A sweeping history of the Spanish Civil War, told through nine American and British characters including Hemingway and George Orwell. It was a war between fascism, communism, and democracy that preceded World War II, and a tale of idealism and a noble cause that failed.

From the acclaimed author of "Agent Zigzag" comes an extraordinary account of the most successful deception--and certainly the strangest--ever carried out in World War II, one that changed the prospects for an Allied victory. The purpose of the plan--code named Operation Mincemeat--was to deceive the Nazis into thinking that Allied forces were planning to attack southern Europe by way of Greece or Sardinia, rather than Sicily, as the Nazis had assumed,...

Integrates the political, social and cultural history of the Spanish Civil War. It sets out the domestic and international context of the war for a general readership. In addition to tracing the course of war, the book locates the war's origins in the cumulative social and cultural anxieties provoked by a process of rapid, uneven and accelerating modernism taking place all over Europe. From the Publisher: Amid the many catastrophes of the twentieth...

Madrid, 1957. Under the fascist dictatorship of General Francisco Franco, Spain is hiding a dark secret. Meanwhile, tourists and foreign businessmen flood into the country under the welcoming guise of sunshine and wine. Among them is eighteen-year-old Daniel Matheson, the son of a Texas oil tycoon, who arrives in Madrid with his parents hoping to connect with the country of his mother's birth through the lens of his camera. Photography--and fate--introduce...

October 1936. Spanish architect Ignacio Abel arrives at Penn Station, the final stop on his journey from war-torn Madrid, where he has left behind his wife and children, abandoning them to uncertainty. Crossing the fragile borders of Europe, he reflects on months of fratricidal conflict in his embattled country, his own transformation from a bricklayer's son to a respected bourgeois husband and professional, and the all-consuming love affair with

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"When the Musketeers pursue the dangerous Michel Dinicoeur to Spain, they're ambushed at every turn, causing them to suspect that there may be a traitor within their own ranks"--

Five interrelated families -- American, German, Russian, English, Welsh -- enter a time of enormous social, political, and economic turmoil, beginning with the rise of the Third Reich, through the Spanish Civil War and the great dramas of World War II, up to the explosions of the American and Soviet atomic bombs. Carla von Ulrich, born of German and English parents, finds her life engulfed by the Nazi tide until she commits a deed of great courage...

In the waning days and immediate aftermath of World War II, Nazi diplomats and spies based in Spain decided to stay rather than return to a defeated Germany. The decidedly pro-German dictatorship of General Francisco Franco gave them refuge and welcomed other officials and agents from the Third Reich who had escaped and made their way to Iberia. Amid fears of a revival of the Third Reich, Allied intelligence and diplomatic officers developed a repatriation...

One of the greatest cautionary tales in Spanish history comes to life as Cullen explores the controversial reign of Juana of Castile--also known as Juana the Mad. Sweeping, page-turning, and wholly entertaining, "Reign of Madness" is historical fiction at its richly satisfying best.