Any suggestions??

[Geisha_girl]

I want to start reading non-fiction books. Books that, you could say, are more educational. But I do think reading fiction can be just as educational. Anyway, I don't care what it's on. But as long as it isn't too boring like, "The theoretical relationships amongst fiscally responsible blah blah (add more non-sensical smart sounding words)..." You get what I'm trying to say, I'm sure. I was thinking of reading stuff about Darwinism and Marxism, I don't know why but that's just been picking at me. And I really love history. Mainly world history. Ancient Egypt, Asian history, etc...But if you know a really good American history book, by all means, I'm open. Ok, thanks!

 

[mehastings]

Ug...far too hard to choose just one...

Just looking at one shelf in my house I come up with Gotham, The Great Shame, Tally's Corner, To Purge This Land with Blood, A Scattered People, The Tweed Ring, Bibles, Brahmins and Bosses, and A Woman of Valor.

They're mostly all American History as that was my focus in college. I was never interested in it until I started reading these books!

 

[PhilW]

Read 'The Gulag Archipelago' by Alexander Solzhenitsyn. It will astound you. The full version can be a bit daunting but there is an abridged single-volume translation that was fully approved by the author.

If you read it and you still thought Stalin, Beria et al were 'OK guys' (assuming you ever did, that is), then you'd need your bumps feeling!

 

[abecedarian]

Read 'The Gulag Archipelago' by Alexander Solzhenitsyn. It will astound you. The full version can be a bit daunting but there is an abridged single-volume translation that was fully approved by the author.

If you read it and you still thought Stalin, Beria et al were 'OK guys' (assuming you ever did, that is), then you'd need your bumps feeling!

Excellent suggestion. Having just read Cancer Ward, and First Circle a few months ago, I wholeheartedly endorse Solzhenitsyn. I will say though, don't be surprised if you need read in stops and fits..the writing isn't so difficult, but the subject matter is a bit hard to take in in large gulps. Allow yourself time to think about the material, but don't be intimidated either.

For a total change of pace, here are two books I enjoyed very much: A Thousand Years Over a Hot Stove: A History of American Women Told through Food, Recipes, and Remembrances -Laura Schenonehttp://tinyurl.com/ytn89w and Eat My Words:Reading Women's Lives Through the Cookbooks They Wrote-Janet Theophano http://tinyurl.com/2bmf2z

 

[FoxxyDeda]

Hello Geisha_girl,

I just read a book that might fall in the middle and help you in this "transition" . One Thousand White Women by Jim Fergus is something like a historic novel and tells the life of a white woman who marries an Indian chief. The story happens during the Indian Wars period and talks about a program started by the American government to try to help keep peace with the Indians by marrying white women into the Indian tribes.
The book is a novel supposedly based on this woman's diary and, although I think it misses a bit because it is a man telling a woman's history, I found it to be a very good read and the historical facts in it seem to be accurate enough.

 

[Ste J]

One of my favourite history books is Stalingrad by Antony Beevor. It's a big book but reads more like a novel than anything giving a very vivid account of one of the turning ponts of World War two.

 

[Rachel]

Booknotes - American Character
72 sessions of C-SPAN’s popular author-interview series, covering prominent nonfiction books on American history. They read like short, informal essays. Amazingly interesting and a great jumping off point! (Short attention spans welcome. )

 

[FoxxyDeda]

One of my favourite history books is Stalingrad by Antony Beevor. It's a big book but reads more like a novel than anything giving a very vivid account of one of the turning ponts of World War two.

Stalingrad was the very first book I read in English, my husband (boyfriend at the time) forgot it at my house and I just decided to try. NOT an easy read for someone that could speak English but was in no way proficient.
I did enjoy it and apart from the sheer volume of dates and numbers and statistics, it does read almost like a novel.