American Power

Elaine Brown assumed her role as the first and only female leader of the Black Panther Party with these words: “I have all the guns and all the money. I can withstand challenge from without and from within. Am I right, Comrade?” It was August 1974. From a small Oakland-based cell, the Panthers had grown to become a revolutionary national organization. How Brown came to a position of power over this paramilitary, male-dominated organization, and what she did with that power, is a riveting, unsparing account of self-discovery.

Channel your Black-girl magic: If you're feeling stuck or trapped by other people's expectations of what you can achieve, it's time to stop playing small and start redefining what success can mean for you. Leave a legacy of Black excellence: With the seven simple rules, you'll learn how to bring your career, income, and lifestyle to that next level. Don't settle for a life of invisibility and mediocrity. Set ambitious goals, reach for bigger opportunities, and know that you are brave enough to get what you deserve.

No company embodied American ingenuity, innovation, and industrial power more spectacularly and more consistently than the General Electric Company. GE once developed and manufactured many of the inventions we take for granted today, nearly everything from the lightbulb to the jet engine. GE also built a cult of financial and leadership success envied across the globe and became the world’s most valuable and most admired company. But even at the height of its prestige and influence, cracks were forming in its formidable foundation.

If society collapsed, could you survive? When Morgan Carter's car breaks down 250 miles from his home, he figures his weekend plans are ruined. But things are about to get much, much worse: the country's power grid has collapsed. There is no electricity, no running water, no Internet, and no way to know when normalcy will be restored - if it ever will be.

A Vegas cocktail waitress. An Indian herbalist. A British chemistry professor. An Italian-American widow. Four unique women with one thing in common: Each is haunted by a tragedy from her past. Cynthia, Rohini, Jane, and Angela meet on a food blogging site and bond over recipes. On impulse, they decide to open The Secret Spice, an elegant cafe on the magnificent ocean liner, the RMS Queen Mary, currently a floating hotel in Long Beach, California. Rich in history and tales of supernatural occurrences, the ship hides her own dark secrets.

For the five Reeves women, nothing is more important than keeping their family bond tight and their communication flowing. But honesty isn't so clear cut when it could blow up everything they've fought to build. Already reeling from betrayal, middle sister Coco is fed up with lies - including her own. If she has her way, someone else's neck needs to be on the line for a change. But soon, Coco's in deep trouble with the law, her future hanging in the balance....

In When Women Ran Fifth Avenue, journalist Julie Satow draws back the curtain on three visionaries who took great risks, forging new paths for the women who followed in their footsteps. This stylish account, rich with personal drama and trade secrets, captures the department store in all its glitz, decadence, and fun, and showcases the women who made that beautifully curated world go round.

Nomi Prins ushers us into the intimate world of exclusive clubs, vacation spots, and Ivy League universities that binds presidents and financiers. She unravels the multi-generational blood, intermarriage, and protégé relationships that have confined national influence to a privileged cluster of people. This unprecedented history of American power illuminates how financiers have retained their authoritative position through history, swaying presidents regardless of party affiliation.

The world lost a courageous leader and a treasured friend with the passing of Vine Deloria Jr. He was, and is, one of the greatest spiritual thinkers of our time. Before his death, Deloria was reexamining native spirituality. His years of collecting native stories of the medicine men and exploring spirituality from different perspectives are brought together in this audiobook.

Doris Kearns Goodwin's classic life of Lyndon Johnson, who presided over the Great Society, the Vietnam War, and other defining moments in the tumultuous 1960s, is a monument in political biography. From the moment the author, then a young woman from Harvard, first encountered President Johnson at a White House dance in the spring of 1967, she became fascinated by the man - his character, his enormous energy and drive, and his manner of wielding these gifts in an endless pursuit of power.

In Move On Up, Aaron Cohen tells the remarkable story of the explosion of soul music in Chicago. Record producers and songwriters broadcast optimism for black America's future through their sophisticated, jazz-inspired productions for the Dells and many others. Musicians like Phil Cohran and the Pharaohs used their music to voice Afrocentric philosophies that challenged racism and segregation, while Maurice White of Earth, Wind, and Fire and Chaka Khan created music that inspired black consciousness.

First published in 1956, The Power Elite stands as a contemporary classic of social science and social criticism. C. Wright Mills examines and critiques the organization of power in the United States, calling attention to three firmly interlocked prongs of power: the military, corporate, and political elite. The Power Elite can be enjoyed as a good account of what was taking place in America at the time it was written, but its underlying question of whether America is as democratic in practice as it is in theory continues to matter very much today.

The definitive biography of Henry Kissinger - at least for those who neither revere nor revile him.

Nuclear power once promised to be the solution to the world's energy crisis, but that all changed in the late twentieth century after multiple high-profile accidents and meltdowns. Power plant workers, finding themselves the subject of public opposition, became leery of reporters. But one plant in Zion, Illinois, allowed unrestricted access to one journalist: the Chicago Tribune's Casey Bukro. Bukro spent two years inside the Zion nuclear plant, interviewing employees, witnessing high-risk maintenance procedures, and watching the radiation exposure counter on his own dosimeter tick up and up.

In 2013, Alicia Garza wrote what she called “a love letter to Black people” on Facebook, in the aftermath of the acquittal of the man who murdered seventeen-year-old Trayvon Martin. Garza wrote: Black people. I love you. I love us. Our lives matter. With the speed and networking capacities of social media, #BlackLivesMatter became the hashtag heard ’round the world. But Garza knew even then that hashtags don’t start movements - people do.

Underdogma is a new "idea book" that shows how our love/hate relationship with power - and those who have power - shape how we look at the world. For many people, those who have less power (underdogs) can do no wrong, even when we do wrong, and those who have more power can do no right - even when they do right. Michael Prell gave this belief system a name - Underdogma - and he reveals how Underdogma is affecting your life right now - and how it threatens America's superpower status.

Based on her inspiring, viral 2018 commencement speech to Barnard College’s graduates in New York City, New York Times best-selling author, two-time Olympic gold medalist, and FIFA World Cup champion Abby Wambach delivers her empowering rally cry for women to unleash their individual power, unite with their pack, and emerge victorious together.

Against all odds, Morgan Carter and his family have endured despite the deteriorating conditions surrounding them. Armed with survivalist tactics, Morgan's crew, alongside their new friends from the recently-liberated DHS camp, have worked together to build a sustainable community. But not all situations can be prepared for. When a massive wildfire threatens their very existence, they must decide: fight or flight?

In Jenny Doan's new memoir, How to Stitch an American Dream, listeners will discover the behind-the-scenes success story of the Missouri Star Quilt Company and Jenny’s remarkable journey to overcome hardship, claim the abundance of family, and ignite the power of giving - all while revitalizing a small town along the way. Over the last decade, the Doan family business, the Missouri Star Quilt Company in tiny Hamilton, Missouri, has grown from Jenny’s corner shop.

Brilliant, listenable, and raw. Maj. (ret.) Danny Sjursen, who served combat tours in Iraq and Afghanistan and later taught history at West Point, delivers a true epic and the perfect companion to Howard Zinn’s A People’s History of the United States.