New Releases by Howard Fast

A collection of thrilling murder mysteries featuring “an unusually interesting detective” from the #1 New York Times–bestselling author of Spartacus (The Washington Star). Japanese-American Beverly Hills homicide detective Masao Masuto is a karate expert, a devotee of roses, and a Zen Buddhist. He does his job with a cool, caustic wit—and with surprising force when necessary. He possesses a singular sense of justice, taking action on his own and occasionally pushing the boundaries of the law . . . The Case of the Angry Actress: When a Hollywood mogul drops dead at his own party, Detective Masuto must dig into the darkest secrets of the magnate’s past. Now he must uncover a secret worth killing for before someone else dies. “A good fast-paced thriller.” —Reader’s Syndicate The Case of the One-Penny Orange: Masuto has a break-in and a murder to solve, both of which are baffling. But when he suspects a connection between the two crimes, he uncovers a bizarre conspiracy that reaches back to the darkest days of World War II. “A finely perceived mystery puzzle . . . an unusually interesting detective.” —The Washington Star The Case of the Russian Diplomat: When a dead body is found in a pool at a high-class hotel notorious for its illicit activities, Matsuo finds himself hunting for a killer and tangled in a web of espionage and international intrigue. “An enjoyable, highly professional entertainment.” —The New Yorker The Case of the Poisoned Eclairs: A pleasant lull in murder cases is broken when a series of unusual poisoning deaths puts Masuto on the hunt for someone whose terrifying vendetta has only just begun. “A consummate storyteller.” —The Baltimore Sun

A pair of imaginative science fiction story collections from the #1 New York Times–bestselling author of Spartacus, Freedom Road, and the Immigrants saga. Over his long and illustrious career, New York Times–bestselling author and prolific novelist Howard Fast proved himself a master of any literary genre, from historical fiction in Spartacus to family generational drama in his bestselling Immigrants saga. Although his output in fantasy and science fiction is relatively modest, these two short story collections, reminiscent of classic Twilight Zone episodes, demonstrate that Fast’s imagination knew no boundaries. The General Zapped an Angel: Nearly forty years after the publication of his first story, “Wrath of Purple,” in the science fiction magazine Amazing Stories, Fast returned to the genre with a set of nine supremely entertaining tales. In this collection, a Vietnam general shoots down what appears to be an angel, a man sells his soul to the devil for a copy of the next day’s Wall Street Journal, and a group of alien beings bestow a mouse with human thought and emotion. “These stories amply display Fast’s considerable gifts as a writer—his clear, concise, often elegant prose, his sense of humor, his gift of sympathetic imagination, and sheer talent as a storyteller.” —Tangent A Touch of Infinity: This follow-up to The General Zapped an Angel offers thirteen brisk and engrossing science fiction stories. In “The Hoop,” a scientist builds a portal to an unknown destination, which the mayor of New York City hijacks to use as a garbage dump until the location’s surprising—and hilarious—revelation. And in “The Egg,” set three thousand years in the future, a research team discovers an egg, something they have never seen before, cryogenically frozen in a nuclear bunker. “Fast, a master of economy . . . spins his stories quickly and most effectively.” —Associated Press

Comparativists evaluate democratization by looking at regimes in the transition and consolidation phases of democracy without considering the essence of democracy. This book argues the need to consider democracy as a combination of rights and virtues, and that problems of democraticization are those of balance.

This edition brings the story of 20th-century Southern politics up to the present day and the virtual triumph of Southern Republicanism. It considers the changes in party politics, leadership, civil rights and black participation in Southern politics.

Originally published in 1942, The Unvanquished is the story of the Continental Army and George Washington in the desperate early months when the American Revolution faced defeat and disintegration. The book begins with the retreat across Manhattan''s East River that saved the Continental Army after the Battle of Long Island. It ends with Washington''s recrossing of the Delaware in the daring 1776 Christmas Eve raid on the Hessian camp at Trenton.

"Howard Fast makes superb use of his material. ... Aside from its social and historical implications, Freedom Road is a high-geared story, told with that peculiar dramatic intensity of which Fast is a master". -- Chicago Daily News

"Fast is always a wonderful storyteller, and the story is a good one. ... Entertaining and memorable". -- Library Journal

The #1 New York Times–bestselling author’s firsthand account of the civil rights benefit concert attacked by a violent mob in upstate New York. In 1949, author Howard Fast found himself in the middle of a violent and terrifying anticommunist riot in Peekskill, New York. Fast was the master of ceremonies at a civil rights benefit concert featuring Paul Robeson, Pete Seeger, and others. But local newspapers stoked anticommunist anger, and the event was besieged by a mob armed with rocks, clubs, fence posts, and knives. Fast’s Peekskill, USA is a blow-by-blow account of the bloody riots, which led to the beating of the first black combat pilot in the US Air Force, Eugene Bullard. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Howard Fast including rare photos from the author’s estate.

From the New York Times–bestselling author of The Immigrant: The conclusion to the Lavette family saga is “addictive as candy” and “genuinely touching” (Publishers Weekly). In the sixth and final installment of the Immigrants saga, Fast revisits the charismatic Barbara Lavette. In this emotional farewell, Barbara, the rock and matriarch of her family, marries a Unitarian priest, and together they travel the world. Though Fast wrote over eighty books, including Spartacus, April Morning, and Freedom Road, his Immigrants saga remains some of his most personal and moving work. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Howard Fast including rare photos from the author’s estate.

DIVFast’s powerful denunciation of Spanish dictator Francisco Franco, and a remarkable historical document of Spain’s fight for freedom from governmental oppression/div DIVHoward Fast was a longtime proponent of the antifascist movement in Spain. During the Spanish Civil War, Fast supported a hospital for Popular Front forces, and in 1950 he was sentenced to three months in jail for refusing to give the names of other supporters of that hospital to the House Un-American Activities Committee. In this pamphlet, published in 1951, Fast gives an overview of Spain under the rule of General Francisco Franco, including the mass strikes that were organized to weaken him. Fast’s fervent appeals to readers to reject American military agreements with Spain demonstrate his passionate opposition to fascism. As Fast writes, “Spain fights on, and in those three words there is a miracle. . . . There is no Spanish worker, professional, intellectual or peasant who strikes a blow for freedom without our being intimately concerned.”/divDIV /divDIVThis ebook features an illustrated biography of Howard Fast including rare photos from the author’s estate./div

DIV“The General Zapped an Angel was written for fun, and offers me a chance to smile at the absurdity of human existence. Therefore, these stories of fantasy and science fiction are among the most serious writing I have done.” —Howard Fast/div DIVNearly forty years after the publication of his first story, “The Wrath of Purple,” in the science fiction magazine Amazing Stories, Howard Fast returned to the genre with a set of nine supremely entertaining tales. In this collection, a Vietnam general shoots down what appears to be an angel, a man sells his soul to the devil for a copy of the next day’s Wall Street Journal, and a group of alien beings bestow a mouse with human thought and emotion. Fast, one of the bestselling authors of the twentieth century, skewers war hawks, oil speculators, and profit-at-all-costs capitalism, issues that are still relevant today./divDIV /divDIVThis ebook features an illustrated biography of Howard Fast including rare photos from the author’s estate./div

DIVA foreign correspondent is targeted by the US government after aligning with the Communist Party for a controversial story /div DIVIn what many consider his most autobiographical novel, bestselling author Howard Fast revisits the McCarthy-era anticommunist witch hunts he endured during his years as a member of the Communist Party. In The Pledge, Bruce Bacon, a war correspondent stationed in Bengal near the end of World War II, investigates a terrible famine that has left millions in India starving to death, despite ample food supplies stored—and allegedly withheld—by the British. Seeking to tell his story back in New York, Bacon meets members of a communist organization, including a Daily Worker reporter named Molly Maguire. But the America he returns to is not the same one he left behind, and soon Bacon discovers that associating with communists has put him squarely in the crosshairs of the House Un-American Activities Committee./divDIV /divDIVThis suspenseful and powerful novel revisits the guilt-by-association fear and suspicion that gripped America during the second Red Scare, which had harrowing consequences for those unfortunate enough to be accused./divDIV /divDIVThis ebook features an illustrated biography of Howard Fast including rare photos from the author’s estate./div

Howard Fast’s controversial essay on the proper role of literature, offering insight into his life and works In this 1950 essay, Howard Fast argues that all writers have a duty to reflect the truth of the world in their works, particularly regarding social justice. Fast’s treatise on literary criticism allows for a fuller understanding of his early novels, in which his political beliefs remain inseparable from his writing. Literature and Reality, which Fast wrote around the time of the 1949 Peekskill riots, offers a unique window into his worldview during the mid-twentieth century. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Howard Fast including rare photos from the author’s estate.

DIVA New York detective’s investigation of a Catholic priest’s murder leads him to a shocking drug plot that reaches the highest seats of American power /div DIVDetective Mel Freedman’s life changes forever the day Joe Cullen walks into his New York City office to confess to murder. Cullen, a pilot and Vietnam veteran, has come to admit his guilt in the murder of an American priest, thrown from a helicopter to his death in the jungles of El Salvador 800 feet below. But when a prostitute to whom Cullen also confessed turns up dead, Freedman quickly realizes that there is much more to Cullen’s story than meets the eye. As he digs deeper into the mystery, Freedman unravels a tangled web of conspiracy stretching from the cocaine fields of Central America all the way to CIA headquarters. /divDIV /divDIVTense and thought-provoking, The Confession of Joe Cullen is a powerful thriller about government corruption and the individuals who try to combat it, by one of the most masterful American writers of the twentieth century./divDIV /divDIVThis ebook features an illustrated biography of Howard Fast including rare photos from the author’s estate./div

DIVDIVFast’s epic novel, about one man’s family tree stretching through history from the Revolutionary War, portrays the best and worst of the American experiment/divDIV /divDIVBroken and sick, a young Revolutionary War soldier from New York is taken in by an innkeeper’s family and nursed to health. The soldier, John Preswick, falls in love with the innkeeper’s daughter, even as his wife Inez waits back home. Through five generations, the two families he starts share an intertwined fate. The Preswicks take part in some of the country’s most significant episodes, from the Civil War to the California Gold Rush, with fortunes discovered, lost, and made on the backs of others./divDIV /divDIVA tenacious chronicler of American history, Howard Fast was one of the most prolific historical novelists of the twentieth century. Strange Yesterday is perhaps his most sweeping, ambitious novel./divDIV /divDIVThis ebook features an illustrated biography of Howard Fast including rare photos from the author’s estate./div/div

DIVA collection of thirteen stunning stories by one of the most celebrated American writers of the twentieth century/div DIVA follow-up to his 1970 science fiction collection, The General Zapped an Angel, Fast’s book of thirteen new science fiction stories is brisk and engrossing. In “The Hoop,” a scientist builds a portal to an unknown destination, which the mayor of New York City hijacks to use as a garbage dump until the location’s surprising, and hilarious, revelation. And in “The Egg,” set three thousand years in the future, a research team discovers an egg, something they have never seen before, cryogenically frozen in a nuclear bunker. These thirteen stories are bizarre, hilarious, poignant, and sure to entertain./divDIV /divDIVThis ebook features an illustrated biography of Howard Fast including rare photos from the author’s estate./div

DIVBestselling author Howard Fast’s straightforward introduction to Zen meditation/div DIVHoward Fast began to formally practice Zen meditation after turning away from communism in 1956. The Art of Zen Meditation, originally published by the antiwar political collective Peace Press in 1977, is the fruit of Fast’s study: a brief and instructive history of Zen Buddhism and its tenets, written with a simplicity that is emblematic of the philosophy itself. Fast’s study of Zen also inspired his popular Masao Masuto mystery series about a Zen Buddhist detective in Beverly Hills, which he published under the pseudonym E. V. Cunningham./divDIV /divDIVThe Art of Zen Meditation is illustrated with twenty-three beautiful photographs./divDIV /divDIVThis ebook features an illustrated biography of Howard Fast including rare photos from the author’s estate./div

DIVFast’s book on his break with the Communist Party, and a riveting tribute to the importance of justice and beauty over dogma and rigidity/div DIVThe Naked God is Howard Fast’s public repudiation of the Communist Party, of which he was a devoted member for thirteen years until reading about the full scope of atrocities committed by the Soviet Union under Stalin. The bestselling author of Spartacus and Citizen Tom Paine, Howard Fast lent his writing talents and celebrity to the communist cause as a steadfast advocate and public figure. However, he felt increasingly ill at ease with the superior manner Party leaders took with rank-and-file members and with rumors of Soviet anti-Semitism. In his first book after officially leaving the Party in 1956, Howard Fast explores the reasons he joined and his long inner struggle with a political movement in which he never felt he truly belonged./divDIV /divDIVThis ebook features an illustrated biography of Howard Fast including rare photos from the author’s estate./div

DIVA collection of Fast’s best short fiction, from science fiction and fantasy to philosophy and suspense/div DIVThis collection of short stories encompasses twenty years of work by Howard Fast, including some of his best-known and most treasured tales. Not merely fantasy or science fiction, these “Zen stories” explore the world’s mysterious and unanswerable questions, big and small, and the results are at once bizarre, humorous, chilling, and poignant. An American general shoots down what appears to be an angel during a Vietnam War battle, a celebrated author becomes a hunted man, and a mouse is granted human thought and emotion by a group of alien beings. The thirty-one stories in Time and the Riddle showcase Fast’s range and supreme talent as a storyteller./divDIV /divDIVThis ebook features an illustrated biography of Howard Fast including rare photos from the author’s estate./div

DIVWhen a starry-eyed model walks off with a powerful woman’s mink coat and diamond bracelet, New York City’s police race to find her—before gangsters get her first/div DIVMargie Beck has always been a magnet for calamity. When she accidentally walks off with a $17,000 mink coat and the $90,000 bracelet contained within it, she finds herself again at the center of an exciting—and possibly deadly—criminal plot./divDIV /divDIVAs the city’s police search for Margie, its criminal class joins the hunt. With only the help of her boyfriend and a clever dress designer, Margie must outsmart her pursuers before it’s too late. This will be a thrilling day, but it could be Margie’s last./divDIV /divDIVThis ebook features an illustrated biography of Howard Fast including rare photos from the author’s estate./div

DIVA hard-boiled insurance investigator upends New York in search of a perfect diamond necklace/div DIVDeath follows the Sarbine necklace. Its eleven diamonds are flawless, and all cut from the same stone—one of the largest ever unearthed from the mines of South Africa. But lately this most elegant piece of jewelry has become a bad luck charm. Its original owner killed himself, and his daughter, who was meant to inherit the piece at eighteen, died shortly after. When the necklace itself goes missing, it becomes Harvey Krim’s problem—and his chance to make a fortune./divDIV /divDIVAn insurance investigator with a porous moral code, Krim will collaborate with thieves if it means recovering the necklace. The answer could lie with a Texan maid named Lydia Harvey, but she seems too inept to be a skilled jewel thief. Those who possess the Sarbine necklace have a short lifespan, and with so many others looking for it, if Krim isn’t careful, his neck could be next./divDIV /divDIVThis ebook features an illustrated biography of Howard Fast including rare photos from the author’s estate./div

DIVA lawyer scrambles to save a judge-killing hooker from the gallows /div DIVNo women have been hanged in San Verdo since 1921, but after four decades it looks like that’s about to change. Helen Pilasky is far from a sympathetic defendant. She’s a known prostitute, and there is strong evidence that she murdered Judge Alexander Knowton, a supreme court justice beloved statewide. More than one hundred thousand people live in San Verdo, and nearly all of them want Helen Pilasky’s neck. It is Blake Eddyman’s job to save her./divDIV /divDIVA well-off lawyer whose once promising career has stalled, Blake is caught between his ambition and his fear of failure. Saving Helen seems impossible, but he can’t refuse the job. She faces a charge of murder in the first degree. If convicted, the sentence is automatic. Only Blake stands between this enigmatic young woman and the hangman./divDIV /divDIVThis ebook features an illustrated biography of Howard Fast including rare photos from the author’s estate./div

DIVDissatisfied with life on the Upper East Side, a socialite finds a new favorite pastime: robbing banks/div DIVWhen James R. Hastings, president of the City Federal Bank, began construction of a new branch on Madison Avenue, he vowed to make it burglar proof. Vaults set forty feet below ground, an array of cameras, and a quartet of burly guards were intended to deter any bandit. But James Hastings did not count on being robbed by his wife./divDIV /divDIVThree weeks after the bank opens, a demure old woman removes a Luger from her handbag and asks a clerk to empty her register, then disappears into the bathroom with a haul of over $50,000. When the guards arrive, a scared young woman flees the bathroom and points them to the stalls. Inside, they find nothing but a discarded disguise, while the young woman walks calmly out the front door. This is Penelope Hastings—a bored banker’s wife who, now that she has taken up crime, will never be bored again./divDIV /divDIVThis ebook features an illustrated biography of Howard Fast including rare photos from the author’s estate./div

DIVDetective Masuto reopens an investigation into a murderous film star—with deadly consequences/div DIVOn the day that Eve Mackenzie murders her husband, Masao Masuto is on a plane to Japan. For years he and his wife, both American-born Japanese, have dreamed of visiting their homeland, and though the trip is a delight, the Zen Buddhist detective cannot help but check the international papers for news of murder on his home turf of Beverly Hills. Part of him regrets missing the sensational Mackenzie killing. Once a high-profile film star, Eve faded from the public eye after wedding a wealthy Scotsman—an unhappy marriage that ended in bloodshed. When Masuto returns home, Eve is headed toward an inevitable conviction. Why, then, does he reopen the case?/divDIV /divDIVThe evidence against the Hollywood starlet is so airtight that Masuto suspects a frame-up. As he pries into the closed case, more blood spills. Eve Mackenzie may not have murdered her husband, but she is far from innocent./divDIV /divDIVThis ebook features an illustrated biography of Howard Fast including rare photos from the author’s estate./div

Howard Fast’s bestselling coming-of-age novel about one boy’s introduction to the horrors of war amid the brutal first battle of the American Revolution On April 19, 1775, musket shots ring out over Lexington, Massachusetts. As the sun rises over the battlefield, fifteen-year-old Adam Cooper stands among the outmatched patriots, facing a line of British troops. Determined to defend his home and prove his worth to his disapproving father, Cooper is about to embark on the most significant day of his life. The Battle of Lexington and Concord will be the starting point of the American Revolution—and when Cooper becomes a man. Sweeping in scope and masterful in execution, April Morning is a classic of American literature and an unforgettable story of one community’s fateful struggle for freedom. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Howard Fast including rare photos from the author’s estate.

The #1 New York Times–bestselling author of Spartacus reimagines the life of John Peter Altgeld, a courageous politician and forgotten national hero. Though Abraham Lincoln is often considered the United States’ most legendary politician, he wasn’t the only country lawyer out of Illinois to change the face of the nation. John Peter Altgeld fought for Lincoln as a foot soldier in the Union Army, then followed in his footsteps from law to politics, eventually becoming governor of Illinois in 1896. Howard Fast’s dazzling fictional account of Altgeld’s life offers an inspirational example of a man who made great sacrifices for quintessentially American ideals. Inspired by Altgeld’s social reforms, such as his fight against the dehumanizing economic injustice of the Gilded Age and his trailblazing implementation of some of the nation’s first child labor laws, Fast celebrates the compelling life of an unsung American luminary. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Howard Fast including rare photos from the author’s estate.

A stunning novel of American revolutionaries battling the brutal winter at Valley Forge—from the “literary phenomenon” and author of Spartacus (The Guardian). General George Washington’s twelve thousand soldiers march into Valley Forge, Pennsylvania, under-fed and under-clothed, their frozen feet leaving bloody tracks in the snow. Shortly after the soldiers establish quarters for the cold months ahead, disease begins to rip through the camp. The men, helpless against sickness and despair, are facing the longest winter of their lives—and their survival will determine the fate of their young nation. Passionate and unforgettable, Conceived in Liberty is one of Fast’s rawest accounts of the brutality of the Revolutionary War, and of the heroism of its soldiers. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Howard Fast including rare photos from the author’s estate.

A novel based on the controversial case of two immigrants executed for murder in 1927, from the #1 New York Times–bestselling author of Spartacus. Seven years, two trials, and three appeals after their arrest for robbery and murder in 1920, anarchists Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti await execution in their prison cells. Supporters around the world have passionately argued their innocence, particularly when Celestino Madeiros, a young mobster, confesses to the murders along with other members of his gang. But no retrial is ordered; on August 23, 1927, Sacco and Vanzetti are executed. Howard Fast’s heartrending fictional account offers a window into the thoughts and feelings of a presumed-innocent Sacco and Vanzetti, and is a withering indictment of the American justice system. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Howard Fast including rare photos from the author’s estate.

The New York Times bestseller that’s “so glowingly human a picture of Tom Paine and America in the revolutionary days” (The New York Herald). Thomas Paine’s voice rang in the ears of eighteenth-century revolutionaries from America to France to England. He was friend to luminaries such as Thomas Jefferson, Ben Franklin, and William Wordsworth. His pamphlets extolling democracy sold in the millions. Yet he died a forgotten man, isolated by his rough manners, idealistic zeal, and unwillingness to compromise. Howard Fast’s brilliant portrait brings Paine to the fore as a legend of American history, and provides readers with a gripping narrative of modern democracy’s earliest days in America and Europe. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Howard Fast including rare photos from the author’s estate.

Science fiction stories from the #1 New York Times–bestselling author of Spartacus. From one of the most prolific and versatile writers of the twentieth century, The Edge of Tomorrow is a collection of tales that journey outside everyday boundaries to offer insight into our own universe. Featuring big bugs, cloned cats, and feral star-children, these unconventional, thought-provoking stories reveal much about the America of their time, when the Cold War and the nascent civil rights movement stoked unconscious fears and desires. From “The First Men,” about scientists tampering with genetic engineering, to “The Large Ant,” about a man’s thoughtless violence against nature, these stories by the author of April Morning and The Immigrants—described by the Los Angeles Times as “one of our very best”—are as relevant today as when they were first written. This ebook features an illustrated biography of Howard Fast including rare photos from the author’s estate.