“[An] unforgettable memoir” (Boston Globe) that provides a window into the wildly divergent nations that once comprised the Soviet Union, from a former NPR reporter Not with a bang, but with a quiet, ten-minute address on Christmas Day, 1991: this is how the Soviet Union met its end. But in the wake of that one deceptively calm moment, conflict and violence soon followed. Some of the emergent new countries began to shed totalitarianism while other sought to revive their own dead empires or were led by ex-Soviet leaders who built equally or even more repressive political machines. Since the late 1980s, Lawrence Scott Sheets lived and reported from the former USSR and saw firsthand the reverberations of the empire’s collapse, through the rise of Vladimir Putin in the new Russia. Eight Pieces of Empire draws readers into the people, politics and day-to-day life, painting a vivid portrait of a tumultuous time. Sheets’ stories about people living through these tectonic shifts of fortune—a trio of female saboteurs in Chechnya, the chaos of newly independent Georgia in the early 1990s, a defiant resident of the Chernobyl exclusion zone in Ukraine, young hustlers eager to strike it rich in the post-Soviet economic vacuum—reveal the underreported and surprising ways in which the ghosts of empire still haunt these lands and the world.

Winner of the Pulitzer Prize One of the Best Books of the Year: The New York Times From the editor of The New Yorker: a riveting account of the collapse of the Soviet Union, which has become the standard book on the subject. Lenin’s Tomb combines the global vision of the best historical scholarship with the immediacy of eyewitness journalism. Remnick takes us through the tumultuous 75-year period of Communist rule leading up to the collapse and gives us the voices of those who lived through it, from democratic activists to Party members, from anti-Semites to Holocaust survivors, from Gorbachev to Yeltsin to Sakharov. An extraordinary history of an empire undone, Lenin’s Tomb stands as essential reading for our times.

A thrilling, harrowing novel of war, intrigue and dark, uncontrollable magic, Toll the Hounds is the new chapter in Erikson's monumental series - epic fantasy at its most imaginative and storytelling at its most exciting. In Darujhistan, the city of blue fire, it is said that love and death shall arrive dancing. It is summer and the heat is oppressive, but for the small round man in the faded red waistcoat, discomfiture is not just because of the sun. All is not well. Dire portents plague his nights and haunt the city streets like fiends of shadow. Assassins skulk in alleyways, but the quarry has turned and the hunters become the hunted. Hidden hands pluck the strings of tyranny like a fell chorus. While the bards sing their tragic tales, somewhere in the distance can be heard the baying of Hounds...And in the distant city of Black Coral, where rules Anomander Rake, Son of Darkness, ancient crimes awaken, intent on revenge. It seems Love and Death are indeed about to arrive...hand in hand, dancing. At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • PULITZER PRIZE WINNER • The bestselling author of Nobody's Fool and Straight Man delves deep into the blue-collar heart of America in a work that overflows with hilarity, heartache, and grace. “Rich, humorous ... Mr. Russo’s most seductive book thus far.” —The New York Times Welcome to Empire Falls, a blue-collar town full of abandoned mills whose citizens surround themselves with the comforts and feuds provided by lifelong friends and neighbors and who find humor and hope in the most unlikely places, in this Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by Richard Russo. Miles Roby has been slinging burgers at the Empire Grill for 20 years, a job that cost him his college education and much of his self-respect. What keeps him there? It could be his bright, sensitive daughter Tick, who needs all his help surviving the local high school. Or maybe it’s Janine, Miles’ soon-to-be ex-wife, who’s taken up with a noxiously vain health-club proprietor. Or perhaps it’s the imperious Francine Whiting, who owns everything in town–and seems to believe that “everything” includes Miles himself. Look for Richard Russo's new book, Somebody's Fool, coming soon.

The appearance in 1964 of A.H.M. Jones’ The Later Roman Empire 284–602: A Social, Economic, and Administrative Survey transformed the study of the Late Antique world. In this volume a number of leading scholars reassess the impact of Jones’ great work, the influences that shaped his scholarship, and the legacy he left for later generations. Jones’ historical method, his fundamental knowledge of Late Roman political, social, economic and religious structures, and his famous assessment of the Decline and Fall of Rome are re-examined here in the light of modern research. This volume offers a valuable aid to academics and students alike who seek to better understand and exploit the priceless resource that is the Later Roman Empire. Contributors are Averil Cameron, Peter Garnsey, David Gwynn, Peter Heather, Caroline Humfress, Luke Lavan, Wolfgang Liebeschuetz, Stefan Rebenich, Alexander Sarantis, Roger Tomlin, Bryan Ward-Perkins, and Michael Whitby.

Winner of the 2020 Hugo Award for Best Novel A Locus, and Nebula Award nominee for 2019 An NPR Favorite Book of 2019 An Esquire Best Sci-Fi Book of All Time A Guardian Best Science Fiction and Fantasy Book of 2019 and “Not the Booker Prize” Nominee A Goodreads Biggest SFF Book of 2019 and Choice Awards Nominee "A Memory Called Empire perfectly balances action and intrigue with matters of empire and identity. All around brilliant space opera, I absolutely love it."—Ann Leckie, author of Ancillary Justice Ambassador Mahit Dzmare arrives in the center of the multi-system Teixcalaanli Empire only to discover that her predecessor, the previous ambassador from their small but fiercely independent mining Station, has died. But no one will admit that his death wasn't an accident—or that Mahit might be next to die, during a time of political instability in the highest echelons of the imperial court. Now, Mahit must discover who is behind the murder, rescue herself, and save her Station from Teixcalaan's unceasing expansion—all while navigating an alien culture that is all too seductive, engaging in intrigues of her own, and hiding a deadly technological secret—one that might spell the end of her Station and her way of life—or rescue it from annihilation. Arkady Martine's debut novel A Memory Called Empire is a fascinating space opera and an interstellar mystery adventure. "The most thrilling ride ever. This book has everything I love."—Charlie Jane Anders, author of All the Birds in the Sky Also by Arkady Martine: A Desolation Called Peace Rose/House At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

The “fascinating” #1 international bestseller of a quest across centuries by two intrepid women to reunite the pieces of a powerful, ancient chess set (Los Angeles Times Book Review). A fabulous, bejeweled chess set that belonged to Charlemagne has been buried in a Pyrenees abbey for a thousand years. As the bloody French Revolution rages in Paris, the nuns dig it up and scatter its pieces across the globe because, when united, the set contains a secret power that could topple civilizations. To keep the set from falling into the wrong hands, two novices, Valentine and Mireille, embark on an adventure that begins in the streets of Paris and leads to Russia, Egypt, Corsica, and into the heart of the Algerian Sahara. Two hundred years later, while on assignment in Algeria, computer expert Catherine Velis finds herself drawn unwillingly into the deadly “Game” still swirling around the legendary chess set—a game that will require her to risk her life and match wits with diabolical forces. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Katherine Neville including rare images from her life and travels.