In March 1621, when Plymouth's survival was hanging in the balance, the Wampanoag sachem (or chief), Ousamequin (Massasoit), and Plymouth's governor, John Carver, declared their people's friendship for each other and a commitment to mutual defense. When the English gathered their first successful harvest and lifted the specter of starvation, Ousmaequin and 90 of his men visited Plymouth for the "First Thanksgiving." 400 years after that famous meal,...

Set in the islands of the Malay Archipelago, Victory tells the story of a disillusioned Swede, Axel Heyst, who rescues Lena, a young English musician, from the clutches of a brutish German hotel owner. Seeking refuge at Heyst's remote island retreat on Samburan, the couple is soon besieged by three villains dispatched by the enraged hotelier. The arrival on the island paradise of this trio of fiends sets off a terrifying series of events that ultimately...

European mercenaries searching for black powder become embroiled in the defense of the Great Wall of China against a horde of monstrous creatures.

Set sail for Africa and the Far East with this iconic tale of adventure from the author of Heart of Darkness. In this semi-autobiographical coming-of-age tale, Charles Marlow, Joseph Conrad's alter ego, shares the story of his first journey to the East. At the age of twenty, he becomes second mate aboard the ship the Judea. But disaster awaits the vessel after it leaves England, loaded with hundreds of tons of coal on its way to Thailand.   A fierce...

A young sea captain tests his mettle off the coast of Siam in this nineteenth-century psychological tale from the author of Heart of Darkness.   When his sailing ship is anchored in the Gulf of Siam-now Thailand-a first-time sea captain questions his ability to command. Anxious and eager for his crew to like him, he takes the first shift of the night watch. Alone in the dark, he encounters a mysterious man swimming alongside the vessel. The captain...

"A panoramic, eye-opening history of the vast migration of Eastern Europeans to the West by a recent winner of a MacArthur Fellowship. Between 1846 and 1940, more than 50 million Europeans moved to the Americas, irrevocably changing both their new lands and the ones they left behind. Their immigration fostered an idea of the 'land of the free,' and yet more than a third returned home again. In a groundbreaking study, Tara Zahra brilliantly explores...

"From the acclaimed author of India After Gandhi: a group biography of seven remarkable men and women who arrived in India during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries in order to join the freedom movement and struggle for a country and people other than their own"-- Provided by publisher.

Pocahontas: a story about a sweet little Indian girl who dramatically saved an Englishman's life? Hardly. This book covers the remarkable life of America's First Lady and depicts the fascinating times of the early 17th century, when a new age was awakening and the brave were seizing it.

During the first half of the twentieth century-decades of war and revolution in Europe-an "intellectual migration" relocated thousands of artists and thinkers to the United States, including some of Europe's supreme performing artists, filmmakers, playwrights, and choreographers. For them, America proved to be both a strange and opportune destination. A "foreign homeland" (Thomas Mann), it would frustrate and confuse, yet afford a clarity of understanding...