France

The definitive biography of the great soldier-statesman by the New York Times best-selling author of The Storm of War....

A never-before-told story of Virginia Hall, the American spy who changed the course of World War II, from the author of Clementine....

In this dazzling work of history, a Pulitzer Prize-winning author follows Benjamin Franklin to France for the crowning achievement of his career....

This is the story of a thousand years, a must-listen narrative history of ambitious aristocrats, family dysfunction, treachery, savage battles, luxury, and madness....

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....

Poisoner, despot, necromancer - the dark legend of Catherine de Medici is centuries old. In this critically hailed biography, Leonie Frieda reclaims the story of this unjustly maligned queen to reveal a skilled ruler battling extraordinary political and personal odds....

Peter Mayle personally recounts the pleasures and frustrations of Provençal life--sharing in a way no one else can, the unique and endearing culture that is Provence....

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....

Bernard Cornwell combines his storytelling skills with a meticulously researched history to give a riveting chronicle of every dramatic moment from Napoleon's daring escape from Elba....

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....

General Alex Dumas is a man almost unknown today, yet his story is strikingly familiar—because his son, the novelist Alexandre Dumas, used his larger-than-life feats as inspiration for such classics as The Count of Monte Cristo and The Three Musketeers....

Here is the enthralling story of the American artists, writers, doctors, politicians, architects, and others who set off for Paris in the years between 1830 and 1900....

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....

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

Historian Rachel Chrastil presents a definitive new history of the war that toppled the French Empire, unified Germany, and set Europe on the path to World War I....

Desmond Seward's critically acclaimed account of the Hundred Years War brings to life all of the intrigue, beauty, and royal to-the-death-fighting of that legendary century-long conflict.

Francia, desgarrada por luchas entre clanes y facciones, mientras los impuestos aplastan a la población y la peste asuela el país, se ve amenazada por Inglaterra, que apresa al monarca en la batalla de Poitiers.

The Cartiers is the revealing tale of a jewelry dynasty—four generations, from revolutionary France to the 1970s....

When the French designer Christian Dior presented his first collection in Paris in 1947, he changed fashion forever. Dior's "New Look" created a striking, romantic vision of femininity, luxury, and grace, making him - and his last name - famous overnight....

Julian Jackson uses Petain's three-week trial as a lens through which to examine one of history's great moral dilemmas....

While the Civil War raged in America, another very different revolution was beginning to take shape across the Atlantic, in the studios of Paris....

Mary Louise Roberts turns the conventional narrative of D-Day on its head, taking listeners across the Channel to view the invasion anew. Roberts builds her history from an impressive range of gripping first-person accounts by French citizens throughout the region....

When a Parisian crowd stormed the Bastille in July 1789, it triggered an event of global consequence: the overthrow of the monarchy and the birth of a new society.

Getting Lost is the diary Annie Ernaux kept during the year and a half she had a secret love affair with a younger married man, a Russian diplomat. Her novel, Simple Passion, was based on this affair, but here her writing is immediate, unfiltered....

John Julius Norwich - called a "true master of narrative history" by Simon Sebag Montefiore - returns with the book he has spent his distinguished career wanting to write, A History of France, a portrait of the past two centuries of the country he loves best....

Step into the enigmatic world of the Parisian past with "The Face of a Mystery: Unraveling the Story of L'Inconnue de la Seine." Delve deep into the heart of a century-old Parisian enigma that continues to fascinate and perplex even the most seasoned historians and sleuths. The tale of the unknown woman of the Seine is a captivating blend of beauty and tragedy, a chronicle steeped in mystery and spun through the loom of time. This immersive book challenges you to explore beyond the known narrative, introducing you to the captivating layers of intrigue that remain unexplored. Journey into ...

Though Napoleon’s unquenchable thirst for military adventurism eventually cost him both his throne and his freedom during the Napoleonic Wars of the late 18th and early 19th centuries, the French emperor was not easily defeated even when most of Europe's nations united against him. In 1812, Napoleon's Russian adventure gutted his veteran army, depriving him of the majority of his finest and most loyal soldiers. Those who remained formed the hard core of his new armies, but the Russian fiasco damaged their health and embittered their previously unquestioning loyalty.

This volume in a series of world history case studies explores the life and relationships of Julie de Lespinasse, a thirty-four-year old woman who broke with convention and opened her own salon in Paris in 1764. What she created was a place where both established and nascent intellectuals were free to express themselves candidly. The novelty of that atmosphere regularly allowed Lespinasse to attract the leading figures of the Enlightenment to her salon, including d'Alembert, Diderot, Hume, and Rousseau. What emerges from these interactions and Lespinasse’s biography is a new perspective ...

Napoleon Bonaparte's Greatest War Speeches. Adapted in English by David Serero.

When a Parisian crowd stormed the Bastille in July 1789, it triggered an event of global consequence: the overthrow of the monarchy and the birth of a new society. Most historians account for the French Revolution by viewing it in retrospect as the outcome of underlying conditions such as a faltering economy, social tensions, or the influence of Enlightenment thought. But what did Parisians themselves think they were doing—how did they understand their world? What were the motivations and aspirations that guided their actions?