We'd like to know what you think...
|
|
Our Customer Satisfaction Survey is open until May 17 2015 . How do you rate Christchurch City Libraries? What are we doing well? What can we do better? Let us know!
|
|
|
New and Recently Released!
|
|
| American reckoning: the Vietnam War and our national identity by Christian G. AppyIn American Reckoning, historian Christian Appy analyzes the Vietnam War's effects on America's self-perception, political atmosphere, and subsequent foreign policy. Examining a variety of popular artistic works (including songs, films, and literature), official documents, and news accounts, Appy recounts the war's growth from a supposedly small anti-Communist operation to a vast, expensive, and deadly engagement that ended in American defeat. Arguing that the reasoning behind this war hasn't been openly debated, he concludes that Vietnam's legacy holds risky implications for 21st-century national and international security and suggests that citizens and policy makers should reconsider current American international policies. |
|
| 88 days to Kandahar: a CIA diary by Robert GrenierImmediately after the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on the U.S., President George W. Bush approved a CIA-led campaign in Afghanistan with the aim of defeating the Taliban and dismantling Al-Qa'ida. Author Robert Grenier, then the CIA's station chief in Islamabad, Pakistan, was asked to develop American policy in Afghanistan and direct the war there. His memoir of these experiences provides vivid depictions of the people involved and of the effects of Washington's political and bureaucratic interference. Grenier's detailed chronology of the war, leadership missteps, and subsequent failures concludes with sobering implications for continued American engagement in the region. |
|
|
The debs of Bletchley Park and other stories
by Michael Smith
The Debs of Bletchley Park and Other Stories tells the stories of the women who worked at Bletchley, how they came to be there, the lives they gave up to do 'their bit' for the war effort, and the part they played in the vital work of 'Station X'.
|
|
|
Lost to time: unforgettable stories that history forgot
by Martin W. Sandler
In this fascinating collection of historical vignettes, author Martin W. Sandler restores to memory important events, people, and developments that have been lost to time. Though barely known today, these are major historical stories, from Ziryab, an eighth-century black slave whose influence on music, cuisine, fashion, and manners still reverberates, to Cahokia, a 12th century city north of the Rio Grande, which at its zenith contained a population greater than any contemporary European city, to the worst peacetime maritime disaster ever, the explosion and sinking of the Sultana on the Mississippi in 1865, and the deadliest fire in U.S. history, in Peshtigo.
|
|
| Hell and good company: the Spanish Civil War and the world it made by Richard RhodesThe Spanish Civil War influenced the creative works of numerous authors and artists, served as a proving-ground for new military technologies, and spurred significant improvements in front-line medical and surgical procedures. In Hell and Good Company, award-winning historian and MacArthur Foundation fellow Richard Rhodes details the impact of this war, whose outcome established the long-lasting dictatorship of Francisco Franco and foreshadowed the world's political divisions throughout the 20th century. Depicting the horrific conflict through the eyes of participants, Rhodes brings to life the political passion, humanitarian dedication, and camaraderie of these events. |
|
|
Midnight at the Pera Palace: the birth of modern Istanbul
by Charles King
Brings to life a remarkable era after the 1925 establishment of the Turkish Republic, when the storied city of Istanbul stumbled into the modern world and reshaped the meaning of cosmopolitanism via its ethnically diverse population and importance in the key historical events and cultural movements of the early 20th century.
|
|
|
The unravelling: high hopes and missed opportunities in Iraq
by Emma Sky
As a Brit, a woman and a liberal, Emma Sky's presence and position in Iraq following the invasion in 2003 is the stuff of fiction. Shortly after the coalition troops went in, Sky, an Arabist, volunteered to go to assist the Coalition Provisional Authority in the occupation. Alone, she made her way to Baghdad, was told they had enough people, so travelled north, to Kirkuk. Within days she became the most senior civilian there, Kirkuk's lady governor. A vivid first-hand account of the occupation of Iraq, this is also a deeply personal memoir that explores what it is like to be British, alone and a woman, working both within and outside of the US Army. As Sky writes, "I have encountered many alien cultures on my travels, but none so alien as the US Army."
|
|
|
The family of Richard III
by Michael Hicks
Richard's family was his making and undoing...with the recent discovery of Richard III's skeleton and his reburial in Leicester Cathedral, Professor Michael Hicks, described by BBC History Magazine as 'the greatest living expert on Richard III' reassesses the family ties and entrails of his wayward and violent family. Many thousands of descendants of Richard survive, some more interested in their linage than others, and the book will conclude with an analysis of Richard's DNA and his 'family' as it exists today.
|
|
|
The tears of the rajas: mutiny, money and marriage in India 1805 - 1905
by Ferdinand Mount
The Tears of the Rajas is a sweeping, epic history of the British in India, seen through the experiences of a single family, the Lows, ancestors of the author, Ferdinand Mount, and also of Prime Minister David Cameron. When he was growing up, Ferdinand Mount used to wonder what stories the various Indian artefacts his family possessed from the days of the British rule of India could tell. Many years before his Aunt Ursie had written a family history of the Lows of India which was largely ignored by the family. When the story of the Lows recently hit the headlines after it transpired that these same relatives were those of David Cameron, and that they were responsible for a number of atrocities in India, Ferdinand Mount set out to uncover the truth behind their lives. What emerged was an evocative, intense and thrilling history of 19th century British rule in India.
|
|
Contact your librarian for more great books!
|
|
|