Showing titles in 21st Century

James Verini arrived in Iraq in the summer of 2016 to write about life in the Islamic State. He stayed to cover the jihadis' last great stand, the Battle of Mosul, not knowing it would go on for nearly a year, nor that it would become, in the words of the Pentagon, "the most significant urban combat since WWII." They Will Have to Die Now takes the listener into the heart of the conflict against the most lethal insurgency of our time. We see unspeakable violence, improbable humanity, and occasional humor.

Since the death of bin Laden in 2011, ISIS has risen, al-Qaeda has expanded its reach, and right-wing extremists have surged in the US for the same simple reason: terrorism works. It’s not caused by psychosis or irrationality, as the media often suggests. Instead, it’s terrifyingly logical. Violent acts produce political results. To show why, Walter Laqueur and Christopher Wall explore the history, rationales, and precepts of terrorism, from the assassination of Tsar Alexander II, through the terror campaigns by Irish and Indian nationalists, and to the Nazis and Italian Fascists.

A chronicle of life on the resplendent island. Adele Barker and her son, Noah, settled into the central highlands of Sri Lanka for an 18-month sojourn, immersing themselves in the customs, cultures, and landscapes of the island: its elephants, birds, and monkeys; its hot curries and sweet mangoes; the cacophony of its markets; the resonant evening chants from its temples. When, having returned home to Tucson, Barker awakes on December 26, 2004, to see televised images of the island's southern shore disappearing into the ocean, she decides she must go back.

In this new edition of his popular 2014 work, Mark Galeotti traces the progress of the wars in Chechnya, from the initial Russian advance through to urban battles such as Grozny, and the prolonged guerrilla warfare in the mountainous regions. Bringing the book up to date, including a revised introduction and new content on the Kadyrovtsy’s role in Russia’s other conflicts, Galeotti assesses how the wars have torn apart the fabric of Chechen society and their impact on Russia itself.

The definitive book on the hunt to find the most ruthless serial killer in Los Angeles' history, told by the fearless reporter who broke the story. In 2008, Christine Pelisek broke the story of a terrifying serial killer who went unchecked in Los Angeles for decades, killing the most vulnerable women in one South Central neighborhood.

El 5 de febrero de 1970, un hombre de 28 años intentó matar a Gustavo Díaz Ordaz. Falló. Pero el Estado reaccionó con saña maquiavélica y no falló en su intento de matarlo en vida. Después del atentado, Carlos Castañeda fue detenido y torturado. Sin embargo, eso no fue lo peor: una jueza lo declaró «jurídicamente incapaz» y ordenó refundirlo en el manicomio. Lo dejaron ahí 23 años, desecho, ignorado, enloquecido. Cuando al fin fue liberado, en 1993, ya era un hombre sin nombre, sin identidad ni historia. Vagó por las calles hasta su muerte.

Keir Starmer: The Biography is an authoritative study of a man who now stands on the brink of becoming Britain's next Prime Minister. If he succeeds, Starmer will be the first Labour leader in a generation to win power, even though most voters still say they don’t know much about him. It not only tells Starmer’s story but also examines the paradox of a politician often uncomfortable with politics, someone who is both remarkably ordinary and capable of defying all efforts to define him.

US Special Operations Command trains and equips units to undertake select military activities, frequently high-risk missions, often for the purposes of counterterrorism and counterinsurgency. Since 9/11, impelled by an attack on US soil, these forces have been a central instrument of America's military campaign - operating in about 100 countries on any given day. This fight - neither hot war nor cold peace - was launched and executed as a new type of global war in 2001 and has since splintered into a spectrum of regional conflicts.

Before there was Coronavirus, before there was the contentious 2020 election or the entire Trump presidency, there was a turning-point year that proved momentous and transformative for American politics and the fate of the nation.

A witty, candid story of a daring young man who made his way to the heights of American journalism and public life, from a New Hampshire weekly through his foreign correspondent years in Europe, to the apex of his career at the Washington Post, whose Watergate coverage gave journalism its finest hours.

Dead Men Risen, winner of the prestigious Orwell Prize for books, is the epic story of a beleaguered British battle group fighting desperately to prevent the Taliban from seizing Afghanistan's Helmand province just as the US Marines arrive to take over. Best-selling author Toby Harnden describes how men from the coal mining valleys and slate quarry villages of Wales found themselves in the most intense combat faced by British troops for a generation.

More than almost anything else, globalization and the great world religions are shaping our lives, affecting everything from the public policies of political leaders and the economic decisions of industry bosses and employees to university curricula, all the way to the inner longings of our hearts. Integral to both globalization and religions are compelling, overlapping, and sometimes competing visions of what it means to live well.

People have been climbing as long as they've existed, and for those who relish the challenge, nothing can top Mount Everest, the tallest mountain on the planet at over 29,000 feet. As Sir Edmund Hillary put it, "It is not the mountain we conquer but ourselves."

On December 16, 2019, Jerrold Nadler, Chairman of the Committee on the Judiciary House of Representatives, and the full Committee on the Judiciary released an updated version of the Impeachment Report. Now officially titled Impeachment of Donald J. Trump, President of the United States, Report of the Committee on the Judiciary House of Representatives, this document serves as the latest government-issued report from the Democrat-led House.

Russia's interference in 2016 marked only the latest chapter of a hidden and revelatory history. In Rigged, David Shimer tells the sweeping story of covert electoral interference past and present. He exposes decades of secret operations - by the KGB, the CIA, and Vladimir Putin's Russia - to shape electoral outcomes, melding deep historical research with groundbreaking interviews with more than 130 key players, from leading officials in both the Trump and Obama administrations, to CIA and NSA directors, to a former KGB general.

On June 17, 2015, 12 members of the historically black Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina welcomed a young white man to their evening Bible study. He arrived with a pistol, 88 bullets, and hopes of starting a race war. Dylann Roof’s massacre of nine innocents during their closing prayer horrified the nation. In Grace Will Lead Us Home, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Jennifer Berry Hawes provides a definitive account of the tragedy’s aftermath.

The accelerating changes of the past generation have been accompanied by a similarly accelerated amnesia. The 20th century has become "history" at an unprecedented rate. The world of 2007 was so utterly unlike that of even 1987, much less any earlier time, that we have lost touch with our immediate past even before we have begun to make sense of it - and the results are proving calamitous.

Tracing a new labor movement sparked and sustained by low-wage workers from across the globe, "We Are All Fast-Food Workers Now" is an urgent, illuminating look at globalization as seen through the eyes of workers-activists: small farmers, fast-food servers, retail workers, hotel housekeepers, home-healthcare aides, airport workers, and adjunct professors who are fighting for respect, safety, and a living wage. Drawing on interviews with activists in many US cities and countries around the world.

Plastic surgery has become the answer for many Americans, and in American Plastic sociologist Laurie Essig explores how we arrived at this particular solution. Over the last decade there has been a 465 percent increase in cosmetic work, and we now spend over $12 billion annually on procedures like liposuction, face-lifts, tummy tucks, and boob jobs.

In The New Counterinsurgency Era, David Ucko examines DoD's institutional obstacles and initially slow response to a changing strategic reality. Ucko also suggests how the military can better prepare for the unique challenges of modern warfare, where it is charged with everything from providing security to supporting reconstruction to establishing basic governance - all while stabilizing conquered territory and engaging with local populations.