DescriptionThe eternal conundrum about James Madison - a key framer of the U.S. Constitution, a formidable political figure, and a man of penetrating analytical intellect and tremendous foresight - is why, when he became chief executive, did he steer the ship of sta…
DescriptionTower jockey Benny Poteat has seen a lot of things. Working hundreds of feet in the air repairing tension lines and replacing burnt-out bulbs, secured by nothing but a leather harness and carabiners, he's witnessed baptisms, outdoor weddings, dogfights, g…
DescriptionTwo hundred years ago China's imperial rulers sensed a threat to a past-oriented society in the dynamism of the West and tried to frustrate foreign entry. Today, one cannot escape the impression that if only it were not for world pressures Maoist China like that of the Ming and Manchus would be happier if it could withdraw into the broad isolation of the Middle Kingdom. Just one year after China's long-closed doors reopened to the West in 1971, Barbara Tuchman journeyed through its cities and countryside drawing the human face on this inscrutable giant.
DescriptionLike Charles Dickens' other early novels, The Old Curiosity Shop was a huge success, even eclipsing The Pickwick Papers . The melodramatic saga of the flight of Little Nell and her grandfather captured the public's attention, so much so that people would wait in long lines for the release of the next installment of the saga. For the character of Little Nell, the beautiful child thrown into a shadowy, terrifying world, Dickens drew on a tragedy in his own life, the death at the age of seventeen of his sister-in-law Mary Hogarth. "The desire to be buried next her is as strong upon me now ... and I know (for I don't think there ever was love like that I bear her) that it will never diminish, " he would write, five years later.
DescriptionRay Bradbury's more than 500 short stories have established him as one of this century's most popular and imaginative storytellers. Long recognized as a master of the science fiction and fantasy genres, his tales range from Gothic and horrifying to melancholy and whimsical. Included in this collection are such gems as "The Veldt, " in which a children's futuristic nursery room holds exactly what meets the eye, and "The Illustrated Man, " Bradbury's masterful story of a man whose magical tattoos tell the future. Bradbury's rich, evocative prose stands in perfect contrast to his dark atmospheres and fantastic settings. These 14 spellbinding stories demonstrate why Ray Bradbury has been called "America's finest living fantasist."…
