BOOZE AND ITS DISCONTENTS: Explore the history of the United States’ struggle with alcoholism—and the emergence of a search for sobriety as old as our nation.“An interesting read for fans of American history.” —Library JournalChristopher Finan introduces a colorful cast of characters who were integral in America’s moral journey to understanding alcoholism. Discover a lesser-known side of American history as you meet:•

**The New York Times bestsellerA New York Times Notable and Critics’ Top Book of 2016Longlisted for the PEN/John Kenneth Galbraith Award for NonfictionOne of NPR's 10 Best Books Of 2016 Faced Tough Topics Head OnNPR's Book Concierge Guide To 2016’s Great ReadsSan Francisco Chronicle's Best of 2016: 100 recommended booksA Washington Post Notable Nonfiction Book of 2016Globe & Mail 100 Best of 2016“Formidable...

The acclaimed portrait of institutionalized patients whose abandoned possessions recall their forgotten lives“A deeply moving testament to the human side of mental illness.” —Oliver SacksWhen Willard State Hospital closed its doors in 1995, after operating as one of New York State’s largest mental institutions for over 120 years, a forgotten attic filled with suitcases belonging to former patients was discovered. Using the possessi...

When Bill Wilson, with his friend Dr. Bob Smith, founded Alcoholics Anonymous in 1935, his hope was that AA would become a safe haven for those who suffered from this disease. Thirty years after his death, AA continues to help millions of alcoholics recover from what had been commonly regarded as a hopeless addiction. Still, while Wilson was a visionary for millions, he was no saint. After cofounding Alcoholics Anonymous, he stayed sober for over thirty-five years, helping countless thousa...

**One of NPR’s Great Reads of 2016“A lively assemblage and smart analysis of dozens of haunting stories…absorbing…[and] intellectually intriguing.” —The New York Times Book ReviewFrom the author of The Unidentified, an intellectual feast for fans of offbeat history that takes readers on a road trip through some of the country’s most infamously haunted places—and deep into the dark side of our history.**Colin Dickey is on the trail of America’s ghos...

Barbara Weisberg's Talking to the Dead blends biography and social history in this revelatory story of the family responsible for the rise of Spiritualism.A fascinating story of spirits and conjurors, skeptics and converts in the second half of nineteenth century America viewed through the lives of Kate and Maggie Fox, the sisters whose purported communication with the dead gave rise to the Spiritualism movement—and whose recanting forty years later is stil...

Its landscaped ground, chosen by Frederick Law Olmsted and dotted with Tudor mansions, could belong to a New England prep school. There are no fences, no guards, no locked gates. But McLean Hospital is a mental institution-one of the most famous, most elite, and once most luxurious in America. McLean "alumni" include Olmsted himself, Robert Lowell, Sylvia Plath, James Taylor and Ray Charles, as well as (more secretly) other notables from among the rich and famous. In its "golden age," McLe...

From a Pulitzer Prize-winning historian comes a riveting history of New York's iconic public hospital that charts the turbulent rise of American medicine.Bellevue Hospital, on New York City's East Side, occupies a colorful and horrifying place in the public imagination: a den of mangled crime victims, vicious psychopaths, assorted derelicts, lunatics, and exotic-disease sufferers. In its two and a half centuries of service, there was hardly an epidemic or social ca...

In the tradition of their Haunting of the Presidents, national bestselling authors Joel Martin and William J. Birnes write The Haunting of America: From The Salem Witch Trials to Harry Houdini, the only book to tell the story of how paranormal events influenced and sometimes even drove political events. In a narrative retelling of American history that begins with the Salem Witch Trials of the seventeenth century, Martin and Birnes unearth the roots of America's fascinati...

In Drinking in America, bestselling author Susan Cheever chronicles our national love affair with liquor, taking a long, thoughtful look at the way alcohol has changed our nation's history. This is the often-overlooked story of how alcohol has shaped American events and the American character from the seventeenth to the twentieth century.Seen through the lens of alcoholism, American history takes on a vibrancy and a tragedy missing from many earlier accounts. From the drun...

“A sensitive look at the social and political barriers that deny disabled people their most basic civil rights.”—The Washington Post“The primer for a revolution.”—The Chicago Tribune“Nondisabled Americans do not understand disabled ones. This book attempts to explain, to nondisabled people as well as to many disabled ones, how the world and self-perceptions of disabled people are changing. It looks at the rise of what ...