Farewell and a Handkerchief—Poems from the Road is a collection that reflects on the month-long travels of Czech poet Vítězslav Nezval through Vienna, Paris, southern France, and Italy. During this journey, on May 9, 1933, Nezval had a chance encounter with two of the surrealist movement’s most influential poets—André Breton and Paul Éluard—while sitting at the Cardinal Café on the Grands Boulevards in Paris, a meeting that proved transformative. After returning home, Nezval helped found the Czech Surrealist Group, along with Karel Teige, Jindřich Stýrský, and Toyen. It became the only official group of its kind outside of France.

Among the 40 poets represented are Bohumil Hrabal, Milan Kundera, Jan Neruda and Nobel Prize winner Jaroslav Seifert.

The world knows Madame Tussaud as a wax artist extraordinaire, but who was this woman who became one of the most famous sculptresses of all time? From the internationally bestselling author of Nefertiti comes a “rollicking drama” (Good Housekeeping) that is “intimate and entertaining” (Associated Press). “Both a gripping, fictionalized biography of an intriguing woman and a well-paced, illuminating chronicle of the French Revolution.”—New York Journal of Books Smart and ambitious, Marie Tussaud has learned the secrets of wax sculpting by working alongside her uncle in their celebrated wax museum, the Salon de Cire. From her popular model of the American ambassador, Thomas Jefferson, to her tableau of the royal family at dinner, Marie’s museum provides Parisians with the very latest news on fashion, gossip, and even politics. Her customers hail from every walk of life, yet her greatest dream is to attract the attention of Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI; their stamp of approval on her work could catapult her and her museum to the fame and riches she desires. Though many people are starving and can no longer afford bread, Marie’s business is booming. In salons and cafés across Paris, people like Maximilien Robespierre are lashing out against the monarchy. Soon, there’s whispered talk of revolution. Spanning five years, from the budding revolution to the Reign of Terror, Madame Tussaud brings us into the world of an incredible heroine whose talent for wax modeling saved her life and preserved the faces of a vanished kingdom.

Initially published in French under the title Operation Nemesis, this revealing work is now available to the English-speaking public for the first time. It ranks as a major revision in the historic study of the Armenian resistance to the Ottoman genocide of Armenians. Operation Nemesis is a study of the Armenian Revolutionary Federation (the Tashnak Party) and the individuals responsible for the execution of Turkish leaders. Until Derogy's book, it had been assumed that the assassins were acting out of personal and emotional motives. But through an amazing amount of detective work, it becomes clear that they were in fact part of a disciplined effort to seek retribution for historic crimes against the Armenian people. The work richly details Turkish plans for the liquidation of the Armenian people, the individuals selected to liquidate the genocidists, and above all, and most complex, to document for the first time the role of the organized Armenian political opposition to Turkish rule. In doing so, Derogy brings to light the relation between the legal party and its extra-legal arm; the mechanisms needed to implement the daring plan of assassination; and the special postwar circumstances in which the Armenian nation found itself - torn asunder by a Turkish-Soviet detente in which the independence of Armenia became the sacrificial pawn. Derogy worked closely with scholars around the world, and interviewed firsthand remaining survivors who had direct contact with the events described. His is a detective story of the first rank, no less than a piece of historical reconstruction with obvious portent for current Armenian efforts to recapture political legitimacy and personal pride.