Two hundred years ago, herds of elk and antelope dotted the hills of the San Francisco-Monterey Bay area. Grizzly bears lumbered down to the creeks to fish for silver salmon and steelhead trout. From vast marshlands geese, ducks, and other birds rose in thick clouds “with a sound like that of a hurricane.” This land of “inexpressible fertility,” as one early explorer described it, supported one of the densest Indian populations in all of North America. One of the most ground-breaking and h...

A look at what Native American life was like in the Bay Area before the arrival of Europeans.Two hundred years ago, herds of elk and antelope dotted the hills of the San Francisco–Monterey Bay area. Grizzly bears lumbered down to the creeks to fish for silver salmon and steelhead trout. From vast marshlands geese, ducks, and other birds rose in thick clouds "with a sound like that of a hurricane." This land of "inexpressible fertility," as one early explorer describ...

The author of Gold Rush Stories shares tales of the larger-than-life characters from the history of the legendary Sierra Nevada mountain range.With its 14,000-foot granite mountains, crystalline lakes, conifer forests, and hidden valleys, the Sierra Nevada has long been the domain of dreams, attracting the heroic and the delusional, the best of humanity and the worst. Stories abound, and characters emerge so outlandish and outrageous that they must be real...

“One of the most important utopian novels of the twentieth century that still has very important lessons to teach us. It will always convey to perfection the wild optimism of that moment: a feeling we need to recapture, adjusted for our time.”—Kim Stanley Robinson on EcotopiaCollected in one handsome volume for the first time, The Complete Ecotopia presents an early classic of environmental science fiction in its entirety. Ecotopia (1975)...

A concise, "colorful, well-told" history of the City by the Bay, from the Gold Rush to the Summer of Love to the twenty-first century ( Los Angeles Times).This is the story of San Francisco, a unique and rowdy tale with a legendary cast of characters. It tells of the Indians and the Spanish missions, the arrival of thousands of gold seekers and gamblers, crackbrains and dreamers, the building of the transcontinental railroad and the cable car, labor strife...

A chronicle of fifty years of deep hanging out in California’s Indian country!"Deep Hanging Out is a vibrant testament to one man’s commitment to nurturing community and dancing with change." —Terry Tempest WilliamsWriter and publisher Malcolm Margolin has been "deep hanging out"—or immersing himself in a social, informal way—in California's Indian country since the 1970s. This volume collects thirty articles, introductions, and ot...

What were the Original Instructions that tribal communities lived by for the vast majority of human existence? Native leaders Oren Lyons, Rebecca Adamson, Katsi Cook, Melissa Nelson, and writer Malcolm Margolin invoke the Original Instructions.

A fascinating history of women on America's western frontier by the #1 New York Times –bestselling author of Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee .Popular culture has taught us to picture the Old West as a land of men, whether it's the lone hero on horseback or crowds of card players in a rough-and-tumble saloon. But the taming of the frontier involved plenty of women, too—and this boo...

A "richly illustrated . . . engaging, lucid account" of Ancient Egyptian Pyramids, what we know about them now, what we don't, and what is still debated today ( Kirkus Reviews).Hailed by Science News as "the new seminal text," The Pyramids is a comprehensive record of Egypt's most awe-inspiring monuments and what Egyptologists now know about them today—from their construction and purpose to the culture that surrounded them. Distinguished ...

An enlightening and entertaining inside look at the lifestyles of America's extremely wealthy from the bestselling author of "Our Crowd"It's no secret that the rich are different from the rest of us. But the rich, as author Stephen Birmingham so insightfully points out, are also different from the very rich. There's Society, and then there's Real Society, and it takes multiple generations for families of the former to become entrenched in the latte...

The renowned historian and author of Normandy '44 recounts the operations and personal experiences of the legendary Sherwood Rangers during WWII.One of the last cavalry units to ride horses into battle, the Sherwood Rangers were transformed into a "mechanized cavalry" of tanks in 1942. After winning acclaim in the North African campaign, they spearheaded one of the D-Day landings in Normandy and became the first British troops to cross into Germany. Their ...

This "wonderfully gripping biography" digs beneath the famous legend to present a nuanced and revealing portrait of a serious-mined monarch (Allan Massie, Wall Street Journal).As the last Queen of France before the French Revolution, Marie-Antoinette was mistrusted and reviled in her own time, while today she is portrayed as a lightweight incapable of understanding the events that engulfed her. But who was she really? In this new account, John Hardman redre...