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History and Current Events December 2025 |
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| Dead and Alive: Essays by Zadie SmithZadie Smith's wide-ranging and witty latest collects 30 essays and talks penned during the last ten years, offering the author's reflections on pop culture, politics, loss, aging, and more. For fans of: Like Love: Essays and Conversations by Maggie Nelson. |
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The Devil Reached Toward the Sky: An Oral History of the Making and Unleashing of the Atomic Bomb
by Garrett M. Graff
On the eightieth anniversary of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings, the Pulitzer Prize finalist whose work is oral history at its finest (Pittsburgh Post-Gazette) delivers an epic narrative of the atomic bomb's creation and deployment, woven from the voices of hundreds of scientists, generals, soldiers, and civilians.The building of the atomic bomb is the most audacious undertaking in human history: a rush by a small group of scientists and engineers in complete secrecy to unlock the most fundamental power of the universe.
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| The Great Contradiction: The Tragic Side of the American Founding by Joseph J. EllisPulitzer Prize-winning historian Joseph J. Ellis follows up The Cause: The American Revolution and Its Discontents, 1773-1783 with an incisive exploration of how America's Founding Fathers were complicit in slavery and Indigenous dispossession despite their calls for universal freedom. Further reading: Liberty Is Sweet: The Hidden History of the American Revolution by Woody Holton. |
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History Matters
by David McCullough; foreword by Jon Meacham, edited by Dorie McCullough Lawson and Michael Hill
In this posthumous collection of 20 essays and speeches (some previously unpublished), Pulitzer Prize-winning historian David McCullough offers freewheeling and impassioned reflections on the importance of learning about history to better understand the present. Try this next: An Unfinished Love Story: A Personal History of the 1960s by Doris Kearns Goodwin.
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The Illegals: Russia's Most Audacious Spies and Their Century-Long Mission to Infiltrate the West
by Shaun Walker
A century ago, the new Bolshevik government began sending Soviet citizens abroad as deep-cover spies, training them to pose as foreign aristocrats, merchants, and students. Over time, this became the most ambitious espionage program in human history. Many intelligence agencies use undercover operatives, but the KGB was the only one to go to such lengths, spending years training its spies to pass for foreigners, then sending them on missions that could last for decades--[and were rarely successful]. These spies were known as the illegals.
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| Lost at Sea: Poverty and Paradise Collide at the Edge of America by Joe KlocJournalist Joe Kloc's compelling debut details how the anchor-outs, an impoverished Sausalito, California community living in abandoned boats, have navigated eviction, homelessness, and dehumanization in their efforts to maintain their way of life. For fans of: Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City by Matthew Desmond. |
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| Motherland: A Feminist History of Modern Russia, from Revolution to Autocracy by Julia IoffeIn this "pensive account of a revolution betrayed" (Kirkus Reviews), Moscow-born journalist Julia Ioffe's National Book Award finalist (as of publication time) explores a century of feminist history in Russia, revealing how women's freedoms after the Russian Revolution have devolved under the regime of Vladimir Putin. Try this next: Red Valkyries: Feminist Lessons from Five Revolutionary Women by Kristen Ghodsee. |
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| We Survived the Night by Julian Brave NoiseCatBlending elements of memoir and reportage with oral storytelling traditions, Tsq̓éscen̓ First Nation filmmaker and activist Julian Brave NoiseCat spotlights contemporary Indigenous life in North America, highlighting the triumphs and travails of misrepresented communities. Try this next: Sugarcane, NoiseCat's documentary for which he became the first Indigenous American filmmaker nominated for an Academy Award; Rez Rules: My Indictment of Canada's and America's Systemic Racism Against Indigenous Peoples by Chief Clarence Louie. |
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Contact the Reference Dept. at 847-720-3230 for more great books! |
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