Attempting the perfect murder, a killer encounters the perfect cop in this short story by Special Edgar Award and Ellery Queen Award–winning author William Link.After years of get-rich-quick schemes, Troy Pellingham's bank account is empty and his options are down to one: take a job in his uncle's rare book shop, and spend his days working for an unpleasant man whose only redeeming quality is a mammoth bank account. Though well into his eighties, Uncle Rodney is the...

Attempting the perfect murder, a killer encounters the perfect cop.After years of get-rich-quick schemes, Troy Pellingham's bank account is empty and his options are down to one: take a job in his uncle's rare book shop, and spend his days working for an unpleasant man whose only redeeming quality is a mammoth bank account. Though well into his eighties, Uncle Rodney is the picture of good health, and the day when Troy will inherit the old man's money seems very far away. But then ...

In The Last Fire-Eater, renowned historian of the American South William A. Link examines the life of Roger A. Pryor, a Virginia secessionist, Confederate general, and earnest proponent of postwar sectional reconciliation whose life involved a series of remarkable transformations. Pryor’s journey, Link reveals, mirrored that of the South. At times, both proved puzzling and contradictory.Pryor recast himself during a crucial period in southern history between the 1850s and ...

"A sweeping yet rigorous analysis of Dixon and his work. The collection approaches the southern intellectual through multiple methodologies -- from literary theory and film studies to social history and religious studies. We get an exhaustive yet diverse perspective on Dixon's influence and legacy." -- Journal of American HistoryThomas Dixon Jr. (1864--1946), best remembered today as the author of the racist novels that served as the basis for D. W. Griffith's controversial 1915 cla...

Few North Carolinians have been as well known or as widely respected as William Friday (1920–2012). The former president of the University of North Carolina remained prominent in public affairs in the state and elsewhere throughout his life and ranked as one of the most important American university presidents of the post–World War II era. In the second edition of this comprehensive biography, William Link traces Friday’s long and remarkable career and commemorates his legendary life.

Jesse Helms (1921–2008) dominated the political landscape of North Carolina during the last half of the twentieth century. Though Helms’s thirty years in the US Senate are most remembered for what he opposed rather than what he achieved, he was a central figure in modern conservativism.In this concise interpretive biography, William A. Link centers Helms in the political realignment of the late twentieth-century South and the national ascendance of modern conservatism. Helms helped...

William Link’s account of the transformation of Virginia’s country schools between 1870 and 1920 fills important gaps in the history of education and the social history of the South. His theme is the impact of localism and community on the processes of public education — first as a motive force in the spread of schooling, then as a powerful factor that collided with the goals of urban reformers.After the Civil War, localism dominated every dimension of education in rural Virginia a...

After conquering Atlanta in the summer of 1864 and occupying it for two months, Union forces laid waste to the city in November. William T. Sherman’s invasion was a pivotal moment in the history of the South and Atlanta’s rebuilding over the following fifty years came to represent the contested meaning of the Civil War itself. The war’s aftermath brought contentious transition from Old South to New for whites and African Americans alike. Historian William Link argues that this struggle def...

Offering a provocative new look at the politics of secession in antebellum Virginia, William Link places African Americans at the center of events and argues that their acts of defiance and rebellion had powerful political repercussions throughout the turbulent period leading up to the Civil War.An upper South state with nearly half a million slaves — more than any other state in the nation — and some 50,000 free blacks, Virginia witnessed a uniquely volatile convergence of slave r...

Die Überwindung von autoritären Formen der Kindererziehung und monogamen, eheähnlichen Zweierbeziehungen war immer wieder integraler Bestandteil utopischer Gesellschaftsentwürfe auf Seiten der politischen Linken. Ebenso waren viele AktivistInnen der 1968er-Bewegung der Überzeugung, soziale Revolution sei nicht ohne "befreite" Sexualität denkbar. Die Hoffnungen, die mit der Idee einer "sexuellen Revolution" verbunden wurden, haben sich jedoch nicht erfüllt: Radikale Kommune-Projekte scheite...

Focusing on the cultural conflicts between social reformers and southern communities, William Link presents an important reinterpretation of the origins and impact of progressivism in the South. He shows that a fundamental clash of values divided reformers and rural southerners, ultimately blocking the reforms. His book, based on extensive archival research, adds a new dimension to the study of American reform movements.The new group of social reformers that emerged near the end of...

The world of work has changed considerably since the second edition of Merit Pay was published. Advances in technology, changes in job design, alternate forms of work processes, and differences in workforce demographics form many of these changes. In addition, compensation (in general) and merit pay (in particular) also have experienced changes based on these trends and events. The third edition addresses how these occurrences have introduced new theory and research impacting meri...