Other books that might interest you

• 

  Gaspipe - Confessions of a Mafia...

  Philip Carlo

  • 0
  • 0
  • 0

  “If your Sopranos addiction shows no signs of abating,” the life and crimes of a mob boss from the New York Times–bestselling author of The Night Stalker (Los Angeles Times).  
   
   
   
  The boss of New York’s infamous Lucchese crime family, Anthony “Gaspipe” Casso’s life in the Mafia was preordained from birth. His rare talent for “earning”—concocting ingenious schemes to hijack trucks, rob banks, and bring vast quantities of drugs into New York—fueled his unstoppable rise up the ladder of organized crime. A mafioso responsible for at least fifty murders, Casso lived large, with a beautiful wife and money to burn. When the law finally caught up with him in 1994, Casso became the thing he hated most—an informer. 
   
  From his blood feud with John Gotti to his dealings with the “Mafia cops,” decorated NYPD officers Lou Eppolito and Stephen Caracappa, to the Windows case, which marked the beginning of the end for the New York Mob, Gaspipe is Anthony Casso’s shocking story—a roller-coaster ride into an exclusive netherworld that reveals the true inner workings of the Mafia, from its inception to the present time. 
   
  “Filled with never-known-before details . . . a very compelling true-crime tale.” —CNN 
   
  “Readers interested in the inner workings of the Mafia will love this chilling look at a Mob boss.” —Booklist (starred review) 
   
  “I couldn’t put the book down . . . Truly amazing.” —San Jose Mercury News 
   
  “The inside information about the lifestyle, rituals, killings, and betrayals is priceless. An authoritative look at a once-rampant predator now at bay.” —Kirkus Reviews

  Show book

• 

  The Last Sovereigns - Sitting...

  Robert M. Utley

  • 0
  • 0
  • 0

  The Last Sovereigns is the story of how Sioux chief Sitting Bull resisted the white man's ways as a last best hope for the survival of an indigenous way of life on the Great Plains—a nomadic life based on buffalo and indigenous plants scattered across the Sioux's historical territories that were sacred to him and his people. 
   
   
   
  Robert M. Utley explores the final four years of Sitting Bull's life of freedom, from 1877 to 1881. To escape American vengeance for his assumed role in the annihilation of General George Armstrong Custer's command at the Little Bighorn, Sitting Bull led his Hunkpapa following into Canada. The Mounties welcomed the Lakota and permitted them to remain if they promised to abide by the laws and rules of Queen Victoria, the White Mother. But the Canadian government wanted the Indians to return to their homeland and the police made every effort to persuade them to leave. They were aided by the diminishing herds of buffalo on which the Indians relied for sustenance and by the aggressions of Canadian Native groups that also relied on the buffalo. 
   
   
   
  Sitting Bull and his people endured hostility, tragedy, heartache, indecision, uncertainty, and starvation and responded with stubborn resistance to the loss of their freedom and way of life. In the end, starvation doomed their sovereignty. This is their story.

  Show book

• 

  Notes from a Colored Girl - The...

  Karsonya Wise Whitehead

  • 0
  • 0
  • 0

  This historical biography provides a scholarly analysis of the personal diaries of a young, freeborn mulatto woman during the Civil War years. 
   
  In Notes from a Colored Girl, Karsonya Wise Whitehead examines the life and experiences of Emilie Frances Davis through a close reading of three pocket diaries she kept from 1863 to 1865. Whitehead explores Davis’s worldviews and politics, her perceptions of both public and private events, her personal relationships, and her place in Philadelphia’s free black community in the nineteenth century. The book also includes a six-chapter historical reconstruction of Davis’s life. 
   
  While Davis’s entries provide brief, daily snapshots of her life, Whitehead interprets them in ways that illuminate nineteenth-century black American women’s experiences. Whitehead’s contribution of edited text and original narrative fills a void in scholarly documentation of women who dwelled in spaces between white elites, black entrepreneurs, and urban dwellers of every race and class. 
   
  Drawing on scholarly traditions from history, literature, feminist studies, and sociolinguistics, Whitehead investigates Davis’s diary both as a complete literary artifact and in terms of her specific daily entries. With few primary sources written by black women during this time in history, Davis’s diary is a rare and extraordinarily valuable historical artifact.

  Show book

• 

  Death and the Dolce Vita - The...

  Stephen Gundle

  • 0
  • 0
  • 0

  “A brilliant, methodical investigation of a murder scandal that convulsed the Roman political and social establishment in the 1950s” (Financial Times).   On April 9 1953, twenty-one-year-old Wilma Montesi went missing from her family home in Rome. Thirty-six hours later her body was found washed up on a neglected public beach. Some said it was suicide; others, a tragic accident. But as the police tried to close the case, darker rumors bubbled to the surface. Could it be that the mysterious death of this quiet, conservative girl was linked to a drug-fueled orgy, involving some of the richest and most powerful men in Italy?  Death and the Dolce Vita, “a hybrid of history and police detection, brilliantly recreates the details of the Montesi affair” in light of the postwar economic miracolo italiano that inspired Fellini’s classic film of libertine frivolity. “As well as being a thriller, [it] provides an excellent account of the virtues and misdeeds of Europe’s most foxy political class” (Ian Thompson, The Guardian, UK).  “An intense, claustrophobic narrative of murder, mystery and scandal worthy of a Verdi opera . . . a page-turning narrative that explores its extraordinary characters and even more extraordinary cover-ups, evasions and dissemblage, reaching to the top of Italian political life.” —The Scotsman, UK

  Show book

• 

  Madam Ataturk - The First Lady...

  Ypek Calyplar

  • 0
  • 0
  • 0

  Mustafa Kemal Ataturk is hailed as one of the most charismatic political leaders of the twentieth century, but little is known today about his one and only wife, Latife Hanym. A multilingual intellectual educated at the Sorbonne, Latife's marriage to Ataturk in 1923 set her apart from her contemporaries, raising her to the pinnacle of political power. She played a central role in the creation of a modern and secular Turkey and campaigned tirelessly for women's right to vote. Throughout her marriage, Latife stood beside her husband and acted as his interpreter, promoter and diplomatic aide. She even twice risked her own life to save his. However, after only two years of marriage, Ataturk divorced Latife and she soon disappeared from public life. She was shunned, blamed for the failure of the marriage and portrayed as a sharp-tongued, quarrelsome woman who had strained Ataturk's nerves. Latife spent the rest of her life in seclusion. In the first biography to be written on Latife Hanym, Ypek Calyplar recounts the life of an exceptional and courageous woman, well ahead of her time, who lived through a remarkable period in Turkish history.

  Show book

• 

  Here Right Matters - An American...

  Alexander Vindman

  • 0
  • 0
  • 0

  Retired U.S. Army Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Vindman, who found himself at the center of a firestorm for his decision to report the infamous phone call that led to presidential impeachment, tells his own story for the first time. Here, Right Matters is a stirring account of Vindman's childhood as an immigrant growing up in New York City, his career in service of his new home on the battlefield and at the White House, and the decisions leading up to, and fallout surrounding, his exposure of President Trump's abuse of power. 
   0900, Thursday, July 25, 2019: President Trump called Ukraine’s President Zelensky, supposedly to congratulate him on his recent victory. In the months that followed, the American public would only learn what happened on that call because Alexander Vindman felt duty-bound to report it up the chain of command: that the President of the United States had extorted a foreign ally to damage a political challenger at home. Vindman’s actions and subsequent testimony before congress would lead to Trump’s impeachment and affirm Vindman's belief that he had done the right thing in the face of intense pressure to stay silent. But it would come at an enormous cost, straining relationships with colleagues, superiors, and even his own father, and eventually end his decorated career in the US Army, by a Trump administration intent on retribution.  
  Here, Right Matters is Vindman’s proud, passionate, and candid account of his family, his career, and the moment of truth he faced for his nation. As an immigrant, raised by a father who fled the Soviet Union in pursuit of a better life for his children, Vindman learned about respect for truth throughout his education and military service. As this memoir makes clear, his decision to speak up about the July 25th call was never a choice: it was Vindman’s duty, as a naturalized citizen and member of the armed forces. In the wake of his testimony, he would endure furious partisan attacks on his record and his loyalty. But far louder was the extraordinary chorus of support from citizens who were collectively intent on reaffirming an abiding American commitment to integrity.   
  In the face of a sure-fire career derailment and public excoriation, Vindman heeded the lessons from the people and institutions who instilled in him the moral compass and the courage to act decisively. Like so many other American immigrant families, the Vindmans had to learn to build a life from scratch and take big risks to achieve important goals. Here, Right Matters is about the quiet heroes who keep us safe; but, above all, it is a call to arms for those who refuse to let America betray its true self.

  Show book