History

Pacific Crucible: War at Sea in the Pacific, 1941-1942 (Hardcover)

By Ian W. Toll

$35.00

ISBN: 9780393068139

Availability: Available at Warehouse

Published: W. W. Norton & Company - November 14th, 2011

Toll (author of the superb Six Frigates) starts with a horrific narrative of Pearl Harbor, goes through the savage learning curve of the Battle of the Coral Sea (this was all a new kind of warfare) and climaxes with a spectacular account of Midway.  In-depth portraits of the major players add an exciting dimension to the great naval duel.

Gary

Wicked River: The Mississippi When It Last Ran Wild (Paperback)

By Lee Sandlin

$16.95

ISBN: 9780307473578

Availability: Available at Warehouse

Published: Vintage - October 4th, 2011

It seems everybody on a Mississippi river boat was out to cheat, swindle, outright rob or even kill you if you were unfortunate enough to be an innocent pilgrim.  It was a wild and raucous bunch who peopled the wild and roiling river, and Sandlin, in addition to painting a vivid picture of the dangerous physicality of the greatest of America's merchantile waterways, packs this flavorful history with river pirates and professional gamblers, rapscallions and adventurers, wrecks and epic Civil War engagements.  The title is apt.

Gary

Young Romantics: The Shelleys, Byron, and Other Tangled Lives (Paperback)

By Daisy Hay

$25.00

ISBN: 9780374532932

Availability: Available at Warehouse

Published: Farrar, Strauss & Giroux-3pl - March 29th, 2011

Drawing upon documents found as recently as 1991, Hay describes in deeply satisfying detail the emotional and commercial interconnectedness of a group of talented young  people, whose philosophical and political beliefs brought them together when all were well under 30. Her use of their extensive correspondence is so successful one feels one is overhearing their conversations at breakfast. The later fabrications and exaggerations of some of the principle players are stripped away, and we learn not only the real story, but the motivations for invention.

Joan

The Great Silence: Britain from the Shadow of the First World War to the Dawn of the Jazz Age (Paperback)

By Juliet Nicolson

$16.95

ISBN: 9780802145406

Availability: Available at Warehouse

Published: Grove Press - June 14th, 2011

Those interested in World War I and its aftermath will find Juliet Nicolson’s study of the years right after the war to be enlightening, engaging and all too often disheartening.  Great Britain suffered from a lack of collective confidence, as well as having the resources to rebound and move past the horrors of the war years.  Written in concise, but vivid prose, Nicolson paints a time of haunting history.

Nathan