Passport to Peril

Passport to Peril
Author: Robert B. Parker
Publisher: Titan Books (US, CA)
Total Pages: 207
Release: 2011-03-29
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 0857683993

THE REDISCOVERED PULP CLASSIC! Decades before Robert Brown Parker began writing his books about Spenser, a man named Robert Bogardus Parker (1905-1955) penned this extraordinary novel of post-war intrigue. From the corridors and compartments of the Orient Express to the shadowy, ruined streets of Budapest – which he saw firsthand as a foreign correspondent during World War II – Parker takes you on a nightmare tour of a land where life is cheap, old hatreds run strong, and a couple of Americans can find themselves in more danger than they ever imagined. With all the immediacy of the wartime dispatches Parker filed from Turkey, Danzig, Warsaw, and Bucharest and all the authority of a man who himself spent three years crossing borders without a passport and narrowly avoiding arrest by the Gestapo, PASSPORT TO PERIL paints a heart-stopping picture of desperate men in a desperate time.

All that is Solid Melts Into Air

All that is Solid Melts Into Air
Author: Marshall Berman
Publisher: Verso
Total Pages: 388
Release: 1983
Genre: History
ISBN: 9780860917854

The experience of modernization -- the dizzying social changes that swept millions of people into the capitalist world -- and modernism in art, literature and architecture are brilliantly integrated in this account.

Risk-Taking in International Politics

Risk-Taking in International Politics
Author: Rose McDermott
Publisher: University of Michigan Press
Total Pages: 256
Release: 2001
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 9780472087877

Discusses the way leaders deal with risk in making foreign policy decisions

The Manchurian Candidate

The Manchurian Candidate
Author: Richard Condon
Publisher: RosettaBooks
Total Pages: 312
Release: 2013-11-25
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 0795335067

The classic thriller about a hostile foreign power infiltrating American politics: “Brilliant . . . wild and exhilarating.” —The New Yorker A war hero and the recipient of the Congressional Medal of Honor, Sgt. Raymond Shaw is keeping a deadly secret—even from himself. During his time as a prisoner of war in North Korea, he was brainwashed by his Communist captors and transformed into a deadly weapon—a sleeper assassin, programmed to kill without question or mercy at his captors’ signal. Now he’s been returned to the United States with a covert mission: to kill a candidate running for US president . . . This “shocking, tense” and sharply satirical novel has become a modern classic, and was the basis for two film adaptations (San Francisco Chronicle). “Crammed with suspense.” —Chicago Tribune “Condon is wickedly skillful.” —Time

A Visit From the Goon Squad

A Visit From the Goon Squad
Author: Jennifer Egan
Publisher: Hachette UK
Total Pages: 309
Release: 2011-03-17
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1849017409

WINNER OF THE PULITZER PRIZE FOR FICTION NEW YORK TIMES TOP 10 BOOKS OF 2010 Jennifer Egan's spellbinding novel circles the lives of Bennie Salazar, an ageing former punk rocker and record executive, and Sasha, the troubled young woman he employs. We first meet Sasha in her mid-thirties, on her therapist's couch in New York City, confronting her longstanding compulsion to steal. We meet Bennie at the melancholy nadir of his adult life - divorced, struggling to connect with his nine-year-old son, listening to a washed-up band in the basement of a suburban house. Although Bennie and Sasha never discover each other's pasts, the reader does, in intimate detail, along with the secret lives of a host of other characters whose paths intersect with theirs, over many years, in many places. With music pulsing on every page, this is a startling, exhilarating novel of self-destruction and redemption. Breathtaking work from one of our boldest writers. 'Irresistible. Fiction of the highest quality' Sunday Times 'Egan's precise, calm underwater prose is a persistent pleasure' Daily Telegraph 'Stories that defy narrative convention' Financial Times 'A must-read' Sunday Times

The Cultural Cold War

The Cultural Cold War
Author: Frances Stonor Saunders
Publisher: New Press, The
Total Pages: 458
Release: 2013-11-05
Genre: History
ISBN: 1595589147

During the Cold War, freedom of expression was vaunted as liberal democracy’s most cherished possession—but such freedom was put in service of a hidden agenda. In The Cultural Cold War, Frances Stonor Saunders reveals the extraordinary efforts of a secret campaign in which some of the most vocal exponents of intellectual freedom in the West were working for or subsidized by the CIA—whether they knew it or not. Called "the most comprehensive account yet of the [CIA’s] activities between 1947 and 1967" by the New York Times, the book presents shocking evidence of the CIA’s undercover program of cultural interventions in Western Europe and at home, drawing together declassified documents and exclusive interviews to expose the CIA’s astonishing campaign to deploy the likes of Hannah Arendt, Isaiah Berlin, Leonard Bernstein, Robert Lowell, George Orwell, and Jackson Pollock as weapons in the Cold War. Translated into ten languages, this classic work—now with a new preface by the author—is "a real contribution to popular understanding of the postwar period" (The Wall Street Journal), and its story of covert cultural efforts to win hearts and minds continues to be relevant today.

The Castle in the Attic

The Castle in the Attic
Author: Elizabeth Winthrop
Publisher: Holiday House
Total Pages: 192
Release: 2012-05-15
Genre: Juvenile Fiction
ISBN: 082342684X

The classic children's story about a young boy, his toy castle, and a magical adventure that reveals the true meaning of courage When his beloved caretaker Mrs. Phillips tells him she's leaving, William is devastated. Not even her farewell gift of a model medieval castle helps him feel better—though he has to admit it's fascinating. From the working drawbridge and portcullis to the fully-furnished rooms, it's perfect in every detail. It almost seems magical. And when William looks at the silver knight, the tiny figure comes to life in his hand—and tells him a tale of a wicked sorcerer, a vicious dragon, and a kingdom in need of a hero. Hoping the castle's magic will help him find a way to make his friend stay, William embarks on a daring quest with Sir Simon, the Silver Knight—but he will have to face his own doubts and regrets if he's going to succeed. William's story continues in The Battle for the Castle, available as a redesigned companion edition. An IRA-CBC Children's Choice A California Young Reader Medal Winner A Dorothy Canfield Fisher Children's Book Award Winner Nominated for 23 State Book Awards