History and Current Events
August 2025
Recent Releases
The Last Great Dream: How Bohemians Became Hippies and Created the Sixties
by Dennis McNally

Grateful Dead biographer McNally (A Long Strange Trip) offers a far-reaching, immersive history of the post-WWII countercultural movement. Beginning in the late 1940s, McNally traces how a “whirlpool of maverick poets” in San Francisco overlapped with art, theater, music, and activist scenes in Los Angeles, New York, and London. McNally masterfully combines many disparate lineages of political, social, art, and pop history into one singular, sweeping portrait. The result is a stunning vision of a broad and powerful idealism that gripped the world for more than two decades 
Threads of Empire: A History of the World in Twelve Carpets
by Dorothy Armstrong

Material culture historian Dorothy Armstrong's sweeping and well-researched world history details the practical and symbolic roles carpets have played in shaping human civilization by spotlighting 12 individual carpets woven between 500 BCE and the present. Try this next: Rope: How a Bundle of Twisted Fibers Became the Backbone of Civilization by Tim Queeney. 
Allies at War: How the Struggles Between the Allied Powers Shaped the War and the World
by Tim Bouverie

Rife with dramatic political intrigue and sly humor, British historian Tim Bouverie's fast-paced account offers fresh insights on the "incongruous alliance" of the Allied forces during World War II, profiling lesser known battles and players that nonetheless played a key role in winning the war. For fans of: The Allies: Roosevelt, Churchill, Stalin, and the Unlikely Alliance That Won World War II by Winston Groom.
Midnight on the Potomac: The Last Year of the Civil War, the Lincoln Assassination, and the Rebirth of America
by Scott Ellsworth

Award-winning historian Scott Ellsworth's compelling and well-researched latest focuses on the final year of the American Civil War, revealing how John Wilkes Booth may have been part of a long-planned Confederate conspiracy to assassinate President Abraham Lincoln. Further reading: Lincoln's Peace: The Struggle to End the American Civil War by Michael Vorenberg.
The CIA Book Club: The Secret Mission to Win the Cold War with Forbidden Literature
by Charlie English

Former Guardian journalist Charlie English evocatively chronicles the CIA's successful efforts to weaken Soviet censorship and control by distributing subversive and pro-democracy literature to Eastern Europe in the 1980s. Try this next: The Book Collectors: A Band of Syrian Rebels and the Stories That Carried Them Through a War by Delphine Minoui.
Bad Company: Private Equity and the Death of the American Dream
by Megan Greenwell

In her incisive debut, journalist Megan Greenwell draws upon her own experience as a former writer for Deadspin to investigate the damaging impact private equity firms have on American workers and communities. Further reading: These Are the Plunderers: How Private Equity Runs--and Wrecks--America by Gretchen Morgenson and Joshua Rosner.  
Misbehaving at the Crossroads: Essays & Writings
by Honorée Fanonne Jeffers

National Book Award-nominated poet and novelist Honorée Fanonne Jeffers (The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois) makes her genre-defying nonfiction debut with this unflinching and insightful essay collection exploring various crossroads Black women have faced throughout history. For fans of: In Search of Our Mothers' Gardens: Womanist Prose by Alice Walker; Black in Blues: How a Color Tells the Story of My People by Imani Perry.
Dinner with King Tut: How Rogue Archaeologists Are Re-creating the Sights, Sounds, Smells and Tastes of Lost Civilizations
by Sam Kean

Bestselling science writer Sam Kean (The Icepick Surgeon) offers a lively chronicle of how experimental archeologists utilize evidence found at dig sites to replicate ancient rituals and customs, including hunting with period-appropriate weaponry, playing an Aztec ballgame, brewing ancient Egyptian beer, and even mummifying corpses. Further reading: Custodians of Wonder: Ancient Customs, Profound Traditions, and the Last People Keeping Them Alive by Eliot Stein.
Their Accomplices Wore Robes: How the Supreme Court Chained Black America to the Bottom of a Racial Caste System
by Brando Simeo Starkey

Legal scholar Brando Simeo Starkey's (In Defense of Uncle Tom) richly detailed history explores the role the United States Supreme Court has played in the systemic oppression of Black people. Try this next: The Worst Trickster Story Ever Told: Native America, the Supreme Court, and the U.S. Constitution by Keith Richotte, Jr.
Hope Dies Last: Visionary People Across the World, Fighting to Find Us a Future
by Alan Weisman

Environmental journalist Alan Weisman's moving and upbeat account profiles inspiring individuals around the world (including scientists, engineers, politicians, and activists) who are fighting to combat climate change. Further reading: Climate Resilience: How We Keep Each Other Safe, Care for Our Communities, and Fight Back Against Climate Change by Kylie Flanagan.
Contact your library for more great books!
Fresno County Public Library
2420 Mariposa St., Fresno, California 93721
559-600-7323

https://www.fresnolibrary.org