Cranston Public Library

"With over 19 million copies in print and a remarkable record of #1 New York Times, Wall Street Journal, USA Today, and Publishers Weekly bestsellers, Bill O'Reilly's Killing series is the most popular series of narrative histories in the world. Killing the Witches revisits one of the most frightening and inexplicable episodes in American history: the events of 1692 and 1693 in Salem Village, Massachusetts. What began as a mysterious affliction of...

The number one New York Times bestselling authors of Vanderbilt return with another riveting history of a legendary American family, the Astors, and how they built and lavished their fortune. The story of the Astors is a quintessentially American story-of ambition, invention, destruction, and reinvention. From 1783, when German immigrant John Jacob Astor first arrived in the United States, until 2009, when Brooke Astor's son, Anthony Marshall, was...

"During World War I and World War II, Rhode Island was dotted with coastal forts filled with large caliber guns. Yet they were never fired in anger. By contrast, from 1929 to 1933, during Prohibition, U.S. Coast Guard vessels frequently fired machine guns at rumrunners in Narragansett Bay. Machine gun fire killed three rumrunners and wounded another on the notorious Black Duck. Despite the incident drawing national protests, the carnage continued....

"From the pioneering co-founder of cliodynamics, the ground-breaking new interdisciplinary science of history, a brilliant big-picture explanation for America's civil strife and its possible endgames. Peter Turchin, one of the most interesting social scientists of our age by any measure, has infused the study of history with approaches and insights from other fields for over a quarter century. End Times is the culmination of his work to understand...

"This comprehensive history of how conquerors of the Eurasian steppes such as Attila the Hun and Genghis Khan focuses on the decisive role they played in world history."--

"A Place Called America takes the long view of the land's history from its earliest formation and inhabitants up through today. Meet those indigenous to the deserts, prairies, forests, and shores of the land called Turtle Island and their relatives who contributed to World War II and whose ideas founded the basis of the Constitution. Meet immigrant communities, who came to the land from all around the world--at different times and against all odds,...

"Few, if any, historians have brought such insight, wisdom, and empathy to public discourse as Jill Lepore. Arriving at The New Yorker in 2005, Lepore, with her panoptical range and razor-sharp style, brought a transporting freshness and a literary vivacity to everything from profiles of long-dead writers to urgent constitutional analysis to an unsparing scrutiny of the woeful affairs of the nation itself. The astonishing essays collected in The Deadline...

"A magnificent, foundational reckoning with how Black Americans have used the written word to define and redefine themselves, in resistance to the lies of racism and often in heated disagreement with each other, over the course of the country's history. Distilled over many years from Henry Louis Gates, Jr.'s legendary Harvard introductory course in African American Studies, The Black Box: Writing the Race, is the story of Black self-definition in...

"Walking Rhode Island is your guide to 40 of the most scenic, natural and historic trails in the state. Casual walkers, families and experienced hikers can pick from easy, moderate and challenging hikes of various distances. Each trail has descriptions of the geological features, wildlife, vegetation and historic landmarks you'll find, directions to the trailheads, pictures, maps, trail tips and other information to make the most of your journey."--...

"All human societies, from prehistory through to today, have been characterized by some degree of economic inequality. Arguably, complex societies would not have thrived if they had been unable to concentrate and redistribute resources effectively. We frequently talk about the top 5% or 1% today but, as Guido Alfani explains in this book, concerns about the rich and super-rich and their potential to influence contemporary politics and society are...