American Epic

From the New York Times best-selling author of The Revenge of Geography comes a sweeping yet intimate story of the most influential humanitarian you’ve never heard of - Bob Gersony, who spent four decades in crisis zones around the world.

From across the sea, they came by the thousands, escaping war and poverty in southern China to seek their fortunes in America. Converging on the enormous western worksite of the Transcontinental Railroad, the migrants spent years dynamiting tunnels through the snow-packed cliffs of the Sierra Nevada and laying tracks across the burning Utah desert. Their sweat and blood fueled the ascent of an interlinked, industrial United States. But those of them who survived this perilous effort would be pushed to the margins of American life and then to the fringes of public memory.

Over one million Black men and women served in World War II. Black troops were at Normandy, Iwo Jima, and the Battle of the Bulge, serving in segregated units and performing unheralded but vital support jobs, only to be denied housing and educational opportunities on their return home. Without their crucial contributions to the war effort, the United States could not have won the war. And yet the stories of these Black veterans have long been ignored, cast aside in favor of the myth of the “Good War” fought by the “Greatest Generation.”

Nothing prepares Jaya, a New York journalist, for the heartbreak of her third miscarriage and the slow unraveling of her marriage in its wake. Desperate to assuage her deep anguish, she decides to go to India to uncover answers to her family’s past. Intoxicated by the sights, smells, and sounds she experiences, Jaya becomes an eager student of the culture. But it is Ravi - her grandmother’s former servant and trusted confidant - who reveals the resilience, struggles, secret love, and tragic fall of Jaya’s pioneering grandmother during the British occupation.

For generations, the forests of Ixachipan have echoed with the clash of weapons, as nation after nation has fallen to the Empire of Songs - and to the unending, magical music that binds its people together. Now, only two free tribes remain. The Empire is not their only enemy. Monstrous, scaled predators lurk in rivers and streams, with a deadly music of their own.

The Snakehead is a panoramic tale of international intrigue and a dramatic portrait of the underground economy in which America's 12 million illegal immigrants live. Based on hundreds of interviews, Patrick Radden Keefe's sweeping narrative tells the story not only of Sister Ping, but of the gangland gunslingers who worked for her, the immigration and law enforcement officials who pursued her, and the generation of penniless immigrants who risked death and braved a 17,000 mile odyssey so that they could realize their own version of the American dream.

Four destinies collide in a unique fantasy world of war and wonders, where empire is won with enchanted steel and magical animal companions fight alongside their masters in battle. A band of rogues and royals should all be enemies, but they unite for a common purpose: to defeat an unstoppable killer who defies the laws of magic. In this battle, they will forge unexpected bonds of friendship and love that will change their lives - and begin to change the world.

The king is dead - and with him, the last thread holding the kingdom together. Deep cracks are forming throughout the kingdom of Nri with whispers of deadly successors lurking beneath the shadows. Despite having the same face, it seems the deepest crack is forming between Naala and Sinai, the reunited twin goddesses, who must put their differences aside as they travel through a broken Nri.

Stonewall Cousins, Roger and Alistair, become lifelong friends when they meet as boys in 1954. After both discovering their homosexuality, their lives intersect against the backdrop of 20th Century gay culture, from the beachboy surfer days of the 1960's, to the Greenwich Village AIDS activism in the 1990's.

Once there was a prophecy that a chosen one would rise to defeat the Eternal Khan, an immortal god-king. But the prophecy was wrong. Now Jian, the former chosen hero, is just an ordinary young man trying to find his own way. But he may yet have an extraordinary destiny, because he joins forces with Taishi, his grumpy grandmaster, who instructs him in the ways of her family’s powerful war art. Jian still has a long way to go before he can become her heir, so she recruits a band of elderly grandmasters out of retirement to whip him into shape and help with this one last job.

Many ancient civilizations have influenced and inspired people in the 21st century. The Greeks and Romans continue to fascinate the West today. But of all the world's civilizations, none have intrigued people more than the Mayans, whose culture, astronomy, language, and mysterious disappearance all continue to captivate people. In 2012 especially, there was a renewed focus on the Mayans, whose advanced calendar led many to speculate the world would end on the same date the Mayan calendar ends.

Alexander Hamilton has become a global celebrity. Millions know his name and imagine knowing the man. But what did he really want for the country? What risks did he run in pursuing those vaulting ambitions? Who tried to stop him? How did they fight? It's ironic that the Hamilton revival has obscured the man's most dramatic battles and hardest-won achievements—as well as downplaying unsettling aspects of his legacy.

In this thrilling sequel to Seventh Son, Alvin Maker is awakening to many mysteries: his own strange powers, the magic of the American frontier, and the special virtues of its chosen people, the Native Americans. Alvin has discovered his own unique talent for making things whole again. Now he summons all his powers to prevent the tragic war between Native Americans and the white settlers of North America.

As a student of Woodrow Wilson at Princeton, Howard Baskerville was aflame not only with the gospel of Jesus, but with the Wilsonian gospel that constitutional democracy is the birthright of all nations. Rather than become a small-town minister like his father in South Dakota, he volunteered for missionary service in Persia. Tabriz in 1907 was a hotbed of democratic revolution. Brilliant young firebrands were among Baskerville’s students at the Presbyterian school—and became his devoted friends. He lectured on freedom; they dedicated their lives to it.

Arlynn Rosemary Banson is an atypical sixteen-year-old—the cool, popular outsider, effortlessly straddling the line between divas and dorks. Her forever young mother, Jennifer, is dedicated to making her life awkward by trying to be her friend. Her father, Alan, is a history professor who barely acknowledges his family’s existence. Her boyfriend, Benz, the quarterback and homecoming king, has just broken up with her, while her best friend, Joslin, bears reluctant witness to Rosemary’s romantic drama. But nothing prepares any of them for a Welsh foreign exchange student named Emrys Balin.

War between the island states of Kattaka and Mazemoor has left no one unscathed. Meka's nomadic people, the Ba'Suon, were driven from their homeland by the Kattakans. Those who remained were forced to live under the Kattakan yoke, to serve their greed for gold alongside the dragons with whom the Ba'Suon share an empathic connection. A decade later and under a fragile truce, Meka returns home from her exile for an ancient, necessary rite: gathering a king dragon of the Crown Mountains to maintain balance in the wild country.

In the late 1880s, Frank Lenz of Pittsburgh, a renowned high-wheel racer and long-distance tourist, dreamed of cycling around the world. He finally got his chance by recasting himself as a champion of the downsized "safety-bicycle" with inflatable tires, the forerunner of the modern road bike that was about to become wildly popular. In the spring of 1892 he quit his accounting job and gamely set out west to cover 20,000 miles over three continents as a correspondent for Outing magazine. Two years later, after having survived countless near disasters and unimaginable hardships, he approached Europe for the final leg. He never made it....

In 2018, Patrick Mahomes stepped onto the gridiron as the new, inexperienced quarterback for the Kansas City Chiefs. Just twenty-two-years old at the time, football fans wondered if this young man could live up to lofty expectations. Little did they know, a star was about to be born. By season's end, Patrick threw a whopping fifty touchdowns, the youngest to ever do so, and took his team nearly all the way to the Super Bowl. And the next season, he became the youngest quarterback ever to win Super Bowl MVP!

Throughout over two decades, Tom Brady has led his teams to seven Super Bowl championships and earned three Most Valuable Player Awards, arguably cementing his status as the greatest quarterback of all time. From the moment Tom Brady stepped on the NFL gridiron, pro football was forever changed. A star, a legend, a future hall-of-famer was born. Over the years, he mounted comeback after comeback win, finding the open man for a touchdown just when victory seemed out of reach.

On the islands of Hans Lollik, Sigourney Rose was the only survivor when her family was massacred by the colonizers. When the childless king of the islands declares he will choose his successor from amongst eligible noble families, Sigourney is ready to exact her revenge. But someone is killing off the ruling families to clear a path to the throne. And as the bodies pile up and all eyes regard her with suspicion, Sigourney must find allies among her prey and the murderer among her peers...lest she become the next victim.