The Civil War was arguably the watershed event in the history of the United States, forever changing the nature of the Republic and the relationship of individuals to their government. The war ended slavery and initiated the long road toward racial equality. The United States now stands at the sesquicentennial of that event, and its citizens attempt to arrive at an understanding of what that event meant to the past, present, and future of the nation. Few states had a greater impact on the outcome of the nation⿿s greatest calamity than Georgia. Georgia provided 125,000 soldiers for the Confederacy as well as thousands more for the Union cause. Also, many of the Confederacy⿿s most influential military and civilian leaders hailed from the state. Georgia was vital to the Confederate war effort because of its agricultural and industrial output. The Confederacy had little hope of winning without the farms and shops of the state. Moreover, the state was critical to the Southern infrastructure because of the river and rail links that crossed it and connected the western Confederacy to the eastern half. Finally, and perhaps most importantly, the war was arguably decided in North Georgia with the Atlanta Campaign and Lincoln⿿s subsequent reelection. This campaign was the last forlorn hope for the Southern Republic and the Union⿿s greatest triumph. Despite the state⿿s importance to the Confederacy and the war⿿s ultimate outcome, not enough has been written concerning Georgia⿿s experience during those turbulent years. The essays in this volume attempt to redress this dearth of scholarship. They present a mosaic of events, places, and people, exploring the impact of the war on Georgia and its residents and demonstrating the importance of the state to the outcome of the Civil War.

*Finalist for the National Book Award* *Finalist for the Kirkus Prize* *Instant New York Times Bestseller* *Named a Best Book of the Year by NPR, New York Post, BuzzFeed, Shelf Awareness, Bustle, and Publishers Weekly* An essential read for our times: an eye-opening memoir of working-class poverty in America that will deepen our understanding of the ways in which class shapes our country and “a deeply humane memoir that crackles with clarifying insight”.* Sarah Smarsh was born a fifth generation Kansas wheat farmer on her paternal side, and the product of generations of teen mothers on her maternal side. Through her experiences growing up on a farm thirty miles west of Wichita, we are given a unique and essential look into the lives of poor and working class Americans living in the heartland. During Sarah’s turbulent childhood in Kansas in the 1980s and 1990s, she enjoyed the freedom of a country childhood, but observed the painful challenges of the poverty around her; untreated medical conditions for lack of insurance or consistent care, unsafe job conditions, abusive relationships, and limited resources and information that would provide for the upward mobility that is the American Dream. By telling the story of her life and the lives of the people she loves with clarity and precision but without judgement, Smarsh challenges us to look more closely at the class divide in our country. Beautifully written, in a distinctive voice, Heartland combines personal narrative with powerful analysis and cultural commentary, challenging the myths about people thought to be less because they earn less. “Heartland is one of a growing number of important works—including Matthew Desmond’s Evicted and Amy Goldstein’s Janesville—that together merit their own section in nonfiction aisles across the country: America’s postindustrial decline...Smarsh shows how the false promise of the ‘American dream’ was used to subjugate the poor. It’s a powerful mantra” *(The New York Times Book Review).

Pegasus is all Amy has left of her past, but he's steadily growing weaker. Amy's trying to care for him and hold Heartland together. She's striving to do just what her mother would have done, but everything is beginning to unravel. It will take all of Amy's courage to let go of her mother's legacy, but it is the only way that she will break free and find her own.

New York Times Bestseller New York Times reporter and “Corner Office” columnist David Gelles reveals legendary GE CEO Jack Welch to be the root of all that’s wrong with capitalism today and offers advice on how we might right those wrongs. In 1981, Jack Welch took over General Electric and quickly rose to fame as the first celebrity CEO. He golfed with presidents, mingled with movie stars, and was idolized for growing GE into the most valuable company in the world. But Welch’s achievements didn’t stem from some greater intelligence or business prowess. Rather, they were the result of a sustained effort to push GE’s stock price ever higher, often at the expense of workers, consumers, and innovation. In this captivating, revelatory book, David Gelles argues that Welch single-handedly ushered in a new, cutthroat era of American capitalism that continues to this day. Gelles chronicles Welch’s campaign to vaporize hundreds of thousands of jobs in a bid to boost profits, eviscerating the country’s manufacturing base and destabilizing the middle class. Welch’s obsession with downsizing—he eliminated 10% of employees every year—fundamentally altered GE and inspired generations of imitators who have employed his strategies at other companies around the globe. In his day, Welch was corporate America’s leading proponent of mergers and acquisitions, using deals to gobble up competitors and giving rise to an economy that is more concentrated and less dynamic. And Welch pioneered the dark arts of “financialization,” transforming GE from an admired industrial manufacturer into what was effectively an unregulated bank. The finance business was hugely profitable in the short term and helped Welch keep GE’s stock price ticking up. But ultimately, financialization undermined GE and dozens of other Fortune 500 companies. Gelles shows how Welch’s celebrated emphasis on increasing shareholder value by any means necessary (layoffs, outsourcing, offshoring, acquisitions, and buybacks, to name but a few tactics) became the norm in American business generally. He demonstrates how that approach has led to the greatest socioeconomic inequality since the Great Depression and harmed many of the very companies that have embraced it. And he shows how a generation of Welch acolytes radically transformed companies like Boeing, Home Depot, Kraft Heinz, and more. Finally, Gelles chronicles the change that is now afoot in corporate America, highlighting companies and leaders who have abandoned Welchism and are proving that it is still possible to excel in the business world without destroying livelihoods, gutting communities, and spurning regulation.

Amy is only 15, but she inherited countless responsibilities when her mother died. Most of all, she is expected to fill her mother's role as the horse healer at Heartland. Amy is talented, but still a novice. She can't admit she needs time to grow and understand.When she can't cure Mercury, and she and Ty argue about his treatment, she decides to visit a Native American horseman who knew her mother. Amy takes Mercury to the mountain-top stable searching for answers, but she ultimately learns that she can't always chase down solutions. Sometimes she has to wait for them to find her.

Amy's life has drastically changed. She's found herself taking on the huge responsibility of running Heartland, the horse refuge that was her mother1s life work. The one constant for Amy has been her friendship with Ty, Heartland1s 17-year-old stable hand. But the arrival of a new hand, Ben, throws everything off balance. By the time Amy realizes she1s taken Ty for granted, it could be too late.

While working at Heartland, Amy finds herself faced with the most difficult decision she's ever had to make.