"A lively and magisterial popular history that refutes common misperceptions of the European Middle Ages, showing the beauty and communion that flourished alongside the dark brutality--a brilliant reflection of humanity itself."--Dust jacket.

"From one of the foremost experts on Ukraine and the former USSR, a concise, authoritative history of Ukraine. Ukraine is currently embroiled in a tense battle with Russia to preserve its economic and political independence. But today's conflict is only the latest in a long history of battles over Ukraine's existence as a sovereign nation. As award-winning historian Serhii Plokhy argues in The Gates of Europe, we must examine Ukraine's past in order...

Traces the sobering history of World War II's largest female concentration camp, revealing the torturous experiences and deaths of thousands of women prisoners of more than twenty nationalities. A masterly and moving account of the most horrific hidden atrocity of World War II: Ravensbruck, the only Nazi concentration camp built for women. On a sunny morning in May 1939 a phalanx of 867 women--housewives, doctors, opera singers, politicians, prostitutes--was...

Tells the story of how modernity emerged on the shores of the North Sea, uncovering a lost history of a thousand years rife with saints, spies, pirates, philosophers, artists, and intellectuals.

"The millennium between the breakup of the western Roman Empire and the Reformation was a long and hugely transformative period--one not easily chronicled within the scope of a few hundred pages. Yet distinguished historian Chris Wickham has taken up the challenge in this landmark book, and he succeeds in producing the most riveting account of medieval Europe in a generation. Tracking the entire sweep of the Middle Ages across Europe, Wickham focuses...

"The rich cultural and political life of Spain has emerged from its complex history, from the diversity of its peoples, and from continual contact with outside influences. This updated edition traces that history from prehistoric times to the present, focusing particularly on culture, society, politics, and personalities. Written in an engaging style, it introduces readers to key themes that have shaped Spain's history and culture. These include its...

""The strong do as they can and the weak suffer what they must." --Thucydides The fate of the global economy hangs in the balance, and Europe is doing its utmost to undermine it, to destabilize America, and to spawn new forms of authoritarianism. Europe has dragged the world into hideous morasses twice in the last one hundred years... it can do it again. Yanis Varoufakis, the former Finance Minister of Greece, shows here that the Eurozone is a house...

"The inspiring story of one woman's struggle to survive during the Holocaust. An expanded edition of the remarkable story of Rena Korneich, one of the few women who survived the first Jewish transport to Auschwitz and more than three years in the Nazi death camp. Rena's Promise is a compelling story of the fleeting human connections that fostered determination and made survival a possibility. Moving from the bonds between mothers, daughters, and sisters...

Following in the footsteps of the greatest Spanish adventurers, Michael Wood retraces the path of the conquistadors from Amazonia to Lake Titicaca, and from the deserts of North Mexico to the heights of Machu Picchu. As he travels the same routes as Hern├ín Cort├®s, Francisco, and Gonzalo Pizarro, Wood describes the dramatic events that accompanied the epic sixteenth-century Spanish conquest of the Aztec and Inca empires. He also follows

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Set amid the growing tyranny of German's Third Reich, here is the riveting and emotional tale of Gunther Goldschmidt and Rosemarie Gumpert, two courageous jewish musicians who strugged to perform under unimaginable circumstances - and found themselves falling in love in a country bent on destoying them.