It was among the most notorious criminal cases of its day. On August 11, 1921, in Birmingham, Alabama, a Methodist minister named Edwin Stephenson shot and killed a Catholic priest, James Coyle, in broad daylight and in front of numerous witnesses. The killer's motive? The priest had married Stephenson's eighteen-year-old daughter Ruth to Pedro Gussman, a Puerto Rican migrant and practicing Catholic. Sharon Davies's Rising Road resurrects the murder of Father Coyle and the trial of his killer. As Davies reveals with novelistic richness, Stephenson's crime laid bare the most potent bigotries of the age: a hatred not only of blacks, but of Catholics and "foreigners" as well. In one of the case's most unexpected turns, the minister hired future U.S. Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black to lead his defense. Though regarded later in life as a civil rights champion, in 1921 Black was just months away from donning the robes of the Ku Klux Klan, the secret order that financed Stephenson's defense. Entering a plea of temporary insanity, Black defended the minister on claims that the Catholics had robbed Ruth away from her true Protestant faith, and that her Puerto Rican husband was actually black. Placing the story in social and historical context, Davies brings this heinous crime and its aftermath back to life, in a brilliant and engrossing examination of the wages of prejudice and a trial that shook the nation at the height of Jim Crow. "Davies takes us deep into the dark heart of the Jim Crow South, where she uncovers a searing story of love, faith, bigotry and violence. Rising Road is a history so powerful, so compelling it stays with you long after you've finished its final page." --Kevin Boyle, author of the National Book Award-winning Arc of Justice "This gripping history...has all the makings of a Hollywood movie. Drama aside, Rising Road also happens to be a fine work of history." --History News Network

It was among the most notorious criminal cases of its day. On August 11, 1921, in Birmingham, Alabama, a Methodist minister named Edwin Stephenson shot and killed a Catholic priest, James Coyle, in broad daylight and in front of numerous witnesses. The killer's motive? The priest had married Stephenson's eighteen-year-old daughter Ruth to Pedro Gussman, a Puerto Rican migrant and practicing Catholic. Sharon Davies's Rising Road resurrects the murder of Father Coyle and the trial of his killer. As Davies reveals with novelistic richness, Stephenson's crime laid bare the most potent bigotries of the age: a hatred not only of blacks, but of Catholics and "foreigners" as well. In one of the case's most unexpected turns, the minister hired future U.S. Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black to lead his defense. Though regarded later in life as a civil rights champion, in 1921 Black was just months away from donning the robes of the Ku Klux Klan, the secret order that financed Stephenson's defense. Entering a plea of temporary insanity, Black defended the minister on claims that the Catholics had robbed Ruth away from her true Protestant faith, and that her Puerto Rican husband was actually black. Placing the story in social and historical context, Davies brings this heinous crime and its aftermath back to life, in a brilliant and engrossing examination of the wages of prejudice and a trial that shook the nation at the height of Jim Crow. "Davies takes us deep into the dark heart of the Jim Crow South, where she uncovers a searing story of love, faith, bigotry and violence. Rising Road is a history so powerful, so compelling it stays with you long after you've finished its final page." --Kevin Boyle, author of the National Book Award-winning Arc of Justice "This gripping history...has all the makings of a Hollywood movie. Drama aside, Rising Road also happens to be a fine work of history." --History News Network

As 1942 draws to a close the world is still in a state of Chaos with fighting occurring nearly worldwide. The intensity of the fighting seems to grow with each passing day. In the far east there is a growing hope by the Allies that serious cracks are developing in the Japanese plan to dominate the region. Following the triumph battle of Midway, Churchill has released to the Pacific submarines and aircraft carriers previously engaged in supply and defense of the lost island of Malta. The added effect was victory after victory in the region. Never thought possible, teams of American generals and Admirals were working hand in hand with their British counterparts to save China and drive the Japanese back. However, this stood in sharp contrast with the setbacks Hitler was inflicting on Stalin. The port city of Sevastopol had fallen and yet another vicious struggle led by German General Erich von Manstein was being waged in the environs of Leningrad and the far north. On the Eurasian Steppe, rebuilt Panzer Divisions from the winter debacle had sweep Stalin's troops before them all the way to the gates of Stalingrad. It now appears the 1942 German Russian offensive has been stopped; however, Italian sea, air and land forces had just successfully captured much of the Russian Black Sea coast. It would appear that things were looking up for Hitler and that Stalin was in a bad way. Although Stalin was furious with his field commanders for letting so much of the motherland slip out of his hands, he knew winter was coming and with it revenge. Literally millions of Soviet troops and thousands of tanks and planes were standing in the wings preparing for a whole host of offenses. All were backed up with thousands of tons of weapons and supplies courtesy Roosevelt and Churchill. But Hitler's iron grip was beginning to slip. In hundreds of secret conversations criticism was building as growing evidences of secret brutality, excesses and regime incompetence were building. Fuel tanks were near empty, serious raw material shortage were at hand, and everyday and night more British and American bombs fell on German factories and cities. The U-boat blockade appeared to be having no effect (not true). Those in the know recognized the imprint of competent leadership by Generals like Heinz Guderian, who had even managed to turn the Italian military around. Here again things were not what they seemed, for while acquiring German and captured technology and equipment, Italian spies and salvage crews also acquired information. Information these spies recently came into revealed how threated Italy's survival truly was. Mussolini was keenly aware this information was both dangerous and potentially an avenue to securing the empire he so greatly desired; perhaps even preeminence in the Axis camp. Before he could win the battle in the shadows, his forces must successfully defend the central Mediterranean. If German Admiral Raeder was correct; the Allies would most surely wager everything they had to regain control and destroy Italy. This great challenge began more quickly than Mussolini would have liked. He knew even if they won, it would probably not be enough, but if they lost nothing could save them. ### After holding off much of British 8th Army, attempting to capture Mersa Matruh, North Africa; Italian forces counter-attack using their modified captured tanks. While Italians attack in the north, German Africa Korps attacks from the south. British forces are driven across the desert past Mussolini’s recently erected Triumphal Arch. One pincer of the Allies’ plan to trap Axis forces in Africa has been removed. In the west, the Allies massive 'Torch' invasion fleet must now take back the Mediterranean on its own.

Running 3,000 miles from the east-coast boomtown of Shanghai to the border of Kazakhstan in the north-west, Route 312 - China's 'Route 66' - is a road that Rob Gifford has always wanted to travel. Gifford's journey and his desire to get to the heart of this country make China Road an outstanding and funny travel narrative - part pilgrimage, part reportage - which illuminates a country on the move.

During the height of the crack epidemic that decimated the streets of D.C., Ruben Castaneda covered the crime beat for the Washington Post. The first in his family to graduate from college, he had landed a job at one of the country's premier newspapers. But his apparent success masked a devastating secret: he was a crack addict. Even as he covered the drug-fueled violence that was destroying the city, he was prowling S Street, a 24/7 open-air crack market, during his off hours, looking for his next fix. Castaneda's remarkable book, S Street Rising, is more than a memoir; it's a portrait of a city in crisis. It's the adrenalin-infused story of the street where Castaneda quickly became a regular, and where a fledgling church led by a charismatic and streetwise pastorwas protected by the local drug kingpin, a dangerous man who followed an old-school code of honor. It's the story of Castaneda's friendship with an exceptional police homicide commander whose career was derailed when he ran afoul of Mayor Marion Barry and his political cronies. And it's a study of the city itself as it tried to rise above the bloody crack epidemic and the corrosive politics of the Barry era. S Street Rising is The Wire meets the Oscar-winning movie Crash. And it's all true.

A Texas family has established a tunnel to help a priest bring refugees across the border. Travis Manning, a young boy, has crossed illegally into Mexico to warn a Salvadoran family seeking political asylum about ICE agents they might encounter on their way into the US, on their family's land. This coming of age story shows how Travis' worldview is expanded when he joins the family on their treacherous journey. They are forced to face mortal danger in their desperate quest for freedom. Rising on the Road to Freedom also explores immigration from the perspective of an ICE agent. Having faced harrowing adventures protecting the border, Agent Steve Cruz takes it upon himself to aid an illegal immigrant in a unique way. Cruz arrives at a significant understanding about the difficulties of his job and the complexities of the trafficking issue.

More information to be announced soon on this forthcoming title from Penguin USA