a call for non-fiction book recs

[human_veil]

preferably of the historical kind, but i really will take anything.

something fun about post-university life is that i am now wholly responsible for what i study, and (fun fact!) i seriously considered pursuing a history degree before i got into law. since i’m not currently feeling very fannish i thought i’d use my downtime to revisit an old love instead, and, well. there is so much to read i don’t know where to start.

i am currently (very slowly) reading richard english’s history of the IRA. if it helps: my interest has always been 20th century political history centric (esp. soviet/cold war) but, again, will take anything. my TBR list can never be too long.

many thanks in advance <3

Comments

[gracerene]

BOY, do I have recs for you! Keeping this (somewhat) brief by trying to specifically only rec NF books I've read and enjoyed that have a somewhat historical bent! Happy to talk more specifically about any or all if there are ones you're particularly curious about, but these are all books I've personally read and rated 4 or 5 stars! The first grouping are books specifically about racism and Black & Indigenous Americans, and the last grouping is a mixed bag!

The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness by Michelle Alexander
Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America by Ibram X Kendi
The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America's Great Migration by Isabel Wilkerson
Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents by Isabel Wilkerson
Four Hundred Souls: A Community History of African America, 1619-2019 by Ibram X Kendi and Others
An Indigenous Peoples' History of the United States by Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz
They Were Her Property: White Women as Slave Owners in the American South by Stephanie Jones-Rogers


White Trash: The 400-Year Untold History of Class in America by Nancy Isenburg
Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind by Yuval Noah Hariri
Debt: The First 5,000 Years by David Graeber
The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity by David Graeber
The Address Book: What Street Addresses Reveal About Identity, Race, Wealth, and Power by Deirdre Mask
Confident Women: Swindlers, Grifters, and Shapeshifters of the Feminine Persuasion by Tori Telfer
Humankind: A Hopeful History by Rutger Bregman
Truth: A Brief History of Total Bullsh*t by Tom Philips
A Curious History of Sex by Kate Lister
The Five: The Untold Lives of the Women Killed by Jack the Ripper by Hallie Rubenhold
The Radium Girls: The Dark Story of America's Shining Women by Kate Moore
The Devil in the White City: Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair That Changed America by Erik Larson
Nine Nasty Words: English in the Gutter — Then, Now, and Forever by John McWhorter
Sea People: The Puzzle of Polynesia by Christina Thompson
The Art of More: How Mathematics Created Civilization by Michael Brooks