France

In this New York Times best seller, award-winning author Simon Schama presents an ebullient country, vital and inventive, infatuated with novelty and technology - a strikingly fresh view of Louis XVI's France.... 

Renowned World War Two historian James Holland presents an entirely new perspective on one of the most important moments in recent history....

Napoleon Bonaparte lived one of the most extraordinary of all human lives....

Through a stellar cast of politicians, diplomats, spies and soldiers, including T. E. Lawrence, Winston Churchill and Charles de Gaulle, A Line in the Sand vividly tells the story of the short but crucial era when Britain and France ruled the Middle East....

Crécy is a story of past and present. It is a new history of one of the most important battles of the Middle Ages: the battle of Crécy, in which the outnumbered English under King Edward III won a decisive victory over the French and changed the course of the Hundred Years War....

From the massively popular podcaster and New York Times best-selling author comes the story of the Marquis de Lafayette's lifelong quest to protect the principles of democracy, told through the lens of the three revolutions he participated in....

A celebration of 25 years of Provençal living - of lessons learned and changes observed - with his final book, Peter Mayle has crafted a lasting love letter to his adopted home, marked by his signature warmth, wit, and humor....

From the author of Bridge of Spies comes a dramatic and colourful new account of the most daring British commando raid of World War Two....

France: An Adventure History is a profoundly original and endlessly entertaining history of France, from the first century BC to the present day, based on countless new discoveries and thirty years of exploring France on foot, by bicycle and in the library....

In December 1943, with the rising realization that the Allies are planning to invade Fortress Europe, Field Marshal Erwin Rommel is assigned the title of General Inspector for the Atlantic Wall. His mission is to assess their readiness....

Despite the importance of Europe's politics, economy and culture, there has not been - until now - a concise book to tell this story....

The landmark history of France and French culture in the 18th century, a winner of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize....

The first of two ground-breaking volumes on the Waterloo campaign, this audiobook is based upon a detailed analysis of sources old and new in four languages.... 

During World War II many escape-line organizations contributed to the Allied cause by funneling hundreds of servicemen out of occupied Europe. As the Germans tightened their noose, the risk of discovery only grew for the servicemen who needed safe passage across the Pyrenees....

The Years is a personal narrative of the period of 1941 to 2006 told through the lens of memory....

Marie Antoinette's dramatic life-story continues to arouse mixed emotions....

In six weeks in 1940, France was overrun by German troops and surrendered. One junior French general, refusing to accept defeat, made his way to England....

This audiobook narrated by Laurel Lefkow reflects on how our pursuit of happiness makes us unhappy....

When Company A of the US 116th Regiment landed on Omaha Beach in D-Day's first wave on June 6, 1944, it lost 96 percent of its effective strength. Sixteen teams of US engineers arriving in the second wave were unable to blow the beach obstacles....

The Algerian War lasted from 1954 to 1962. From the perspective of half a century, it looks less like the last colonial war than the first postmodern one....

In A New World Begins, Jeremy D. Popkin offers a riveting account of the revolution that puts the listener in the thick of the debates and the violence that led to the overthrow of the monarchy and the establishment of a new society....

An epic story of wasted opportunities and deadly miscalculations, Embers of War delves deep into the historical record to provide hard answers to the unanswered questions surrounding the demise of one Western power in Vietnam and the arrival of another....

Antony Beevor's Paris After Liberation: 1944-1949 is a remarkable historical account of the chaos and uncertainty that followed the liberation of Paris in August 1944....

Victoire is the story of an inspirational and multi-faceted hero: a passionate, courageous spy but one also fragile and desperate to belong. She embodies the moral complexity of Occupation and the bargaining between high ideals and dirty reality....

As an international war correspondent and radio commentator, William L. Shirer didn't just research the fall of France. He was there. In just six weeks, he watched the Third Reich topple one of the world's oldest military powers - and institute a rule of terror and paranoia....

Beginning with the Roman army's first recorded encounter with the Gauls and ending in the era of Emmanuel Macron, France takes listeners on an endlessly entertaining journey through French history. Robb conveys with wit and precision what it felt like to look over the shoulder of a young Louis XIV as he planned the vast garden of Versailles, and the dangerous thrill of having a seat at the French revolution. Some of the protagonists may be familiar, but appear here in a very different light—Caesar, Charlemagne, Louis XIV, Napoleon Bonaparte, General Charles de Gaulle.

The day of 9 Thermidor (July 27, 1794) is universally acknowledged as a major turning-point in the history of the French Revolution. At midnight, Maximilien Robespierre was planning to destroy one of the most dangerous plots that the Revolution had faced. By midnight at the close of the day, his world had been turned upside down. He was an outlaw, on the run, and himself wanted for conspiracy against the Republic. He shot himself shortly afterwards. Half-dead, the guillotine finished him off. The Fall of Robespierre provides an hour-by-hour analysis of these twenty-four hours.

Some historians have called the Seven Years’ War the first true world war, and they make a good point. Ultimately, this globally coordinated war involved five continents and at least 29 states and tribal confederacies, with a casualty toll in the millions and the maps forever altered. As part of the Seven Years’ War, the French and Indian War was the last in a long series of colonial conflicts between the French and British and also changed the map in America. At the end of the war, disputed borders were finally settled, and both empires were left reeling from the costs of war.

This book focuses on the history of several kings and queens. Learn about Anne Boleyn, her execution for treason, and her political and religious upheaval, and Bloody Mary, or Mary Tudor, the queen who took on the Protestant revolt. In France, learn about Charlemagne, King of the Franks, King of Lombardy, and Emperor of the Romans; Eleanor of Aquitaine, one of the wealthiest women in Western Europe; and Marie Antoinette, the last queen of France before the French Revolution. Last, return to England with Queen Victoria and Richard the Lionheart.

The battle of Crécy in 1346 is one of the most famous and widely studied military engagements in history. The repercussions of this battle were felt for hundreds of years, and the exploits of those fighting reached the status of legend. Yet cutting-edge research has shown that nearly everything that has been written about this dramatic event may be wrong. In this new study, Michael Livingston reveals how modern scholars have used archived manuscripts, satellite technologies and traditional fieldwork to help unlock what was arguably the battle’s greatest secret.