English Biography

In Morgan, noted biographer Jean Strouse creates the first complete portrait of a man who defined American commerce and banking. Contemporaries described J. Pierpoint Morgan as “the financial Moses of the New World.” She shows J.Pierpoint Morgan in the full context of his childhood and health, travels and tastes, personal affairs and business relationships. And through Nelson Runger’s thoughtful narration, this accessible biography becomes a fascinating audio production.

Most of the world remembers Crazy Horse as a peerless warrior who brought the U.S. Army to its knees at the Battle of Little Bighorn. But to his fellow Lakota Indians, he was a dutiful son and humble fighting man who, with valor, spirit, respect, and unparalleled leadership, fought for his people's land, livelihood, and honor. In this fascinating biography, Joseph Marshall, himself a Lakota Indian, creates a vibrant portrait of the man, his times, and his legacy.

The first vice president to become president on the death of the incumbent, John Tyler (1790-1862) was derided by critics as "His Accidency." In this biography of the 10th president, Edward P. Crapol challenges depictions of Tyler as a die-hard advocate of states' rights, limited government, and a strict interpretation of the Constitution. Instead, he argues, Tyler manipulated the Constitution to increase the executive power of the presidency. Crapol also highlights Tyler's faith in America's national destiny and his belief in boundless territorial expansion.

In 2008, Howard Schultz, the president and chairman of Starbucks, made the unprecedented decision to return as CEO, eight years after he stepped down from daily oversight of the company to become chairman. Concerned that Starbucks had lost its way, Schultz was determined to help it return to its core values and restore not only its financial health, but also its soul.

If you want a view into the world that lies behind the Ted Bundy murders, this last work in a series of six books on Bundy is definitely for you. For within this audiobook, you will find many questions still surrounding this fascinating and intricate case, as well as the answers that are only now being provided here. There’s so much more to learn, and new information is still surfacing about Bundy, his victims, and his potential victims. As such, there is new testimony included from those who had a brush with the killer, and others who played their own roles in this multistate case.

When Hugh Hefner quit his job at Esquire to start a magazine called Playboy, he didn't just want to make money, he wanted to make dreams come true. In this wise and penetrating biography, intellectual historian Steven Watts looks at what Hugh Hefner went on to become and how he took America with him. Hefner became one of the most hated and envied celebrities in America, standing just barely on the wrong side of decency - with as many as seven million subscribers to his magazine.

Michael Ruhlman, author of best-selling books about professional cooking and chefs and best-selling cookbooks with such chefs as Thomas Keller, Eric Ripert, and Michael Symon, turns his reporter's eye and engaging style on himself to answer the question "how on earth did I get here?" In an unlikely and unplanned series of chance connections, and work often motivated primarily by fear of poverty, he managed to carve a unique place for himself in the increasingly obsessive world of restaurants, chefs, and writers.

He was the biggest man baseball has ever produced. Babe Ruth transcended the sport that brought him fame, money, and adulation, moving beyond the limits of baselines and outfield fences into the mainstream of American life. In this extraordinary biography, Creamer uncovers the complex and captivating man behind the legend.

Four shocking crimes. Four lives lost. Countless lives shattered. Four shocking tales of young lives cut brutally short that will make you want to hug your daughter and never let her go.

James Baldwin's Nobody Knows My Name records the last months of this famed American writer's 10-year self-exile in Europe, his return to America and to Harlem, and his first trip south at the time of the school integration battles. It contains Baldwin's controversial and intimate profiles of Norman Mailer, Richard Wright, and Ingmar Bergman. And it explores such varied themes as the relations between blacks and whites, the role of blacks in America and in Europe, and the question of sexual identity.

Richard "The Ice Man" Kuklinski led a double life beyond anything ever seen on The Sopranos, becoming one of the most notorious professional assassins in American history while hosting neighborhood barbecues in suburban New Jersey. Now, after 240 hours of face-to-face interviews with Kuklinski and his wife and daughters, author Philip Carlo tells his extraordinary story.

If Truth Be Told: A Monk's Memoir is an honest and straightforward account of Om Swami's life, one of the foremost spiritual leaders of India.

We all have things in our life that we should know by now, but don’t. Absences in our knowledge and skillset that are frankly shameful in an adult. Things that would be too embarrassing to ask anyone to explain – except our very best friend. Listen in as Mel and Sue tackle their ignorance head on, asking each other to explain something that they still don’t know - but absolutely, as adults, should - from how to parallel park to fully understanding bread (why has it got all those holes in it? What, honestly, is yeast?).

He was one of America's most exciting and secretive generals - the man Franklin Roosevelt made his top spy in World War II. A mythic figure whose legacy is still intensely debated, "Wild Bill" Donovan was director of the Office of Strategic Services (the country's first national intelligence agency) and the father of today's CIA. Donovan introduced the nation to the dark arts of covert warfare on a scale it had never seen before.

In the summer of 1985, a brilliant young British DNA scientist Helena Greenwood is found murdered in her front garden in a quiet suburb in California. The police believe they know the killer’s identity but there’s no evidence against him, and the only thing linking him to the crime is the fact he’d been charged with sexually assaulting Helena just a few months previously.

It was a bleak November in 2012 when Cari Lea Farver vanished from Omaha, Nebraska. Cari, 37, was a devoted mother, reliable employee, and loyal friend - not the type to shirk responsibilities, abandon her son, and run off on an adventure while her dying father took his last breaths. Yet, the many texts from her phone indicated she had done just that. While Cari's boyfriend, Dave Kroupa, and her supervisor were bewildered by her abrupt disappearance, they accepted the texts at face value. Her mother, Nancy Raney, however, was alarmed and reported Cari missing.

War as I Knew It is the personal and candid account of General George S. Patton, Jr.'s celebrated, relentless crusade across Europe during World War II. First published in 1947, this absorbing narrative draws on Patton's vivid memories of battle and his detailed diaries, from the moment the Third Army exploded onto the Brittany Peninsula to the final Allied casualty report. The result is not only a grueling, human account of daily combat but also a valuable chronicle of the strategies and fiery personality of a brilliant warrior.

Report from Engine Co. 82 is the story of one company of New York firefighters battling unimaginable death and destruction every day. Dennis Smith worked as a firefighter in the South Bronx, New York City, and the graphic detail and gripping prose of this firefighting classic drives the most important, accomplished, terrifying audiobook ever published on firefighting.

Drawing on the diaries of one woman in 18th-century Maine, this intimate history illuminates the medical practices, household economies, religious rivalries, and sexual mores of the New England frontier. Between 1785 and 1812, a midwife and healer named Martha Ballard kept a diary that recorded her arduous work (in 27 years she attended 816 births) as well as her domestic life in Hallowell, Maine.

Bradford Bishop had it all: a beautiful wife, three towhead sons, a nice home in a quiet Maryland suburb, and a promising career in the US State Department. But on March 1, 1976, he threw it all away. After finding out he'd been passed over for a promotion, Bishop snapped. He went home and, in an act of unspeakable brutality, murdered his wife, his three boys, and his own mother - five people in all. Then he vanished off the face of the Earth. Or so it seemed.