"An obsessive genealogist and descendent of one of the most prominent Jewish families since the American Revolution, Blanche Moses firmly believed her maternal ancestors were Sephardic grandees. Yet she found herself at a dead end when it came to her grandmother's maternal line. Using family heirlooms to unlock the mystery of Moses's ancestors, Once We Were Slaves overturns the reclusive heiress's assumptions about her family history to reveal that her grandmother and great-uncle, Sarah and Isaac Brandon, actually began their lives as poor Christian slaves in Barbados. Tracing the siblings' extraordinary journey throughout the Atlantic World, Leibman examines artefacts they left behind in Barbados, Suriname, London, Philadelphia, and, finally, New York, to show how Sarah and Isaac were able to transform themselves and their lives, becoming free, wealthy, Jewish, and-at times-white. While their affluence made them unusual, their story mirrors that of the largely forgotten population of mixed African and Jewish ancestry that constituted as much as ten percent of the Jewish communities in which the siblings lived, and sheds new light on the fluidity of race-as well as on the role of religion in racial shift-in the first half of the nineteenth century"--

This updated Agatha Christie compendium offers synopses of all Christie's novels, plays and short stories, without revealing whodunit. It also features: a portrait of Agatha Christie by Julian Symons; Christie's own comments on her work; articles on themes in her work such as a guide to Agatha's toxic agents, gossip and intuition as detective tools and the subtleties of the all-encompassing dress codes that governed her characters; articles on films, plus an updated filmography and new-video listing; a behind-the-scenes look at "Agatha" the movie; a mystery map showing locations of stories; a Christie crossword; and coverage of her romantic writing under the pen name Mary Westmacott.--From publisher description.

John Feinstein, whom the Boston Globe calls 'the best writer of sports books in America today,' captures the fiercest four days in golf as no other writer could. Chronicling the U.S. Open as it was played, for the first time in history, on a true public golf course-and one of the most challenging courses in the country (only one player, Tiger Woods, finished under par at Bethpage Black)-Feinstein lifts the mystery shrouding golf's most celebrated event and takes the reader through every shot, every trap, every thorny hole, and every bitter rivalry of golf's greatest tournament.

The world-renowned novelist, poet and singer/songwriter inspired generations of writers, musicians and artists. For decades, Leonard Cohen tenaciously supplied the world with melancholy but urgent observations on the state of the human heart. With equal parts gravitas and grace, he teased out a startlingly inventive and singular language, depicting both an exalted spirituality and an earthly sexuality. His interweaving of the sacred and the profane, of mystery and accessibility, was such a compelling combination it became seared into memory. Situated between monograph and devotional exercise, this visually striking publication documents a unique exhibition and pays homage to a global star's enormous cultural achievements. Visual artists, filmmakers, performers and musicians from around the world revisit Cohen's words, songs, and biography with new perspectives. Cohen himself makes an appearance as a visual artist with a projection of his many self-portraits. Co-curators John Zeppetelli and Victor Shiffman discuss the two years that went into bringing the ambitious event to fruition, from its original conception as a celebration to its final form of a tribute suffused in elegy. Cohen biographer Sylvie Simmons reviews Cohen's career from early promise to unexpected paths, through set-backs, and onto its astounding culmination. Chantal Ringuet draws upon specific moments in Cohen's life from early childhood to his last writings where he seems to be reciting his own Kaddish, the Jewish prayer for the dead. Also featured are artist statements from each of the 40 participants.

In the fifth volume of the popular series of historical mysteries, a ragged stranger and the prospect of losing her family's fortune lead Flavia Gemina and her friends, Jonathan, Lupus, and Nubia to a seaside villa. There, they discover a shipwreck and sunken treasure--and that someone else is after the treasure, too. As they solve the riddle of the wreck, the four friends also stumble across the terrible mystery of Lupus's past.

It all started with a Special Project: Solve a mystery in your own life. For seventh grader Bethesda Fielding, one mystery is too tempting to ignore. She’s convinced that her mousy Music Fundamentals teacher is hiding a secret life. But no one is prepared for what she discovers. Ms. Finkleman used to be . . . a rock star? Soon the whole school goes rock crazy, and a giant concert is in the works, led by none other than timid Ms. Finkleman! But is the case really closed or could there be even more to the story of Ms. Finkleman? With the help of her rock-obsessed classmate, Tenny Boyer, Bethesda won’t stop until she solves this mystery once and for all!

Published together for the first time are three of Ayn Rand's most compelling stage plays. The courtroom drama Night of January 16th, famous for its open-ended verdict, is presented here in its definitive text. Also included are two of Rand's unproduced plays, Think Twice, a clever philosophical murder mystery, and Ideal, a bitter indictment of people's willingness to betray their highest values-symbolized by a Hollywood goddess suspected of a crime.

Rabbi Nachman of Breslov is a figure of enigma and mystery. It may therefore come as a surprise to find how much detailed information has survived about his life. Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan s biography is the fruit of meticulous research into all the surviving source material, including the oral tradition of the Breslover Chassidim themselves. The work is accompanied by a rich array of supplementary material covering Rabbi Nachman s family and leading followers, other key personages in his life and period, contemporary historical trends, and the towns and cities which figure in his career. With a leader of Rabbi Nachman s stature a biographical approach of interpretation and evaluation is likely to be more misleading than illuminating. Rabbi Nachman s Torah, his teachings and his spiritual exploits were his life: to attempt to explain them from an extraneous perspective is to miss the point. Until the Mashiach presents the facts, leaving the reader free to reach his own conclusions about Rabbi Nachman's significance. What emerges is a picture of a leader who, while passionately concerned about the currents of his time, rose way above to become a torch to all the ensuing generations. His challenge to us is to free ourselves and prepare to greet the Mashiach. For my fire will burn until the Mashiach will come." Features an extensive historical overview, detailed maps, and full appendices listing significant towns and cities, biographical data, and anecdotes about Rebbe Nachman's family, followers and other contemporary figures, with full source references throughout. An essential reference work for every student of Breslov.

Barack Obama’s inauguration as president on January 20, 2009, inspired the world. But the great promise of “Change We Can Believe In” was immediately tested by the threat of another Great Depression, a worsening war in Afghanistan, and an entrenched and deeply partisan system of business as usual in Washington. Despite all the coverage, the backstory of Obama’s historic first year in office has until now remained a mystery. In The Promise: President Obama, Year One , Jonathan Alter, one of the country’s most respected journalists and historians, uses his unique access to the White House to produce the first inside look at Obama’s difficult debut. What happened in 2009 inside the Oval Office? What worked and what failed? What is the president really like on the job and off-hours, using what his best friend called “a Rubik’s Cube in his brain?" These questions are answered here for the first time. We see how a surprisingly cunning Obama took effective charge in Washington several weeks before his election, made trillion-dollar decisions on the stimulus and budget before he was inaugurated, engineered colossally unpopular bailouts of the banking and auto sectors, and escalated a treacherous war not long after settling into office. The Promise is a fast-paced and incisive narrative of a young risk-taking president carving his own path amid sky-high expectations and surging joblessness. Alter reveals that it was Obama alone—“feeling lucky”—who insisted on pushing major health care reform over the objections of his vice president and top advisors, including his chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, who admitted that “I begged him not to do this.” Alter takes the reader inside the room as Obama prevents a fistfight involving a congressman, coldly reprimands the military brass for insubordination, crashes the key meeting at the Copenhagen Climate Change conference, and bounces back after a disastrous Massachusetts election to redeem a promise that had eluded presidents since FDR. In Alter’s telling, the real Obama is an authentic, demanding, unsentimental, and sometimes overconfident leader. He adapted to the presidency with ease and put more “points on the board” than he is given credit for, but neglected to use his leverage over the banks and failed to connect well with an angry public. We see the famously calm president cursing leaks, playfully trash-talking his advisors, and joking about even the most taboo subjects, still intent on redeeming more of his promise as the problems mount. This brilliant blend of journalism and history offers the freshest reporting and most acute perspective on the biggest story of our time. It will shape impressions of the Obama presidency and of the man himself for years to come.

Best-selling author Belva Plain follows the enormous success of "Whispers" and "Daybreak" with another explosive novel that explores the realities simmering below the surface of a seemingly admirable Amencan family. In the opening pages of "The Carousel" a woman is looking at an exquisite music box, a silver carousel. She is pensive and reflects upon how this beautiful object has linked the momentous events of a family's life. She has married into that family, the Greys, whose successful business is nationally known. The sun has long shone upon the patriarch, Oliver Grey, his two sons Ian and Clive, and his niece and nephew, Amanda and Dan. Oliver has recently handed over control of the business to his two sons and his nephew. Amanda has a non-voting share. Now the sky has clouded over and terrible storms arise as a series of incidents threatens to destroy the family... Amanda is making furious demands upon the business. Ian's greed and his adultery collide with Clive's jealousy. And the five-year-old daughter of Dan and his wife has been the victim of sexual abuse. The Greys, pillars of their upstate New York community, are being torn apart. And before their ordeal comes to an end someone will be the victim of murder. As she did in the enormously successful "Whispers," Belva Plain tells a timely story of a family with a dark and dirty secret. With the additional touches of mystery--a new territory for Belva Plain --"The Carousel" confirms her place as one of our most compelling and popular writers. "The queen of the family saga writers...Belva Plain is in a class by herself." -- "The New York Times,"

Ellery Queen mystery set in New York City

Hollywood star Mike Burton and his blond sex goddess have a rocky marriage, but when she's kidnapped and held for ransom he's quick tp pay the million dollar ransom without police interference. Detective Masao Masuto suspects her disappearance is a hoax, but the real puzzle is who set it up and who got the money since her husband was found dead.

When a mystery writer cries bloody murder, everyone blames her overactive imagination ... Thriller scribe Sophie Katz is as hard-boiled as a woman who drinks Grande Caramel Brownie Frappuccinos can be. So Sophie knows it's not paranoia or post-divorce, living-alone-again jitters, when she becomes convinced that a crazed reader is sneaking into her apartment to reenact scenes from her books. The police, however, can't tell a good plot from an unmarked grave. When a filmmaker friend is brutally murdered in the manner of a death scene in one of his movies, Sophie becomes convinced that a copyca.

Zach Adams is one of the best detectives in the country. Nicknamed Cowboy, he’s a soft-spoken homicide detective known for his integrity and courage under fire. He serves on a federal task force that has a single mission: to hunt down Dominic Abend, a European gangster who has taken over the American underworld.After a brutal murder gives them a lead, Zach and his tough guy NYPD partner Martin Goulart are finally on Abend’s trail. But things get complicated — and very, very weird. Goulart’s on-the-job enemies are accusing him of corruption. And Zach is beginning to suspect that Abend’s evil goes beyond crime—perhaps to the edge of the supernatural. As his investigation continues in Germany, Zach finds himself lured into the impossible. In a centuries-old forest under a full moon, a beast assaults him, cursing him forever. In the aftermath, Zach is transformed into something horrible —something deadly.Now, the good cop has innocent blood on his hands. He has killed—and will kill again—in the form of a beast who can’t be controlled or stopped. Before he can free himself, he’s going to have to solve the greatest mystery of all: How can you defeat evil when the evil is inside you?

In Nicholas Meyer's The Return of the Pharaoh , Sherlock Holmes returns in an adventure that takes him to Egypt in search of a missing nobleman, a previously undiscovered pharaoh's tomb, and a conspiracy that threatens his very life. With his international bestseller, The Seven Per Cent Solution , Nicholas Meyer brought to light a previously unpublished case of Sherlock Holmes that reinvigorated the world's interest in the first consulting detective. Now, many years later, Meyer is given exclusive access to Dr. Watson's unpublished journal, wherein he details a previously unknown case. In 1910, Dr. John Watson travels to Egypt with his wife Juliet. Her tuberculosis has returned and her doctor recommends a stay at a sanitarium in a dry climate. But while his wife undergoes treatment, Dr. Watson bumps into an old friend--Sherlock Holmes, in disguise and on a case. An English Duke with a penchant for egyptology has disappeared, leading to enquiries from his wife and the Home Office. Holmes has discovered that the missing duke has indeed vanished from his lavish rooms in Cairo and that he was on the trail of a previous undiscovered and unopened tomb. And that he's only the latest Egyptologist to die or disappear under odd circumstances. With the help of Howard Carter, Holmes and Watson are on the trail of something much bigger, more important, and more sinister than an errant lord.

Dermott McBride was a James Joyce scholar who went on to become overlord of every pimp in Manhattan. Isaac Sidel wanted to break his toes for scarring young prostitute Annie Powell, but first he had to sort out the small matter of a corrupt New York police commissioner.

A dog's murder leads detective Masuto to a most unusual poisoning case In Beverly Hills, murder has suddenly gone out of style. For five weeks, the head of the city's tiny homicide squad, Zen detective Masao Masuto, has worked only robbery investigations. But after more than a month without a corpse, this dry spell is about to end. The dead woman is Ana Fortez, a Chicana whose death was originally classified as terminal food poisoning brought on by a feast of botulism-infested clairs. But because botulism can only grow in an airtight space, the medical examiner warns Masuto that the fatal bacteria must have been purposefully injected into the pastry. When a wealthy housewife's dog drops dead after munching on premium chocolates, Masuto finds that her bonbons have been laced with the same toxin. He begins a search for a killer targeting the sweet tooth of Beverly Hills - proof that crime in Southern California never stays boring for long.

It is the late summer of 1938, Europe is about to explode, the Hollywood film star Fredric Stahl is on his way to Paris to make a movie for Paramount France. The Nazis know he's coming--a secret bureau within the Reich Foreign Ministry has for years been waging political warfare against France, using bribery, intimidation, and corrupt newspapers to weaken French morale and degrade France's will to defend herself. For their purposes, Fredric Stahl is a perfect agent of influence, and they attack him. What they don't know is that Stahl, horrified by the Nazi war on Jews and intellectuals, has become part of an informal spy service being run out of the American embassy in Paris. From Alan Furst, the bestselling author, often praised as the best spy novelist ever, comes a novel that's truly hard to put down. "Mission to Paris" includes beautifully drawn scenes of romance and intimacy, and the novel is alive with extraordinary characters: the German Baroness von Reschke, a famous hostess deeply involved in Nazi clandestine operations; the assassins Herbert and Lothar; the Russian film actress and spy Olga Orlova; the Hungarian diplomat and spy, Count Janos Polanyi; along with the French cast of Stahl's movie, German film producers, and the magnetic women in Stahl's life, the socialite Kiki de Saint-Ange and the emigre Renate Steiner. But always at the center of the novel is the city of Paris, the heart and soul of Europe--its alleys and bistros, hotels grand and anonymous, and the Parisians, living every night as though it was their last. As always, Alan Furst brings to life both a dark time in history and the passion of the human hearts that fought to survive it. Praise for Alan Furst "Unfolds like a vivid dream . . . One couldn't ask for a more engrossing novel.""--The Wall Street Journal, "about" Spies of the Balkans" " " "Though set in a specific place and time, Furst's books are like Chopin's nocturnes: timeless, transcendent, universal. One does not so much read them as fall under their spell."--"Los Angeles Times, " about" The Spies of Warsaw" "Alan Furst's novels swing a beam into the shadows at the edges of the great events leading to World War II. Readers come knowing he'll deliver effortless narrative."--"USA Today, " about "The Foreign Correspondent" "Positively bristles with plot, characters and atmosphere . . . "Dark Voyage" has the ingredients of several genres--the mystery, the historical novel, the espionage thriller, the romance--but it rises above all of them."--"The Washington Post, " about" Dark Voyage" "No other espionage writer touches [Furst's] stylish forays into Budapest and Berlin, Moscow and Paris. No other writer today captures so well the terror and absurdity of the spy, the shabby tension and ennui of emigre communities at the time. His characters are hopeless, lethal, charming. His voice is, above all, knowing."--"Boston Sunday Globe, " about "Blood of Victory"

(Nero Wolfe, Sherlock Holmes, Miss Marple, Hercule Poirot, Maigret, Ellery Queen, Philip Marlowe) Whatever did happen to Sherlock Holmes? Was Marlowe no more than a figment of Chandler’s imagination, or was he really his alter ego? Why did Simenon gloss over those details of Maigret’s private life? Readers of the detective story have puzzled for decades over these and other intriguing questions about their heroes—and heroines. Now Julian Symons, himself a master crime writer, suggests some of the answers in the form of amusing and revealing incidents in the lives of the world’s most famous detectives, together with some hitherto undocumented case histories. With him we walk the roads and lanes of St Mary Mead in the company of its vicar, learning many fascinating details of Miss Marple’s past. We quiz Archie Goodwin in his den and gain a clue to the ultimate fate of Nero Wolfe. We disentangle the facts of Poirot’s career from the rumors, and uncover the history of Ellery Queen. While the stealthiest detective buff will find this new information essential reading, the newcomer will simply be delighted by this introduction to the worlds of The Great Detectives. (Publisher’s description) Contents: How a hermit was disturbed in his retirement — About Miss Marple and St Mary Mead — In which Archie Goodwin remembers — Which expounds the Ellery Queens mystery — About Maigret and the stolen papers — The life of Hercule Poirot : based on the notes of Captain Arthur Hastings — About the birth of Philip Marlowe

When you first notice it, something seems a bit unusual. Then it occurs to you that most, if not all, of the pools you've ever seen before were painted blue or white. The Captain's House pool is black. Not painted black. But constructed of black marble and black tile. The marble has streaks of white that look like lightning bolts in a black sky. There is a sexiness to this pool; a personality. It looks and feels like a warm, wet blanket, surrounding and protecting you like a dark, quiet womb. There's a dead body at the bottom of a pool in the backyard of a guest house in Key West. Who is he? And what caused his untimely demise? Maybe it's suicide. Or an accident. But more likely - murder! And who's responsible? One of the guests, the people who run the guest house or one of those mysterious women in town? A Lambda Literary Awards Finalist in 1991, this new edition includes a foreword by renowned LGBTQ publicist and friend of Stan Leventhal, Michele Karlsberg. "The pace is brisk: the plot keeps twisting, as no one is at all who they seem." - Keith John Glaeske, Out In Print "Stan was a literary activist who always gave to, built and endorsed literature and writers. On this Sunday morning, all these years later, I can still see Stan in his apartment window on Christopher Street, next door to the Stonewall Inn, overlooking Sheridan Square as he typed away." - Michele Karlsberg "Stan Leventhal was wonderful company: warm, honest, curious, engaging, and human. [His writing] is the next best thing to hanging out with him." - Christopher Bram