America's Constitution
A Biography
Written by Akhil Reed Amar

Format: Hardcover, 672 pages
Publisher: Random House
On Sale: September 13, 2005
Price: $29.95
ISBN: 978-1-4000-6262-1 (1-4000-6262-4)

In America’s Constitution, one of this era’s most accomplished constitutional law scholars, Akhil Reed Amar, gives the first comprehensive account of one of the world’s great political texts. Incisive, entertaining, and occasionally controversial, this “biography” of America’s framing document explains not only what the Constitution says but also why the Constitution... Read more >

The Triumph of the Thriller
How Cops, Crooks, and Cannibals Captured Popular Fiction
Written by Patrick Anderson

Format: Hardcover, 288 pages
Publisher: Random House
On Sale: February 6, 2007
Price: $24.95
ISBN: 978-0-345-48123-8 (0-345-48123-2)

There’s been a revolution in American popular fiction. The writers who dominated the bestseller lists a generation ago with blockbuster novels about movie stars and exotic foreign lands have been replaced by a new generation writing a new kind of bestseller, one that hooks readers with crime, suspense, and ever-increasing violence... Read more >

Grace
Quotes & Passages for Heart, Mind, and Soul
Written by B.C. Aronson

Format: Hardcover, 224 pages
Publisher: Random House Reference
On Sale: May 9, 2006
Price: $14.95
ISBN: 978-0-375-42607-0 (0-375-42607-8)

This treasury of quotes and passages on leading a centered, purposeful, and spiritual life offers the advice and observations of leaders from all walks of life. Included are Ghandi, Lao-Tzu, Maya Angelou, Martin Luther King, Jr., Mother Teresa, and hundreds of other unique and inspiring voices on subjects like compassion, kindness... Read more >

Radical Innocent: Upton Sinclair

Written by Anthony Arthur

Format: Hardcover, 400 pages
Publisher: Random House
On Sale: June 6, 2006
Price: $27.95
ISBN: 978-1-4000-6151-8 (1-4000-6151-2)

Few American writers have revealed their private as well as their public selves so fully as Upton Sinclair, and virtually none over such a long lifetime (1878—1968). Sinclair’s writing, even at its most poignant or electrifying, blurred the line between politics and art–and, indeed, his life followed a similar arc. In... Read more >

Casting a Spell
The Bamboo Fly Rod and the American Pursuit of Perfection
Written by George Black

Format: Hardcover, 272 pages
Publisher: Random House
On Sale: August 8, 2006
Price: $25.00
ISBN: 978-1-4000-6396-3 (1-4000-6396-5)

"In this beautifully crafted, utterly engaging work, Black wraps his own personal journey through the contemporary world of bamboo fly rod making in a sweeping, meticulous telling of the history of American fly-fishing. With admirable dexterity, he manages to make the story a metaphor for a great deal of how American... Read more >

When a Heart Turns Rock Solid
The Lives of Three Puerto Rican Brothers On and Off the Streets
Written by Timothy Black

Format: Hardcover, 464 pages
Publisher: Pantheon
On Sale: August 4, 2009
Price: $29.95
ISBN: 978-0-307-37774-6 (0-307-37774-1)

This provocative and compelling book examines how jobs, schools, the streets, and prisons have shaped the lives and choices of a generation of Puerto Rican youth at the turn of the twenty-first century.

At the center of this riveting account–based on an unprecedented eighteen-year study–are three engaging, streetwise brothers from Springfield, Massachusetts... Read more >

American Lightning
Terror, Mystery, the Birth of Hollywood, and the Crime of the Century
Written by Howard Blum

Format: Hardcover, 352 pages
Publisher: Crown
On Sale: September 16, 2008
Price: $24.95
ISBN: 978-0-307-34694-0 (0-307-34694-3)

It was an explosion that reverberated across the country—and into the very heart of early-twentieth-century America. On the morning of October 1, 1910, the walls of the Los Angeles Times Building buckled as a thunderous detonation sent men, machinery, and mortar rocketing into the night air. When at last the wreckage... Read more >

Bright Boulevards, Bold Dreams
The Story of Black Hollywood
Written by Donald Bogle

Format: Trade Paperback, 432 pages
Publisher: One World/Ballantine
On Sale: January 31, 2006
Price: $15.95
ISBN: 978-0-345-45419-5 (0-345-45419-7)

In Bright Boulevards, Bold Dreams, Donald Bogle tells–for the first time–the story of a place both mythic and real: Black Hollywood. Spanning sixty years, this history uncovers the audacious manner in which many blacks made a place for themselves in an industry that originally had no place for them.

Through interviews... Read more >

The First American
The Life and Times of Benjamin Franklin
Written by H.W. Brands

Format: Trade Paperback, 784 pages
Publisher: Anchor
On Sale: March 12, 2002
Price: $17.00
ISBN: 978-0-385-49540-0 (0-385-49540-4)

Pulitzer Prize Finalist

A groundbreaking scientist, leading businessman, philosopher, bestselling author, inventor, diplomat, politician, and wit, Benjamin Franklin was perhaps the most beloved and celebrated American of his age, or indeed of any age. Now, in a beautifully written and meticulously researched account of Franklin's life and times, his clever repartee, generous... Read more >

Lone Star Nation
The Epic Story of the Battle for Texas Independence
Written by H.W. Brands

Format: Trade Paperback, 608 pages
Publisher: Anchor
On Sale: February 8, 2005
Price: $17.95
ISBN: 978-1-4000-3070-5 (1-4000-3070-6)

In Lone Star Nation, Pulitzer Prize finalist H. W. Brands demythologizes Texas’s journey to statehood and restores the genuinely heroic spirit to a pivotal chapter in American history.

From Stephen Austin, Texas’s reluctant founder, to the alcoholic Sam Houston, who came to lead the Texas army in its hour of crisis and... Read more >

"I Heard You Paint Houses"
Frank "The Irishman" Sheeran & Closing the Case on Jimmy Hoffa
Written by Charles Brandt

Format: Trade Paperback, 320 pages
Publisher: Steerforth
On Sale: May 24, 2005
Price: $15.95
ISBN: 978-1-58642-089-5 (1-58642-089-5)

"I heard you paint houses" are the first words Jimmy Hoffa ever spoke to Frank "the Irishman" Sheeran. To paint a house is to kill a man. The paint is the blood that splatters on the walls and floors. In the course of nearly five years of recorded interviews Frank Sheeran... Read more >

Boom!
Talking About the Sixties: What Happened, How It Shaped Today, Lessons for Tomorrow
Written by Tom Brokaw

Format: Trade Paperback, 688 pages
Publisher: Random House Trade Paperbacks
On Sale: October 14, 2008
Price: $18.00
ISBN: 978-0-8129-7511-6 (0-8129-7511-1)

In Boom!, Tom Brokaw, one of America’s premier journalists and the acclaimed author of The Greatest Generation, gives us an epic portrait of another defining era in America: the tumultuous Sixties. The voices and stories of both famous people and ordinary citizens come together in this “virtual reunion” as Brokaw takes... Read more >

Cringe
Teenage Diaries, Journals, Notes, Letters, Poems, and Abandoned Rock Operas
Written by Sarah Brown

Format: Hardcover, 240 pages
Publisher: Crown
On Sale: August 26, 2008
Price: $22.95
ISBN: 978-0-307-39358-6 (0-307-39358-5)

Did you keep a diary during your teen years? Do you have a box of loopy-cursive, never-sent notes to your crush? Or some overwrought poetry about your bleak existence? An unfinished rockopera? Well, you’re not alone, and in Cringe, you’ll find a reason to unearth your adolescent angst and have a... Read more >

Condoleezza Rice: An American Life
A Biography
Written by Elisabeth Bumiller

Format: Trade Paperback, 464 pages
Publisher: Random House Trade Paperbacks
On Sale: January 13, 2009
Price: $17.00
ISBN: 978-0-8129-7713-4 (0-8129-7713-0)

Condoleezza Rice, one of the most powerful and controversial women in the world, has until now remained a mystery behind an elegant, cool veneer. New York Times reporter Elisabeth Bumiller peels back the layers and presents a revelatory portrait of the first black female secretary of state and President George W... Read more >

Joker One
A Marine Platoon's Story of Courage, Leadership, and Brotherhood
Written by Donovan Campbell

Format: Hardcover, 336 pages
Publisher: Random House
On Sale: March 10, 2009
Price: $26.00
ISBN: 978-1-4000-6773-2 (1-4000-6773-1)

After graduating from Princeton, Donovan Campbell, motivated by his unwavering patriotism and commitment, decided to join the service, realizing that becoming a Marine officer would allow him to give back to his country, engage in the world, and learn to lead. In this immediate, thrilling, and inspiring memoir, Campbell recounts a... Read more >

Uncle Tom or New Negro?
African Americans Reflect on Booker T. Washington and UP FROM SLAVERY 100 Years Later
Written by Rebecca Carroll

Format: Trade Paperback, 512 pages
Publisher: Harlem Moon
On Sale: January 10, 2006
Price: $15.95
ISBN: 978-0-7679-1955-5 (0-7679-1955-6)

Includes Washington’s classic memoir Up from Slavery

On the ninetieth anniversary of Booker T. Washington’s death comes a passionate, provocative dialogue on his complicated legacy, including the complete text of his classic autobiography, Up from Slavery.

Booker T. Washington was born a slave in 1858, yet roughly forty years later he had established... Read more >

Such Sweet Thunder
A Novel
Written by Vincent O. Carter

Format: Trade Paperback, 440 pages
Publisher: Zoland Books
On Sale: June 13, 2006
Price: $16.95
ISBN: 978-1-58195-217-9 (1-58195-217-1)

This unique and compelling novel deserves a place of prominence in American literature. Completed in 1963, read and widely admired in manuscript by a network of expatriate American artists strung across Europe, it was never published during Vincent Carter’s lifetime. In 2003, Steerforth Press published the text in its entirety, knowing... Read more >

Titan
The Life of John D. Rockefeller, Sr.
Written by Ron Chernow

Format: Trade Paperback, 832 pages
Publisher: Vintage
On Sale: March 30, 2004
Price: $18.95
ISBN: 978-1-4000-7730-4 (1-4000-7730-3)

John D. Rockefeller, Sr.—history’s first billionaire and the patriarch of America’s most famous dynasty—is an icon whose true nature has eluded three generations of historians. Now Ron Chernow, the National Book Award-winning biographer of the Morgan and Warburg banking families, gives us a history of the mogul “etched with uncommon objectivity... Read more >

Norman Rockwell
A Life
Written by Laura Claridge

Format: Trade Paperback, 592 pages
Publisher: Modern Library
On Sale: March 25, 2003
Price: $16.95
ISBN: 978-0-8129-6723-4 (0-8129-6723-2)

“[An] excellent and thorough new biography.” —Michael Kimmelman, The New York Times

Norman Rockwell’s hundreds of memorable covers for The Saturday Evening Post made him a twentieth-century American icon. However, because of the very popularity of his idealized depictions of middle-class life, his more serious paintings have been largely ignored, and he... Read more >

Made in Detroit

Written by Paul Clemens

Format: Trade Paperback, 256 pages
Publisher: Anchor
On Sale: October 10, 2006
Price: $13.95
ISBN: 978-1-4000-7596-6 (1-4000-7596-3)

A New York Times Notable Book

A powerfully candid memoir about growing up white in Detroit and the conflicted point of view it produced.

Raised in Detroit during the ‘70s, ‘80s, and ‘90s, Paul Clemens saw his family growing steadily isolated from its surroundings: white in a predominately black city, Catholic in an... Read more >

A Consumers' Republic
The Politics of Mass Consumption in Postwar America
Written by Lizabeth Cohen

Format: Trade Paperback, 576 pages
Publisher: Vintage
On Sale: December 30, 2003
Price: $18.00
ISBN: 978-0-375-70737-7 (0-375-70737-9)

The three decades after World War II are often heralded as a “Golden Era” of American affluence. But as Lizabeth Cohen makes clear, the pursuit of prosperity defined much more than the nation’s economy; it also became a basic component of American citizenship. Consumers were encouraged to buy not just for... Read more >

Democracy in America, Vol. 1

Written by Alexis De Tocqueville

Format: Trade Paperback, 480 pages
Publisher: Vintage
On Sale: August 11, 1990
Price: $13.95
ISBN: 978-0-679-72825-2 (0-679-72825-2)

In 1831 Alexis de Tocqueville traveled through the United States to investigate the country’s prison system. Instead, he wrote this study of democracy in its infancy—a study that embraces America’s history, geography, politics, legal system, economy, and culture. Here are glimpses of a vanished America, from town meetings in New England... Read more >

Democracy in America, Vol. 2

Written by Alexis De Tocqueville

Format: Trade Paperback, 528 pages
Publisher: Vintage
On Sale: August 11, 1990
Price: $13.95
ISBN: 978-0-679-72826-9 (0-679-72826-0)

In 1831 Alexis de Tocqueville traveled through the United States to investigate the country's prison system. Instead, he wrote this study of democracy in its infancy--a study that embraces America's history, geography, politics, legal system, economy, and culture. Here are glimpses of a vanished America, from town meetings in New England... Read more >

Letters from Nuremberg
My Father's Narrative of a Quest for Justice
Written by Christopher Dodd

Format: Trade Paperback, 384 pages
Publisher: Three Rivers Press
On Sale: November 25, 2008
Price: $15.95
ISBN: 978-0-307-38117-0 (0-307-38117-X)

For some sixty years, the Nuremberg trials have demonstrated the resolve of the United States and its fellow Allied victors of the Second World War to uphold the principles of dispassionate justice and the rule of law even when cries of vengeance threatened to carry the day. In the summer of... Read more >

Dangerous Words
Talking About God in the Age of Fundamentalism
Written by Gary Eberle

Format: Hardcover, 240 pages
Publisher: Trumpeter
On Sale: June 12, 2007
Price: $21.95
ISBN: 978-1-59030-432-7 (1-59030-432-2)

Religious language, Gary Eberle notes, can be the linguistic equivalent of nitroglycerine. A little three-letter word like God, for example, is so complex, so intertwined with various identities, so ultimately undefinable, that using it can be like throwing a hand grenade, regardless of one's intentions. Others have noted the linguistic problem... Read more >