War Years

Well-loved author Tomie dePaola brings his childhood memories to audio in this collection of books 5-8 from his 26 FAIRMOUNT AVENUE series.

“Sprightly and sparkling…dramatic incidents abound…a lively rendering of a life and mind that inspires.” In the year of grace 1396, Christine de Pizan is a young Parisian woman living in a tower overlooking the Seine, but hers is no fairy story. Since her beloved husband’s death, she struggles daily to support her aged mother and two small children. Seeking to ease her broken heart, Christine begins to write poetry in a delicate blend of form and emotion that provides a much-needed outlet for her loneliness and sorrow. In time, Christine begins reading her verses at court, ...

Many years ago, the great British philosopher Sir Isaiah Berlin urged Herman Wouk to write his autobiography. Wouk responded, "Why me? I'm nobody." Berlin answered, "No, no. You've traveled. You've known many people. You have interesting ideas. It would do a lot of good."

The Darkest Year focuses on Americans’ state of mind not only through what they said, but in the day-to-day details of their behavior. William K. Klingaman blends these psychological effects with the changes the war wrought in American society and culture, including shifts in family roles, race relations, economic pursuits, popular entertainment, education, and the arts.

Based on a true story, Found at Sea is the account of how 19-year-old Pete O’Brien, while attempting to circumnavigate the globe, is interrupted on his journey by his arrest on drug charges in Bangkok, Thailand and incarcerated in a prison in the heart of that city, along as what follows when he is eventually deported to the custody of a U.S. Consul in Singapore. Once arrived there, he is offered employment aboard an American merchant vessel as an alternative to a flight back to the United States in disgrace and the day that he boards a consulate launch for a trip out into Singapore ...

At the beginning of 1940 Germany was at the pinnacle of its power. By May 1945 Hitler was dead and Germany had suffered a disastrous defeat. Hitler had failed to achieve his aim of making Germany a super power and had left its people to cope with the endless shame of the Holocaust. In The Hitler Years - Disaster 1940-1945, Professor Frank McDonough charts the dramatic change of fortune for the Third Reich and challenges long-held accounts of the Holocaust and Germany's ultimate defeat.

This story is from The Reminiscences of Sherlock Holmes (His Last Bow) collection. Further adventures by the master of observation and deduction, as faithfully recounted by his companion and greatest admirer, Dr. Watson. "The Adventure of the Bruce-Partington Plans," "The Disappearance of Lady Frances Carfax", and "The Adventure of the Dying Detective" are among the stories. David Timson's award-winning performances continue with this series.

Barack Obama’s inauguration as president on January 20, 2009, inspired the world. But the great promise of “Change We Can Believe In” was immediately tested by the threat of another Great Depression, a worsening war in Afghanistan, and an entrenched and deeply partisan system of business as usual in Washington. Despite all the coverage, the backstory of Obama’s historic first year in office has until now remained a mystery.

Nadine Crichton is a glamorous thirty-something woman of the eighties, running a successful business with her friend Pat. But is it enough? Orphaned as a young adult, she longs to have a family to belong to. She’s not the sort to act on a whim, but as 1987 gets underway and heralds a whole series of tragedies from the Zeebrugge ferry sinking to the King’s Cross fire, that’s just what she does. Surely this look-alike woman from years ago must be a relative. Her search leads her first to a small English village, where she finds unexpected complications in the person of local farmer Josh...

It has been famously pointed out that the Holy Roman Empire was neither holy, nor Roman, but it was also not an empire in the sense people expect when hearing the term. In theory, the emperor was the highest prince in Christendom, and his dominion extended the length and breadth of Western Europe. The empire had been created by the papacy in 801 when Pope Leo III famously crowned the supposedly unwitting Charlemagne in Saint Peter’s Basilica, intending to recreate the Western Roman Empire.

Samuel Leech provides a fascinating account of life as a sailor in the War of 1812 and through early 19th century. It is a remarkable account of a man who, until the conflict with the USS United States, had fought British Navy but after that battle changed allegiance to the United States and continued sailing with her navy for a further four years. A perfect addition to any sailor's library, A Voice from the Main Deck is a vivid account of life at sea in the early 19th century.

The Treaty of Paris, in 1783, formally ended the American Revolutionary War, but it was the pivotal campaigns and battles of 1781 that decided the final outcome. 1781 was one of those rare years in American history when the future of the nation hung by a thread, and only the fortitude, determination, and sacrifice of its leaders and citizenry ensured its survival.

Nazis & Reds: A Chronology of the Prewar Years, is the first installment in The Protocols series, a series chronicling the rise of authoritarianism in the modern era from the Industrial Revolution to the implementation of the Final Solution in January 1942. The focus of Nazis & Reds is primarily the 1930s, a decade remarkably similar to our own. Like all the books in the series, Nazis & Reds is the continuing story of people caught in events. It is composed of carefully annotated excerpts taken from diaries, memoirs, newspaper and magazine articles, speeches, trial records, situation ...

Chaplain James D. Johnson chose to accompany his men, unarmed, on their daily combat operations, a decision made against the recommendations of his superiors. During what would be the final days for some, he offered his ministry not from a pulpit but on the battlefields - in hot landing zones and rice paddies, in hospitals, aboard ship, and knee-deep in mud. Through his compelling narration, he takes us into the hearts of frightened young boys and the minds of experienced men.

Her plans for her Europe trip didn’t include falling in love! When Tiffany Gallagher flies to London to spend the holidays with her family, volunteering at a homeless shelter on Christmas Day isn’t part of her plan. Nor is having to travel to Edinburgh with Mac, the wounded and cynical Scottish photojournalist also volunteering at the shelter, to get the Scottish New Year's Eve she'd dreamed of, a real Hogmanay. Returning to London determined to prove to her family and to herself that she's good at something other than shopping, she sets up an ambitious back-to-work partnership between ...

Shortly after losing all of his wealth in a terrible 1884 swindle, Ulysses S. Grant learned he had terminal throat and mouth cancer. Destitute and dying, Grant began to write his memoirs to save his family from permanent financial ruin. As Grant continued his work, suffering increasing pain, the American public became aware of this race between Grant's writing and his fatal illness. Twenty years after his respectful and magnanimous demeanor toward Robert E. Lee at Appomattox, people in the North and the South came to know Grant, now using his famous determination in this final effort.

When eight-year-old Harry Spencer’s father returns from WWI with a missing arm, his father’s bitterness shatters their relationship. Though confused and brokenhearted, Harry is determined to make something of himself. Endeavoring with heart and sometimes humorous results, he sets out on his path in life, working in his granddad’s store, selling medicinal salves, washing windows, and falling in love.

The most eye-opening, and terrifying, story in Chip Reid's career as a journalist was the six weeks he spent with 3d Battalion, 5th Marines, during the invasion of Iraq in 2003, as a correspondent for NBC News. Traveling shoulder-to-shoulder with the young Marines, he had unparalleled access, witnessing them in combat, and interviewing as many as he could persuade his bosses to put on air, allowing them to tell their war stories in their own words.

Joan's story almost feels like a novel instead of a part of history. She was a shining savior on a warhorse, waving her white banner and calling her soldiers forth to victory; but she was also painfully and intensely human, a young girl who wept and bled just the same as the rest of us. In the same breath, it is as easy to relate to Joan as it is to be awed by her incredible character. She may have been beatified as a saint, but Joan of Arc was in many ways a very ordinary human being, a person who felt pain and fear, a person who made mistakes, and who had moments of weakness.

In 1948, after surviving World War II by escaping Nazi-occupied France for refugee camps in Switzerland, the author's grandparents, Anna and Armand, bought an old stone house in a remote, picturesque village in the South of France. Five years later, Anna packed her bags and walked out on Armand, taking the typewriter and their children. Aside from one brief encounter, the two never saw or spoke to each other again, never remarried, and never revealed what had divided them forever.