- Table View
- List View
The Enemy of the People \ El enemigo del pueblo (Spanis edition): Una época peligrosa para contar la verdad en América
by Jim AcostaDel veterano corresponsal de la Casa Blanca de la CNN, Jim Acosta, un explosivo relato de primera mano sobre los peligros que enfrenta al informar sobre la actual Casa Blanca mientras se encontraba en la primera línea de una Guerra con el presidente Trump por contar la verdad.En la campaña de Trump contra lo que él presidente llama "Noticias falsas", el corresponsal principal de la CNN en la Casa Blanca, Jim Acosta, es el enemigo público número uno. Desde el momento en que el Sr. Trump anunció su candidatura en 2015, ha atacado a los medios de comunicación y ha llamado a los periodistas "el enemigo del pueblo".Acosta presenta un examen condenatorio de la disfunción burocrática, el engaño y la amenaza sin precedentes que la retórica que dirige el señor Trump en nuestra democracia. Cuando el líder del mundo libre incita al odio y la violencia, Acosta no retrocede y exhorta a sus conciudadanos a hacer lo mismo. En el canal de televisión más odiado por el Sr. Trump, CNN, Acosta ofrece un informe nunca narrado de lo que es ser el corresponsal más odiado del presidente. Acosta se enfrenta con la Casa Blanca, incluso después de que los partidarios de Trump hayan amenazado su vida con palabras y con violencia física. Desde los nebulosos rechazos y acusaciones que pretenden desacreditar la investigación de Mueller hasta los escandalosos tuits del presidente, Jim Acosta está en el ojo de la tormenta mientras informa a millones de personas en todo el mundo. Después de pasar cientos de horas en suspenso con el personal de la Casa Blanca, Acosta pinta retratos de las personalidades de Sarah Huckabee Sanders, Stephen Miller, Steve Bannon, Sean Spicer, Hope Hicks, Jared Kushner y más. Acosta es tenaz e inflexible en su batalla pública para preservar la Primera Enmienda y lo que él llama #RealNews (#noticiasreales).
Plata como cancha: Secretos, impunidad y fortuna de César Acuña
by Christopher AcostaUna exhaustiva investigación periodística que revelan secretos, impunidad y fortuna del político peruano César Acuña Este no es un perfil oficial ni una biografía autorizada. Es más bien la exposición de un proceder, de una conducta. El periodista Christopher Acosta Alfaro escarba en la narrativa que el actual candidato a la presidencia del Perú, César Acuña, ha urdido durante años tanto política como comercialmente. Y demuestra que solo su fortuna ha sido capaz de crear un sistema que compensa atropellos y silencia agraviados. Valiéndose de una exhaustiva investigación que incluye expedientes judiciales y fiscales, resoluciones gubernamentales, informes de inteligencia, acuerdos confidenciales, así como un amplio acceso al círculo más íntimo del político y empresario, el autor de Plata como cancha saca a la luz las piezas de un rompecabezas donde el poder y el dinero se solapan entre sí, en las historias que se cuentan aquí por primera vez. «Si César Acuña no fuera rico —señala Acosta Alfaro en estas páginas—, estaría, muy probablemente, preso».
Presidentes por accidente: Castillo y Boluarte. Corrupción, golpe y suerte
by Christopher AcostaEL MEJOR PERIODISTA DE INVESTIGACIÓN TRAS LA HUELLA DEL ACCIDENTE QUE LLEVÓ A PEDRO CASTILLO Y DINA BOLUARTE A LA PRESIDENCIA Si a Pedro Castillo lo conocíamos poco, a Dina Boluarte, menos. ¿Quién es la mujer que, tras un fallido golpe de Estado, asume el poder del país? ¿Quién el hombre que intenta retenerlo, convencido de una traición de quien lo sucede? Presidentes por accidente, la nueva investigación periodística de Christopher Acosta -autor del bestseller Plata como cancha-, nos revela detalles hasta ahora desconocidos, no solo de las biografías y las personalidades de Castillo y Boluarte, sino de cómo estas explican las controvertidas decisiones que adoptaron tras colocarse la banda presidencial. Boluarte llega a la presidencia ahorrándose aquello que más temen los candidatos de una campaña electoral: el escrutinio de sus actos públicos y sus vidas privadas. Este libro llena ese vacío. Acorralado por las investigaciones en su contra, Castillo cierra su paso por el Gobierno con un número temerario y espectacular: el de un clavadista que se lanza a una piscina que sabe sin agua. Pero ¿son en verdad ambos personajes tan diferentes como se presentan? Estas páginas delinean el doble perfil de nuestros dos últimos presidentes, pero son también una apasionante crónica política colmada de intrigas, traiciones y corrupción. Una historia que demuestra que para Castillo y Boluarte la presidencia es algo que les sucede: un acontecimiento en sus vidas.
No Way Home: A Dancer's Journey from the Streets of Havana to the Stages of the World
by Carlos AcostaCarlos Acosta, the Cuban dancer considered to be one of the world's greatest performers, fearlessly depicts his journey from adolescent troublemaker to international superstar in his captivating memoir, No Way Home.Carlos was just another kid from the slums of Havana; the youngest son of a truck driver and a housewife, he ditched school with his friends and dreamed of becoming Cuba's best soccer player. Exasperated by his son's delinquent behavior, Carlos's father enrolled him in ballet school, subjecting him to grueling days that started at five thirty in the morning and ended long after sunset. The path from student to star was not an easy one. Even as he won dance competitions and wowed critics around the world, Carlos was homesick for Cuba, crippled by loneliness and self-doubt. As he traveled the world, Carlos struggled to overcome popular stereotypes and misconceptions; to maintain a relationship with his family; and, most of all, to find a place he could call home. This impassioned memoir is about more than Carlos's rise to stardom. It is about a young man forced to leave his homeland and loved ones for a life of self-discipline, displacement, and physical hardship. It is also about how the heart and soul of a country can touch the heart and soul of one of its citizens. With candor and humor, Carlos vividly depicts daily life in communist Cuba, his feelings about ballet -- an art form he both lovesand hates -- and his complex relationship with his father. Carlos Acosta makes dance look effortless, but the grace, strength, and charisma we see onstage have come at a cost. Here, in his own words, is the story of the price he paid.
Dance to the Piper
by Joan Acocella Agnes De MilleBorn into a family of successful playwrights and producers, Agnes de Mille was determined to be an actress. Then one day she witnessed the Russian ballet dancer Anna Pavlova, and her life was altered forever. Hypnotized by Pavlova's beauty, in that moment de Mille dedicated herself to dance. Her memoir records with lighthearted humor and wisdom not only the difficulties she faced--the resistance of her parents, the sacrifices of her training--but also the frontier atmosphere of early Hollywood and New York and London during the Depression. "This is the story of an American dancer," writes de Mille, "a spoiled egocentric wealthy girl, who learned with difficulty to become a worker, to set and meet standards, to brace a Victorian sensibility to contemporary roughhousing, and who, with happy good fortune, participated by the side of great colleagues in a renaissance of the most ancient and magical of all the arts."
Twenty-eight Artists and Two Saints
by Joan AcocellaHere is a dazzling collection from Joan Acocella, one of our most admired cultural critics: thirty-one essays that consider the life and work of some of the most influential artists of our time (and two saints: Joan of Arc and Mary Magdalene). Acocella writes about Primo Levi, Holocaust survivor and chemist, who wrote the classic memoir,Survival in Auschwitz; M. F. K. Fisher who, numb with grief over her husband’s suicide, dictated the witty and classicHow to Cook a Wolf; and many other subjects, including Dorothy Parker, Mikhail Baryshnikov, and Saul Bellow. Twenty-Eight Artists and Two Saintsis indispensable reading on the making of art—and the courage, perseverance, and, sometimes, dumb luck that it requires.
Alfred Hitchcock
by Peter AckroydA gripping short biography of the extraordinary Alfred Hitchock, the master of suspense. Alfred Hitchcock was a strange child. Fat, lonely, burning with fear and ambition, his childhood was an isolated one, scented with fish from his father's shop. Afraid to leave his bedroom, he would plan great voyages, using railway timetables to plot an exact imaginary route across Europe. So how did this fearful figure become the one of the most respected film directors of the twentieth century? As an adult, Hitch rigorously controlled the press's portrait of him, drawing certain carefully selected childhood anecdotes into full focus and blurring all others out. In this quick-witted portrait, Ackroyd reveals something more: a lugubriously jolly man fond of practical jokes, who smashes a once-used tea cup every morning to remind himself of the frailty of life. Iconic film stars make cameo appearances, just as Hitch did in his own films: Grace Kelly, Cary Grant, and James Stewart despair of his detached directing style and, perhaps most famously of all, Tippi Hedren endures cuts and bruises from a real-life fearsome flock of birds. Alfred Hitchcock wrests the director's chair back from the master of control and discovers what lurks just out of sight, in the corner of the shot.
A Brief Guide to William Shakespeare (Brief Histories)
by Peter AckroydAn accessible and entertaining journey through the life, times, and work of the Bard - Enigma. Master of language. The greatest comedian in history? The most famous writer in the world. But isn't he a little bit boring? This is an essential guide for anyone who has previously avoided the Bard, and is the perfect introduction for first time students or seasoned theatre lovers. The book contains a full commentary of all the plays by bestselling and reknowned writer Peter Ackroyd as well as full descriptions of the cast and the drama; not forgetting the best speeches, and the wit and wisdom from across the works. There is also an opportunity to explore the poems and a complete set of sonnets, as well as an investigation of who the dark lady might have been.Contains:The complete sonnets; the greatest speeches; the best lines.Perfect for students struggling through their first play or for theatre lovers anywhere.Entertaining, accessible, Shakespeare without the boring bits.
Charlie Chaplin
by Peter AckroydA brief yet definitive new biography of one of film's greatest legends: perfect for readers who want to know more about the iconic star but who don't want to commit to a lengthy work.He was the very first icon of the silver screen and is one of the most recognizable of Hollywood faces, even a hundred years after his first film. But what of the man behind the moustache? Peter Ackroyd's new biography turns the spotlight on Chaplin's life as well as his work, from his humble theatrical beginnings in music halls to winning an honorary Academy Award. Everything is here, from the glamor of his golden age to the murky scandals of the 1940s and eventual exile to Switzerland. There are charming anecdotes along the way: playing the violin in a New York hotel room to mask the sound of Stan Laurel frying pork chops and long Hollywood lunches with Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks Jr. This masterful brief biography offers fresh revelations about one of the most familiar faces of the last century and brings the Little Tramp vividly to life.
Chaucer: Ackroyd's Brief Lives
by Peter AckroydGeoffrey Chaucer enjoyed an eventful life, serving with the Duke of Clarence and with Edward III. Through his wife, Philippa, he gained the patronage of John of Gaunt, which helped him carve out a career at Court. His official posts included Controller of Customs at the Port of London, Knight of the Shire for Kent, and King's Forester. He went on numerous adventurous diplomatic missions to France and Italy, and in 1359 was taken prisoner in France and ransomed. He began to write in the 1360s, and his masterpiece,The Canterbury Tales, dominated the last part of his life. He died in 1400. Peter Ackroyd's short biography, rich in drama and colour, evokes the medieval world of London and Kent, and provides an entertaining introduction to Chaucer's poetry.
J.M.W. Turner
by Peter AckroydAlso available in ACKROYD’S BRIEF LIVES ChaucerIn this second volume in the Ackroyd’s Brief Lives series, bestselling author Peter Ackroyd brings us a man of humble beginnings, crude manners, and prodigious talents, the nineteenth-century painter J. M. W. Turner. Joseph Mallord William Turner was born in London in 1775. His father was a barber, and his mother came from a family of London butchers. “His speech was recognizably that of a Cockney, and his language was the language of the streets. ” As his finest paintings show, his language was also the language of light. Turner’s landscapes—extraordinary studies in light, colour, and texture—caused an uproar during his lifetime and earned him a place as one of the greatest artists in history. Displaying his artistic abilities as a young child, Turner entered the Royal Academy of Arts when he was just fourteen years old. A year later his paintings appeared in an important public exhibition, and he rapidly achieved prominence, becoming a Royal Academician in 1802 and Professor of Perspective at the Academy from 1807–1837. His private life, however, was less orderly. Never married, he spent much time living in taverns, where he was well known for his truculence and his stinginess with money. Peter Ackroyd deftly follows Turner’s first loves of architecture, engraving, and watercolours, and the country houses, cathedrals, and landscapes of England. While his passion for Italy led him to oil painting, Turner’s love for London remained central to his heart and soul, and it was within sight of his beloved Thames that he died in 1851. His dying words were: “The sun is God. ”
The Life of Thomas More
by Peter AckroydPeter Ackroyd's The Life of Thomas More is a masterful reconstruction of the life and imagination of one of the most remarkable figures of history. Thomas More (1478-1535) was a renowned statesman; the author of a political fantasy that gave a name to a literary genre and a worldview (Utopia); and, most famously, a Catholic martyr and saint.Born into the professional classes, Thomas More applied his formidable intellect and well-placed connections to become the most powerful man in England, second only to the king. As much a work of history as a biography, The Life of Thomas More gives an unmatched portrait of the everyday, religious, and intellectual life of the early sixteenth century. In Ackroyd's hands, this renowned "man for all seasons" emerges in the fullness of his complex humanity; we see the unexpected side of his character--such as his preference for bawdy humor--as well as his indisputable moral courage.
Newton
by Peter AckroydThe third short biography in Peter Ackroyd’s brilliantBrief Livesseries, Newton is a companion volume to Chaucer and Turner. Sir Isaac Newton (1642-1727) is said to have made his greatest contributions to science in 1665-66 while at his parents’ home in Lincolnshire escaping the Great Plague (which had closed the universities). It was at this fruitful time that he formulated calculus, hit upon the idea of gravity and performed experiments which showed that white light was made up of different coloured rays. Newton wrote Principia, one of the most important books in the history of science, in which he proved the “laws of motion. ” He was also interested in the movements of the planets and designed his own telescope, and was as passionate about astrology as he was about astronomy. Newton dabbled in alchemy, and used the Bible to work out that the date of the earth’s creation was 3,500 B. C. Newton is a wonderful subject for a writer with Peter Ackroyd’s imagination and flair: the alchemist, the magician, the thinker light years ahead of his time. Einstein wrote of Newton: “In one person, he combined the experimenter, the theorist, the mechanic and, not least, the artist in exposition. ”
Poe: A Life Cut Short
by Peter AckroydGothic, mysterious, theatrical, fatally flawed, and dazzling, the life of Edgar Allan Poe, one of America's greatest and most versatile writers, is the ideal subject for Peter Ackroyd. Poe wrote lyrical poetry and macabre psychological melodramas; invented the first fictional detective; and produced pioneering works of science fiction and fantasy. His innovative style, images, and themes had a tremendous impact on European romanticism, symbolism, and surrealism, and continue to influence writers today. In this essential addition to his canon of acclaimed biographies, Peter Ackroyd explores Poe's literary accomplishments and legacy against the background of his erratic, dramatic, and sometimes sordid life. Ackroyd chronicles Poe's difficult childhood, his bumpy academic and military careers, and his complex relationships with women, including his marriage to his thirteen-year-old cousin. He describes Poe's much-written-about problems with gambling and alcohol with sympathy and insight, showing their connections to Poe's childhood and the trials, as well as the triumphs, of his adult life. Ackroyd's thoughtful, perceptive examinations of some of Poe's most famous works shed new light on these classics and on the troubled and brilliant genius who created them.
Shakespeare: The Biography
by Peter AckroydThis is the big one from Peter Ackroyd — and a worthy companion toLondon: The Biography. Only Peter Ackroyd can combine readable narrative and unique observation with a sharp eye for the fascinating fact. His method is to position Shakespeare in the close context of his world. In this way, he not only richly conjures up the texture of Shakespeare’s life, but also imparts an amazing amount of vivid, interesting material about place, period and background. Some snippets: Shakespeare was secretly a Roman Catholic; the witches in Macbeth were not hags but nymphs played by boys; the “best” bed was for guests which was why he bequeathed his wife his “second best” bed (the matrimonial bed in which he probably died); “ham acting” derives from the strutting walk which showed off the ham-strings; an actor called “Will” played female parts — could it have been Shakespeare himself? And, the strongest bond in the plays is between father and daughter, perhaps reflecting Shakespeare’s own family life. From the Hardcover edition.
Wilkie Collins
by Peter AckroydA gripping short biography of the extraordinary Wilkie Collins, author of The Moonstone and The Woman in White, two early masterpieces of mystery and detection. Short and oddly built, with a head too big for his body, extremely near-sighted, unable to stay still, dressed in colorful clothes, Wilkie Collins looked distinctly strange. But he was nonetheless a charmer, befriended by the great, loved by children, irresistibly attractive to women--and avidly read by generations of readers. Peter Ackroyd follows his hero, "the sweetest-tempered of all the Victorian novelists," from his childhood as the son of a well-known artist to his struggling beginnings as a writer, his years of fame and his lifelong friendship with the other great London chronicler, Charles Dickens. As well as his enduring masterpieces, The Moonstone--often called the first true detective novel--and the sensational The Woman in White, he produced an intriguing array of lesser known works. Told with Ackroyd's inimitable verve, this is a ravishingly entertaining life of a great storyteller, full of surprises, rich in humor and sympathetic understanding.From the Hardcover edition.
These Fevered Days: Ten Pivotal Moments In The Making Of Emily Dickinson
by Martha AckmannAn engaging, intimate portrait of Emily Dickinson, one of America’s greatest and most-mythologized poets, that sheds new light on her groundbreaking poetry. On August 3, 1845, young Emily Dickinson declared, “All things are ready” and with this resolute statement, her life as a poet began. Despite spending her days almost entirely “at home” (the occupation listed on her death certificate), Dickinson’s interior world was extraordinary. She loved passionately, was hesitant about publication, embraced seclusion, and created 1,789 poems that she tucked into a dresser drawer. In These Fevered Days, Martha Ackmann unravels the mysteries of Dickinson’s life through ten decisive episodes that distill her evolution as a poet. Ackmann follows Dickinson through her religious crisis while a student at Mount Holyoke, which prefigured her lifelong ambivalence toward organized religion and her deep, private spirituality. We see the poet through her exhilarating frenzy of composition, through which we come to understand her fiercely self-critical eye and her relationship with sister-in-law and first reader, Susan Dickinson. Contrary to her reputation as a recluse, Dickinson makes the startling decision to ask a famous editor for advice, writes anguished letters to an unidentified “Master,” and keeps up a lifelong friendship with writer Helen Hunt Jackson. At the peak of her literary productivity, she is seized with despair in confronting possible blindness. Utilizing thousands of archival letters and poems as well as never-before-seen photos, These Fevered Days constructs a remarkable map of Emily Dickinson’s inner life. Together, these ten days provide new insights into her wildly original poetry and render a concise and vivid portrait of American literature’s most enigmatic figure.
Up Tunket Road
by Philip Ackerman-LeistEver since Thoreau's Walden, the image of the American homesteader has been of someone getting away from civilization, of forging an independent life in the country. Yet if this were ever true, what is the nature and reality of homesteading in the media-saturated, hyper-connected 21st century? For seven years Philip Ackerman-Leist and his wife, Erin, lived without electricity or running water in an old cabin in the beautiful but remote hills of western New England. Slowly forging their own farm and homestead, they took inspiration from their experiences among the mountain farmers of the Tirolean Alps and were guided by their Vermont neighbors, who taught them about what it truly means to live sustainably in the postmodern homestead-not only to survive, but to thrive in a fragmented landscape and a fractured economy. Up Tunket Roadis the inspiring true story of a young couple who embraced the joys of simple living while also acknowledging its frustrations and complexities. Ackerman-Leist writes with humor about the inevitable foibles of setting up life off the grid-from hauling frozen laundry uphill to getting locked in the henhouse by their ox. But he also weaves an instructive narrative that contemplates the future of simple living. His is not a how-to guide, but something much richer and more important-a tale of discovery that will resonate with readers who yearn for a better, more meaningful life, whether they live in the city, country, or somewhere in between.
Dark Horse: The Surprise Election and Political Murder of President James A. Garfield
by Kenneth D. AckermanIn post-Civil War America, politics was a brutal sport played with blunt rules. Yet the era produced wide public excitement and high voter participation, as well as our last log cabin-born president. James Garfield's 1880 dark horse campaign after the longest-ever Republican nominating process (thirty-six convention ballots), his victory in the closest-ever popular vote for president (by a margin of only 7,018 votes out of more than nine million cast), his struggle against bitterly feuding factions once elected, and the public's response to its violent climax produce the most dramatic presidential odyssey of the Gilded Age--and among the most momentous in our nation's history. Capitol Hill veteran Kenneth D. Ackerman re-creates an American political landscape where fierce battles for power unfolded against a chivalrous code of honor in a country struggling to emerge from the long shadow of recent war. He casts familiar Civil War figures like Ulysses S. Grant and Winfield Scott Hancock in unfamiliar roles as politicos alongside feuding machine bosses like senators Roscoe Conkling and James G. Blaine and backroom string-puller Chester A. Arthur, Garfield's unlikely vice-presidential running mate. The journey through political backrooms, dazzling convention floors, and intrigue-filled congressional and White House chambers, reveals the era's decency and humanity as well as the sharp partisanship that exploded in the pistol shots of assassin Charles Guiteau, the weak-minded political camp follower and patronage seeker eager to replace the elected commander-in-chief with one of his own choosing. Garfield's path from a seat in the House of Representatives to White House to martyred hero changed the tone of politics for generations to come. His assassination prompted leaders to recoil at their excesses and brought shocked Americans together with a dignity and grace that have long held the nation together in crisis. Kenneth D. Ackerman tells this overlooked story in a historical page-turner that will enthrall aficionados of presidential lives and all lovers of American history. Kenneth D. Ackerman has served for more than twenty-five years in senior posts on Capitol Hill and in the Executive Branch, including as counsel to two U.S. Senate committees and as administrator of the Department of Agriculture's Risk Management Agency during the Clinton-Gore administration. He is the author of "The Gold Ring: Jim Fisk, Jay Gould, and Black Friday 1869" and currently practices law in Washington, D.C.
Trotsky in New York, 1917: From Times Square to Petrograd
by Kenneth D. AckermanLev Davidovich Trotsky burst onto the world stage in November 1917 as co-leader of a Marxist Revolution seizing power in Russia. It made him one of the most recognized personalities of the Twentieth Century, a global icon of radical change. Yet just months earlier, this same Lev Trotsky was a nobody, a refugee expelled from Europe, writing obscure pamphlets and speeches, barely noticed outside a small circle of fellow travelers. Where had he come from to topple Russia and change the world? Where else? New York City. Between January and March 1917, Trotsky found refuge in the United States. America had kept itself out of the European Great War, leaving New York the freest city on earth. During his time there-just over ten weeks-Trotsky immersed himself in the local scene. He settled his family in the Bronx, edited a radical left wing tabloid in Greenwich Village, sampled the lifestyle, and plunged headlong into local politics. His clashes with leading New York socialists over the question of US entry into World War I would reshape the American left for the next fifty years.
The Genius of Birds
by Jennifer Ackerman<P>Birds are astonishingly intelligent creatures. In fact, according to revolutionary new research, some birds rival primates and even humans in their remarkable forms of intelligence. Like humans, many birds have enormous brains relative to their size. Although small, bird brains are packed with neurons that allow them to punch well above their weight. <P> In The Genius of Birds, acclaimed author Jennifer Ackerman explores the newly discovered brilliance of birds and how it came about. As she travels around the world to the most cutting-edge frontiers of research-- the distant laboratories of Barbados and New Caledonia, the great tit communities of the United Kingdom and the bowerbird habitats of Australia, the ravaged mid-Atlantic coast after Hurricane Sandy and the warming mountains of central Virginia and the western states--Ackerman not only tells the story of the recently uncovered genius of birds but also delves deeply into the latest findings about the bird brain itself that are revolutionizing our view of what it means to be intelligent. <P>Consider, as Ackerman does, the Clark's nutcracker, a bird that can hide as many as 30,000 seeds over dozens of square miles and remember where it put them several months later; the mockingbirds and thrashers, species that can store 200 to 2,000 different songs in a brain a thousand times smaller than ours; the well-known pigeon, which knows where it's going, even thousands of miles from familiar territory; and the New Caledonian crow, an impressive bird that makes its own tools. <P>But beyond highlighting how birds use their unique genius in technical ways, Ackerman points out the impressive social smarts of birds. They deceive and manipulate. They eavesdrop. They display a strong sense of fairness. They give gifts. They play keep-away and tug-of-war. They tease. They share. They cultivate social networks. They vie for status. They kiss to console one another. They teach their young. They blackmail their parents. They alert one another to danger. They summon witnesses to the death of a peer. They may even grieve. <P>This elegant scientific investigation and travelogue weaves personal anecdotes with fascinating science. Ackerman delivers an extraordinary story that will both give readers a new appreciation for the exceptional talents of birds and let them discover what birds can reveal about our changing world. Incredibly informative and beautifully written, The Genius of Birds richly celebrates the triumphs of these surprising and fiercely intelligent creatures. <P><b>A New York Times Bestseller</b>
The Fifth Act: America's End in Afghanistan
by Elliot AckermanA powerful and revelatory eyewitness account of the American collapse in Afghanistan, its desperate endgame, and the war&’s echoing legacyElliot Ackerman left the American military ten years ago, but his time in Afghanistan and Iraq with the Marines and later as a CIA paramilitary officer marked him indelibly. When the Taliban began to close in on Kabul in August 2021 and the Afghan regime began its death spiral, he found himself pulled back into the conflict. Afghan nationals who had worked closely with the American military and intelligence communities for years now faced brutal reprisal and sought frantically to flee the country with their families. The official US government evacuation effort was a bureaucratic failure that led to a humanitarian catastrophe. With former colleagues and friends protecting the airport in Kabul, Ackerman joined an impromptu effort by a group of journalists and other veterans to arrange flights and negotiate with both Taliban and American forces to secure the safe evacuation of hundreds. These were desperate measures taken during a desperate end to America's longest war. For Ackerman, it also became a chance to reconcile his past with his present. The Fifth Act is an astonishing human document that brings the weight of twenty years of war to bear on a single week, the week the war ended. Using the dramatic rescue efforts in Kabul as his lattice, Ackerman weaves a personal history of the war's long progression, beginning with the initial invasion in the months after 9/11. It is a play in five acts, the fifth act being the story&’s tragic denouement, a prelude to Afghanistan's dark future. Any reader who wants to understand what went wrong with the war&’s trajectory will find a trenchant account here. But The Fifth Act also brings readers into close contact with a remarkable group of characters, American and Afghan, who fought the war with courage and dedication, and at great personal cost. Ackerman's story is a first draft of history that feels like a timeless classic.
Places and Names: On War, Revolution, and Returning
by Elliot AckermanFrom a decorated Marine war veteran and National Book Award Finalist, an astonishing reckoning with the nature of combat and the human cost of the wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and Syria. <P><P>"War hath determined us ..." - John Milton, Paradise Lost <P><P>Toward the beginning of Places and Names, Elliot Ackerman sits in a refugee camp in southern Turkey, across the table from a man named Abu Hassar, who fought for Al Qaeda in Iraq, and whose connections to the Islamic State are murky. At first, Ackerman pretends to have been a journalist during the Iraq War, but after establishes a rapport with Abu Hassar, he takes a risk by revealing to him that in fact he was a Marine special operation officer. <P><P>Ackerman then draws the shape of the Euphrates River on a large piece of paper, and his one-time adversary quickly joins him in the game of filling in the map with the names and dates of where they saw fighting during the war. They had shadowed each other for some time, it turned out, a realization that brought them to a strange kind of intimacy. <P><P>The rest of Elliot Ackerman's extraordinary memoir is in a way an answer to the question of why he came to that refugee camp and what he hoped to find there. By moving back and forth between his recent experiences on the ground as a journalist in Syria and its environs and his deeper past in combat in Iraq and Afghanistan, he creates a work of astonishing atmospheric pressurization. <P><P>Ackerman shares extraordinarily vivid and powerful stories of his own experiences in battle, culminating in the events of the Second Battle of Fallujah, the most intense urban combat for the Marines since Hue in Vietnam, where Ackerman's actions leading a rifle platoon saw him awarded the Silver Star. He weaves these stories into the latticework of a masterful larger reckoning, with contemporary geopolitics through his vantage as a journalist in Istanbul and with the human extremes of both bravery and horror. <P><P> At once an intensely personal book about the terrible lure of combat and a brilliant meditation on the larger meaning of the past two decades of strife for America, the region and the world, Places and Names bids fair to take its place among our greatest books about modern war.
One Hundred Names for Love: A Memoir
by Diane AckermanFinalist for the Pulitzer Prize Finalist for the National Book Circle Critics Award "A testament to the power of creativity in language, life--and love." --Heller McAlpin, Washington Post No other writer can blend the science of the brain with the love of language like Diane Ackerman. In this extraordinary memoir, she opens a window into the experience of wordlessness--the language paralysis called aphasia. In narrating the recovery of her husband, Paul West, from a stroke that reduced his vast vocabulary to a single syllable, she evokes the joy and mystery of the brain's ability to find and connect words. Deeply rewarding to readers of all kinds, Ackerman has given us a literary love story, accessible insight into the science and medicine of brain injury, and invaluable spiritual sustenance in the face of life's myriad physical sufferings.