From renowned pirate historian David Cordingly, author of Under the Black Flag and film consultant for the original Pirates of the Caribbean, comes the thrilling story of Captain Woodes Rogers, the avenging nemesis of the worst cutthroats ever to terrorize the high seas. Once a marauding privateer himself, Woodes Rogers went from laying siege to laying down the law. During Britain’s war with Spain, Rogers sailed for the crown in sorties against Spanish targets in the Paci...

Patrick O'Brian, C.S. Forester and Captain Marryat all based their literary heroes on Thomas Cochrane, but Cochrane's exploits were far more daring and exciting than those of his fictional counterparts. He was a man of action, whose bold and impulsive nature meant he was often his own worst enemy. Writing with gripping narrative skill and drawing on his own travels and original research, Cordingly tells the rip-roaring story of a flawed Romantic hero who helped define his age.

The amazing true story of Blackbeard, Calico Jack and all the other pirates of the Caribbean and Captain Woodes Rogers, the privateer turned governor of the Bahamas, who brought them to book.'Both a brilliant idea and an engrossing book that tells the story of a ship of the line in Nelson's day' Bernard Cornwell, Books of the Year, Mail on Sunday'David Cordingly is a brilliant historian: authoritative but easy to read, with...

For centuries the sea has been regarded as a male domain. Fisherman, navy officers, pirates, and explorers roamed the high seas while their wives and daughters stayed on shore. Oceangoing adventurers and the crews of their ships were part of an all-male world — or were they?In this illuminating historical narrative, maritime scholar David Cordingly shows that in fact an astonishing number of women went to sea in the great age of sail. Some traveled as the wives or mistresses of cap...

For centuries, the sea has been regarded as a male domain, but in this illuminating historical narrative, maritime scholar David Cordingly shows that an astonishing number of women went to sea in the great age of sail. Some traveled as the wives or mistresses of captains; others were smuggled aboard by officers or seamen. And Cordingly has unearthed stories of a number of young women who dressed in men’s clothes and worked alongside sailors for months, sometimes years, without ever reveali...

For this rousing, revisionist history, the former head of exhibitions at England's National Maritime Museum has combed original documents and records to produce a most authoritative and definitive account of piracy's "Golden Age." As he explodes many accepted myths (i.e. "walking the plank" is pure fiction), Cordingly replaces them with a truth that is more complex and often bloodier.

“An elegant, wide-ranging history” (The New York Review of Books) of the centuries-long quest to discover the critical role of germs in disease thatreveals as much about human reasoning—and the pitfalls of ego—as it does about microbes.“Levenson takes readers through an entertaining . . . journey of missed opportunities in microbiology and the eventual advances that arose in this field.”—ScienceScientists and enthusiastic ...

This harrowing tale of early twentieth century New York reveals the true stories of an immigrant underworld, a secret vice squad, and the rise of organized crime.In the early 1900s, prior to World War I, New York City was a vortex of vice and corruption. On the Lower East Side, then the most crowded ghetto on earth, Eastern European Jews formed a dense web of crime syndicates. Gangs of horse poisoners and casino owners, pimps and prostitutes, thieves and thugs, joc...

The timely story of how the forces of change converge on a small tribe of Niaruna Indians living in the heart of the Amazon rain forest. In addition to being a prophetic commentary on emerging threats to the environment, and the troublesome encroachment of the modern world on traditional cultures, the novel is a suspenseful adventure story about two men striving to find meaning in a world not their own.

Winner, American Battlefield Trust Prize for HistoryWinner, Library of Virginia Literary Award for NonfictionFinalist, Los Angeles Times Book Prize for BiographyA “compelling portrait” (Jon Meacham, Pulitzer Prize–winning author) of the controversial Confederate general who later embraced Reconstruction and became an outcast in the South.It was the most remarkable political about-face...

The untold story of a heroic band of Caribbean pirates whose defiance of imperial rule inspired revolt in colonial outposts across the worldIn the early eighteenth century, the Pirate Republic was home to some of the great pirate captains, including Blackbeard, “Black Sam” Bellamy, and Charles Vane. Along with their fellow pirates—former sailors, indentured servants, and runaway slaves—this “Flying Gang” established a crude but distinctive democracy in the Bahamas, carving out thei...

""This is a serious, meticulous history that will also appeal to Game of Thrones fans, who will discover intriguing parallels between history and fiction.” — Booklist""An enlightening portrait of the medieval mindset.” — Publishers WeeklyThe authors of The Bright Ages return with a real-life Game of Thrones—the story of the Carolingian Civil War, a bloody, protracted battle pitting brothe...