Quite possibly the most dangerous and intelligent member of the Nazi hierarchy, Joseph Goebbels’s flair for propaganda and spectacular organization ensured the fu¨hrer’s rise to power. As founder of the Reich Chamber of Culture, gauleiter of Berlin, and architect of complex machinery of modern totalitarian propaganda, Goebbels is considered one of the most evil figures of the twentieth century. It was through his understanding of the instruments of public enlightenment” that the dictators...

Authors Roger Manvell and Heinrich Fraenkel, notable biographers of the World War II German leaders Joseph Goebbels and Herman Goring, delve into the life of one of the most sinister, clever, and successful of all the Nazi leaders: Heinrich Himmler. As the head of the feared SS, Himler supervised the extermination of millions. Here is the story of how a seemingly ordinary boy grew into an obsessive and superstitious man who ventured into herbalism, astrology, and homeopathic medicine befor...

In Goering, Roger Manvell and Heinrich Fraenkel use first-hand testimonies and a variety of historical documents to tell the story of a monster lurking in Hitler’s shadows. After rising through the ranks of the German army, Hermann Goering became Hitler’s right hand man and was hand-picked to head the Luftwaffe, one of history’s most feared fighting forces. As he rose in power, though, Goering became disillusioned and was eventually shunned from Hitler’s inner circle. Alone at the...

July 20, 1944. Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg carried a time bomb in a briefcase into a conference with Adolf Hitler. After wedging the briefcase directly in front of Hitler under a table, Stauffenberg took his leave. Only ill luck and divine providence could have caused what happened next; a junior staffer accidentally kicked the case, moving it further from Hitler. When the bomb exploded, four died, but none was the megalomaniacal Führer.Men from all walks of German life—the army...

A penetrating biography of one of the most infamous members of the Nazi high command.In Goering, Roger Manvell and Heinrich Fraenkel use firsthand testimonies and a variety of historical documents to tell the story of a monster lurking in Hitler's shadows. After rising through the ranks of the German army, Hermann Goering became Hitler's right hand man and was hand-picked to head the Luftwaffe, one of history's most feared fighting forces. As he rose in po...

Living as a carpenter who had spent time working in a watch factory, Georg Elser was just an ordinary member of society living in Munich. That is, however, until he took it upon himself to attempt to assassinate the Führer, Adolph Hitler. Being a common man who opposed the Nazi regime, Elser took the skills from his craft and worked to assemble his own bomb detonator. Every night, he snuck out to the Munich Beer Hall, where he worked on assembling the bomb that he planned to use to kill Hi...

This thrilling account of WWII espionage by the former French secret service chief chronicles an Allied spy's actions in the German Cipher Office.A spy for the French Secret Service during World War II, Hans-Thilo Schmidt was embedded in the nerve center of the Third Reich. From deep within Hitler's most sensitive operations, Schmidt created an intelligence network between France, Poland, and England. In The Spy in Hitler's Inner Circle, France's former se...

General Robert E. Lee is well known as a major figure in the Civil War. However, by removing Lee from the delimiting frame of the Civil War and placing him in the context of the Republic's total history, Dowdey shows the "eternal relevance" of this tragic figure to the American heritage. With access to hundreds of personal letters, Dowdey brings fresh insights into Lee's background and personal relationships and examines the factors which made Lee that rare specimen, a complete person.” I...

The breathtaking memoir by a member of Nicky’s family,” a group of 669 Czechoslovakian children who escaped the Holocaust through Sir Nicholas Winton’s Kindertransport project, My Train to Freedom relates the trials and achievements of award-winning humanitarian and former Episcopal priest, Ivan Backer.As Backer recounts in his memoir, in May of 1939 as a ten-year-old Jewish boy, he fled Nazi-occupied Czechoslovakia for the United Kingdom aboard one of the Kindertransport...

Between 1933 and 1945, more than 500,000 German citizens resisted the Nazi government. Many were imprisoned for political crimes which included both active attempts to remove Hitler from office and passive attempts to oppose the Nazi regime. Resistance was found among university students, churches and even in the German military.This fascinating and compelling history of the German resistance covers groups and methods from underground newspapers such as "Rote Kapella" and "Internal...

They called Meyer Lansky the Godfather of the Godfathers, the Chairman of the Board of the National Crime Syndicate, the Mafia’s banker. They credited him with a personal fortune of $300 million, with having said “We’re bigger than U.S. Steel.” He was portrayed on the screen in The Godfather, Part II as Hyman Roth, dividing up Cuba with his fellow gangsters, and more recently in Boardwalk Empire as himself, played by Anatol Yusef.

A New York Times BestsellerFrank Sinatra desperately wanted to be part of John F. Kennedy, Jr.’s gang. He had his own famed Rat Pack,” made up of hard drinking, womanizing individuals like himself-guys like Dean Martin, Sammy Davis, Jr., and Peter Lawford-but the guy Ol’ Blue Eyes” really wanted to hang with was Lawford’s brother-in-law, the real chairman of the board, John F. Kennedy.In Sinatra and the Jack Pack, Michael Sheridan delves...