Biography

  • Desert Fox: The Storied Military Career of Erwin Rommel

    ByNorm Haskett Reading Time: 1 minute

    Just who was Erwin Rommel?

    War hero or war criminal? Hitler  flunky or man of integrity? Military genius or just lucky?

    Now, bestselling military historian Samuel W. Mitcham Jr. gets to the heart of the mysterious  figure respected and even admired by the people of the Allied nations he fought against. Mitcham recounts Rommel’s improbable and meteoric military career, his epic battles in North Africa, and his fraught relationship with Hitler and the Nazi Party. Desert Fox: The Storied Military Career of Erwin Rommel reveals:

    • How Rommel’s victories in North Africa were sabotaged by Hitler’s incompetent interference
    • How Rommel burned orders telling him to commit war crimes
    • Why it wouldn’t have helped Patton if he really had read Rommel’s book
    • How Rommel was responsible for the Germans’ defense against the D-Day landing
    • Why the plot to overthrow Hitler was fatally compromised when Rommel was gravely injured in an Allied attack
    • The reason Rommel agreed to commit suicide after his part in the plot was discovered by Hitler 

    Mitcham’s gripping account of Rommel’s life takes you through the amazing adventure of the World War II battles in North Africa. Again and again, Rommel outfoxed the Allies—until the war of attrition and Hitler’s blunders doomed the Axis cause. Illustrated with dozens of historical photos, this illuminating biography paints a fascinating and tragic picture of the man known as the Desert Fox.

  • Churchill: Walking with Destiny

    ByNorm Haskett Reading Time: 1 minute

    NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

    One of The Wall Street Journal’s Ten Best Books of 2018
    One of The Economist’s Best Books of 2018
    One of The New York Times’s Notable Books of 2018

    “Unarguably the best single-volume biography of Churchill . . . A brilliant feat of storytelling, monumental in scope, yet put together with tenderness for a man who had always believed that he would be Britain’s savior.” —Wall Street Journal

    In this landmark biography of Winston Churchill based on extensive new material, the true genius of the man, statesman and leader can finally be fully seen and understood–by the bestselling, award-winning author of Napoleon and The Storm of War.

    When we seek an example of great leaders with unalloyed courage, the person who comes to mind is Winston Churchill: the iconic, visionary war leader immune from the consensus of the day, who stood firmly for his beliefs when everyone doubted him. But how did young Winston become Churchill? What gave him the strength to take on the superior force of Nazi Germany when bombs rained on London and so many others had caved? In Churchill, Andrew Roberts gives readers the full and definitive Winston Churchill, from birth to lasting legacy, as personally revealing as it is compulsively readable.

    Roberts gained exclusive access to extensive new material: transcripts of War Cabinet meetings, diaries, letters and unpublished memoirs from Churchill’s contemporaries. The Royal Family permitted Roberts–in a first for a Churchill biographer–to read the detailed notes taken by King George VI in his diary after his weekly meetings with Churchill during World War II. This treasure trove of access allows Roberts to understand the man in revelatory new ways, and to identify the hidden forces fueling Churchill’s legendary drive.

    We think of Churchill as a hero who saved civilization from the evils of Nazism and warned of the grave crimes of Soviet communism, but Roberts’s masterwork reveals that he has as much to teach us about the challenges leaders face today–and the fundamental values of courage, tenacity, leadership and moral conviction.

  • Franklin Delano Roosevelt

    ByDorothy Haskett Reading Time: 1 minute

    “No president since the founders has done more to shape the character of American government,” notes Alan Brinkley in this magnificent biography of America’s thirty-second president. “And no president since Lincoln has served through darker or more difficult times. Roosevelt thrived in crisis. It brought out his greatness, and his guile. It triggered his almost uncanny ability to communicate effectively with people of all kinds. And at times, it helped him excoriate his enemies, and to revel in doing so.”
    This brilliant, compact biography chronicles Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s rise from a childhood of privilege to a presidency that forever changed the face of international diplomacy, the American party system, and the government’s role in global and domestic policy. Brinkley, the National Book Award-winning New Deal historian, provides a clear, concise introduction to Roosevelt’s sphinx-like character and remarkable achievements. In a vivid narrative packed with telling anecdotes, the book moves swiftly from Roosevelt’s youth in upstate New York–characterized by an aristocratic lifestyle of trips to Europe and private tutoring–to his schooling at Harvard, his brief law career, and his initial entry into politics. From there, Brinkley chronicles Roosevelt’s rise to the presidency, a position in which FDR remained until death, through an unparalleled three-plus terms in office. Throughout the book, Brinkley elegantly blends FDR’s personal life with his professional one, providing a lens into the President’s struggles with polio and his somewhat distant relationship with the first lady.
    Franklin Delano Roosevelt led the United States through the worst economic crisis in the nation’s history and through the greatest and most terrible war ever recorded. His extraordinary legacy remains alive in our own troubled new century as a reminder of what bravery and strong leadership can accomplish.