In this grand and astonishing tale, Alec Wilkinson brings us the story of S. A. Andrée, the visionary Swedish aeronaut who, in 1897, during the great age of Arctic endeavor, left to discover the North Pole by flying to it in a hydrogen balloon. Called by a British military officer “the most original and remarkable attempt ever made in Arctic exploration,” Andrée’s expedition was followed by nearly the entire world, and it made him an international legend.The Ice Balloon be...

A vivid portrait of legendary liquor agent Garland Bunting, an American original who patrolled rural North Carolina when moonshiners worked their stills in the backcountry.For thirty-five years, Garland Bunting slid his “sweet potato shape—small at both ends and big in the middle” onto the front seat of his beat-up pickup with the coon dogs in the back to ride around in pursuit of moonshine stills in Halifax County, North Carolina. Bunting was true a one-of-a-kind,...

“**Midnights is both a comedy of errors and an affectionate portrait of small-town police, those beleaguered souls charged with the task of keeping their neighbors in line....A reminder that those assigned to protect are often vulnerable and quietly heroic.”—TimeFunny, touching, revealing, here is the view from a rookie cop’s patrol car, during midnight shifts, in a (mostly) peaceful town. With a rich cast of characters, this is a classic memoir of the fear, surpr...

A Divine Language: One Man's Second Attempt at Understanding the Universal Mysteries of MathA New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice"Wilkinson has accomplished something more moving and original, braiding his stumbling attempts to get better at math with his deepening awareness that there's an entire universe of understanding that will, in some fundamental sense, forever lie outside his reach." —Jennifer Szalai, The New York Times"There is...

A spirited and intimate look at American icon and activist Pete Seeger.Throughout his life, Pete Seeger transformed a classic American musical style into a form of peaceful protest against war, segregation, and nuclear weapons. Drawing on his extensive talks with Seeger, Alec Wilkinson delivers a first hand look at Seeger's unique blend of independence and commitment, charm, courage, energy, and belief in human equality and American democracy. We see Seeger as a child, instilled wi...

In this grand and astonishing account, Alec Wilkinson brings us the story of S. A. Andrée, the visionary Swedish aeronaut who, in 1897, during the great age of Arctic endeavor, left to discover the North Pole by flying to it in a hydrogen balloon. Called by a British military officer “the most original and remarkable attempt ever made in Arctic exploration,” Andrée’s expedition was followed by nearly the entire world, and it made him an international legend. The Ice Balloon begin...

“Illuminating . . . Handling strong emotions—shame, love, grief—without fuss, Maxwell gives the bald facts of life a poignant shimmer.”—Wall Street JournalAs a fiction editor at The New Yorker from 1936 to 1975, William Maxwell helped shaped several generations’ sense of the literary short story. At the same time, Maxwell himself was also an exceptional novelist, short story writer, essayist, children’s author, and memoirist.Given unique, ...

A Divine Language: One Man's Second Attempt at Understanding the Universal Mysteries of MathA New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice"Wilkinson has accomplished something more moving and original, braiding his stumbling attempts to get better at math with his deepening awareness that there's an entire universe of understanding that will, in some fundamental sense, forever lie outside his reach." —Jennifer Szalai, The New York Times"There is...

**The legendary and harrowing tale of British explorer Ernest Shackelton’s 1914 shipwreck on Antarctic ice – and how his leadership rescued his crew“One of the greatest adventure stories of our time.” –New York Times Book Review**In August 1914, polar explorer Ernest Shackleton boarded the Endurance and set sail for Antarctica, where he planned to cross the last uncharted continent on foot. In January 1915, after battling its way through a thousand miles o...

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • A white-knuckle tale of polar exploration and heroism in the Gilded Age from the New York Times bestselling author of Blood and Thunder and Ghost Soldiers. • “A splendid book in every way…a marvelous nonfiction thriller.” —The Wall Street JournalOn July 8, 1879, Captain George Washington De Long and his team of thirty-two men set sail from San Francisco on the USS Jeanette.Heading d...

“Hard-boiled computer hacker Kidd and his sometime girlfriend LuEllen make for a refreshingly roguish couple” (Entertainment Weekly). Now they’re back in #1 New York Times bestselling author John Sandford’s electrifying novel of murder, intrigue, and revenge—Kidd style.When Kidd’s superhacker friend Bobby is murdered and his laptop is stolen, Kidd knows it’s panic time. The secrets stashed in Bobby’s computer are enough to hang Kidd and everyone else in Bobby’s cri...

A Navy SEAL dropout will break every rule to expose the truth**—**even if it means destroying the people he loves in this thriller from the world's #1 bestselling author.Mitchum is back. His brother's been charged with murder. Nathaniel swears he didn't kill anyone, but word on the street is that he was involved with the victim's wife. Now, Mitchum will do anything to get even ... no matter what the cost.BookShots—o...