Caleb Carr

Uses contemporary documents to explore the development of the Cold War struggle, the consequences in the 1950s and 1960s, and the lasting effects on American social and cultural patterns.

In The Lessons of Terror, novelist and military historian Caleb Carr examines terrorism throughout history and the roots of our present crisis and reaches a provocative set of conclusions: the practice of targeting enemy civilians is as old as warfare itself; it has always failed as a military and political tactic; and despite the dramatic increases in its scope and range of weapons, it will continue to fail in the future.International terrorism--the victimization of unarmed civilians in an attempt to affect their support for the government that leads them--is a phrase with which Americans have become all too familiar recently. Yet while at first glance terrorism seems a relatively modern phenomenon, Carr illustrates that it has been a constant of military history. In ancient times, warring armies raped and slaughtered civilians and gratuitously destroyed property, homes, and cities; in the Middle Ages, evangelical Muslims and Christian crusaders spread their faiths by the sword; and in the early modern era, such celebrated kings as Louis XIV revealed a taste for victimizing noncombatants for political purposes.It was during the Civil War that Americans themselves first engaged in "total war," the most egregious of the many euphemisms for the tactics of terror. Under the leadership of such generals as Stonewall Jackson, the forces of the South tried to systematize this horrifying practice; but it fell to a Union general, William Tecumseh Sherman, to achieve that dubious goal. Carr recounts Sherman's declaration of war on every man, woman, and child in the South--a policy that he himself knew was badly flawed, had nothing to do with his military successes (indeed, it hampered them), and brought long-term unrest to the American South by giving birth to the Ku Klux Klan.Carr's exploration of terror reveals its consistently self-defeating nature. Far from prompting submission, Carr argues, terrorism stiffens enemy resolve: for this reason above all, terrorism has never achieved--nor will it ever achieve--long-term success, however physically destructive and psychologically debilitating it may become. With commanding authority and the storyteller's gift for which he is renowned, Caleb Carr provides a critical historical context for understanding terrorist acts today, arguing that terrorism will be eradicated only when it is perceived as a tactic that brings nothing save defeat to its agents.

In one of the most critically acclaimed novels of the year, Caleb Carr-- bestselling author of The Alienist--pits Dr. Laszlo Kreizler and his colleagues against a murderer as evil as the darkest night. . . .From the Paperback edition.

The year is 1896, the place, New York City. On a cold March night New York Times reporter John Schuyler Moore is summoned to the East River by his friend and former Harvard classmate Dr. Laszlo Kreizler, a psychologist, or "alienist." On the unfinished Williamsburg Bridge, they view the horribly mutilated body of an adolescent boy, a prostitute from one of Manhattan's infamous brothels. The newly appointed police commissioner, Theodore Roosevelt, in a highly unorthodox move, enlists the two men in the murder investigation, counting on the reserved Kreizler's intellect and Moore's knowledge of New York's vast criminal underworld. They are joined by Sara Howard, a brave and determined woman who works as a secretary in the police department. Laboring in secret (for alienists, and the emerging discipline of psychology, are viewed by the public with skepticism at best), the unlikely team embarks on what is a revolutionary effort in criminology-- amassing a psychological profile of the man they're looking for based on the details of his crimes. Their dangerous quest takes them into the tortured past and twisted mind of a murderer who has killed before. and will kill again before the hunt is over. Fast-paced and gripping, infused with a historian's exactitude, The Alienist conjures up the Gilded Age and its untarnished underside: verminous tenements and opulent mansions, corrupt cops and flamboyant gangsters, shining opera houses and seamy gin mills. Here is a New York during an age when questioning society's belief that all killers are born, not made, could have unexpected and mortal consequences.From the Paperback edition.

A courageous leader who became the first American mandarin, Frederick Townsend Ward won crucial victories for the Emperor of China during the Taiping Rebellion, history's bloodiest civil war. Carr's skills as historian and storyteller come to the fore in this thrilling account of the kind of adventurer the world no longer sees.

Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson are summoned to the aid of Queen Victoria in Scotland by a telegram from Holmes’ brother, Mycroft, a royal advisor. Rushed northward on a royal train—and nearly murdered themselves en route—the pair are soon joined by Mycroft, and learn of the brutal killings of two of the Queen’s servants, a renowned architect and his foreman, both of whom had been working on the renovation of the famous and forbidding Royal Palace of Holyrood, in Edinburgh. Mycroft has enlisted his brother to help solve the murders that may be key elements of a much more elaborate and pernicious plot on the Queen’s life. But the circumstances of the two victims’ deaths also call to Holmes’ mind the terrible murder—in Holyrood—of "The Italian Secretary," David Rizzio. Only Rizzio, a music teacher and confidante of Mary, Queen of Scots, was murdered three centuries ago. Holmes proceeds to alarm Watson with the announcement that the Italian Secretary’s vengeful spirit may have taken the lives of the two men as punishment for disturbing the scene of his assassination. Critically acclaimed, bestselling author Caleb Carr’s brilliant new offering takes the Conan Doyle tradition to remarkable new heights with this spellbinding tale.

Thinking that he had glimpsed the face of Evil as a witness to atrocities committed on the innocent during WWII, Lankester Merrin lost his faith in his fellow man and the Almighty. He renounced his vocation, and is now an archaeologist in Africa. A collector of rare comes to him with an odd request. An old Christian Byzantine church has been unearthed in Kenya, surprisingly intact, as if it were buried right after its completion. Merrin is asked to find an ancient relic hidden within the church before a British expedition can. Interested, Merrin agrees to take the job. Beneath the church, something much older and malevolent sleeps, waiting to be awoken. The blood of innocents flows freely, but the horror has only just begun. In the place where Evil was born, Merrin will finally see its true face.

The USS Enterprise is on patrol near the Romulan neutral zone and the crew is experiencing unusual dreams. Captain James T. Kirk and Science Officer Spock both confess that they are having dreams that Spock is Captain of the ship and Kirk is an Ensign. Kirk informs Spock that Starfleet intelligence has discovered that the Romulans are attempting to use time travel and are sending more ships to investigate. Captain Kirk goes to sleep, and awakes as Ensign Kirk on the VSS ShiKahr, which appears to otherwise be the Enterprise. The Ensign is a drug addled ex-convict who has been on board for only a day. The Romulans had attempted to travel back in time and destroy the Federation, but they instead created a Federation dominated by Vulcans. They shielded a ship from the changes and compare the differences, realising that it needs to be reversed. Meanwhile, Captain Spock begins to act protectively of Ensign Kirk, but the Captain is injured on an away mission. After Doctor McCoy conducts a series of mental scans, the crew of the ShiKahr realise that history has been altered. The Romulans plot to use Kirk to force Spock to impersonate their leader. Spock mindmelds with Kirk, each realising their personas from the main timeline. Romulan agents board the ShiKahr and capture Kirk. Spock agrees to their demands and travels with them. Whilst en route, Spock enters pon farr and finds that he is linked to Kirk, but mates with the Romulan Thea to allow it to pass. They retrieve Kirk, and discover that taking Kirk and Spock was a ploy to have them both travel back in time to stop the Romulan agents from preventing the formation of the Federation. They travel back in time and disable the agents, but Spock is seriously injured and dying. Kirk and Spock mindmeld as reality shifts once more and restores the original timeline.

An epic account about the kingdom of Broken follows the efforts of a solitary noble soldier to confront legendary medieval adversaries to save a fortress city from internal and external dangers. "Some years ago, a remarkable manuscript long rumored to exist was discovered: The Legend of Broken. It tells of a prosperous fortress city where order reigns at the point of a sword--even as scheming factions secretly vie for control of the surrounding kingdom. Meanwhile, outside the city's granite walls, an industrious tribe of exiles known as the Bane forages for sustenance in the wilds of Davon Wood. At every turn, the lives of Broken's defenders and its would-be destroyers intertwine: Sixt Arnem, the widely respected and honorable head of the kingdom's powerful army, grapples with his conscience and newfound responsibilities amid rumors of impending war. Lord Baster-kin, master of the Merchants' Council, struggles to maintain the magnificence of his kingdom even as he pursues vainglorious dreams of power. And Keera, a gifted female tracker of the Bane tribe, embarks on a perilous journey to save her people, enlisting the aid of the notorious and brilliant philosopher Caliphestros. Together, they hope to exact a ruinous revenge on Broken, ushering in a day of reckoning when the mighty walls will be breached forever in a triumph of science over superstition"--Dust jacket.