Books like Peter the Great and Tsarist Russia by Miriam Greenblatt

An engaging blend of river history, Twain’s early steamboat memories, and humorous sketches that inspired his classic "Adventures of Huckleberry Finn," offering readers a lively portrait of the Mississippi and its people.

A biography of the tsar who began the transformation of Russia into a modern state in the late seventeenth-early eighteenth centuries.

A day in the life of King Louis XIV of France, detailing his ceremonies from morning dressing to nighttime bedtime through meals, state affairs, and entertainment.

"Linking together and transcending Peter's many reforms of state and society, Cracraft argues, was nothing less than a cultural revolution. New ways of dress, elite social behavior, navigation, architecture, and image-making emerged along with expansive vocabularies for labeling new objects and activities. Russians learned how to build and sail warships; train, supply, and command a modern army; operate a new-style bureaucracy; conduct diplomacy on a par with the other European states; apply modern science and conceptualize the new governing system. Throughout, Peter remains the central figure, and Cracraft discusses the shaping events of the tsar's youth, his inner circle, the resistance his reforms engendered, and the founding of the city that would embody his vision - St. Petersburg, which celebrated its tercentenary in spring 2003"--Jacket.