Archives par étiquette : Javelin

WHEN THE STONES SPEAK de Doron Spielman

This is the untold story of the rediscovery of the ancient City of David in Jerusalem and the powerful evidence that proves the Jewish people’s historical and indigenous connection to the Holy Land.

WHEN THE STONES SPEAK:
The Remarkable Discovery of the City of David and What Israel’s Enemies Don’t Want You To Know
by Doron Spielman
Center Street, May 2025
(via Javelin)

Since the founding of Israel in 1948, the Jewish people have faced nine wars against multiple enemies. Yet, beyond the physical conflicts, a deeper ideological battle has been waged against Israel and the Jewish people. This war, crafted by certain Arab leaders and echoed by international organizations like the United Nations, seeks to erase the Jewish people’s ancestral ties to the land, casting them as outsiders, imposters, and “settlers.”

One thing, however, stands in the way of the denialists: the 3,800-year history of the City of David, a site lying just south of the Old City. Archeologists at the site are unearthing evidence that proves the Jewish people’s origin story in the land for over three millennia. Every shovel of dirt reveals that while others may claim to be indigenous to Jerusalem, the Jewish people are, in fact, more indigenous to the Land of Israel than perhaps any other group living anywhere in the world.

This is the timely story of those who transformed City of David from a neglected hilltop village into one of the most important archeological heritage sites in the world, while facing powerful global institutions and terror groups that would do almost anything to keep this truth hidden. Highly relevant to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, this book foreshadows the events and historical denialism that unfolded with Hamas’s attack on Israel on October 7, 2023.

Born and educated in the United States, Doron Spielman moved to Israel in 2000, where he serves as an international spokesperson in the Israel Defense Forces Reserves with the rank of Major. For over two decades, he has worked to transform the City of David into one of the world’s most significant archaeological and historical sites. He is a graduate of the Churchill National Security Program, a Senior Fellow at the Herut Center in Jerusalem, and a graduate of the University of Michigan.

CODE NAME BLUE WREN de Jim Popkin

A fantastic spy story with all the intrigue of a Le Carre novel, about Ana Montes, a Cuban spy within the US intelligence community who was trying to stay one step ahead of her sister, also a government official. One of the greatest spy stories you’ve never heard.

CODE NAME BLUE WREN:
The True Story of the Hunt for America’s Most Dangerous Female Spy
by Jim Popkin
Hanover Square Press, early 2023
(via Javelin)

In the aftermath of 9/11, Ana Montes was arrested by federal authorities after 17 years of feeding American secrets to the Cuban government.
The Cubans made a habit out of selling US intel to the highest bidders – Russia, Venezuela, Iran – and Ana Montes was a generous supplier of some of our nation’s biggest secrets. Her offenses were so grave she is called the most dangerous female spy in American history, and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld wanted her executed. The hunt for this dangerous spy – an operation codenamed BLUE WREN – has been an obsession for journalist Jim Popkin, who has written about this case in publications such as the Washington Post. He has unprecedented access to key characters in this story, including Ana’s sister, Lucy, who worked for the FBI. Lucy’s job: identifying Cuban spies.
This is a story about ideology, about betrayal, about the supersecret world of espionage (which the Cubans have mastered), and about two sisters who chose two very different paths.

Popkin’s cover story for the Washington Post Magazine, “The Queen of Cuba,” was selected as a “Page-Turner” by the New Yorker and named one of the “Great Post Reads” by the Washington Post.
A dramatic adaptation is already in the works.

Jim Popkin is a writer whose investigative articles and reports have appeared in the Washington Post Magazine, Newsweek, WIRED, Slate, The Guardian, Washingtonian and on National Public Radio.

COLLECTIVE ILLUSIONS de Todd Rose

Drawing on cutting-edge neuroscience, behavioral economic, and social psychology research, acclaimed author, former Harvard professor, and think tank founder Todd Rose reveals how so much of our thinking about each other is informed by false assumptions that drive bad decisions that make us dangerously mistrustful as a society and hopelessly unhappy as individuals.

COLLECTIVE ILLUSIONS:
Conformity, Complicity, and the Science of Why We Make Bad Decisions
by Todd Rose
Hachette Go, February 2022
(via Javelin)

The desire to fit in is one of the most powerful, least understood forces in a society. Todd Rose believes that as human beings we continually act against our own best interests out of our brains’ misunderstanding of what we think others believe.  A complicated set of illusions driven by conformity bias distorts how we see the world around us. From toilet paper shortages to kidneys that get thrown away rather than used for desperately needed organ transplants, from racial segregation to the perceived “electability” of women for political office, from bottled water to “cancel culture,” we routinely copy others, lie about what we believe, cling to tribes, and silence others. We are so profoundly social that when we are incongruent with the group that we do lasting damage to our self-worth, diminish our well-being and never realize our full potential. It’s why we all too often chase the familiar trappings of money, fame, and success that leave us feeling empty even when we do achieve them. It’s why we’ll blindly espouse a viewpoint we don’t necessarily believe in so that we blend in with the group. We trap ourselves in prisons of our own making that prevent us from living the happy, fulfilled lives we envision. The question is, Why do we keep believing the lies and hurting ourselves? Todd Rose reveals the answer is deeply hard-wired in our DNA, with brains that are more socially dependent than we realize or dare to accept. Most of us would rather be fully in sync with the social norms of our respective groups than true to who we are.
Using originally researched data, COLLECTIVE ILLUSIONS shows us where we get things wrong and just as important, how we can be authentic in forming our opinions while valuing truth. Rose offers a counterintuitive, empowering, and hopeful explanation for how we can bridge the inference gap, make decisions with a newfound clarity, and achieve fulfillment. Only then can we transform ourselves, and ultimately, society.

Social scientist Dr. Todd Rose is the co-founder of Populace, a think tank dedicated to building a world where all people have the chance to live fulfilling lives in a thriving society. He is also a faculty member at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, where he founded the Laboratory for the Science of Individuality and previously directed the Mind, Brain, and Education program. He is the author of Dark Horse: Achieving Success Through the Pursuit of Fulfillment and The End of Average: Unlocking Our Potential by Embracing What Makes Us Different.

THE WATCHMAKER’S DAUGHTER de Larry Loftis

A WWII biography of Corrie ten Boom, a groundbreaking female Dutch watchmaker who sheltered Jews and refugees from the Nazis, and persevered despite the loss of most of her family and being sent to a concentration camp.

THE WATCHMAKER’S DAUGHTER
by Larry Loftis
William Morrow/HarperCollins, March 2023
(via Javelin)

Photo credit: Spencer Freeman

From New York Times and internationally bestselling author Larry Loftis, the definitive biography of Corrie Ten Boom, a Dutch Christian watchmaker who worked with her family to help many Jews escape from the Nazis during WWII by hiding them in her home before getting arrested and sent to the Ravensbrück concentration camp.

Larry Loftis is the New York Times and international bestselling author of the nonfiction spy thrillers, Code Name: Lise—The True Story of the Woman Who Became WWII’s Most Highly Decorated Spy, and Into the Lion’s Mouth: The True Story of Dusko Popov—World War II Spy, Patriot, and the Real-Life Inspiration for James Bond, which have been published in multiple languages around the world. Prior to becoming a full-time writer, Mr. Loftis was a corporate attorney and adjunct professor of law.

THE VIKING HEART d’Arthur Herman

From a New York Times best-selling historian and Pulitzer Prize finalist, a sweeping epic of how the Vikings and their descendants have shaped history and America.

THE VIKING HEART:
How Scandinavians Conquered the World
by Arthur Herman
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, August 2021
(via Javelin)

Scandinavia has always been a world apart. For millennia Norwegians, Danes, Finns, and Swedes lived a remote and rugged existence among the fjords and peaks of the land of the midnight sun. But when they finally left their homeland in search of opportunity, these wanderers—including the most famous, the Vikings—would reshape Europe and beyond. Their ingenuity, daring, resiliency, and loyalty to family and community would propel them to the gates of Rome, the steppes of Russia, the courts of Constantinople, and the castles of England and Ireland. But nowhere would they leave a deeper mark than across the Atlantic, where the Vikings’ legacy would become the American Dream.
In THE VIKING HEART, Arthur Herman melds a compelling historical narrative with cutting-edge archaeological and DNA research to trace the epic story of this remarkable and diverse people. He shows how the Scandinavian experience has universal meaning, and how we can still be inspired by their indomitable spirit.

“Heroic battles, sea adventures, empires rising and falling, voyages of discovery, and archaeological detective work— THE VIKING HEART shines brilliantly with them all. Arthur Herman triumphs with a stirring investigation of the Scandinavian influence on our times, both past and present. You won’t look at the world the same way again.”—Neal Bascomb, New York Times best-selling author of The Winter Fortress

Arthur Herman, PhD, is the author of the New York Times bestseller How the Scots Invented the Modern World, which has sold a half-million copies worldwide, and Gandhi and Churchill, which was a 2009 finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. His six other books include To Rule the Waves: How the British Navy Shaped the Modern World, which was nominated for the UK’s prestigious Mountbatten Maritime Prize; Freedom’s Forge, named by the Economist as one of the Best Books of 2012; and Douglas MacArthur: American Warrior. He is currently a Senior Fellow at the Hudson Institute in Washington, DC.