“First in War, First in Peace . . . and Last in the American League.” Expressions such as this characterized the legend and lore of baseball in the nation's capital, from the pioneering Washington Nationals of 1859 to the Washington Senators, whose ignominious departure in 1971 left Washingtonians bereft of the national pastime for thirty-three years. This reflective book gives the complete history of the game in the D.C. area, including the 1924 World Series championship team and the Homestead Grays, the perennial Negro League pennant winners from the late 1930s to the mid-1940s who consistently outplayed the Senators. New chapters describe the present-day Nationals, who, in 2012, won the National League East led by the arms of Gio Gonzalez and Stephen Strasburg and the bats of Ryan Zimmerman, Adam LaRoche and rookie Bryce Harper. The book is filled with the voices of current and former players, along with presidents, senators, and political commentators who call the team their own.

The bestselling author of Intern and Doctored tells the story of the thing that makes us tick For centuries, the human heart seemed beyond our understanding: an inscrutable shuddering mass that was somehow the driver of emotion and the seat of the soul. As the cardiologist and bestselling author Sandeep Jauhar shows in Heart: A History, it was only recently that we demolished age-old taboos and devised the transformative procedures that have changed the way we live. Deftly alternating between key historical episodes and his own work, Jauhar tells the colorful and little-known story of the doctors who risked their careers and the patients who risked their lives to know and heal our most vital organ. He introduces us to Daniel Hale Williams, the African American doctor who performed the world’s first open heart surgery in Gilded Age Chicago. We meet C. Walton Lillehei, who connected a patient’s circulatory system to a healthy donor’s, paving the way for the heart-lung machine. And we encounter Wilson Greatbatch, who saved millions by inventing the pacemaker—by accident. Jauhar deftly braids these tales of discovery, hubris, and sorrow with moving accounts of his family’s history of heart ailments and the patients he’s treated over many years. He also confronts the limits of medical technology, arguing that future progress will depend more on how we choose to live than on the devices we invent. Affecting, engaging, and beautifully written, Heart: A History takes the full measure of the only organ that can move itself.

First published in 1943, this classic memoir by well-known Filipino poet Carlos Bulosan describes his boyhood in the Philippines, his voyage to America, and his years of hardship and despair as an itinerant laborer following the harvest trail in the rural West.

"Impossible to put down. It haunts me still.” -Alex Marzano-Lesnevich, author of The Fact of a Body: A Murder and a Memoir A riveting, deeply personal exploration of the opioid crisis-an empathic memoir infused with hints of true crime. In November 2013, Rose Andersen's younger sister Sarah died of an overdose in the bathroom of her boyfriend's home in a small town with one of the highest rates of opioid use in the state. Like too many of her generation, she had become addicted to heroin. Sarah was 24 years old. To imagine her way into Sarah's life, Rose revisits their volatile childhood, marked by their stepfather's omnipresent rage and their father's pathological lying. As the dysfunction comes into focus, so does a broader picture of the opioid crisis and the drug rehabilitation industry in small towns across America. And when Rose learns from the coroner that Sarah's cause of death was a methamphetamine overdose, the story takes a wildly unexpected turn. As Andersen sifts through her sister's last days, we come to recognize the contours of grief and its aftermath: the psychic shattering which can turn to anger, the pursuit of an ever-elusive verdict, and the intensely personal rites of imagination and art needed to actually move on. Reminiscent of Alex Marzano-Lesnevich's The Fact of a Body, Maggie Nelson's Jane: A Murder, and Lacy M. Johnson's The Other Side, Andersen's debut is a potent, profoundly original journey into and out of loss.

Final words and heartfelt remembrances from bestselling author Pat Conroy take center stage in this winning nonfiction collection, supplemented by touching pieces from Conroy’s many friends. This new volume of Pat Conroy’s nonfiction brings together some of the most charming interviews, magazine articles, speeches, and letters from his long literary career, many of them addressed directly to his readers with his habitual greeting, “Hey, out there.” Ranging across diverse subjects, such as favorite recent reads, the challenge of staying motivated to exercise, and processing the loss of dear friends, Conroy’s eminently memorable pieces offer a unique window into the life of a true titan of Southern writing. With a beautiful introduction from his widow, novelist Cassandra King, A Lowcountry Heart also honors Conroy’s legacy and the innumerable lives he touched. Finally, the collection turns to remembrances of “The Great Conroy,” as he is lovingly titled by friends, and concludes with a eulogy. The inarguable power of Conroy’s work resonates throughout A Lowcountry Heart, and his influence promises to endure. This moving tribute is sure to be a cherished keepsake for any true Conroy fan and remain a lasting monument to one of the best-loved masters of contemporary American letters. Praise for A Lowcountry Heart “A fascinating look into the mind of one of the South’s greatest authors . . . something to remember him by and cherish for years to come.”—The Clarion-Ledger “Fans of Conroy . . . will relish the chance to spend more time with him in this glowing valedictory to his life and writing . . . Eloquent, folksy, and sometimes brutally honest.”—Publishers Weekly “A moving and proper tribute to a true Southern icon.”—The Florida Times-Union “Elegant essays [that] will not disappoint.”—The Washington Post “Resplendent . . . As always, his storytelling, word choice and rhythm are gorgeous, almost lyrical.”—USA Today

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During the 1800s, Manhattanville flourished as the West Side counterpart to its parent village of Harlem. The wide valley around present-day Broadway and 125th Street formed a unique gateway to the Hudson River between Morningside Heights and Washington Heights. Although rural, Manhattanville was the convergence of river, railroad, and stage lines, representing one of nineteenth-century New York City's most significant residential, manufacturing, and transportation hubs. However, this once-prominent upper Manhattan suburb eventually succumbed to the advent of mass transit and to the absorption of its distinctive features by the city in chase. Manhattanville: Old Heart of West Harlem acquaints readers with the richly diverse history and lore of this famously picturesque locale. From Henry Hudson's exploration of the area's waterfront in 1609 to Gen. George Washington's conversion of its terrain into a battlefield in 1776, momentous events marked Manhattanville's crossroads long before the village streets were laid out in 1806. Readers discover later landmarks, including New York's first Episcopal church to abolish pew rentals, where patriots, Tories, and African American abolitionists convened-today, Harlem's oldest continuing congregation on the same site. The book also introduces notable Manhattanville residents, such as founders Jacob and Hannah Lawrence Schieffelin, clothier Daniel Devlin, and New York City Mayor Daniel F. Tiemann.