The Very Best Men is the story of the CIA's early days as told through the careers of four glamorous, daring, and idealistic men who ran covert operations for the government from the end of World War II to Vietnam. Evan Thomas re-creates the personal dramas and sometimes tragic lives of Frank Wisner, Richard Bissell, Tracy Barnes, and Desmond FitzGerald, who risked everything to contain the Soviet threat. Within the inner circles of Washington, they were regarded as the best and the brightest. They planned and acted to keep the country out of war—by stealth and “political action” and to do by cunning and sleight of hand what great armies could not, must not be allowed to do. In the end, they were too idealistic and too honorable, and were unsuited for the dark, duplicitous life of spying. Their hubris and naïveté led them astray, producing both sensational coups and spectacular blunders like the Bay of Pigs and the failed assassination attempts on foreign leaders in the early 1960s. Thomas draws on the CIA's own secret histories, to which he has had exclusive access, as well as extensive interviews, to bring to life a crucial piece of American history.

"The sacrifice of Canadian soldiers in the Second World War was staggering. Over the course of the conflict, more than one million Canadians served in the Canadian Army, the Royal Canadian Navy, the Royal Canadian Airforce, and in forces across the British Commonwealth, including the Royal Airforce. More than 44,000 Canadians were killed in the war, and more than 54,000 were left wounded. In Four Who Dared, author and historian Ken Cothliff lifts four Canadian volunteer pilots out of obscurity, highlighting their personal stories and acts of heroism. The four pilots in this book were unknown to each other, but they are forever united in their quest to serve their country and its allies in an unprecedented hour of need. Reg Lane joined British Bomber Command relatively early in the War, rising from NCO pilot to become a Master Bomber with the elite Pathfinder Force. Jim Moffat ended his flying combat career after twelve operations, becoming a Resistance fighter on the European mainland. Steve Puskas's comprehensive diaries and unpublished writings provide extraordinary insight into his training as part of the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan, an experience familiar to many Commonwealth and British aircrew. Bill Gracie, a Scot who had immigrated to Canada as a boy, was keen to take up the fight when the war began, with the sole aim of becoming aircrew. Sadly, he was one of the over ten thousand Canadian Bomber Command aircrew who never returned home. Equal parts riveting and humbling, Four Who Dared is a must-read for anyone interested in delving into the lives and sacrifices of our unsung Canadian heroes."--

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • Brené Brown has taught us what it means to dare greatly, rise strong, and brave the wilderness. Now, based on new research conducted with leaders, change makers, and culture shifters, she’s showing us how to put those ideas into practice so we can step up and lead. Don’t miss the five-part HBO Max docuseries Brené Brown: Atlas of the Heart! NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY BLOOMBERG Leadership is not about titles, status, and wielding power. A leader is anyone who takes responsibility for recognizing the potential in people and ideas, and has the courage to develop that potential. When we dare to lead, we don’t pretend to have the right answers; we stay curious and ask the right questions. We don’t see power as finite and hoard it; we know that power becomes infinite when we share it with others. We don’t avoid difficult conversations and situations; we lean into vulnerability when it’s necessary to do good work. But daring leadership in a culture defined by scarcity, fear, and uncertainty requires skill-building around traits that are deeply and uniquely human. The irony is that we’re choosing not to invest in developing the hearts and minds of leaders at the exact same time as we’re scrambling to figure out what we have to offer that machines and AI can’t do better and faster. What can we do better? Empathy, connection, and courage, to start. Four-time #1 New York Times bestselling author Brené Brown has spent the past two decades studying the emotions and experiences that give meaning to our lives, and the past seven years working with transformative leaders and teams spanning the globe. She found that leaders in organizations ranging from small entrepreneurial startups and family-owned businesses to nonprofits, civic organizations, and Fortune 50 companies all ask the same question: How do you cultivate braver, more daring leaders, and how do you embed the value of courage in your culture? In this new book, Brown uses research, stories, and examples to answer these questions in the no-BS style that millions of readers have come to expect and love. Brown writes, “One of the most important findings of my career is that daring leadership is a collection of four skill sets that are 100 percent teachable, observable, and measurable. It’s learning and unlearning that requires brave work, tough conversations, and showing up with your whole heart. Easy? No. Because choosing courage over comfort is not always our default. Worth it? Always. We want to be brave with our lives and our work. It’s why we’re here.” Whether you’ve read Daring Greatly and Rising Strong or you’re new to Brené Brown’s work, this book is for anyone who wants to step up and into brave leadership.

A Newbery Honor Book author has written a powerful and gripping novel about a youth in Nazi Germany who tells the truth about Hitler. Susan Campbell Bartoletti has taken one episode from her Newbery Honor Book, Hitler Youth, and fleshed it out into thought-provoking novel. When 16-year-old Helmut Hubner listens to the BBC news on an illegal short-wave radio, he quickly discovers Germany is lying to the people. But when he tries to expose the truth with leaflets, he's tried for treason. Sentenced to death and waiting in a jail cell, Helmut's story emerges in a series of flashbacks that show his growth from a naive child caught up in the patriotism of the times , to a sensitive and mature young man who thinks for himself.

The proving ground on which we stand as women is comprised of milestones achieved by our visionary sisters of past and present. a tribute to trailblazing women from all walks of life, this concise volume includes photographs, quotations, and brief biographies of notable women, from Susan B. Anthony to Hillary Clinton, who opened doors for those who followed.

Dare to Make History is the story of two courageous and talented women who weren’t willing to accept anything less than being treated as equals. On their journey to a gold medal in women’s ice hockey, they became role models for generations before and after them. Twins Jocelyne Lamoureux-Davidson and Monique Lamoureux-Morando started playing ice hockey with their four older brothers and their friends on a frozen pond next to their home in North Dakota. No girls hockey teams, no problem―they just played on boys teams. They went on to win six World Championships and played in three Olympics, winning two silver medals and ultimately a gold medal in South Korea in 2018 for the USA Women’s National Team. They did not allow roadblocks and discrimination deter them from taking on their governing body—USA Hockey—threatening to boycott the 2017 World Championships and jeopardizing their ability to compete in the 2018 Olympics unless their gender equity issues were addressed. The success of Monique, Jocelyne, and their team thrust them into the center of the struggle for gender equity, for women in hockey and in sports in general, as well as in society at large. In Dare to Make History, the Lamoureux twins chronicle their journey to the pinnacle of their sport, their efforts along with almost 150 other hockey players to start a new professional women’s hockey league, their training to come back and make another national team after giving birth, their tireless efforts to advance the interests of disadvantaged communities in closing the digital divide, and their ongoing contributions as role models championing the dreams of future generations of girls in sports, education, and the workplace. This is not a hockey book. It is not a girls book. It is a book about the importance of the fight for equity, particularly gender equity. It is the inspirational story of how two young women from a small town in North Dakota have dreamed big—had the courage to take on huge battles—and in the end how they have dared to make history.

John Randal, an American lieutenant serving in the British Army, joins the first British commando troop during World War II, but must face grueling training in Scotland and growing pains with his comrades during their first missions.

A captivating blend of personal biography and public drama, The Wise Men introduces the original best and brightest, leaders whose outsized personalities and actions brought order to postwar chaos: Averell Harriman, the freewheeling diplomat and Roosevelt's special envoy to Churchill and Stalin; Dean Acheson, the secretary of state who was more responsible for the Truman Doctrine than Truman and for the Marshall Plan than General Marshall; George Kennan, self-cast outsider and intellectual darling of the Washington elite; Robert Lovett, assistant secretary of war, undersecretary of state, and secretary of defense throughout the formative years of the Cold War; John McCloy, one of the nation's most influential private citizens; and Charles Bohlen, adroit diplomat and ambassador to the Soviet Union.

Have you ever been led by someone who cared for you like family, and dared you to achieve more than you ever thought possible for yourself, your organization, and even society? Award-winning author of Hostage at the Table, George Kohlrieser, along with his co-authors Susan Goldsworthy and Duncan Coombe, explain how becoming a secure base leader releases extraordinary potential in others. Part of the Warren Bennis leadership series Care to Dare shows you how to become a Secure Base Leader so that you release your followers from the fears that get in the way of their performance. It shows you how you can unleash astonishing potential by building the trust, delivering the change, and inspiring the focus that underpins sustainable high performance. From extensive interviews with executives from all over the world, as well as from surveys with more than a thousand executives, the book reveals the nine characteristics that Secure Base Leaders display on a daily basis. The research shows that a primary difference between a successful leader and a failed leader is the presence or absence of secure bases in his or her life. Care to Dare will take you on a journey where you will discover your own secure bases, past and present, and determine how you can be a secure base for other people in your life at work and at home.

A compelling collection of speeches, articles, poetry, book excerpts, political cartoons, and more from the American antiwar tradition beginning with the War of 1812 offers the full range of the subject's richness and variety, with contributions from Daniel Webster, Mark Twain, Andrew Carnegie, Patrick Buchanan, and many others. Original.