While it is (still) impossible to travel through time, reading historical books is the best way to get a sense for how others lived in generations past. Whether you have a favorite time period you’re fascinated by, or want to learn about a new culture, there’s no shortage of popular […]
While it is (still) impossible to travel through time, reading historical books is the best way to get a sense for how others lived in generations past. Whether you have a favorite time period you’re fascinated by, or want to learn about a new culture, there’s no shortage of popular books that are both rooted in history and highly entertaining.
Some of the best-received historical books range from biographies that further popularized famous figures, such as Ron Chernow’s Alexander Hamilton, to surprisingly true tales that resemble novels, like Erik Larson’s TheDevil in the White City. Another important category of historical books are those that highlight the experiences of disenfranchised communities, such as Michelle Alexander’s The New Jim Crow or An Indigenous Peoples’ History of the United States by Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz. Once you’ve finished reading some of these historical introductions, you can also dive deeper into books about racism, LGBT-focused books, or books by Hispanic authors to learn even more about these underrepresented but undoubtedly vital communities.
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Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind
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This international bestseller explores what it means to be human from a biological and historical perspective. It examines how homo sapiens survived out of six initial species that inhabited the Earth, and tries to connect the dots as we attempt to examine what will become of us as we gain the ability to bend laws of natural selection.
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SPQR: A History of Ancient Rome
$10.18
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Critics praise Mary Beard’s SPQR not only due to the vast amount of history it covers, nearly 1,000 years of ancient Rome, but also because of its easy readability. Beard avoids jargon and writes vividly to bring this dramatic time period to life.
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A People’s History of the United States
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Howard Zinn’s book is now widely popular in classrooms across the country, in part because of its inclusive retelling of American history. Rather than focusing on the highest offices, Zinn writes about the perspectives women, Native Americans, factory workers, and other marginalized groups throughout our country’s past.
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An Indigenous Peoples’ History of the United States
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Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz won the American Book Award in 2015 for this book, which challenges the origin story of the United States by telling it exclusively from the perspective of Indigenous peoples. Spanning over 400 years, it’s a comprehensive examination of both colonialist government policy and Indigenous resistance.
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The Devil in the White City: A Saga of Magic and Murder at the Fair that Changed America
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The Devil in the White City is an incredibly popular historical book so vibrant that it almost reads like fiction. Erik Larson tells the story of two men at the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair: one an architect, the other a serial killer.
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The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness
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Michelle Alexander’s book has had a profound impact on recent U.S. history. Her argument that mass incarceration is an evolution of the racial caste system in America has inspired a new generation of activists, as well as aided Black Lives Matter and other racial justice movements.
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Alexander Hamilton
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If you watched Hamilton and are interested to learn more about this Founding Father, Ron Chernow’s biography will be a fascinating read. It was Lin-Manuel Miranda’s inspiration for the Broadway play, and unsurprisingly is a vivid account of Hamilton’s role in birth of America.
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Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World
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This revisionist history book presents Genghis Khan and his accomplishments in a brand new light. Weatherford paints a picture of Khan as far more progressive than his European counterparts, and underscores his impact on trade, communication, and modern civilization as a whole.
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A Woman of No Importance: The Untold Story of the American Spy Who Helped Win World War II
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A winner of numerous awards, Purnell’s biography tells the story of Virginia Hall, an unlikely American spy during World War II. Hall, who started out as a Baltimore socialite, quickly rose the ranks and ultimately became the first Allied woman to conduct secret warfare behind enemy lines.
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The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America’s Great Migration
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Pulitzer Prize winner Isabel Wilkerson captures the Great Migration of African Americans to Southern states from 1915 to 1970 with impressive detail. Featuring over a thousand interviews, records, and new data, this book is as well-researched as it is gripping.
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Blowout: Corrupted Democracy, Rogue State Russia, and the Richest, Most Destructive Industry on Earth
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For coverage of events in recent history, Rachel Maddow’s Blowout offers a powerful account of how oil and gas industries have the ability to corrupt Western democracy as we know it.
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The Great Influenza: The Story of the Deadliest Pandemic in History
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John Barry chronicles the 1918 Flu Epidemic in The Great Influenza, and offers lessons we can use when considering how to handle future (and current) pandemics. According to Barry, the 1918 pandemic teaches us that most essential for survival is our authority’s ability to establish trust among its citizens.
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Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong
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James Loewen’s critique of American history textbooks in Lies My Teacher Told Me might make you rethink what you learned in school. His coverage spans events from the first Thanksgiving to the Iraq War, while offering a plea for greater truth in education.
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Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland
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Patrick Keefe tells the story of the Troubles in Northern Ireland through the entry point of the 1972 murder of widow Jean McConville. By interviewing people on both sides, he captures this all-around devastating conflict in intimate detail.
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The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks
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Henrietta Lacks, though not alive today, has cells that are, and they sparked a medical revolution involving the development of the polio vaccine, cloning, and more. Her incredible story is one of scientific discovery and its dark past of experimenting on African Americans, told beautifully by Rebecca Skloot.
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Mythos: (Ancient Greek Mythology Book for Adults, Modern Telling of Classical Greek Myths Book) (Stephen Fry’s Greek Myths 1)
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English comedian Stephen Fry makes Greek mythology accessible and entertaining in Mythos. By infusing familiar tales such as Pandora’s Box with humor and fresh historical perspective, his take on the Greek classics feels impressively modern.
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Lawrence in Arabia: War, Deceit, Imperial Folly and the Making of the Modern Middle East
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To understand the complicated military relationships in the Middle East today, Scott Anderson’s Lawrence in Arabia is a deeply insightful piece of work that connects the wars of the early 1900’s to current events in the 21st century.
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The Professor and the Madman: A Tale of Murder, Insanity, and the Making of the Oxford English Dictionary
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The Professor and the Madman details the ambitious and dramatic making of the Oxford English Dictionary in the 1850s. Primarily, when one man submits 10,000 definitions, the committee is shocked to learn he’s an inmate at an insane asylum.
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A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier
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A former child soldier himself, Ishamel Beah offers a tragic and riveting account of civil war in Sierra Leone, and its effects on the children that were deployed to fight in it.
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Midnight in Chernobyl: The Untold Story of the World’s Greatest Nuclear Disaster
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Through first-hand interviews, letters, and memoirs, Midnight in Chernobyl casts an intimate light on the worst nuclear disaster in history. Written over several years by journalist Adam Higginbotham, it offers powerful lessons about how to handle climate change and other crises today.
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Confederates in the Attic: Dispatches from the Unfinished Civil War (Vintage Departures)
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When Pulitzer Prize winning war correspondent Tony Horwitz joins a group of Civil War reenactors, the result is a journalistic venture that combines history, present-day tensions, and humor.
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Salt: A World History
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You might not have thought something commonly found on your kitchen table could provide an overarching view of world history, but Mark Kurlansky proves otherwise. In Salt, he demonstrates how this substance has inspired everything from trade routes to revolutions since the beginning of civilization.
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Begin Again: James Baldwin’s America and Its Urgent Lessons for Our Own
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In Begin Again, Eddie S. Glaude Jr. recalls James Baldwin’s disillusionment over the Civil Rights Movement and applies it to America’s current struggle with race relations. Part biography, memoir, and commentary on the present day, Glaude Jr.’s book provides important lessons for moving forward.
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Mayflower: A Story of Courage, Community, and War
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For those with an interest in colonial America and the epic voyage that launched it, Nathaniel Philbrick’s Mayflower will expose a darker truth to these events as they’re commonly told. The establishment of New England consisted of a brutal 55 year conflict that threatened to ruin colonists and natives alike, and ultimately influenced the country that developed as a result.
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The Accidental President: Harry S. Truman and the Four Months That Changed the World
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When Harry S. Truman was unexpectedly thrust into the presidency after the passing of FDR, he oversaw one of the most eventful periods of American history. A.J. Baime takes readers through the first four months of his administration filled with global conflicts and incredibly high stakes at home and abroad.
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D-Day Girls: The Spies Who Armed the Resistance, Sabotaged the Nazis, and Helped Win World War II
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When Winston Churchill began recruiting Women in World War II to join an elite spy agency, 39 heeded the call and helped bring the Allies to victory. Sarah Rose’s analysis of diaries and oral histories brings the courage of these inspiring women to life.
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His Truth Is Marching On: John Lewis and the Power of Hope
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In his biography of John Lewis, Jon Meacham illuminates this civil rights leader’s path to preaching non-violence and unwavering hope. Both an icon and a hero, John Lewis leaves a legacy that Meacham compares to that of Thomas Jefferson in terms of the impact he’s had on the development of our nation.
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Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee: An Indian History of the American West
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First published in 1970, this bestseller inspired a generation of Americans to reconsider the history of Westward expansion and the human cost it had on native populations. Dee Brown focuses on the suffering experienced between 1860 and 1890 in this thoroughly researched and tragic tale of Native American history.
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Norse Mythology
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Fans of Neil Gaiman’s popular works of fiction will be drawn to Norse Mythology. This non-fiction book weaves familiar characters, including Thor, Odin, and Loki, into a captivating and epic saga.
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In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex
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Winner of the National Book Award and recently adapted into a major motion film, In the Heart of the Sea tells the exhilarating survival tale of the sailors aboard an 1820 Nantucket whaleship.
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WASHINGTON — The Department of Defense is slated to release its counter-small unmanned aircraft systems strategy next month, bringing an open-system architecture and enterprise approach to the military’s capabilities.The Army-led Joint C-sUAS Office, or JCO, has worked to align current and future counter-drone technologies to support operational requirements at home […]
