In the 1920s and 30s, consummate con man John Brinkley went from selling worthless patent cures to a career as a famed surgeon specializing in the restoration of male virility (he transplanted goat testicles into thousands of men). In addition, he was an early innovator in the field of radio advertising, and after the state of Kansas revoked his medical license, he ran for governor. This ambitious man was, of course, also ultimately a mass murderer, as his patients often died from organ rejection and infection. Charlatan is an absorbing, well-researched account of this self-made quack and the man who finally brought him down.

The North might have won the U.S. Civil War, but the battle for equality and unity was far from over when Reconstruction began in 1865. By using newspaper reports and following the careers of two Union officers, a Confederate general, a northern entrepreneur, and a former slave, author Stephen Budiansky is able to trace Reconstruction-era violence in the South, especially vigilante attacks on African Americans and their white allies. For another vivid history of the aftermath of the Civil War, try Drew Gilpin Faust's recent This Republic of Suffering, which looks at the consequences of the war's horrific death toll.

Former Mexican foreign minister Jorge Castañeda offers an evaluation of America's Mexican immigrant group and, in the process, challenges popular misconceptions of immigration and immigrants. He discusses why today's immigrants have chosen to live in the U.S., what they hope to achieve, and the consequences of immigration for both the U.S. and Mexico. After all, about 11% of Mexico's population lives in the U.S., and Castañeda believes that the number of Mexican immigrants to the U.S. is sure to increase substantially. To learn more about immigration from Mexico's point of view, pick up this enlightening book.

When Abraham Lincoln and Stephen A. Douglas were running for the U.S. Senate in 1858, they participated in a series of debates in little towns across Illinois. Although Lincoln lost, the national recognition he gained helped him to win the presidency three years later. The debates also allowed him to air and defend his position on slavery, paving the way for emancipation later on. There are myriad books on Lincoln, including several that focus on these particular debates, but this one from two-time Lincoln Prize winner Allen Guelzo is "a crisply articulated, dynamic presentation of how the debates unfolded and why they still matter today" (Kirkus Reviews).

This panoramic history of Islamic culture in early Europe traces five centuries of engagement between Islam and Christianity, beginning with the demise of the Roman and Persian empires. Pulitzer Prize-winning author David Lewis is a historian rather than a religious scholar, and this "fast-paced and provocative new study" (The New York Times) discusses such events as the rise of the prophet Muhammad, the Battle of Poitiers in 732, and the collapse of the Umayyad dynasty of Spain. If you're curious about this era, this "superb portrayal" (Publishers Weekly) would be a good place to start.

One spring morning in 1843, a woman walking through New Orleans saw a slave girl whom she believed to be Salomé Müller, the long-lost daughter of a friend who had died on the way to America 25 years previously. To get to the bottom of the girl's identity, a series of hotly contested trials was held to determine whether the woman was rightfully a free German woman forced into slavery, or was indeed a multi-racial slave. Combining an examination of the complexities of slave law with the engrossing legal battle over the girl's identity, this is a compelling look at the status of enslaved women in antebellum Louisiana.

The famous, the not-so-famous, and the downright obscure: America's women in all their roles are celebrated here, from the first English woman to give birth in the new world to the new feminists of the 1970s, and everything in between. In particular, newspaper editor Gail Collins notes the societal and political conflicts that have influenced women's roles in the U.S. with regard to fashion, education, sex, health, and work. This is an "exceptionally readable, lively account" (Kirkus Reviews) peopled equally by housewives and religious dissidents, laborers and pioneers.

Elizabeth McIntosh was a war correspondent who joined the propaganda arm of the OSS (the predecessor to the CIA) in 1943. She's written a memoir of her own exploits during World War II, called Undercover Girl; in Sisterhood of Spies she expands her focus to include the many amazing women of the OSS, particularly those who served undercover. Though she points out that women were largely underused, she also shares stories of female spies like Virginia Hall, whom the French Gestapo called "one of the most dangerous Allied agents in France," and Gertrude Legendre, who was captured in France but managed to escape. "Enthralling," says Publishers Weekly.

When U.S. and Filipino troops, having retreated from Manila to the Bataan Peninsula, were forced to surrender to the Japanese, nurses were evacuated to the offshore fortress of Corregidor to work in the underground hospital. When Corregidor fell, the nurses were imprisoned for nearly three years in overcrowded, unsanitary civilian prisoner-of-war camps. Using diaries and letters written by the nurses at the time as well as interviews with 20 of the remaining survivors, author Elizabeth Norman highlights the daily privations and the struggles that these women faced, as well as their courage and dedication.

Karenna Gore Schiff, a journalist and attorney as well as the daughter of former U.S. Vice President Al Gore, provides an inspirational and illuminating study of nine women who transformed modern America by fighting for equality and social justice. The essays, which focus on activists and advocates for issues ranging from black voter rights to workers' rights, draw a detailed picture of Ida B. Wells-Barnett, Mother Jones, Alice Hamilton, Frances Perkins, Virginia Durr, Septima Clark, Dolores Huerta, Dr. Helen Rodriguez-Trias, and Gretchen Buchenholtz. The New York Times calls Schiff's effort "engaging and superbly researched."