Kindle Customer

We are familiar with maps that outline all 50 states. And we are also familiar with the idea that the United States is an "empire", exercising power around the world. But what about the actual territories - the islands, atolls, and archipelagos - this country has governed and inhabited? In How to Hide an Empire, author Daniel Immerwahr tells the fascinating story of the United States outside the United States. In crackling, fast-paced prose, he reveals forgotten episodes that cast American history in a new light.

If anyone could be considered a Russian counterpart to the infamous British double-agent Kim Philby, it was Oleg Gordievsky. The son of two KGB agents and the product of the best Soviet institutions, the savvy, sophisticated Gordievsky grew to see his nation's communism as both criminal and philistine. He took his first posting for Russian intelligence in 1968 and eventually became the Soviet Union's top man in London, but from 1973 on he was secretly working for MI6.

Theodore Roosevelt Jr., (1858-1919), 26th president of the United States, from 1901 to 1909, was also a conservationist, naturalist, and writer. From 1884 to 1886, he established his ranch in Dakota Territory, which involved much hardship and toil. Ranch Life and the Hunting Trail - published in 1888 - is the account of his labors and adventures as a cowboy, hunter, herder, and even a stint as a deputy sheriff.