Discovered in the attic in which she spent the last years of her life, Anne Frank’s remarkable diary has become a world classic—a powerful reminder of the horrors of war and an eloquent testament to the human spirit. 

In 1942, with the Nazis occupying Holland, a thirteen-year-old Jewish girl and her family fled their home in Amsterdam and went into hiding. For the next two years, until their whereabouts were betrayed to the Gestapo, the Franks and another family lived cloistered in the “Secret Annexe” of an old office building. Cut off from the outside world, they faced hunger, boredom, the constant cruelties of living in confined quarters, and the ever-present threat of discovery and death. In her diary Anne Frank recorded vivid impressions of her experiences during this period. By turns thoughtful, moving, and surprisingly humorous, her account offers a fascinating commentary on human courage and frailty and a compelling self-portrait of a sensitive and spirited young woman whose promise was tragically cut short.
--back cover

The Diary of a Young Girl

Max Havelaar - a Dutch civil servant in Java - burns with an insatiable desire to end the ill treatment and oppression inflicted on the native peoples by the colonial administration. Max is an inspirational figure, but he is also a flawed idealist whose vow to protect the Javanese from cruelty ends in his own downfall. In Max Havelaar, Multatuli (the pseudonym for Eduard Douwes Dekker) vividly recreated his own experiences in Java and tellingly depicts the hypocrisy of those who gained from the corrupt coffee trade. Sending shockwaves through the Dutch nation when it was published in 1860, this damning exposé of the terrible conditions in the colonies led to welfare reforms in Java and continues to inspire the fairtrade movement today.

Roy Edwards's vibrant translation conveys the satirical and innovative style of Multatuli's autobiographical polemic. In his introduction, R. P. Meijer discusses the author's tempestuous life and career, the controversy the novel aroused and its unusual narrative structure.

Max Havelaar, or the Coffee Auctions of the Dutch Trading Company

A tale of art, beauty, lust, greed, deception and retribution -- set in a refined society ablaze with tulip fever.

In 1630s Amsterdam, tulipomania has seized the populace. Everywhere men are seduced by the fantastic exotic flower. But for wealthy merchant Cornelis Sandvoort, it is his young and beautiful wife, Sophia, who stirs his soul. She is the prize he desires, the woman he hopes will bring him the joy that not even his considerable fortune can buy.

Cornelis yearns for an heir, but so far he and Sophia have failed to produce one. In a bid for immortality, he commissions a portrait of them both by the talented young painter Jan van Loos. But as Van Loos begins to capture Sophia's likeness on canvas, a slow passion begins to burn between the beautiful young wife and the talented artist. 

As the portrait unfolds, so a slow dance is begun among the household's inhabitants. Ambitions, desires, and dreams breed a grand deception--and as the lies multiply, events move toward a thrilling and tragic climax.

In this richly imagined international bestseller, Deborah Moggach has created the rarest of novels--a lush, lyrical work of fiction that is also compulsively readable. Seldom has a novel so vividly evoked a time, a place, and a passion.

Tulip Fever

The first book to offer an in depth look at hidden Holland and the fascinating people that live there, Why the Dutch are Different is an entertaining book about a country unlike any other. The Netherlands are a tiny nation that punch above their weight on the world stage, where prostitutes are entitled to sick pay and prisons are closing due to lack of demand. After a chance encounter, Ben Coates left behind life in London to move to the Netherlands, where he learned the language, worked for Dutch company and married a Dutch wife. He takes readers into the heart of his adopted country, going beyond the usual tourist attractions and cliches to explore what it is that makes the Dutch the Dutch, Holland not the Netherlands and the colour orange so important. A travelogue, a history and a personal account of a changing country - Ben Coates tells the tale of an Englishman who went Dutch and liked it.

Why the Dutch are Different: A Journey into the Hidden Heart of the Netherlands

From the team of Bill O'Reilly and Martin Dugard, bestselling authors of the blockbuster "Killing" series, now comes "Killing Reagan". This page-turning epic account of the career of President Ronald Reagan tells the vivid story of his rise to power -- and the forces of evil that conspired to bring him down.
Just two months into his presidency, Ronald Reagan lay near death after an assassin's bullet came within inches of his heart. His recovery was nothing short of remarkable -- or so it seemed. But Reagan was grievously injured, forcing him to encounter a challenge that few men ever face. Could he silently overcome his traumatic experience while at the same time carrying out the duties of the most powerful man in the world?Told in the same riveting fashion as "Killing Lincoln", "Killing Kennedy", "Killing Jesus", and "Killing Patton", "Killing Reagan" reaches back to the golden days of Hollywood, where Reagan found both fame and heartbreak, up through the years in California governor's mansion, and finally to the White House, where he presided over boom years and the fall of the Iron Curtain. But it was John Hinckley Jr.'s attack on him that precipitated President Reagan's most heroic actions. In "Killing Reagan", O'Reilly and Dugard take readers behind the scenes, creating an unforgettable portrait of a great man operating in violent times.

Killing Reagan: The Violent Assault That Changed a Presidency (Bill O'Reilly's Killing Series)

At the apogee of its powers in the seventeenth century, Holland was a tiny island of prosperity in a sea of want. Its homes were well-furnished and fanatically clean; its citizens feasted on 100-course banquets and speculated fortunes on new varieties of tulip. Yet, in the midst of plenty, the Dutch were ill at ease. In this brilliantly innovative book--which launched his reputation as one of our most perspicacious and stylish historians--Simon Schama explores the mysterious contradictions of a nation that invented itself from the ground up, attained an unprecedented level of affluence, and lived in dread of being corrupted by its happiness.

Drawing on a vast array of period documents and sumptuously reproduced art, Schama re-creates, in precise and loving detail, a nation's mental furniture. He tells of bloody uprisings and beached whales, of the cult of hygiene and the plague of tobacco, of thrifty housewives and profligate tulip-speculators. He tells us how the Dutch celebrated themselves and how they were slandered by their enemies. "The Embarrassment of Riches" is a book that set a standard for its discipline; it throbs with life on every page.

The Embarrassment of Riches: An Interpretation of Dutch Culture in the Golden Age

An endlessly entertaining portrait of the city of Amsterdam and the ideas that make it unique, by the author of the acclaimed "Island at the Center of the World"

 Tourists know Amsterdam as a picturesque city of low-slung brick houses lining tidy canals; student travelers know it for its legal brothels and hash bars; art lovers know it for Rembrandt's glorious portraits.

 But the deeper history of Amsterdam, what makes it one of the most fascinating places on earth, is bound up in its unique geography-the constant battle of its citizens to keep the sea at bay and the democratic philosophy that this enduring struggle fostered. Amsterdam is the font of liberalism, in both its senses. Tolerance for free thinking and free love make it a place where, in the words of one of its mayors, "craziness is a value." But the city also fostered the deeper meaning of liberalism, one that profoundly influenced America: political and economic freedom. Amsterdam was home not only to religious dissidents and radical thinkers but to the world's first great global corporation.

 In this effortlessly erudite account, Russell Shorto traces the idiosyncratic evolution of Amsterdam, showing how such disparate elements as herring anatomy, naked Anabaptists parading through the streets, and an intimate gathering in a sixteenth-century wine-tasting room had a profound effect on Dutch-and world-history. Weaving in his own experiences of his adopted home, Shorto provides an ever-surprising, intellectually engaging story of Amsterdam from the building of its first canals in the 1300s, through its brutal struggle for independence, its golden age as a vast empire, to its complex present in which its cherished ideals of liberalism are under siege.

Amsterdam: A History of the World's Most Liberal City

"The Discovery of Heaven" begins with the meeting of Onno and Max, two complicated individuals whom fate has mysteriously and magically brought together, They share responsibility for the birth of a remarkable and radiant boy who embarks on a mandated quest that takes the reader all over Europe and to the land where all such quests begin and end. Abounding in philosophical, psychological and theological inquiries - yet laced with humour that is as infectious as it is wilful - "The Discovery of Heaven" convinces us that it just might be possible to bring order into the chaos of the world through a story.

The Discovery of Heaven

In the 1630s, visitors to the prosperous trading cities of the Netherlands couldn't help but notice that thousands of normally sober, hardworking Dutch citizens from every walk of life were caught up in an extraordinary frenzy of buying and selling. The object of this unprecedented speculation was the tulip, a delicate and exotic Eastern import that had bewitched horticulturists, noblemen, and tavern owners alike. For almost a year rare bulbs changed hands for incredible and ever-increasing sums, until single flowers were being sold for more than the cost of a house. 

Historians would come to call it tulipomania. It was the first futures market in history, and like so many of the ones that would follow, it crashed spectacularly, plunging speculators and investors into economic ruin and despair.

This is the history of the tulip, from its origins on the barren, windswept steppes of central Asia to its place of honor in the lush imperial gardens of Constantinople, to its starring moment as the most coveted--and beautiful--commodity in Europe. Historian Mike Dash vividly narrates the story of this amazing flower and the colorful cast of characters--Turkish sultans, Yugoslav soldiers, French botanists, and Dutch tavern keepers--who were centuries apart historically and worlds apart culturally, but who all had one thing in common: tulipomania.

Tulipomania: The Story of the World's Most Coveted Flower & the Extraordinary Passions It Aroused

The Edgar Award–winning novel "A Conspiracy of Paper" was one of the most acclaimed debuts of 2000. In his richly suspenseful second novel, author David Liss once again travels back in time to a crucial moment in cultural and financial history. His destination: Amsterdam, 1659 — a mysterious world of trade populated by schemers and rogues, where deception rules the day.

On the world’s first commodities exchange, fortunes are won and lost in an instant. Miguel Lienzo, a sharp-witted trader in the city's close-knit community of Portuguese Jews, knows this only too well. Once among the city’s most envied merchants, Miguel has lost everything in a sudden shift in the sugar markets. Now, impoverished and humiliated, living on the charity of his petty younger brother, Miguel must find a way to restore his wealth and reputation.

Miguel enters into a partnership with a seductive Dutchwoman who offers him one last chance at success — a daring plot to corner the market of an astonishing new commodity called "coffee." To succeed, Miguel must risk everything he values and test the limits of his commercial guile, facing not only the chaos of the markets and the greed of his competitors, but also a powerful enemy who will stop at nothing to see him ruined. Miguel will learn that among Amsterdam’s ruthless businessmen, betrayal lurks everywhere, and even friends hide secret agendas.

With humor, imagination, and mystery, David Liss depicts a world of subterfuge, danger, and repressed longing, where religious and cultural traditions clash with the demands of a new and exciting way of doing business. Readers of historical suspense and lovers of coffee (even decaf) will be up all night with this beguiling novel.

The Coffee Trader

"A Bridge Too Far" is Cornelius Ryan's masterly chronicle of the Battle of Arnhem, which marshalled the greatest armada of troop-carrying aircraft ever assembled and cost the Allies nearly twice as many casualties as D-Day.In this compelling work of history, Ryan narrates the Allied effort to end the war in Europe in 1944 by dropping the combined airborne forces of the American and British armies behind German lines to capture the crucial bridge across the Rhine at Arnhem. Focusing on a vast cast of characters -- from Dutch civilians to British and American strategists to common soldiers and commanders -- Ryan brings to life one of the most daring and ill-fated operations of the war. "A Bridge Too Far" superbly recreates the terror and suspense, the heroism and tragedy of this epic operation, which ended in bitter defeat for the Allies.

A Bridge Too Far

Moscow, May 1876: What would cause a talented young student from a wealthy family to shoot himself in front of a promenading public in the Alexander Gardens? Decadence and boredom, most likely, is what the commander of the Criminal Investigation Division of the Moscow Police thinks, but still he finds it curious enough to send the newest member of the division, Erast Fandorin, a young man of irresistible charm, to the Alexander Gardens precinct for more information.

Fandorin is not satisfied with the conclusion that this is an open-and-shut case, nor with the preliminary detective work the precinct has done—and for good reason: The bizarre and tragic suicide is soon connected to a clear case of murder, witnessed firsthand by Fandorin. There are many unresolved questions. Why, for instance, have both victims left their fortunes to an orphanage run by the English Lady Astair? And who is the beautiful "A.B.," whose signed photograph is found in the apparent suicide's apartment? Relying on his keen intuition, the eager sleuth plunges into an investigation that leads him across Europe, landing him at the deadly center of a terrorist conspiracy of worldwide proportions.

The Winter Queen (Erast Fandorin Mysteries, #1)

Book 1 in the 5-book biblical historical fiction series by the "New York Times" bestselling author of "Redeeming Love" and "A Voice in the Wind."

"Betrayed by the men who controlled her future, she fought for her right to believe in a loving God."

Meet Tamar, one of the five women in the lineage of Christ. She risked her life and her reputation to be the woman she was called to be. Her story serves as an example of how God uses our circumstances and our steps toward Him, however faltering, to fulfill His plan.

"Unveiled" is book one in the popular Lineage of Grace series about five unlikely women who changed eternity.

"Francine Rivers utilizes her expertise as master storyteller to unveil Tamar's saga, a tale of deception, betrayal, and ultimately hope."
--
  "Romantic Times"


"This novella includes an in-depth Bible study perfect for personal reflection or group discussion."

Unveiled: Tamar (Lineage of Grace #1)

Rick Steves doesn't just list where to travel in Europe, he leads travelers through the "Back Door," and reveals how to give every journey an extra, more authentic dimension. He shows travelers how to delve into European culture, make friends with the locals, and experience each region's natural wonders -- economically and hassle free. Rick Steves' Amsterdam, Bruges and Brussels 2003 is packed with opinionated advice on visiting top sights, such as Amsterdam's Van Gogh Museum, Bruges' 14th-century belfry, and La Grand Place in Brussels. This book provides a healthy dose of Back Door intimacy with visits to local markets, community theaters, and family-run chocolate shops. Also included is a broad array of dining and lodging options, from cheery cafeterias and backpackers' dorms to trendy cafes and elegant inns; self-guided walking tours that mix the famous and not-so-famous; practicalities, such as when to go, planning your time, estimated costs, red tape and taxes, and banking hours. This new edition has the most current information available in any European guidebook, based on research conducted during the summer before publication. "It's Rick Steves again, that one-man Euro-dynamo." -- Chicago Tribune

Rick Steves' Amsterdam, Bruges & Brussels

Vollständig überarbeitete, um unbekanntes Material erweiterte Neuausgabe der maßgeblichen Biographie Anne Franks.Melissa Müllers fesselnde Biographie der Anne Frank erregte Ende der 1990er Jahre international großes Aufsehen. Zwei zuvor geheimgehaltene Tagebucheinträge Annes sowie Briefe und Aufzeichnungen nie zuvor befragter Zeitzeugen erweiterten das Bild der Familie Frank um wesentliche Facetten. Die Verfilmung des Buchs wurde 2001 mit dem Emmy-Award ausgezeichnet. In dieser überarbeiteten Neuausgabe kann Melissa Müller anhand neuester Forschungsergebnisse und nach Durchsicht erst kürzlich freigegebener Akten umfassender untersuchen, wer zum Netzwerk der Mitwisser gehörte und die Untergetauchten verraten haben könnte; bisher noch nie publizierte Fotos ergänzen das Bild."Eine gründlich recherchierte und packende Biographie" Der Spiegel"Eine erzählerisch starke und souveräne Verknüpfung biographischer und historischer Details" The Times

Anne Frank: The Biography

Near the end of World War II, 14-year-old Michiel becomes involved with the Resistance after coming to the aid of a wounded British soldier.  With the conflict coming to an end, Michiel comes of age and learns of the stark difference between adventure fantasy and the ugly realities of war.

Winter in Wartime

When a book of unexplainable occurrences brings Petra Andalee and Calder Pillay together, strange things start to happen: seemingly unrelated events connect, an eccentric old woman seeks their company, and an invaluable Vermeer painting disappears. Before they know it, the two find themselves at the center of an international art scandal, where no one — neighbors, parents, teachers — is spared from suspicion. As Petra and Calder are drawn clue by clue into a mysterious labyrinth, they must draw on their powers of intuition, their problem-solving skills, and their knowledge of Vermeer. Can they decipher a crime that has left even the FBI baffled?

Chasing Vermeer (Chasing Vermeer, #1)

Presents an in-depth humorous look at Dutch life, quirks, customs, and character, with observations of Dutch behavior in the Netherlands and abroad; includes appendices on Dutch idioms, expressions, and homonyms.

The Undutchables: An Observation of the Netherlands: Its Culture and Its Inhabitants

This is the astonishing true story of three teenage Dutch girls, Hannie Schaft and sisters Truus and Freddie Oversteegen, that has inspired many throughout the world.

When Nazi Germany invaded the Netherlands in World War II, these girls took up arms against the enemy by seducing high-ranking Nazi officers, luring them into the woods and killing them. They provided Jewish children with safe houses and gathered vital intelligence for the resistance. They did what they did "because it had to be done." Above all, they tried to remain human in inhuman circumstances.

Hannie Schaft was executed by the Nazis three weeks before the end of the war and became the icon of female Dutch resistance. Truus and Freddie Oversteegen survived the war, but were forever haunted by the demons of their past.

Seducing and Killing Nazis: Hannie, Truus and Freddie: Dutch Resistance Heroines of WWII

In this profoundly affecting memoir from the internationally renowned author of "The Caged Virgin", Ayaan Hirsi Ali tells her astonishing life story, from her traditional Muslim childhood in Somalia to her intellectual awakening in the Netherlands, to her life under armed guard in the West.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali is one of today's most admired and controversial political figures. She burst into international headlines following the murder of Theo van Gogh by an Islamist who threatened she would be next. An international bestseller, "Infidel" shows the coming of age of this elegant, distinguished and sometimes reviled political superstar and champion of free speech. Raised in a strict Muslim family and extended clan, Hirsi Ali survived civil war, female circumcision, brutal beatings, an adolescence as a devout believer, the rise of the Muslim Brotherhood, and life in four countries under dictatorships. She escaped from a forced marriage and sought asylum in the Netherlands, where she fought for the rights of Muslim women and the reform of Islam, earning her the enmity of reactionary Islamists and craven politicians. Under constant threat, she refuses to be silenced.

Ultimately a celebration of triumph over adversity, Hirsi Ali's story tells how a bright, curious, dutiful little girl evolves into a pioneering freedom fighter. As Western governments struggle to balance democratic ideals with religious pressures, no other book could be more timely, or more significant.

Infidel: My Life

In his new book, BikeSnobNYC reaches the final frontier of cycling: riding with the family. As his choice to take to the road with his toddler son in tow is met with bewilderment and disapproval from onlookers and the occasional motorist, he ponders why it's such a taboo. And what does it really mean to be a bike-friendly country? Seeking answers, he heads from the U.S. to London, Amsterdam, Gothenburg, and San Vito dei Normanni in search of an alternative. With humorous anecdotes and his trademark biting wit and wisdom, BikeSnobNYC takes us on his most personal narrative journey yet, and ultimately shines a light on the growing pains that exist in any culture that asks smartphone-obsessed text-happy pedestrians, the two-wheeled, and the four-wheeled to share the road.

Bike Snob Abroad: Strange Customs, Incredible Fiets, and the Quest for Cycling Paradise

Ian Buruma returns to his native land to explore the great dilemma of our time through the story of the brutal murder of controversial Dutch filmmaker Theo van Gogh at the hands of an Islamic extremist. It was the emblematic crime of our moment: On a cold November day in Amsterdam, an angry young Muslim man, Mohammed Bouyeri, the son of Moroccan immigrants, shot and killed the celebrated and controversial Dutch filmmaker Theo van Gogh, great-grandnephew of Vincent and iconic European provocateur, for making a movie with the vocally anti-Islam Somali-born Dutch politician Ayaan Hirsi Ali that "blasphemed" Islam. After Bouyeri shot van Gogh, he calmly stood over the body and cut his throat with a curved machete, as if performing a ritual sacrifice, which in a very real sense he was. The murder horrified quiet, complacent, prosperous Holland, a country that prides itself on being a bastion of tolerance, and sent shock waves across Europe and around the world. Shortly thereafter, Ian Buruma returned to his native country to try to make sense of it all and to see what larger meaning should and shouldn't be drawn from this story. The result is Buruma's masterpiece: a book with the intimacy and narrative control of a true-crime page-turner and the intellectual resonance we've come to expect from one of the most well-regarded journalists and thinkers of our time. Ian Buruma's entire life has led him to this narrative: In his hands, it is the exemplary tale of our age, the story of what happens when political Islam collides with the secular West and tolerance finds its limits.

Murder in Amsterdam: The Death of Theo van Gogh and the Limits of Tolerance

A year after one of their identical twin daughters, Lydia, dies in an accident, Angus and Sarah Moorcraft move to the tiny Scottish island Angus inherited from his grandmother, hoping to put together the pieces of their shattered lives.

But when their surviving daughter, Kirstie, claims they have mistaken her identity—that she, in fact, is Lydia—their world comes crashing down once again.

As winter encroaches, Angus is forced to travel away from the island for work, Sarah is feeling isolated, and Kirstie (or is it Lydia?) is growing more disturbed. When a violent storm leaves Sarah and her daughter stranded, Sarah finds herself tortured by the past—what really happened on that fateful day one of her daughters died?

The Ice Twins

Lucia works as a servant girl in Italy and is engaged to be married. But after the pox disfigures her face, she flees in shame without telling her lover. Years later, as a reknowned Amsterdam courtesan who never goes out without her veil, Lucia is at the theater when she recognizes her long-lost fiancé, Giacomo Casanova; and she cannot resist the opportunity to encounter him again. Based on a woman who appeared briefly in Casanova’s legendary diaries, Lucia emerges as a brilliant woman who becomes every bit his match. "In Lucia’s Eyes" is an elegant and moving story of love denied and transformed.

In Lucia's Eyes

Set in one day in 1632, "The Anatomy Lesson" is a stunning portrayal of Golden Age Amsterdam and a brilliantly imagined back-story to Rembrandt's first great work of art. Told from several points of view, ranging from a curio dealer who collects bodies for the city’s chief anatomist to philosopher Rene Descartes, the novel opens on the morning of the medical dissection that is to be recorded by the twenty-six-year-old artist from Leiden who has yet to attach his famous signature to a painting.  

As the story builds to its dramatic and inevitable conclusion, the events that transpire throughout the day sway Rembrandt to make fundamental changes to his initial composition. These changes will remain mysteries for centuries until a young art historian closely examines the painting in the twenty-first century, and makes surprising discoveries about the painter, his process, and his genius for capturing enduring truths about human nature in a single moment.

The Anatomy Lesson: A Novel

It should have been easy.
I needed the money. He needed a babysitter to keep him from snorting himself to death.
I was cherry-picked especially for him. Responsible. Optimistic. Warm. Innocent.
The worst part is that I should have known better.
Alex Winslow. British rock star. Serial heartbreaker. Casanova with whiskey eyes.
“Don’t get near the devil in a leather jacket. He’ll chew you up and spit you out.”
Guess what? I didn’t listen.
I signed the contract.
World tour. Three months. Four Continents. One hundred shows.
My name is Indigo Bellamy, and I sold my soul to a tattooed god.
Problem was, my soul wasn’t enough for Alex Winslow. He ended up taking my body, too.
Then he took my heart.
Then he took my all.

From bestselling author L.J. Shen, comes a new, standalone, contemporary romance.

Midnight Blue

Drawing on vital new evidence, a top historian dramatically reinterprets the ruler of the world’s first transatlantic empire

The life of Emperor Charles V (1500–1558), ruler of Spain, Germany, the Netherlands, and much of Italy and Central and South America, has long intrigued biographers. But the elusive nature of the man (despite an abundance of documentation), his relentless travel and the control of his own image, together with the complexity of governing the world’s first transatlantic empire, complicate the task.
 
Geoffrey Parker, one of the world’s leading historians of early modern Europe, has examined the surviving written sources in Dutch, French, German, Italian, Latin, and Spanish, as well as visual and material evidence. He explores the crucial decisions that created and preserved this vast empire, analyzes Charles’s achievements within the context of both personal and structural factors, and scrutinizes the intimate details of the ruler's life for clues to his character and inclinations. The result is a unique biography that interrogates every dimension of Charles’s reign and views the world through the emperor’s own eyes.

Emperor: A New Life of Charles V

"A brilliant coming-of-age story with an outlandish twist . . . this wonderfully weird novel is not one to miss." --"Publishers Weekly", starred review

After a farming accident plunges him into a coma for six months, Frankie Hermans wakes up to discover that he's paralyzed and mute. Bound to a wheelchair, Frankie struggles to adjust to a life where he must rely on others to complete even the simplest tasks. The only body part he can control is his right arm, which he uses obsessively to record the details of daily life in his town in Holland.

But when he meets Joe--a boy who blazed into his sleepy rural town like a meteor while Frankie slept--everything changes. Joe is a centrifugal force, both magician and daredevil, and he alone sees potential strength in Frankie's handicaps. With Joe's help, Frankie's arm will be used for more than just writing: as a champion arm-wrestler, Frankie will be powerful enough to win back his friends, and maybe even woo P.J., the girl who has them all in a tailspin . . .

From the award-winning author of "These are""the Names", "Joe Speedboat" is "[an] offbeat story of a group of boys searching for meaning . . .This work conjures John Irving's" A Prayer for Owen Meany" but with a lighter touch" ("Library Journal").

"Witty, thoughtful and surprisingly tender." --"The Independent"

Joe Speedboat

In the hands of an award-winning historian, Vermeer's dazzling paintings become windows that reveal how daily life and thought--from Delft to Beijing--were transformed in the seventeenth century, when the world first became global. 
A painting shows a military officer in a Dutch sitting room, talking to a laughing girl. In another, a woman at a window weighs pieces of silver. Vermeer's images captivate us with their beauty and mystery: What stories lie behind these stunningly rendered moments? As Timothy Brook shows us, these pictures, which seem so intimate, actually offer a remarkable view of a rapidly expanding world. The officer's dashing hat is made of beaver fur, which European explorers got from Native Americans in exchange for weapons. Those beaver pelts, in turn, financed the voyages of sailors seeking new routes to China. There--with silver mined in Peru--Europeans would purchase, by the thousands, the porcelains so often shown in Dutch paintings of this time. Moving outward from Vermeer's studio, Brook traces the web of trade that was spreading across the globe. 
The wharves of Holland, wrote a French visitor, were an inventory of the possible. "Vermeer's Hat" shows just how rich this inventory was, and how the urge to acquire the goods of distant lands was refashioning the world more powerfully than we have yet understood.

Vermeer's Hat: The Seventeenth Century and the Dawn of the Global World

Event planner Jennifer -J.J.- Tanner is planning a cruise ship casino night--and she's really going overboard. She even arranged for radio DJ Connor Mac and TV personality Miranda Myers to help the good times roll. But the party comes to a screeching halt when Miranda is found dead on the main deck... 

With a boatload of suspects, the police focus in on J.J., who, though recently linked with Connor, never knew he was once engaged--to Miranda. With Half Moon Bay's gossip mill running full tilt, J.J. turns to her fellow dinner club members to help fish for clues and keep herself out of hot water... 

INCLUDES DELICIOUS RECIPES

Roux the Day (Dinner Club Mystery, #2)

Monday, the lowest point of the week. A day of dark impulses. A day to snatch a child from the streets ...

The abduction of five-year-old Matthew Farraday provokes a national outcry and a desperate police hunt. And when a picture of his face is splashed over the newspapers, psychotherapist Frieda Klein is left troubled: one of her patients has been relating dreams in which he has a hunger for a child. A child he can describe in perfect detail, a child the spitting image of Matthew.

Detective Chief Inspector Karlsson doesn't take Frieda's concerns seriously until a link emerges with an unsolved child abduction twenty years ago and he summons Frieda to interview the victim's sister, hoping she can stir hidden memories. Before long, Frieda is at the center of the race to track the kidnapper.

But her race isn't physical. She must chase down the darkest paths of a psychopath's mind to find the answers to Matthew Farraday's whereabouts.

And sometimes the mind is the deadliest place to lose yourself.

Blue Monday (Frieda Klein, #1)

Rick Steves Belgium: Bruges, Brussels, Antwerp & Ghent

CAN'T FIND A RATIONAL EXPLANATION TO A MYSTERY? CALL IN THE QUIET COUNCIL. The mysterious and glamorous Lady De Winter is one of their most valuable agents. A despicable murder inside a locked and bolted room on the Rue Morgue in Paris is just the start. This whirlwind adventure will take Milady to the highest and lowest parts of that great city - and cause her to question the very nature of reality itself.

"File Under": Steampunk [ Alternate History | Reptilian Royalty | Murder Most Foul | The World’s Fair ]

Camera Obscura (The Bookman Histories, #2)

In dit boek staat de ontwikkeling van kind tot volwassene en de worsteling met de levensraadsels centraal. De kleine Johannes komt verschillende sprookjesachtige figuren tegen die hem helpen volwassen te worden. In wezen gaat het boek over het opgroeien van kleine Johannes over Frederik van Eeden zelf.

De kleine Johannes

In "No Visible Bruises", journalist Rachel Louise Snyder frames this urgent and immersive account of the scale of domestic violence in our country around key stories that explode the common myths-that if things were bad enough, victims would just leave; that a violent person cannot become nonviolent; that shelter is an adequate response; that violence inside the home is separate from other forms of violence like mass shootings, gang violence, and sexual assault. Through the stories of victims, perpetrators, law enforcement, and reform movements from across the country, Snyder explores not only the dark corners of private violence, but also its far-reaching consequences for society, and what it will take to truly address it.

No Visible Bruises: What We Don’t Know About Domestic Violence Can Kill Us

Siem Sigerius is a beloved, brilliant professor of mathematics with a promising future in politics. His family—including a loving wife, two gorgeous, intelligent stepdaughters and a successful future son-in-law—and carefully appointed home in the bucolic countryside complete the portrait of a comfortable, morally upright household. But there are elements of Siem's past that threaten to upend the peace and stability that he has achieved, and when he stumbles upon a deception that’s painfully close to home, things begin to fall apart. A cataclysmic explosion in a fireworks factory, the advent of internet pornography, and the reappearances of a discarded, dangerous son all play a terrible role in the spectacular fragmentation of the Sigerius clan.

          A riveting portrait of a family in crisis and the ways that even the smallest twists of fate can forever change our lives, "Bonita Avenue" is an incendiary, unpredictable debut of relationships torn asunder by lies, and minds destroyed by madness.

Bonita Avenue

A fairy tale that summons up a vast Netherlands encompassing Europe’s highest peaks and a captivating pair of circus performers hunting for work.

In the Dutch Mountains

De mensen moesten hem niet, dat was altijd zo geweest. Maar de natuur nam hem zoals hij was.

Nadat Jonathan bij gebrek aan bewijs is vrijgesproken van tbs, keert hij terug naar het krappe huisje in het vissersdorp waar hij samen met zijn eenzame moeder woont. Hij verheugt zich erop om weer met hond Milk in de duinen te kunnen wandelen. Al snel krijgt hij gezelschap van zijn nieuwe buurmeisje, die door haar moeder aan haar lot wordt overgelaten.
Jonathan is bang om opnieuw de fout in te gaan en probeert haar op afstand te houden. Gewetensvol maakt hij de oefeningen die zijn psycholoog hem in de gevangenis heeft gegeven. Maar zijn hoofd wordt voller en voller en hij lijkt de controle te verliezen.

Netherlands

The Diary of a Young Girl

Anne Frank

Max Havelaar, or the Coffee Auctions of the Dutch Trading Company

Multatuli

Tulip Fever

Deborah Moggach

Why the Dutch are Different: A Journey into the Hidden Heart of the Netherlands

Ben Coates

Killing Reagan: The Violent Assault That Changed a Presidency (Bill O'Reilly's Killing Series)

Bill O'Reilly

The Embarrassment of Riches: An Interpretation of Dutch Culture in the Golden Age

Simon Schama

Amsterdam: A History of the World's Most Liberal City

Russell Shorto

The Discovery of Heaven

Harry Mulisch

Tulipomania: The Story of the World's Most Coveted Flower & the Extraordinary Passions It Aroused

Mike Dash

The Coffee Trader

David Liss

A Bridge Too Far

Cornelius Ryan

The Winter Queen (Erast Fandorin Mysteries, #1)

Boris Akunin

Unveiled: Tamar (Lineage of Grace #1)

Francine Rivers

Rick Steves' Amsterdam, Bruges & Brussels

Rick Steves

Anne Frank: The Biography

Melissa Müller

Winter in Wartime

Jan Terlouw

Chasing Vermeer (Chasing Vermeer, #1)

Blue Balliett

The Undutchables: An Observation of the Netherlands: Its Culture and Its Inhabitants

Colin White

Seducing and Killing Nazis: Hannie, Truus and Freddie: Dutch Resistance Heroines of WWII

Sophie Poldermans

Infidel: My Life

Ayaan Hirsi Ali

Bike Snob Abroad: Strange Customs, Incredible Fiets, and the Quest for Cycling Paradise

BikeSnobNYC

Murder in Amsterdam: The Death of Theo van Gogh and the Limits of Tolerance

Ian Buruma

The Ice Twins

S.K. Tremayne

In Lucia's Eyes

Arthur Japin

The Anatomy Lesson: A Novel

Nina Siegal

Midnight Blue

L.J. Shen

Emperor: A New Life of Charles V

Geoffrey Parker

Joe Speedboat

Tommy Wieringa

Vermeer's Hat: The Seventeenth Century and the Dawn of the Global World

Timothy Brook

Roux the Day (Dinner Club Mystery, #2)

Linda Wiken

Blue Monday (Frieda Klein, #1)

Nicci French

Rick Steves Belgium: Bruges, Brussels, Antwerp & Ghent

Rick Steves

Camera Obscura (The Bookman Histories, #2)

Lavie Tidhar

De kleine Johannes

Frederik van Eeden

No Visible Bruises: What We Don’t Know About Domestic Violence Can Kill Us

Rachel Louise Snyder

Bonita Avenue

Peter Buwalda

In the Dutch Mountains

Cees Nooteboom

Muidhond

Inge Schilperoord