Twice a year, in summer and in winter, appointments to the Order of Canada are posted in newspapers across the country. The range of professions represented are often dizzying, but there are common themes in the choices: excellence, service to the nation, passion, innovation, commitment, dedication, brilliance. The order’s motto effectively captures the generous and selfless spirit of these people: Desiderantes meliorem patriam—they desire a better country.The Order of Canada—our n...

This amazing and heartwarming story of Secretariat and the African-American man who knew him best is "detailed in all its equine awesomeness" (Maxim).Most of us know the legend of Secretariat: the only two-year-old ever to win Horse of the Year, in 1972; winner in 1973 of the Triple Crown, his times in all three races still unsurpassed, Yet while Secretariat will be remembered forever, one man, Eddie "Shorty" Sweat, who was pivotal to the great horse's success, has ...

Part history, part memoir, this tale of Canada’s heritage horse is a moving odyssey into the past — and one man’s heart.Saving what’s left of our history often falls to a passionate few. This is the case with a group of horse breeders who have pledged to re-establish Canada’s heritage horse, aptly called the Canadian — a breed descended from the Norman horses that took European knights into battle. Habitants of old Quebec called this uncommonly strong breed le petit cheval de fer —...

Carole Fletcher's story opens on a November morning in 1975. She began this day as a striking young teacher in a happy relationship; a horse lover and car enthusiast -- ultimately, a young woman eager for what lay ahead. But a gasoline explosion changed all that, leaving her with second- and third-degree burns over sixty-five percent of her body. At day's end, surgeons warned she had a one-in-ten chance of surviving the night and that even if she did, it would be more than likely she would...

National Bestseller ¸ Globe and Mail BestsellerMore than any other creature, the beautiful and spirited horse has shaped the course of human history. To gallop on horseback even once is to understand instantly why humans have been connecting with horses for more than 6,000 years. Thoughtful, lyrical, exhaustively researched and generously illustrated, Wild About Horses illuminates and chronicles the ancient, powerful and mystical bond between horses and humans.

**New York Times BestsellerA Wall Street Journal Top Ten Book of the YearA True West Magazine Best Historical Non-Fiction Book and Best Author of the YearWestern Heritage Award for "Outstanding Nonfiction Book"Winner of the Western Writers of America Spur Award for Historical NonfictionWinner of the Will Rogers Medallion AwardFrom the author of The Apache Wars, the true story of the American West, revealing how ...

This instant New York Times bestselling “dynamic detective story” (The New York Times) reveals the hidden history Rudolf Diesel, one of the world’s greatest inventors, and his mysterious disappearance on the eve of World War I.September 29, 1913: the steamship Dresden is halfway between Belgium and England. On board is one of the most famous men in the world, Rudolf Diesel, whose new internal combustion engine is on the v...

**Book Authority • 36 Best Textile Design eBooks of All TimeA briskly told, 30,000-year history of textiles that “will make you rethink your relationship with fabric” (Elle Decoration).**From colorful threads found on the floor of an ancient Georgian cave to the Indian calicoes that fueled the Industrial Revolution, The Golden Thread illuminates the myriad and fascinating histories behind the cloths that came to define human civilization—the fabric, for ex...

**Winner of the Civil War Round Table of New York’s Fletcher Pratt Literary Award, the Austin Civil War Round Table’s Daniel M. & Marilyn W. Laney Book Prize, and the Army Historical Foundation Distinguished Writing Award“A superb account” (The Wall Street Journal) of the longest and most decisive Civil War campaign—the Siege of Vicksburg in Vicksburg, Mississippi—which opened the Mississippi River, split the Confederacy, freed tens of thousands of slaves, and made Ulysses...

A major new history of the Crusades with an unprecedented wide scope, told in a tableau of portraits of people on all sides of the wars, from the author of Powers and Thrones.For more than one thousand years, Christians and Muslims lived side by side, sometimes at peace and sometimes at war. When Christian armies seized Jerusalem in 1099, they began the most notorious period of conflict between the two religions. Depending on who you ask, the fall of the h...

The first full account of the government-sanctioned genocide of California Indians under United States rule—Winner of the 2016 Los Angeles Times Book Award for History and a New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice."Gruesomely thorough. . . . Others have described some of these campaigns, but never in such strong terms and with so much blame placed directly on the Un...

The unmatched guide—and perfect gift—for stymied scribes and working wordsmiths everywhere, now expanded and updated.A singular and indispensable reference tool, The Describer's Dictionary—now expanded and updated—has served for over twenty years as the go-to resource for writers who are determined to capture the world in just the right words.The dictionary uses a unique reverse definition-to-term format that makes it easy to zero in on the term yo...