Tuesday Media Recommendations: Nonfiction History Books

Post your recommendations in the comments; other weeks, there'll be other posts for other topics and other formats.

Comments

[darkknight9]

The Nisei Soldier - Nakasone
The First World War (and sub books) - Strachan
The Last Cruise of the Emden: The Amazing True WWI Story of a German-Light Cruiser and Her Courageous Crew - Hoy
My Reminiscences Of East Africa - von Lettow-Vorbeck

[The Margrave of Azilia]

The Guns of August by Barbara Tuchman
The Proud Tower by Barbara Tuchman
A World on Fire, by Amanda Foreman

[John F. Carr]

Has nobody improved on The Guns of August in the past 60 years?

[Bob from Ohio]

"Has nobody improved on The Guns of August in the past 60 years?"

Professional historians say yes but its jealousy that a talented amateur is a better historian than them.

[LawTalkingGuy]

Sounds like you’re jealous professional historians here tbh.

[Lee Moore]

Pedantry intervention :

You mean “envious”

“jealousy” consists in the desire to keep what you have, and to deny it to others

“envy” is resentment that someone else has something you don’t have

“covetousness” is the desire to have something that you don’t have but you see that someone else doesn’t have.

Thus if you have a particularly beautiful and accomplished spouse, if you want him/her/etc exclusively for yourself and get anxious and annoyed when someone else shows an interest, that’s jealousy. (Which is by no means always a bad thing.)

If your neighbour has a beautiful and accomplished spouse and you don’t then if you are angry at your neighbour’s good fortune and wish his spouse was ugly and stupid (like yours) that’s envy. (Envy is always a bad thing.)

If you want your neighbour’s spouse for yourself, that’s covetousness. Which is not always bad – it may motivate you to wash your hair, get a better job and give yourself a chance of acquiring a top quality spouse.

[Lee Moore]

My 5 mins editing time ran out before I could correct the “doesn’t” in the definition of covetousness to “does”

[The Margrave of Azilia]

"Has nobody improved on The Guns of August in the past 60 years?"

Make your own recommendations of superior works.

[Drewski]

Will Cuppy's The Decline and Fall of Practically Everybody is a gem. It's very unfortunate that he died with it still incomplete.

[newbie]

Blood and Thunder: The Epic Story of Kit Carson and the Conquest of the American West
Empire of the Summer Moon: Quanah Parker and the Rise and Fall of the Comanches
If you like old-school football stories, Art Donovan's memoir Fatso. Runner-up: Mad Ducks and Bears by George Plimpton (more entertaining than Paper Lion)

[Frank Drackman]

Lee's Lieutenants, and stick your preconceived biases where the sun doesn't shine, Rumor says it was on Hitlers bedside table (and if it wasn't it should have been)

Frank

[GKHoff]

Related - Lincoln And His Generals

[Doug Huffman]

The Crusades: A History (Bloomsbury Academic; 3rd edition (April 10, 2014) by Jonathan Riley-Smith

[Sarcastr0]

The Making of the Atomic Bomb by Richard Rhodes

The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt, Theodore Rex and Colonel Roosevelt by Edmund Morris.

The Smartest Guys in the Room: The Amazing Rise and Scandalous Fall of Enron by Bethany McLean

Master of the Senate by Robert Caro (haven't gotten to the other Johnson bios by him; did read The Power Broker which is also very good)

Number Go Up: Inside Crypto's Wild Rise and Staggering Fall by Zeke Faux

[Ridgeway]

+1 on the Rhodes book. Really fascinating.

You should try Vol I of the Caro LBJ biography -- It is great as well. Not just the stuff about LBJ, but the information on the New Deal and how it actually worked in practice.

[Sarcastr0]

I'm basically a Caro fanboy at this point, I'm just intimidated by the commitment.

[Stephen Lathrop]

The Making of the Atomic Bomb is such a standout. It somehow combines the conventions of a standard history, with those of an intellectual history, by means of biographical sketches. A staggering achievement.

Another excellent work with a similar structure is, Annals of the Former World, by John McPhee. That one takes geology as its focus.

[Sarcastr0]

Also Truman by David McCullough

[Brett Bellmore]

In the correct list this time:

Conscious Choice: The Origins of Slavery in America and Why it Matters Today and for Our Future in Outer Space, by Robert Zimmerman. It's an analysis of the differences between the original American colonies, that led some of them to become free states, and others to become slave states.

It's written with the intention of guiding space colony design to avoid a really dark future, but also works as just a historical analysis.

[The Margrave of Azilia]

Speaking of space-slavery: one of the few good lines in the Thor movie was where Jeff Goldblum, the evil slaver, objects to the term "slave," preferring "prisoners with jobs."

[SRG2]

The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire by Gibbon. An unparalleled work of history, with an archaic style that takes a short while to get used to, but an absolutely fascinating read and once I got going I couldn't put it down.

In Ishmael's House: A History of Jews in Muslim Lands by Martin Gilbert. After reading it, any reasonable person would conclude that Jews were entitled to our homeland even if the Holocaust had never happened and Europe had treated its Jews well. I described the history as a thousand years of Jim Crow - but worse.

Less reliable but highly readable classics:

"The Twelve Caesars" by Suetonius. Gossipy and fun - "Tiberius was a good emperor despite being a pederast".

"Anabasis" (also known as "the Journey of the 10,000") by Xenophon. 10,000 Greeks help Cyrus to win the Persian throne but though the battle is won, Cyrus is killed, and the Greeks have to hot-foot it back to Greece. It was the inspiration for the novel "the Warriors", later made into an excellent film. Unlikely to be entirely reliable, as Xenophon himself was one of the generals who led the Greeks back home.

"Brief Lives" by Plutarch. It inspired Shakespeare and so should be good enough for you. 🙂 Potted biographies of eminent Romans. Those of you familiar with Julius Caesar's line "let me have men about me that are fat" will find that this was a reference to Mark Antony, who was a plump and jovial fellow.

I recommend all of Anthony Beevor's WWII histories - "Stalingrad" is a good starting point.

[bernard11]

Second "Stalingrad."

"The Silk Roads" by Peter Frankopan. A view of world history from a different place than we are accustomed to. (Also "The First Crusade")

"Brunelleschi's Dome" by Ross King. The construction by one of the giants of architecture of the great Duomo in Florence, including technical detail and political intrigue. (Also "Leonardo and the Last Supper" and "Michelangelo and the Pope's Ceiling")

"The Great Influenza" by John Barry (Also "Rising Tide") The Spanish Flu.

"Cod" by Mark Kurlansky. The importance of that fish.

[Sarcastr0]

I found Cod a bit dry.

[SRG2]

Needs more miso paste

[Stephen Lathrop]

That happens when you hang out around flakes.

[PFSchaffner]

Paul Johnson, The Birth of the Modern: World Society 1815-1830 (1991). Lively, opinionated, and anecdotal in the Johnson manner, and probably the most consistently engaging, and wide-ranging, of his books.

James Stuart, Three Years in North America (Edinburgh, 1833). A neglected 1st-person account of ante-bellum America from the perspective of a liberal Scottish Whig. See, e.g., his observation that Americans never walk anywhere that they can drive...

[taqmcg]

One series that I found quite fascinating was Ian Toll’s trilogy history of the Pacific theatre in WWII, starting with “Pacific Crucible: War at Sea in the Pacific, 1941–1942”. More than any other account I’ve seen, I think it conveyed the sense of what it was to live through the events there and then. It is very US-focused though.

His account of the early US navy, Six Frigates, is also a lot of fun.

[GKHoff]

Ditto that.

[SAtex]

Crucible of War: The Seven Years' War and the Fate of Empire in British North America, 1754-1766, by Fred Anderson

A great book to really understand the global conflict that precipitated the American Revolution. All we typically hear is that it involved the French and George Washington was in it.

[SRG2]

There's a reason some modern historians regard the US war of independence as part of a broader conflict that should be recognised as World War I.

[Stephen Lathrop]

The Indian World of George Washington, by Colin Calloway

American Slavery, American Freedom, by Edmund Morgan

Inventing the People: The Rise of Popular Sovereignty in England and America, by Edmund Morgan

The Revolutionary: Samuel Adams, by Stacy Schiff

Gettysburg: The Last Invasion, by Alan Guelzo

The Second World War, by Antony Beevor

Of Plimoth Plantation, by William Bradford
This one is available in many editions. Do not buy an abridged edition. Whether you want early 17-century English or modernized English is a choice. I prefer the former; it does a better job to alert the reader that unfamiliar context is implied in every sentence.

[Lee Moore]

When Money Dies by Adam Fergusson (about the German hyperinflation of the early 1920s)

The Russian Civil War by Evan Mawdsley

[Ed Grinberg]

Communism: A History (Richard Pipes)
Succinct and informative.

A History of Israel: From the Rise of Zionism to Our Time (Howard Sachar)
Everything you ever wanted to know (and then some).

[Joe_dallas]

History of Israel is a good basis history of the region starting in the mid to late 1800's though the 1960/1970's (as I recall, though its been 10+ years since I read the book) It does have a pro Jewish tilt. While the region generally had more arabs in present day Israel though the 48 war, One item that stands out is the amount of arab migration into the area in the early 1900's as the Israelis made the area more prosperous.

[SRG2]

the amount of arab migration into the area in the early 1900’s as the Israelis [Zionists] made the area more prosperous.

This is seldom mentioned - partly because it undermines the idea that the Palestinians had always been there.

[Joe_dallas]

Also rarely mentioned is the number of Jews who were expelled from their native Middle East countries starting shortly after the 48 war and continuing until the early 1950's who settled in Israel. My recollection is some of the largest number expulsions were from Libya and Iran

[Stepped Reckoner]

When The Cheering Stopped by Gene Smith -- the tremendous biography of Woodrow Wilson's final years. When one despises someone it's important to study their possible sympathetic attributes or experiences, to ensure that one's dislike does not go beyond reasonable to unthinking. I despise Wilson, and this book moved me to tears on his behalf. Truly excellent.

[Rubbish!]

Grant by Ron Chernow
A History of the Jews by Paul Johnson
Citizens: A Chronicle of the French Revolution by Simon Schama
The Wisconsin Frontier by Mark Wyman
France: An Adventure History by Graham Robb (currently reading)

[JonFrum]

Gladius: the world of the Roman soldier by Guy de la Bedoyere - a look not at wars fought, but at the soldiers themselves. Guy was featured on the UK Time Team archaeology TV show.
The Story of Russia, by Orlando Figes - the whole thing, from A to Z.
The Ottomans: kahns, caesars and caliphs. by Marc David Baer - if it's only a name to you, the Ottoman empire was a major part of the civilized world and was much more a part of Europe than you might realize.
The Great Railroad Revolution:the history of trains in America. by Christian Walmar - one of those subjects that fills in the gaps of wars/politicians history and gets down to how people actually lived.
That's a start from my library history list.

[bernard11]

Jon,

Sounds like you might enjoy "Istanbul," by Thomas Madden.

[SRG2]

And "The Ottoman Centuries" by Lord Kinross.

[arhar]

Ottomans civilized? Only someone writing from a long distance could see it like that. They left behind only disasters and a 300 years backwardness in all the territories that used to be their colonies.

[dunlop212]

The multi-volume bios of Theodore Roosevelt by Morris and LBJ by Caro, for sure, but to read just one of each series, Theodore Rex and Master of the Senate. If you have read all of Caro's LBJ books and are in the interminable wait for the final volume, read The Power Broker while you are waiting.

Also, Lady Violet Bonham-Carter, Winston Churchill as I Knew Him.

[MN2828]

John Adams by David McCullough. I also enjoyed "The Great Bridge" about building the Brooklyn Bridge, "Path between the Seas" about building the Panama Canal and "Mornings on Horseback" about Teddy Roosevelt's early life -- all by McCullough.

Midnight in Chernobyl by Adam Higgonbotham

Robert Massie's Castles of Steel and Dreadnought, which discuss the role that Germany's attempt to build a navy to rival Britain's played in WWI.

[IANNAL]

“Big Trouble” by J. Anthony Lukas (which I mis-remembered as being by McCullough). Wobblies v. Pinkertons.

I also enjoyed "The Last Duel" by Eric Jager that Prof. Volokh posted about a while back.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Big Trouble is fascinating. Not least notable for the fact that it chronicles events of world-wide import—which were understood that way at the time. People involved included Big Bill Heywood, Clarence Darrow, William Borah, Teddy Roosevelt, and many other notables. Mass demonstrations extended to European capitals. All of that all but totally forgotten now. Forgotten not only nationwide, but even in Idaho where the events mainly occurred.

I lived years in Idaho in complete ignorance about that part of the state's history. I knew several people well-informed politically, and old enough to have remembered. Nobody ever mentioned any of it. You cannot go anywhere in the state without stumbling over residue from the various mining booms. Knowledge about the most consequential political occurrences related to those booms? Utterly missing from public consciousness.

That at least was the case in the 1970s and 1980s. Whether Lukas's book made any difference when it was published in 1997, after Lukas committed suicide, I cannot say. I doubt it. The book is even hard to find with Google, because another work by that name gets precedence in the returns.

[IANNAL]

"I lived years in Idaho in complete ignorance about that part of the state’s history. "

Me too. Moved there a couple of months after the Teton Dam broke, which reminds me to add:

"Cadillac Dessert" by Marc Reisner

[Joe_dallas]

Rise and fall of the third reich (by william shirer?) is a good one for basic level of understanding, though would like recommendations for better ones

[LawTalkingGuy]

Saul Friedlander Nazi Germany and the Jews. There’s a two volume version and an abridged version.

[Ridgeway]

An interesting thing about the Shirer book (RaFotTR) is how well it has aged. It still IS the conventional wisdom on Nazi Germany.

[JonFrum]

It's not often that an author writes a big picture book for which he was actually present. I've gone back just this year and re-read it.

[Stephen Lathrop]

An interesting companion to the Shirer book is journalist Howard K. Smith's notable, Last Train from Berlin. Smith relies on two year's experience in Germany, which ended coincidentally on 12/7/41, to tell a story framed as a prescient account derived from contemporaneous notes linking early Nazi historical occurrences to the ultimate collapse.

[Joe_dallas]

Stalin's War: A New History of World War II
Book by Sean McMeekin.
Roosevelt doesnt look good in this account (though there wasnt a good choice between hilter and stalin)

The Second World Wars: How the First Global Conflict Was Fought and Won
Book by Victor Davis Hanson

Hansons book deals more with the geopolitical / industrial part of the war and much less so on the individual battles.

[Lee Moore]

One can certainly argue that there wasn’t a good choice morally between Hitler and Stalin, but from a cold hearted US interests point of view, there was an easy choice - for Russia and against Germany, for purely geographical reasons.

German victory over Russia would have closed off the whole of Europe to the US, Russian victory over Germany would not. Or at least not necessarily - so long as the US intervened to assist Western Europe.

No comparable intervention could have protected Eastern Europe - it’s in the wrong place, right between the two jackals duking it out.

So from a US point of view, it was either abandon all of Europe to the winning jackal by continuing with isolation. Or help the Eastern jackal while securing the West.

And you have to be very isolationist indeed to think allowing another power to control all of Europe, and all of Europe’s trade, would have been a good option.

[Brett Bellmore]

Or, as Patton advised, ally with Stalin only until Hitler had been beaten, and then defeat an exhausted USSR.

[bernard11]

That always sounded fantastical to me.

Would the allies have gone along? Would the public, which wanted its soldiers home, have supported attacking the USSR, exhausted or not? And could we afford to do that without abandoning the Marshall Plan?

Were US forces in such good shape that it would have been an easy task? Invasions of Russia don't exactly have a history of ending well.

Most important, what would be accomplished? Nothing but more death and destruction, ISTM. Installing an occupation government creating a democratic state, a la Germany and Japan, don't strike me as practical options.

[Lee Moore]

I agree that carrying the war into Russia would not have been plausible politically.

But militarily it wouldn’t have been that hard to do a 1945 limited version of Fall Blau to neuter the Soviet Union. The strategic purpose of Fall Blau was to gain the Caucasus oilfields for Germany, and at the same time deny them to the Soviets.

Attacking from Persia where the Western Allies had a well founded logistical supply route, the Western Allies could have seized the Baku oilfields and most of the Caucasus. And then established a comfortable defense line along the mountains.

A Soviet Union deprived of oil would be no military competitor.

[Joe_dallas]

Patton was correct on that point - except the US still had to defeat japan, and the US public at the time was very tired of the war. As I noted below, US supplies to Russia should have ended by late 1943 or early 1944 where as the continued until July 1945.

Also of note as detailed in Hanson's book, Russia's industrial power remained very strong through the war.

[Stephen Lathrop]

Various commenters here seem poorly informed about the relative strengths of the Red Army in Europe, and the Allied forces there. Take note of those, and a premise that a war against the Soviets would enjoy any base at all on mainland Europe looks questionable. More likely, the war would begin with the political problem to explain to the U.S. people the sudden defeat and disappearance of an apparently victorious U.S. force in Europe.

The military problem might not have begun as an extension of an already-successful thrust into Europe. It might have begun as a challenge to determine the best way to re-invade, after an existing force had been annihilated.

This has been a rare example of a historical counter-factual worth considering, because it was as a speculation that it had to be considered at the time.

[Joe_dallas]

Concur that there was no good choice - though quite astonishing how much material was sent to Russia. The could be argued that cutting of the material assistance after stalingrad or kursk or sometime in 44. The continuation of supplying stalin through july 1945 wound up playing a big part in mao's defeating the nationalists a few years later when stalin ceded manchuria to mao.

Much to be learned from McKeenin's book

[Lee Moore]

The difficulty with that approach - with which I have a fair amount of sympathy - is that the Germans had a fixed quantity of military capacity, and thus the less they deployed on the Eastern Front, the more they could deploy on the Western Front*.

The German strategy in 1944 was to cede territory in the east in a hoped for controlled retreat, and focus on defeating the western invasion. Once the western invasion had been driven into the sea, forces could be redeployed back to the east.

Thus the more help the US gave to the Soviets (so long as that help didn’t detract from the forces available in Normandy) the larger would be the minimum German requirement in the east. And thus the smaller the German forces in the west.

By end August 1944, when it was clear that the invasion and breakout had been successful - then supplies to the Soviets could be reduced. Before then it would have increased the chances of failure in the west.

* the 3rd front important in the equation was the bombing of Germany. Even if you think that the air war was very inefficient, it tied up a large part of the Luftwaffe which would otherwise have been available on the eastern or western fronts.

[Joe_dallas]

fwiw - your assessment is consistent with my assessment, with the exception that by mid 1944, soviets industrial output was sufficient that a cut back of materials would not have impeded the soviet output. Certainly should not have continued supplying material in 1945.
You are definitely correct on the allied bombing tying up the luftwaffe.

[Hank Griffin]

Guns, Germs and Steel by Jared Diamond
1491 and 1493 by Charles Mann

[SRG2]

I really enjoyed "Guns, germs and steel". I regard it as one of the essential books, even though it has come in for later criticism(as does everything...)

[bernard11]

A very good book, I think.

[JonFrum]

I enjoyed 1491. Diamond isn't to my taste.

[Mark Regan]

Margaret MacMillan's Paris 1919.

Luigi Albertini's three volume The Origins of the War of 1914.

Isabel Wilkerson's The Warmth of Other Suns.

[Jerry B.]

The Last Stand of the Tin Can Sailors by James D. Hornfischer.

Off the island of Samar during the U.S. invasion of the Philippines, six escort carriers, three destroyers, and four destroyer escorts prevent a Japanese fleet of three battleships, six heavy cruisers, two light cruisers, and eleven destroyers from attacking the invasion fleet while “Bull” Halsey is off chasing a decoy squadron of Japanese carriers with no planes. The U.S. carriers have been doing ground support for the invasion, and have no bombs that can damage a Japanese heavy ship.

[Ridgeway]

Neptune's Inferno, about the naval campaign around Guadalcanal, by the same guy is also excellent. He ties all the individual battles together in a way that really makes sense.

The best book about the Pacific War I've read in a long time is Shattered Sword (Tully and Parshall). It completely changed my view of the Battle of Midway, and exploded a bunch of widely-accepted myths.

[jimc5499]

Read "Shattered Sword" and "Incredible Victory" one after the other. The books compliment each other.

[Ridgeway]

IIRC, Incredible Victory was one of the main purveyors of the Midway myths, mostly by relying on Fuchida's self-aggrandizing account.

[jimc5499]

Outstanding book.

I'd go with "The Admirals" by Walter Borneman.

[Bob from Ohio]

Lost to the West: The Forgotten Byzantine Empire That Rescued Western Civilization by Lars Brownworth

[Sarcastr0]

His podcast 7 Byzantine Rulers remains in my top 10.

Norman Centuries was also very good. I love to tell people Sicily was founded by a Norman adventurer.

[Lee Moore]

Hardly.

The Athenians were unsuccessfully besieging Syracuse in the Peloponesian war. Sicily had been vitally important and contested turf for at least 1500 years before any Normans turned up.

But it’s true those Norsemen did get about. Amazing what a boat will do for you. Just ask that Genoese adventurer whose name may no longer be mentioned.

[Sarcastr0]

Sicily had a banger location strategically, but perhaps because of that was never unified.

Grand Count Roger got hisself the whole dang island.

[Stupid Government Tricks]

The Victorian Internet, all about how the telegraph upended society with its constant interruptions and demand for attention, much like email (written late 1990s, I think). Little book, great example of there being nothing new under the sun.

Feeding Nelson's Navy. How Britain fed and supplied its Navy during the Napoleonic wars. Recipes, costs, and one fascinating example of buying cattle in Spain with discounted bills which ended up back in London, while the cattle were rowed out to ships and distributed to the fleet, and all the costs accounted for down to the farthing, all hand checked by three clerks in London years later as ships returned for overhauls.

[MoreCurious]

Battle Cry of Freedom: McPherson.
The Power Broker: Caro.
Europe. Davies.
Postwar. Judt.

[LawTalkingGuy]

I have a bunch but I’ll stick with my favorite microhistories quasi-microhistories

The Cheese and the Worms by Carlo Ginzburg
Immodest Acts by Judith Brown
The Question of Hu by Jonathan Spence
Return of Martin Guerre by Natalie Zemon Davis
Trent 1475 by Ronnie Po Chia Hsia
Voyage of the Slave Ship Hare by Sean M Kelly
The Great Cat Massacre by Robert Darnton

[Ed Grinberg]

re: The Great Cat Massacre
A curious book. It was one of the assigned readings in a French history course I took in college. The professor saw a connection between this incident and the future French Revolution.

[HankViam]

Modern Times: The World from the Twenties to the Nineties — Paul Johnson

The Making of the Atomic Bomb — Richard Rhodes

Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar — Simon Sebag Montefiore

Moscow, 1937 — Karl Schlögel

Commies: A Journey Through the Old Left, the New Left and the Leftover Left — Ronald Radosh

[SRG2]

The two Stalin bios -that SS-M wrote are not only excellent but they may well never be exceeded because he had access to materials and archives that were later closed down and it's conceivable that no future historian will ever have the same - or indeed any - level of access.

[Ed Grinberg]

I haven't (yet) read Montefiore's biography of Stalin. I did read this one (and thought it was very good):
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stalin_(Radzinsky_book)

[Lee Moore]

Yup - “Young Stalin” was excellent.

As for the one on the grown up Stalin, IIRC SSM repeats the story that Stalin was in a complete panic at the beginning of Barbarossa and shut himself away, unable to make decisions.

But I have read elsewhere that this is Khruschevian propaganda. Stalin was working flat out and only shut himself away to have a sleep when he’d done a 36 hour shift.

[Intelligent Mr Toad]

SURVIVAL IN AUSCHWITZ aka IF THIS IS A MAN (Se questo è un uomo), by Primo Levi.

[Dan Schiavetta]

The Myth of Rome’s Fall by Richard Masefield Haywood. Very readable and covers an amazing amount of material in 136 pages.

[SRG2]

Some more:
"Landscape and Memory" by Simon Schama - astonishing historical view on the connection between humans and nature. Schama carries his learning heavily but boy can he write.

“Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World” by Jack Weatherfield – a revisionist, in the best sense, perspective on ol’ Temujin. Weatherfield takes the view that for all the atrocities for which he was known, he wasn’t any worse than European monarchs, and many good things arose from his reign. It’s an easy read.

“

[Frank Drackman]

Since I’m a frustrated Shyster, I already know the answer, buttttttttt……….
Would Jim Bouton’s “Ball Four” qualify?

Your Witness, Counselor

Frank

[GKHoff]

The Hamilton Scheme: An Epic Tale of Money and Power in the American Founding by William Hogeland. A very interesting account of revolutionary era America from a financial perspective.

[Robert Efroymson]

Six Days of War, by Michael Oren. Excellent book on a war that set up many of the issues we are still working through in the Middle East

The Lion’s Gate, by Steven Pressfield, another book on that war, but more personal stories.

With The Old Breed, by E.B. Sledge. Mortar man’s view of the battles Peleliu and Okinawa. Powerful book. I think HBO used the story for the Pacific series, but I’ve not seen it. I regularly reread this

[Ridgeway]

"With The Old Breed, by E.B. Sledge. Mortar man’s view of the battles Peleliu and Okinawa. Powerful book. I think HBO used the story for the Pacific series, but I’ve not seen it. I regularly reread this."

HBO did, but the book is better. The Pacific pales in comparison to Band of Brothers.

[ducksalad]

The Conquest of the Sahara, by Douglas Porch. History of French military expeditions into what is now Algeria/Mali/Mauritania.

The Fight for the Malvinas, by Martin Middlebrook. British war historian who had already written a book about the Falklands War goes to Argentina to get their side of the same events.

[ducksalad]

BTW thanks to Brett Bellmore for recommending The Silicon Man in the media thread three weeks back. I’m 2/3 through and it’s pretty good.

Also picked up Primordial Planet based on the rec from Harvey Mosley but haven’t started on it yet.

[Fort Worth Lawyer]

Empire of the Summer Moon. By SC Gwynne. Excellent book. I didn't even find Indian history interesting before reading this.

[EllaWilson]

The Last Place on Earth: Scott and Amundsen's Race to the South Pole by Roland Huntford and Paul Theroux

Endurance: Shackleton's Incredible Voyage
by Alfred Lansing and Nathaniel Philbrick

[fatnastyretiredguy]

Neihardt - Black Elk Speaks

[blcjr]

The New Roman Empire: A History of Byzantium, by Anthony Kaldellis.

[Frank Drackman]

that sounds interesting, the Eastern Roman Empire gets overlooked, like the Eastern US of the latter 19th Century, who's ever heard of the "Gunfight at the Concord NH Corral?"""

[TwomblyMan]

Churchill's Marlborough.

[The Margrave of Azilia]

There ought to be a book about all Churchill's ancestors. Title: A Pack of Marlboroughs.

[ZT]

Dava Sobel's "Longitude" and "Galileo's Daughter."

[doug-sundseth]

Nothing Like it in the World, Stephen Ambrose - the building of the transcontinental railroad.

The War of the Austrian Succession, Reed Browning - One of the most fascinating examples of the byzantine politics of Europe in the 18th century.

John Julius Norwich's three volume history of the Byzantine Empire, starting with Byzantium: the Early Centuries

Rick Atkinson's Liberation Trilogy - Covers the development of the US Army from an army of amateurs to great power.

Samuel Eliot Morison's History of US Naval Operations in WWII - perhaps the best official military history ever written.

Nearly any of the books about British colonial warfare written by Byron Farwell. He is a brilliant storyteller and the books provide a more anecdotal look at the conflicts of that period.

Quartered Safe Out There, George MacDonald Fraser - a ground-level look at the Burma Campaign in WWII.

And as was mentioned above, The Last Stand of the Tin Can Sailors, James Hornfischer - a brilliant look at the Battle Off Samar during the Leyte campaign.

[Intelligent Mr Toad]

THE CHEMISTS' WAR 1914-1918 by Michael Freemantle

[CalArtian]

The End of Everything -- Victor Davis Hanson

Everybody Loves Dead Jews -- Dara Horn

[arhar]

The Grand Strategy of the Byzantine Empire - Edward Luttwak
Strategy - Liddell Hart

[Sorcer23]

Battle for the Island Kingdom
England's Destiny 1000-1066
Don Hollway

[rajpe]

Political Pilgrims by Paul Hollander

[Kulikovo1380]

1. Stalin's War by Sean McMeeken (sp?). Good antidote to the cults of not only FDR but also Winston Churchill...2 innocents abroad. Stalin must have been so astonished by his good luck as possibly to consider the possibility that God exists.
2. Haiti or the Black Republic by Sir Spencer St. John. St. John was Queen Victoria's diplomatic rep to Haiti for several decades in the last half of the 19th century. Very entertaining and fascinating book. He writes with the mordant wit of an upper class Englishmen viewing the oddities on display. This book is HATED by modern historians of Haiti, most of whom are marxists, because it gives the true face of things like Voodoo and because the author, amazingly enough, does not think it is possible for Haiti ever to establish a civilized European-style government. And as we read the gaga accounts in The NY Times and hear them on NPR about the wonders of Haitian immigrants (harder working than Americans, less crime than Americans, cleaner than Americans...in sum just a superior people than Americans) we know how wrong Sir Spencer was.