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Non-Fiction
The End of the Barbary Terror
Frederick C. Leiner ’85
Oxford University Press
The End of the Barbary Terror draws upon ship logs, journals, love letters, and government documents to tell the vivid story of America’s fight to regain U.S. hostages taken by the terrorizing Barbary Pirates in 1812. Throughout America’s fledgling history, the Barbary pirates continually threatened the safety of sea merchants by seizing ships and selling Christian prisoners to white slavery. Refusing to remain subject to such injustices, American President James Madison fought back by sending the largest American naval force ever gathered at that time.
Frederick Leiner ’85 recreates the heroic history of the naval officers and diplomats in the early nineteenth century as he describes Madison’s initial efforts at diplomacy, followed by his declaration of war led by Commodore Stephen Decatur. In twenty-four hours, the rulers of Algiers, where the hostages were being kept, signed the treaty, “dictated at the mouths of our cannons,” as Decatur himself put it. Praising how the book links elements of Islamic terrorism, white slavery, and diplomatic intrigue, Dr. John F. Lehman, former Secretary of the Navy says “Frederick Leiner’s The End of the Barbary Terror is not only an exciting and well-told sea story, but a well-researched reminder that with regard to transnational terrorism, the only thing new in the world is the history that you don’t know.”
Leiner currently lives in Baltimore, Maryland and is also the author of Millions for Defense: The Subscription Warships of 1798.
War and the Law of Nations
Stephen C. Neff ’76, ’77 (LL.M.), ’88
(S.J.D)
Cambridge University Press
Stephen Neff ’s War and the Law of Nations traces war as a legal concept by looking closely at its history from Roman times to the twentieth century. Neff illustrates the various interpretations of war during these periods as a law-enforcement operation, a duel between states, and a “crime against the peace.” He also looks closely at the post World War II definition of war as an international law enforcement mechanism under United Nations auspices, and how this view brought about a focus on humanitarian, rather than policy, problems. War and the Law of Nations will surely prove enjoyable for anyone interested in international relations and international law.
Neff is a Reader in Public International Law at the University of Edinburgh and is the author of Friends But No Allies: Economic Liberalism and the Law of Nations and The Rights and Duties of Neutrals: A General History.
The Strategic Guide to Selling your Software Company
William H. Venema ’81
Lulu.com
The Strategic Guide to Selling Your Software Company offers strategic advice to anyone considering the sale, merger, and/or acquisition of a software company. William Venema takes you through the entire process of selling your company from the decision to sell, to the closing of the deal. As a West Point graduate, Venema uses the military planning sequence to address these issues as he has experienced them throughout his work as a Mergers & Acquisitions attorney. Venema also includes checklists and useful forms in the book, materials that venture capitalists, investment bankers, attorneys, and CPAs will all find very helpful.
Venema currently works in Dallas, Texas at Epstein, Becker, Green, Wickliff, & Hall, where he practices in the areas of corporate law, mergers and acquisitions, technology and software licensing, and business law, with a special emphasis on transactions involving technology companies.
FICTION
The Collectors
David Baldacci ’86
Warner Books
A sequel to The Camel Club, The Collectors opens with the assassination of the United States Speaker of the House by Roger Seagraves, a CIA agent selling American secrets to the highest bidder. After the Camel Club connects this killing with the murder of the director of the Library of Congress’ rare collection, they begin unraveling a “world of espionage that can bring America to its knees.”
Baldacci has written eleven consecutive New York Times Bestsellers prior to The Collectors and is also co-founder, with his wife Michelle, of the Wish You Well Foundation, which advocates literacy across America.
Baby Proof
Emily Giffin ’97
St. Martin’s Press
Emily Giffin’s novel, Baby Proof, tells the story of Claudia and Ben, a couple living in perfect harmony with a marriage centered upon freedom, possibility, and exploration. However, when Ben decides he wants to have children after all, Claudia must make the ultimate choice and discovers that love is not necessarily ‘baby proof.’ Giffin’s third novel after Something Blue and Something Borrowed, Baby Proof is “a fast-paced and interesting look at the various ways women view motherhood and pregnancy,” according to Library Journal.
After living and writing in London, Giffin now lives in Atlanta with her husband and twin sons Edward and George. She was recently featured in a New York Times interview by Zoë Wolff.
