Alden R. Carter – författare

The Scholar and the Tiger is at once a compelling family saga, thriller, social history, and spiritual journey. Written by a noted China scholar, assisted by a writer friend, the story brings to life a tumultuous period in Chinese history while providing surprising insights into China's emergence as a global power. Wen-wei Chang was born in 1929 as famine gripped northern China, taking the lives of countless peasants, including his father. Only his iron-willed mother kept the family alive. The eldest son, Wen-po, joined the army. Eighteen years Wen-wei's senior, Wen-po fought bandits, opium smugglers, the Japanese, and Mao's Communists, becoming known as "Tiger Chang."Meanwhile, Wen-wei—a brilliant scholar from childhood—seemed destined for a career in the age-old mandarin tradition of civil service. But civil war intervened, forcing him to evacuate his ill mother and two sisters-in-law and their children only days before the Communists reached Beijing. In Shanghai, they were reunited with Wen-po, now a leading Guomindang general who commanded the city's final defenses. Wen-wei refused evacuation to Taiwan, insisting on caring for his mother and making the best life he could under the Communists. But a day after the occupation of the city, a terrified friend told Wen-wei that Wen-po had been left behind and was hiding in the friend's apartment, putting all of their lives at risk.What follows has all the drama of a spy novel: narrow escapes and rescues, treachery and blackmail, and a final wrenching irony that would tear Wen-wei from his family and homeland. Only after thirty years in America, with a new life as university professor David Chang, is he allowed to return to China to learn the fate of his mother and loved ones—and perhaps to heal his broken heart.

William Barker Cushing is considered one of the navy's greatest heroes of the Civil War. After his expulsion from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1861, Cushing managed to get an appointment as a master's mate on one of the warships of a blockading squadron. Cushing's daring and exceptional performance in battle led to a spectacular rise in rank, responsibility, and reputation. His military career culminated in his torpedoing of the Confederate ironclad Albermarle on the Roanoke River in 1864, an operation he executed under heavy enemy fire. This new and fully annotated edition of Cushing's memoir, originally written in 1867–1868, conveys the excitement and drama of a truly extraordinary Civil War naval career.