Catherine of Siena
A Passionate Life
An all-new biography of the great mystic and saint Catherine of Siena. It presents a moving, lucid portrait of the strong-minded and fiery young woman who campaigned for peace and struggled to reform the church during the turbulent 14th century, and became one of our most beloved spiritual figures.
History/Biography 304 pages
Cloth $24.95
9781933346281
Winged Wonders
A Celebration of Birds
in Human History
Winged Wonders celebrates the powerful presence of birds in art and language, in legends and myth, in the sacred books of the ancients and in spiritual symbolism, in proverbial sayings, in nursery rhymes and poetry, in visual imagery and heraldry, in music, dance, and folk customs around the world and throughout history.
“Leave it to the English to draw together, in one slim, delightful volume, nearly all that need be said about birds and humans and their long, complex relationship in history, folklore, and literature.”
—The Wall Street Journal
Nature/History 224 pages
Trade Paper $12.95
9781933346298
(Also available in cloth, 9781933346076)
Revolutionary Spirits
The Enlightened Faith of
America’s Founding Fathers
Revolutionary Spirits confronts many of the later myths about the religious views of America’s Founders, and brings to life their complex creeds and personalities. It offers clear and candid portraits of Franklin, Washington, Paine, Adams, Jefferson, and Madison as both religious reformers and political rebels, and reclaims their spiritual inheritance for today.
“Kowalski seeks to shatter what he regards as a myth, commonly exhorted by politicians and religious groups. His spiritual portraits... argue that the founding fathers were neither devout Christians nor secularists.”
—USA Today
History/Biography 224 pages
Trade Paper $13.95
9781933346304
(Also available in cloth, 9781933346090)
Mr. Langshaw’s
Square Piano
The Story of the First Pianos and How They Caused a Cultural Revolution
A handwritten serial number inside a neglected Broadwood square piano built in 1807 leads Madeline Goold on a captivating quest to uncover the remarkable history of these now almost forgotten musical instruments.
“A wealth of fascinating stories and characters...One of the strengths of Ms. Goold’s fine book is showing us how the presence of pianos expanded and deepened the cultural life...Ms. Goold has herself produced an enchanting work.”
—The Wall Street Journal
History/Music 288 pages
Cloth $24.95
9781933346212
One Hundred Great
French Books
From the Middle Ages
to the Present
Concise, provocative, and entertaining, One Hundred Great French Books features many of the famous classics of French literature across ten centuries, but also political and philosophical texts, detective novels and science fiction, and much more. Each entry provides a book’s historic and cultural context, author background, and key information about the author, and a summary of its content.
Literary Criticism 240 pages
Trade Paper $15.95
9781933346229
The Great
Medieval Heretics
Five Centuries of Religious Dissent
Replete with terror, passion, and hope, this gripping narrative history explores the intricate mysteries of medieval Europe through the lives of the great heretics whose beliefs and practices challenged the teachings of an all-powerful church. Five centuries of social and spiritual turmoil are covered through a vivid and telling mix of events, personalities, and ideas.
“Frassetto admirably demonstrates that many who were declared heretics have much to teach us and some may not have been as far from orthodoxy as originally thought.”
—Library Journal
History 256 pages
Trade Paper $15.95
9781933346236
(Also available in cloth, 9781933346120)
The Last Divine Office
Henry VIII and the
Dissolution of the Monasteries
Geoffrey Moorhouse explores the enormous upheaval caused by the English Reformation, drawing for his sources on material that has lain forgotten in one of the world’s great cathedrals. He recreates in vivid detail what life was like in a major monastery before the Dissolution began in 1536, and how that life was forever transformed on the orders of King Henry VIII.
“[An] elegant narrative.”
—The Boston Globe
“Geoffrey Moorhouse has written an absorbing, detailed and scrupulously fair account of this English revolution.”
—The Daily Telegraph (U.K.)
History 304 pages
Cloth $24.95
9781933346182
The Frozen Ship
The Histories and Tales
of Polar Exploration
The Frozen Ship examines the most influential, popular, and intriguing accounts of journeys into the eternal ice—from Viking settlers and Renaissance conquerors to Robert Falcon Scott and Ernest Shackleton, and from the tales of Parry, Franklin, Nansen, and Byrd to the forgotten stories of women at the poles.
“This remarkable book offers the most vivid account yet of polar exploration.”
—Booklist
“Moss...writes well on the hold the frozen wastelands have always had on the imagination.”
—The New York Review
of Books
History 256 pages
Trade Paper $13.95
9781933346205
(Also available in cloth, 9781933346038)
The Angelic Way
Angels through the Ages
and Their Meaning for Us
The Angelic Way illuminates the spiritual, philosophical, and psychological implications of angels. It offers an accessible history of angels in our varied religious and cultural traditions, an exploration of angelology through the ages, and a means to make sense of angels and the divine in today’s world.
“Shapiro’s The Angelic Way delves into the many ways that angels have captivated human thought and helped us find ways to express our understanding of the divine.”
—Los Angeles Times
Spirituality 240 pages
Trade Paper $15.95
9781933346199
The Popes of Avignon
A Century in Exile
This narrative history masterfully weaves together the sweeping events surrounding the so-called “Babylonian captivity” of the popes into the broader story of 14th-century Europe, a turbulent time of transition between Middle Ages and Renaissance when seven successive popes resided in Avignon in the south of France.
“Mullins...spans the intriguing 70 years of the Avignon papacy with this highly readable narrative...he draws readers into this fascinating period of the church’s ‘Babylonian captivity.’”
—Library Journal
History 256 pages
Cloth $24.95
9781933346151
Cluny
In Search of God’s Lost Empire
A monastery like no other, this is Cluny’s story from humble beginnings in the early Middle Ages, through centuries of immense wealth and sacred glory, to its decline, destroyed by the French Revolution. Much of Cluny’s enduring legacy lies in great cultural innovations sponsored by the abbey.
“Mullins’s affection and admiration for Cluny provide a glimpse into a mostly forgotten medieval abbey.”
—Publishers Weekly
“Only ruins remain of Cluny’s once glorious past. This book seeks to recapture that past, its architecture, its sculpture, its idealism.”
—The Dallas Morning News
History 256 pages
Trade Paper $14.95
9781933346175
(Also available in cloth, 9781933346007)
The Search for Spirituality
Our Global Quest
for a Spiritual Life
Ursula King offers a comprehensive overview of the incredibly rich and diverse spiritual landscapes of our world, and explores the global search for a spiritual life at an individual and social level, inside and outside religious traditions, and in the secular world.
“King has written a remarkably wide-ranging book that touches briefly on many aspects of the spiritual life across the world...both our need for spirituality and how we have sought to address that need through nature, science, and the arts.”
—Library Journal
Spirituality 256 pages
Cloth $24.95
9781933346144
The Gift of Years
Growing Older Gracefully
The Gift of Years looks at the many dimensions of aging, the purposes and concerns, struggles and surprises, the potential and joys, and invites us to embrace older age as a natural part of life that is deeply rewarding.
“Chittister beautifully downplays regrets and accents the rewards of a mature life. While she acknowledges the pain of old age, she focuses on the new beginnings that life can offer at this stage and discusses the need to stay involved, to put one’s affairs in order, and to be open to new relationships.”
—Library Journal
Spirituality/Self-Help 240 pages
Cloth $19.95
9781933346106
Simple Ways
Towards the Sacred
A lucid, poetic, and practical primer for prayer, meditation, and mindful living. Offers a wide range of accessible ways towards the Sacred in our daily lives: With Our Bodies, In Our Dwellings, With Our Everyday Things, and In Our Gratitude. No matter what our spiritual background, these ways are completely available to any of us.
Spirituality/Self-Help 160 pages
Cloth $18.95
9781933346113
Horse
How the Horse
Has Shaped Civilizations
Drawing on archaeology, biology, art, literature, and ethnography, Horse illuminates the relationship between humans and horses throughout history. It shares stories of horses at work, at war, and at play, in paintings, books, and movies, and ponders the intelligence of horses, their skill and strength as well as their grace and beauty.
“A paean to the horse, our ambassador between the wild and the civilized...Ambitious and sweeping.”
—The Washington Post
“Both as a genuine labor of love and awe and as a treasure trove of equinalia, Horse is bound to find many delighted fans.”
—Los Angeles Times
Nature/History 288 pages
Trade Paper $13.95
9781933346137
(Also available in cloth, 9780974240596)
The Door of No Return
The History of Cape Coast Castle and the Atlantic Slave Trade
Called one of the best books of the year by The Economist, the London Times, and Publishers Weekly, this is the gripping history of Cape Coast Castle in Ghana, the African headquarters of the British slave trade for nearly one hundred and fifty years—until the legal trade was abolished in 1807.
“A readable and detailed account of Britain’s role in the slave trade between West Africa and the United States, Brazil and the Caribbean...Surprisingly, the records of Cape Coast Castle had scarcely been touched before St Clair began delving into them, sifting through records and ledgers, letters and notes.”
—The New York Times
“St Clair shines a light at the heart of the shame.”
—The Economist
History 288 pages
Trade Paper $15.95
9781933346168
(Also available in cloth, 9781933346052)
One Hundred Great Catholic Books
From the Early Centuries
to the Present
Don Brophy offers succinct, thoughtful, and entertaining introductions to one hundred classics of Catholic literature past and present, ranging from biography, spirituality, theology, and poetry to history, mystical writings, and fiction. Written for seekers of every faith tradition, this book offers an illuminating gateway to some of the great achievements of the human heart and mind.
“Don Brophy is eminently qualified...and carries it out beautifully...any person...who is passionate about books will find a kind of spiritual catechism.”
—Publishers Weekly
Literary Criticism/Spirituality
240 pages Trade Paper $16.00
9781933346083
Wise Choices
A Spiritual Guide to Making Life’s Decisions
Wise Choices takes the guesswork out of the decision-making process and offers a systematic and concise approach to making the right choices. Written in gentle, poetic prose full of compassion and insight, it encourages us to trust the processes of our own heart and mind as we make life’s many decisions.
“Peppered with practical advice...[Silf's] commitment to decision making is careful, forward looking and informed by a sense of responsibility to oneself and to the world.”
—Publishers Weekly
Self-Help/Spirituality 128 pages
Trade Paper $14.00
9781933346045
Enough Room for Joy
The Early Days of
Jean Vanier’s L’Arche
This firsthand account details the life of Jean Vanier and his L’Arche movement—a revolutionary experience of living in community that started in 1964. It came to be known as a diverse place of refuge that gave its inhabitants hope. Today, L’Arche is a worldwide movement with over 130 communities in 30 countries.
“L’Arche became for me the place where I really came home. There is nothing in me that desires to go anywhere else.”
—Henri Nouwen
Inspirational 144 pages
Trade Paper $14.95
9781933346069
