"In his moving memoir, John Cotter anticipates a world without sound . . . a compelling portrait of how deafness isolates people." — The Washington PostJohn Cotter was thirty years old when he first began to notice a ringing in his ears. Soon the ringing became a roar inside his head. Next came partial deafness, then dizziness and vertigo that rendered him unable to walk, work, sleep, or even communicate. At a stage of life when he expected to be emerging f...

I wrote this story after many years of walking long roads and a lot of hard thinking as to how I was going to put all the words that were floating around in my head, down on to paper. But then I thought of a town that was there many years ago (But its changed now.) which is near where I live, King Williams Town. Then I decided to start the story by calling it King William Brown. I thought more and more and I put it all together. But this book couldnt have been possible without all the long...

“I was in the car the first time music seemed strange: the instruments less distinct, the vocals less crisp.”John Cotter was thirty years old when he first began to notice a ringing in his ears. Soon the ringing became a roar inside his head. Next came partial deafness, then dizziness and vertigo that rendered him unable to walk, work, sleep, or even communicate.At a stage of life when he expected to be emerging fully into adulthood, teaching, and writing b...

**Finalist for the PEN/Jacqueline Bograd Weld Award for BiographyFinalist for the Mark Lynton History Prize“Meticulously researched, crackling with insights, and rich in novelistic detail” (Steve Silberman), this “provocative, sensitive, beautifully written biography” (Sylvia Nasar) tells the true—and troubling—story of Alexander Graham Bell’s quest to end deafness.“Researched and written through the Deaf perspective, this marvelously engaging history will have us re...

In the autumn of 1943, André Boulloche became de Gaulle’s military delegate in Paris, coordinating all the Resistance movements in the nine northern regions of France only to be betrayed by one of his associates, arrested, wounded by the Gestapo, and taken prisoner. His sisters carried on the fight without him until the end of the war. André survived three concentration camps and later became a prominent French politician who devoted the rest of his life to reconciliation of France and Ger...

What is a country? While certain basic tenets—such as the clear demarcation of a country's borders, and the acknowledgment of its sovereignty by other countries and by international governing bodies like the United Nations—seem applicable, journalist Joshua Keating's book explores exceptions to these rules, including "breakaway," "semi-autonomous," or "self-proclaimed" countries such as Abkhazia, Kurdistan, Somaliland, a Mohawk reservation straddling the U.S.-Canada border, and an island n...

This sweeping history of thirteenth century England examines how the successive reigns of two very different kings established the English way of life.In 1204, the great Angevin Empire was fragmenting under King John's rule. Unable to withstand France's invasion of Normandy, John also faced difficult relations with the papacy, and rising dissent among his barons. By the time John died in 1216, the failed Magna Carta gave way to civil conflict, and more than half of...

The wisdom of famous philosophers distilled into practical takeaways for modern listeners.For centuries, philosophers have considered the “big questions” of human life, mulling over everything from ethics to the definition of reality. Their ideas and insights are powerful and innovative, but often inaccessible and far too academic for most listeners.In The Philosophy Cure: Lessons on Living from the Great Philosophers, scholar and expert on Cartesi...

An important book of epic scope on America’s first racially integrated, religiously inspired movement for changeThe civil war brought to a climax the country’s bitter division. But the beginnings of slavery’s denouement can be traced to a courageous band of ordinary Americans, black and white, slave and free, who joined forces to create what would come to be known as the Underground Railroad, a movement that occupies as romantic a place in the nation’s imagination as the Lewis and ...

An eye-opening narrative of how geometric principles fundamentally shaped our worldOne night in 1661, Nicholas Fouquet, a superintendent under Louis XIV, was arrested. His crime was peculiar: he had dared to construct a grand geometrical garden. In doing so, he violated an irrefutable hierarchy: that geometry, in its perfection, was a testament to divine right. The elegant, symmetrical designs were more than just ornament; they were proofs of incontestable certaint...

“A detailed and meticulously researched tale… that reads like a thriller.”—New York Times Book ReviewFrom the New York Times best-selling author of Blitzed, the incredible true story of two idealistic young lovers who led the anti-Nazi resistance in the darkening heart of BerlinSummertime, 1935. On a lake near Berlin, a young man is out sailing wh...

A new look at Thomas Morton, his controversial colonial philosophy, and his lengthy feud with the Puritans.Adding new depth to our understanding of early New England society, this riveting account of Thomas Morton explores the tensions that arose from competing colonial visions. A lawyer and fur trader, Thomas Morton dreamed of a society where Algonquian peoples and English colonists could coexist. Infamous for dancing around a maypole in defiance of his Pilgrim ne...