|
|
|
|
History and Current Events January 2026 |
|
|
|
| Capitalism: A Global History by Sven BeckertAward-winning Harvard historian Sven Beckert (Empire of Cotton) explores the development of capitalism around the globe in his sweeping and scholarly latest that's "a joy to read" and "a monumental achievement" (Publishers Weekly). Further reading: Capitalism and Its Critics: A History: From the Industrial Revolution to AI by John Cassidy. |
|
|
|
Worlds of Islam: A Global History
by James McDougall
A sweeping global history of Islam, tracing the 1,400-year evolution of a diverse community of faith and its place in the modern world. From its birth in seventh-century Arabia, Islam has been a faith on the move. Over the span of a thousand years, armies, missionaries, and merchants carried it to the edges of Europe, the coasts of Southeast Asia, and the remote interior of China.
Sweeping and authoritative, Worlds of Islam narrates the epic story of how Muslims emerged as a community, built empires, traversed the globe, came to number in the billions, and became modern.
|
|
|
|
Japanese Submarines in World War Two: Hirohito's Silent Hunters
by Terry C. Treadwell
A comprehensive account of Japanese submarine operations in World War Two. The Imperial Japanese Navy developed the submarine faster than any other country in the world. But because of rivalries between the two military hierarchies, the Army and the Navy, they never utilized the submarine to its full extent. Nevertheless, during World War II, Japan deployed a number of unique submarines.
The submarine losses suffered by the Japanese Navy as the war progressed, when Allied, and in particular U.S. destroyers and aircraft hunted them down are all recorded in this comprehensive account of a fascinating element of the war at sea.
|
|
|
|
Tunnel 29: The True Story of an Extraordinary Escape Beneath the Berlin Wall
by Helena Merriman
In September 1961, at the height of the Cold War, 22-year-old Joachim Rudolph escaped from East Germany, one of the world's most brutal regimes. He'd risked everything to do it. Then, a few months later, working with a group of students, he picked up a spade...and tunneled back in.
The goal was to tunnel into the East to help people escape. They spend months digging, hauling up carts of dirt in a tunnel ventilated by stove pipes.
After several attempts, run-ins with a spy and secret police, and some unlikely financial aid from an American TV network, they finally break through into the East, and free 29 people.--
|
|
| Daring to Be Free: Rebellion and Resistance of the Enslaved in the Atlantic World by Sudhir HazareesinghHistorian and Black Spartacus author Sudhir Hazareesingh's thought-provoking revisionist history eschews Eurocentric notions of abolition to reveal the forgotten ways in which enslaved Africans and African Americans actively resisted their captors in thought and deed. Further reading: Brooding Over Bloody Revenge: Enslaved Women's Lethal Resistance by Nikki M. Taylor. |
|
|
|
Rot: An Imperial History of the Irish Famine
by Padraic X. Scanlan
A vigorous and engaging (Fintan O'Toole, New Yorker) new history of the Irish Great Famine, showing how the British Empire caused Ireland's most infamous disaster.
In Rot, historian Padraic X. Scanlan offers the definitive account of the Great Famine, showing how Ireland's place in the United Kingdom and the British Empire made it uniquely vulnerable to starvation.
Uncovering the disaster's roots in Britain's deep imperial faith in markets, commerce, and capitalism, Rot reshapes our understanding of the Great Famine and its tragic legacy.
|
|
|
|
Rain of Ruin: Tokyo, Hiroshima, and the Surrender of Japan
by Richard Overy
With the development of the B-29 "Superfortress" in summer 1944, strategic bombing, a central component of the Allied war effort against Germany, arrived in the Pacific theater. The two atomic blasts in August killed hundreds of thousands in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, most of them civilians. The bombing brought a destabilizing devastation that, combined with a declaration of war by the Soviet Union, induced Japan, as they put it, to terminate the war.
The atomic bombing emerges as impactful but not decisive in this rich, multilayered history. A leading historian of World War II sheds new light on the purposes and impact of the U.S. incendiary and atomic bombing of Japan's cities in 1945.
|
|
| The Greatest Sentence Ever Written by Walter IsaacsonBestselling biographer Walter Isaacson turns his attention to the second sentence of the Declaration of Independence (which begins with "We hold these truths to be self-evident..."), offering a word-by-word breakdown of its significance. Published to coincide with the document's 250th anniversary, this "short, smart analysis" (Kirkus Reviews) will appeal to fans of The Pursuit of Happiness: How Classical Writers on Virtue Inspired the Lives of the Founders and Defined America by Jeffrey Rosen. |
|
|
|
Captive Queen: The Decrypted History of Mary, Queen of Scots
by Jade Scott
For almost two decades before her execution at Fotheringhay Castle in 1587, Mary, Queen of Scots was a prisoner. From her chambers, she wrote countless letters, many encrypted using complex ciphers to prevent her communications from being intercepted.
In this way, she used language to exert her will and her influence, even while incarcerated. More than four hundred years after Mary's death, the discovery of further encoded letters has led to renewed interest in the breadth of her correspondence while in captivity.
In Captive Queen: The Decrypted History of Mary, Queen of Scots, Jade Scott draws on hundreds of these ground-breaking letters to create a vivid picture of one of history's most fascinating personalities.
|
|
Contact your librarian for more great books!
|
|
|
Carrollton Public Library 1700 Keller Springs Road, Carrollton Texas 75006 4220 North Josey Lane, Carrollton Texas 75010 |
|
|