Books with author Michael Doran

“Deeply researched, tightly argued, and accessibly concise” (The New York Times Book Review)—a major retelling of the Suez Canal Crisis of 1956, a seminal event in the history of US relations with the Middle East, and why President Eisenhower sided with Egypt rather than Britain, France, and Israel, and how he came to regret that decision.In 1956 President Nasser of Egypt moved to take possession of the Suez Canal, thereby bringing the Middle East to the brink of war. The British and the French, who operated the canal, joined with Israel in a plan to retake it by force. Despite the special relationship between England and America, Dwight Eisenhower intervened to stop the invasion. In Ike’s Gamble, “a disturbing history that clearly reveals the dangerous ‘collective American delusion’ about the Middle East” (Kirkus Reviews), Michael Doran shows how Nasser manipulated the US, invoking America’s opposition to European colonialism to drive a wedge between Eisenhower and two British Prime Ministers, Winston Churchill and Anthony Eden. Meanwhile, Nasser was making weapons deals with the USSR and destabilizing other Arab countries that the US had been courting. The Suez Crisis was his crowning triumph. In time, Eisenhower would conclude that Nasser had duped him, that the Arab countries were too fractious to anchor America’s interests in the Middle East, and that the US should turn instead to Israel. “This is a story that has been told many times, but seldom with the depth and stylistic elegance of Ike’s Gamble. Michael Doran does not just challenge the prevailing historiography, he turns it on its head” (The Weekly Standard). Affording deep insight into Eisenhower and his foreign policy, this fascinating and provocative history provides a rich new understanding of how the US became the power broker in the Middle East.

This major retelling of the Suez Crisis of 1956—one of the most important events in the history of US policy in the Middle East—shows how President Eisenhower came to realize that Israel, not Egypt, is America’s strongest regional ally.In 1956 President Nasser of Egypt moved to take possession of the Suez Canal, thereby bringing the Middle East to the brink of war. The British and the French, who operated the canal, joined with Israel in a plan to retake it by force. Despite the special relationship between England and America, Dwight Eisenhower intervened to stop the invasion. In Ike’s Gamble, Michael Doran shows how Nasser played the US, invoking America’s opposition to European colonialism to drive a wedge between Eisenhower and two British Prime Ministers, Winston Churchill and Anthony Eden. Meanwhile, in his quest to make himself the strongman of the Arab world, Nasser was making weapons deals with the USSR and destabilizing other Arab countries that the US had been courting. The Suez Crisis was his crowning triumph. In time, Eisenhower would conclude that Nasser had duped him, that the Arab countries were too fractious to anchor America’s interests in the Middle East, and that the US should turn instead to Israel. Affording deep insight into Eisenhower and his foreign policy, this fascinating and provocative history provides a rich new understanding of how the US became the power broker in the Middle East.

Morning Girl, who loves the day, and her younger brother Star Boy, who loves the night, take turns describing their life on an island in pre-Columbian America; in Morning Girl's last narrative, she witnesses the arrival of the first Europeans to her world.Tells the story of Morning Girl and her brother, Star Boy, two Native Americans of the Taino tribe, their family, and their community, as they grow up together in the Bahamas in the fateful year of 1492

“Deeply researched, tightly argued, and accessibly concise” (The New York Times Book Review)—a major retelling of the Suez Canal Crisis of 1956, a seminal event in the history of US relations with the Middle East, and why President Eisenhower sided with Egypt rather than Britain, France, and Israel, and how he came to regret that decision.In 1956 President Nasser of Egypt moved to take possession of the Suez Canal, thereby bringing the Middle East to the brink of war. The British and the French, who operated the canal, joined with Israel in a plan to retake it by force. Despite the special relationship between England and America, Dwight Eisenhower intervened to stop the invasion. In Ike’s Gamble, “a disturbing history that clearly reveals the dangerous ‘collective American delusion’ about the Middle East” (Kirkus Reviews), Michael Doran shows how Nasser manipulated the US, invoking America’s opposition to European colonialism to drive a wedge between Eisenhower and two British Prime Ministers, Winston Churchill and Anthony Eden. Meanwhile, Nasser was making weapons deals with the USSR and destabilizing other Arab countries that the US had been courting. The Suez Crisis was his crowning triumph. In time, Eisenhower would conclude that Nasser had duped him, that the Arab countries were too fractious to anchor America’s interests in the Middle East, and that the US should turn instead to Israel. “This is a story that has been told many times, but seldom with the depth and stylistic elegance of Ike’s Gamble. Michael Doran does not just challenge the prevailing historiography, he turns it on its head” (The Weekly Standard). Affording deep insight into Eisenhower and his foreign policy, this fascinating and provocative history provides a rich new understanding of how the US became the power broker in the Middle East.

Michael Dorris has crafted a fierce saga of three generations of Indian women, beset by hardships and torn by angry secrets, yet inextricably joined by the bonds of kinship. Starting in the present day and moving backward, the novel is told in the voices of the three women: fifteen-year-old part-black Rayona; her American Indian mother, Christine, consumed by tenderness and resentment toward those she loves; and the fierce and mysterious Ida, mother and grandmother whose haunting secrets, betrayals, and dreams echo through the years, braiding together the strands of the shared past.

Winner of the Scott O'Dell Award, this moving and poetic fictional story follows two Taíno siblings and their life in the Bahamas during the fateful year of 1492. Morning Girl and Star Boy couldn't be more different. Morning Girl relishes the day and all it has to offer, while her younger brother Star Boy loves the night. As they navigate change on their island, from familial struggles to the arrival of a hurricane, they realize everything that makes them different has the power to bring them closer together. This historical coming of age story thoughtfully portrays Morning Girl and Star Boys' complex sibling bond and life in the Caribbean leading up to the eve of Christopher Columbus' arrival to their home. Told in alternating chapters, this is a rich, lyrical story about an indigenous Caribbean family and the strong bonds of love.

In October 1962, at the height of the Cold War, the United States and the Soviet Union came to the brink of nuclear conflict over the placement of Soviet missiles in Cuba. In this hour-by-hour chronicle of those tense days, veteran Washington Post reporter Michael Dobbs reveals just how close we came to Armageddon.Here, for the first time, are gripping accounts of Khrushchev's plan to destroy the U.S. naval base at Guantánamo; the handling of Soviet nuclear warheads on Cuba; and the extraordinary story of a U-2 spy plane that got lost over Russia at the peak of the crisis.Written like a thriller, One Minute to Midnight is an exhaustively researched account of what Arthur Schlesinger, Jr. called “the most dangerous moment in human history,” and the definitive book on the Cuban missile crisis.

Leverage the power of R to elegantly manage crucial geospatial analysis tasksAbout This BookWrite powerful R scripts to manipulate your spatial dataGain insight from spatial patterns utilizing R's advanced computation and visualization capabilitiesWork within a single spatial analysis environment from start to finishWho This Book Is ForThis book is intended for anyone who wants to learn how to efficiently analyze geospatial data with R, including GIS analysts, researchers, educators, and students who work with spatial data and who are interested in expanding their capabilities through programming. The book assumes familiarity with the basic geographic information concepts (such as spatial coordinates), but no prior experience with R and/or programming is required. By focusing on R exclusively, you will not need to depend on any external software—a working installation of R is all that is necessary to begin.What You Will LearnMake inferences from tables by joining, reshaping, and aggregatingFamiliarize yourself with the R geospatial data analysis ecosystemPrepare reproducible, publication-quality plots and mapsEfficiently process numeric data, characters, and datesReshape tabular data into the necessary form for the specific task at handWrite R scripts to automate the handling of raster and vector spatial layersProcess elevation rasters and time series visualizations of satellite imagesPerform GIS operations such as overlays and spatial queries between layersSpatially interpolate meteorological data to produce climate mapsIn DetailR is a simple, effective, and comprehensive programming language and environment that is gaining ever-increasing popularity among data analysts.This book provides you with the necessary skills to successfully carry out complete geospatial data analyses, from data import to presentation of results.Learning R for Geospatial Analysis is composed of step-by-step tutorials, starting with the language basics before proceeding to cover the main GIS operations and data types. Visualization of spatial data is vital either during the various analysis steps and/or as the final product, and this book shows you how to get the most out of R's visualization capabilities. The book culminates with examples of cutting-edge applications utilizing R's strengths as a statistical and graphical tool.