It tells her story and describes what life was…
like in St. Catharines during the eight years she lived in Canada. The author also illustrates the importance of family history by tracing Harriet's descendants to the present day. Grades 5-8. 1997.By Cheryl Strayed. 2015
At 26, Cheryl Strayed thought she had lost everything. In the wake of her mother's death, her family disbanded and…
her marriage crumbled. With nothing to lose, she made the most impulsive decision of her life: to walk 1,100 miles of the west coast of America - from the Mojave Desert, through California and Oregon, and into Washington State - and to do it alone. She had no experience of long-distance hiking and the journey was nothing more than a line on a map. But it held a promise - a promise of piecing together a life that lay in ruins at her feet. 2015.Aimé Tschiffely had an unlikely dream: to ride 10,000 miles from Buenos Aires to New York City. On 23 April…
1925 this quiet, unassuming schoolteacher, with little equestrian experience, set out on his epic journey. His only companions were two native Argentine horses called Mancha and Gato. Together the trio traversed the Pampas, scaled the Andes and swam across the crocodile-infested rivers of Colombia. Along the way they were assailed by vampire bats, mistaken for gods and stalked by hostile revolutionaries. After two harrowing years, the man who had originally been labelled 'a lunatic' by the press was accorded a ticker-tape parade when he rode triumphantly through the streets of New York. 2014.By John Milton Cooper. 2009
Evaluates the parallel worlds of the twenty-eighth president's personal and political arenas, examining his World War I leadership, his failed…
efforts to bring the United States into the League of Nations, and his contributions toward the creation of the United Nations. 2009.By Arthur M Schlesinger. 2004
The gravest decision in a democracy is the one to go to war. In a book that brings a command…
of history to the most urgent of contemporary questions, the author explores the war in Iraq, the presidency, and the future of democracy. Describing unilateralism as "the oldest doctrine in American history," he nevertheless warns of the dangers posed by the fatal turn in U.S. policy from deterrence and containment to preventive war. 2004.By Bill Bryson. 2002
Bryson describes his cross-country journey to revisit what he deems the "magic places" of his youth, beginning with his hometown…
of Des Moines, Iowa, and including the Rocky Mountains. Reminisces about his childhood and his father as he recounts adventures across thirty-eight states and 13,978 miles. Some strong language. c1989, 2002.By Jim Murphy. 2003
An overview of the struggle between the Texan settlers and Mexico's General Santa Anna for control of Texas, with a…
detailed description of the 1836 siege of the Alamo. The author's inside book separates fact from fiction as often as possible. For junior and senior high readers. 2003.After a thirty-year career as high profile vet, columnist, presenter and author, Bruce Fogle - the UK's bestselling cat &…
dog writer - decided to leave urban Britain and take a journey with his dog Macy. Travelling in the footsteps of the great American novelist John Steinbeck, who published Travels with Charley - his standard poodle - in the '60s, Fogle set off in search of the North America of his childhood. 2006.By Bill Bryson. 1997
Bryson relates the adventures and misadventures of two totally unfit hikers, as he and longtime friend Stephen Katz traverse the…
2,100-mile Appalachian Trail from Georgia to Maine. Returning from more than twenty years in Britain, he set out to rediscover his homeland, but the two men find themselves awed by the terrain and stymied by the unfamiliar local culture. His gruelling yet fascinating trek gave him a rare perspective on American life. Some strong language. Bestseller.By Bill Bryson. 1998
After nearly two decades in England, Bill Bryson returned to the country of his birth. Gathered here are 18 months'…
worth of his "Mail on Sunday" columns about that strange phenomena, the American way of life, in which he brings his bemused wit to bear on one of the world's craziest countries.By Susan Orlean. 2018
Reopens the unsolved mystery of the most catastrophic library fire in American history; chronicles the Los Angeles Public Library fire…
and its aftermath to showcase the larger, crucial role that libraries play in our lives; delves into the evolution of libraries across the country and around the world, from their humble beginnings as a metropolitan charitable initiative to their current status as a cornerstone of national identity; brings each department of the library to vivid life through on-the-ground reporting; studies arson attempts to burn a copy of a book herself; reflects on her own experiences in libraries; and reexamines the case of Harry Peak, the blond-haired actor long suspected of setting fire to the LAPL more than thirty years ago. Bestseller. 2018.By Rosemary Sadlier. 1997
A biography of Harriet Tubman, who helped slaves escape to freedom. It tells her story and describes what life was…
like in St. Catharines during the eight years she lived in Canada. The author also illustrates the importance of family history by tracing Harriet's descendants to the present day. Grades 5-8. 1997.By Barack Obama. 2020
A riveting, deeply personal account of history in the making—from the president who inspired us to believe in the power…
of democracy#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • NAMED ONE OF THE TEN BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEWNAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY The Washington Post • Jennifer Szalai, The New York Times • NPR • The Guardian • Marie Claire In the stirring, highly anticipated first volume of his presidential memoirs, Barack Obama tells the story of his improbable odyssey from young man searching for his identity to leader of the free world, describing in strikingly personal detail both his political education and the landmark moments of the first term of his historic presidency—a time of dramatic transformation and turmoil.Obama takes readers on a compelling journey from his earliest political aspirations to the pivotal Iowa caucus victory that demonstrated the power of grassroots activism to the watershed night of November 4, 2008, when he was elected 44th president of the United States, becoming the first African American to hold the nation’s highest office.Reflecting on the presidency, he offers a unique and thoughtful exploration of both the awesome reach and the limits of presidential power, as well as singular insights into the dynamics of U.S. partisan politics and international diplomacy. Obama brings readers inside the Oval Office and the White House Situation Room, and to Moscow, Cairo, Beijing, and points beyond. We are privy to his thoughts as he assembles his cabinet, wrestles with a global financial crisis, takes the measure of Vladimir Putin, overcomes seemingly insurmountable odds to secure passage of the Affordable Care Act, clashes with generals about U.S. strategy in Afghanistan, tackles Wall Street reform, responds to the devastating Deepwater Horizon blowout, and authorizes Operation Neptune’s Spear, which leads to the death of Osama bin Laden.A Promised Land is extraordinarily intimate and introspective—the story of one man’s bet with history, the faith of a community organizer tested on the world stage. Obama is candid about the balancing act of running for office as a Black American, bearing the expectations of a generation buoyed by messages of “hope and change,” and meeting the moral challenges of high-stakes decision-making. He is frank about the forces that opposed him at home and abroad, open about how living in the White House affected his wife and daughters, and unafraid to reveal self-doubt and disappointment. Yet he never wavers from his belief that inside the great, ongoing American experiment, progress is always possible.This beautifully written and powerful book captures Barack Obama’s conviction that democracy is not a gift from on high but something founded on empathy and common understanding and built together, day by day.