Showing results by publisher "Recorded Books" in Biographies

Poland, 1940. The Russian army invades the beautiful city streets of Vilna. Soldiers storm 10-year-old Esther Rudomin's house and arrest her entire family. The Rudomins, the soldiers say, are "capitalists - enemies of the people". Forced from their home and friends, the Rudomins are herded onto crowded cattle cars. Their destination: the endless steppe of Siberia.

Best-selling author Georgia Bragg delights young people with her quirky characters and unique subject matter. How They Croaked provides all the gory details of the awful ends of 19 awfully famous people. It details Ludwig Van Beethoven’s expansive finale, Henry VII’s explosive end, Albert Einstein’s great brain escape, and Marie Curie’s glowing demise.

Called back to Egypt to complete the excavation conducted by the recently-murdered Lord Baskerville, Amelia and Emerson encounter a tomb the locals believe to be cursed.

Twelve-year-old Ji-li Jiang has brains, friends, and a bright future. Then Mao Zedong launches China’s infamous Cultural Revolution. Soon school is suspended and students are getting caught up in the fervor of Mao’s extreme politics. When Ji-li’s family is accused of capitalist crimes, all of her beautiful dreams burst like soap bubbles. Because Ji-li’s grandfather was a landlord, her family is harassed and humiliated. Their home is searched, and they live in constant fear. Nonetheless, Ji-li remains loyal to her beloved Chairman Mao....

Over the course of history, famous people made mistakes that were so monumental they could never escape them, no matter how brilliant their successes! Ferdinand Magellan is credited as the first man to sail around the world...but he only actually made it halfway. His terrible treatment of everyone he met cut his life journey short. Queen Isabella of Spain is remembered for financing Columbus' expeditions - and for creating the Spanish Inquisition.

One of the founders of US cryptology who would eventually become one of the world’s greatest code breakers, Elizebeth Smith Friedman (1892-1980) was a brilliant mind behind many important battles throughout the 20th century, saving many lives through her intelligence and heroism. Whip-smart and determined, Elizebeth displayed a remarkable aptitude for language and recognizing patterns from a young age.

As a female Jewish physicist in Berlin during the early 20th century, Lise Meitner had to fight for an education, a job, and equal treatment in her field, like having her name listed on her own research papers. Meitner made groundbreaking strides in the study of radiation, but when Hitler came to power in Germany, she suddenly had to face not only sexism, but also life-threatening anti-Semitism as well. Nevertheless, she persevered and one day made a discovery that rocked the world: the splitting of the atom.

This Chelsea House’s Galaxy of Superstars book features Celine Dion, a frequent chart-topper in the United States for a decade.

When pirates attacked her town and the captain took a liking to her, she saw a way out. Zheng Yi Sao agreed to marry him only if she got an equal share of his business. When her husband died six years later, she took command of the fleet. Over the next decade, the pirate queen built a fleet of over 1,800 ships and 70,000 men. On land and sea, Zheng Yi Sao's power rivaled the emperor himself. Time and again, her ships triumphed over the emperor's ships. 

Madam C. J. Walker was beloved within her community for her philanthropy and expanding the local black YMCA, but she couldn't have done that if she weren't the first female self-made millionaire and one of the most successful African American business owners ever. Born Sarah Breedlove, she was the first person born free in her family. She married Charles Joseph Walker and became known as Madam C. J. Walker, the name she would later use on her haircare products.

From the Chelsea House Black Americans of Achievement series, this biography focuses on one of today’s most talented and popular screen stars. Denzel Washington rose to stardom, won an Academy Award, and was named one of the most popular movie stars in 1998.

Adolf Hitler’s Nazi Party is gaining strength and becoming more menacing every day. Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a pastor upset by the complacency of the German church toward the suffering around it, forms a breakaway church to speak out against the established political and religious authorities. When the Nazis outlaw the church, he escapes as a fugitive.

This is the story of the Italian tourist who became the first European to completely cross Asia. After returning home, he wrote a book about the amazing things he had seen. Even today, people still love hearing about his adventures!

George Washington Carver was determined to help the people he loved. Born enslaved in Missouri, he left home in search of an education, eventually earning his master’s degree. When Booker T. Washington invited Carver to start the agricultural department at the all-Black-staffed Tuskegee Institute, Carver found his calling. He spent the rest of his life seeking solutions to poverty among landless Black farmers by developing new uses for soil-replenishing crops such as peanuts, cowpeas, and sweet potatoes.

One of the most important patriots in post-Revolutionary times. Most people know Noah Webster for his dictionary masterpieces and his promotion of a living "American Language" that embraces words and idioms from all its immigrant peoples. But he was also the driving force behind universal education for all citizens, including slaves, females, and adult learners. Speaker of twenty languages, he developed the new country's curriculum, writing and publishing American literature, American history, and American geography. He published New York City's first daily newspaper.

Inge Auerbacher is a happy German girl when the nightmare begins. Six-year-old Inge is made to wear a yellow star to identify her as a Jew. As the Nazis gain power, her family is subjected to greater and greater horrors. Their home and citizenship are taken away. Inge’s relatives are sent away, and she and her parents are forced into the Terezin concentration camp in Czechoslovakia.

Picked by President Thomas Jefferson to explore the unknown wilds of the Louisiana Territory, Meriwether Lewis assembles a rugged team of adventurers, including co-captain William Clark - and a Newfoundland dog named Seaman. As hunter, retriever, and guard, Seaman becomes a trusted member of the Corps of Discovery. While the team tackles raging rivers and muddy shallows, Seaman is there - sharing their hunger and fatigue. Whether Indians threaten or grizzlies roar, he stands his ground. And through mountain peak or valley deep, Seaman remains a watchful friend and determined foe.

From Chelsea House’s Galaxy of Superstars series comes the story of Britney Spears, who began her career in the 1990s update of The Mickey Mouse Club.

Before Carl Linnaeus began classifying organisms, before John James Audubon drew birds from the wild, before Charles Darwin proposed his theory of evolution, there lived a 13-year-old girl named Maria Merian who loved to draw bugs. With no formal training or university education, Maria Merian took on the role of artist, adventurer, and scientist in 17th-century Europe - a time when women were rarely allowed responsibilities outside the home, and unusual interests led to accusations of witchcraft.

Before he won stunning acclaim as one of today's most gifted southern writers, Larry Brown was a firefighter with the Oxford, Mississippi, Fire Department. On Fire, his powerful and unflinching account of this experience, catapults listeners into the daily trauma all firefighters face, from the blistering heat of burning homes to the crunch of broken glass at crash scenes.