Eastern Europe

The three tales in this audiobook are adapted from stories told by the peasants in Eastern Europe and Central Asia. They are drawn from some books I found in shops when I visited the former USSR in 1988 as part of a citizen diplomacy group. I was intrigued by these folktales, since my paternal grandmother lived for some time in Odessa in the Ukraine. Also, I found these stories share a common theme - the poor peasant is able to succeed despite obstacles against an unfair ruler.

Greater Than a Tourist - Copenhagen Denmark by Maddie Ipsen offers the inside scope on Copenhagen, Denmark. Most travel books tell you how to travel like a tourist. Although there's nothing wrong with that, as a part of the Greater than a Tourist series, this book will give you travel tips from someone who lives at your travel destination. This book will not tell you exact addresses or store hours but instead will give you an excitement and knowledge from a local that you may not find in other smaller travel books.

Greater Than a Tourist—Minsk, Belarus by Anna Martsynkevich offers the inside scoop on Minsk. Most travel books tell you how to travel like a tourist. Although there is nothing wrong with that, as part of the Greater Than a Tourist series, this book will give you travel tips from someone who has lived at your next travel destination.

La historia de Rusia ha cautivado al público durante generaciones. Desde las hazañas de Iván el Terrible hasta el asesinato de la familia real Románov, hay mucha historia que explorar. ¿Cómo se ganó el título Iván el Terrible? ¿Quiénes eran los Románov y qué llevó al brutal final de su dinastía? Siga la historia de Rusia y descubra los principales acontecimientos históricos que dieron forma a este país.

For more than 40 years, communism held eight European nations in its iron fist. Yet by the end of 1989, all of these nations had thrown off communism, declared independence, and embarked on the road to democracy.

Imagine a society with no unemployment, zero inflation, free healthcare and education, free childcare, virtually no serious crime, and where women and men are treated with absolute equality. Such a society has existed: in the German Democratic Republic (GDR), popularly known as East Germany.

The first complete history of Central Eurasia from ancient times to the present day, Empires of the Silk Road represents a fundamental rethinking of the origins, history, and significance of this major world region. Christopher Beckwith describes the rise and fall of the great Central Eurasian empires, including those of the Scythians, Attila the Hun, the Turks and Tibetans, and Genghis Khan and the Mongols.

Discover the remarkable history of the Crimean War...The Crimean War was one of the bloodiest conflicts of the 19th century, but it is also one of the least remembered. More men died in the Crimean War than in the American Civil War which followed soon after. Yet the Crimean War is important for a number of reasons. Although it did not change the map of Europe and did not directly cause the fall of any of the combatants, it did indirectly shape the second half of the 19th century and the early years of the twentieth century in Europe.

Before the Mongols rode across the steppes of Asia and Eastern Europe, the Cumans were a major military and cultural force that monarchs from China to Hungary and from Russia to the Byzantine Empire faced, often losing armies and cities in the process. The Cumans were a tribe of Turkic nomads who rode the steppes looking for plunder and riches, but they rarely stayed long after they got what they wanted. From the late 9th century until the arrival of the Mongols in 1223, there was virtually nothing that could be done to stop the Cumans.

From Christmas music to gifts and food, as well as a look back through the country's rich and troubled history through the perspective of the festive season, this beautiful and powerful book introduces listeners to Ukraine's unique Christmas traditions. In a country where East and West meet, this is a fascinating and unmissable guide to capturing the spirit of one of the most important times of year and a powerful reminder of the strength of holding on to your culture and beliefs, even as others try to take everything from you.

Russian literature exudes an atmosphere of mysticism, which is said to be a natural result of the simplicity of her people. Often, instead of being "about" anything, Russian stories sometimes seem to be the "thing" in itself. Be this as it may, it is an undeniable fact that with hardly any portent of future greatness to come, Russian literature suddenly sprang fully developed into existence in the 19th century.

These are the memoirs of the US Ambassador to the Ottoman Empire during World War I, abridged for this production in order to focus on the mass deportations and systematic killings of Turkey's Armenian population. This work is a renowned primary source for this Armenian Genocide, a crime since recognized by 29 countries. Ambassador Morgenthau offers detailed profiles of the Turkish leaders with whom he interacts, finding that they are responsible for a "death warrant to a whole race".

Although many have heard of the Crusades and some of the more famous orders like the Templars, few know about the Livonian Crusade or the Livonian Brothers of the Sword. This organization was one of many Catholic military orders that sprung up during the Middle Ages in response to the papacy’s call for holy war, and the Livonian Crusade is the term used to group together dozens of military actions undertaken by German knights in Eastern Europe. The order was also significant for consolidating the power of the Holy Roman Empire in Eastern Europe.

In terms of geopolitics, perhaps the most seminal event of the Middle Ages was the successful Ottoman siege of Constantinople in 1453. The city had been an imperial capital as far back as the fourth century, when Constantine the Great shifted the power center of the Roman Empire there, effectively establishing two almost equally powerful halves of antiquity’s greatest empire. The Rise of the Ottoman Empire chronicles the rise of one of history’s most influential empires. You will learn about the rise of the Ottoman Empire like never before.

During the height of the Cold War, a group of small-town young men would lead their underdog hockey team from the little country of Czechoslovakia against the Soviet Union, the juggernaut in their sport. As they battled on the ice, the young players would keep their people's quest for freedom alive, and forge a way to fight back against the authoritarian forces that sought to crush them. Freedom to Win tells a story that ranges from iconic moments in history to courageous individual stories.

Are you thinking about a vacation in Spain? Do you want to be well prepared and well informed, so that you can get the most out of your experience? Spain is a marvelous country, packed with history, great tourist resorts, an interior that boasts epic natural beauty and people who are warm and welcoming. Now you can share in everything that Spain has to offer, with Discover Spain: The Ultimate Travel Guide for Exploring Spain Like a Local.

Ita was born in the wrong place at the wrong time. The place was the former Pale of Settlement, which was a large swath of land in Western Russia where Jews were forced to live for centuries. The year was 1918 and Russia was in the midst of two revolutions. Ita was caught in the middle during this time of great political and social upheaval. Wave after wave of murderous anti-Jewish riots, or pogroms, descended upon Jewish shtetls, and the only chance for her survival was to escape. Escape was not easy. In fact, it could be deadly.

L'ouverture des archives du Goulag Depuis l'ouverture au début des années 1990 des archives de l'ex-URSS, une immense source d'informations minutieuses, due notamment aux quelque 100.000 fonctionnaires de l'administration du goulag, a été offerte aux historiens pour comprendre le système concentrationnaire soviétique.Un univers complexe Cette révolution documentaire a permis de dévoiler un univers complexe, à plusieurs cercles, par lequel, le temps d'une génération (1930-1950), vingt millions d'individus sont passés (un homme adulte sur cinq).

Greater Than a Tourist: Rotterdam Zuid-Holland Netherlands, by Rikki Srichankij, offers the inside scoop on Rotterdam. This audiobook will give you tips from someone who lives at your next travel destination.

Despite the best efforts of a number of historians, many aspects of the ferocious struggle between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union during the Second World War remain obscure or shrouded in myth. One of the most persistent of these is the notion - largely created by many former members of its own officer corps in the immediate postwar period - that the German Army was a paragon of military professionalism and operational proficiency whose defeat on the Eastern Front was solely attributable to the amateurish meddling of a crazed former Corporal.