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History and Current Events November 2026 |
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Britain at Bay: The Epic Story of the Second World War, 1938-1941
by Alan Allport
Here is the many-faceted, world-historically significant story of Britain at war. In looking closely at the military and political dimensions of the conflict's first crucial years, Alan Allport tackles questions such as: Could the war have been avoided? Could it have been lost? Were the strategic decisions the rights ones? How well did the British organize and fight? How well did the British live up to their own values? What difference did the war make in the end to the fate of the nation? In answering these and other essential questions he focuses on the human contingencies of the war, weighing directly at the roles of individuals and the outcomes determined by luck or chance. Moreover, he looks intimately at the changes in wartime British society and culture. Britain at Bay draws on a large cast of characters--from the leading statesmen and military commanders who made the decisions, to the ordinary men, women, and children who carried them out and lived through their consequences--in a comprehensible and compelling single history of forty-six million people. For better or worse, much of Britain today is ultimately the product of the experiences of 1938-1941--
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| Man in the Mirror: Hope, Struggle, and Belonging in an American City by Anand GiridharadasOn May 1, 2023, Jordan Neely, a Black unhoused man experiencing a psychotic episode on the New York City subway, was placed in a chokehold by a fellow passenger, white former Marine Daniel Penny, until he died. Investigative journalist Anand Giridharadas’ nuanced account looks beyond the headlines to reveal the complexity of the tragedy, exploring themes of race and privilege, homelessness, mental health care, and America’s criminal justice system. Further reading: In the Shadow of Freedom: The Enduring Call for Racial Justice by Alessandra Harris. |
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End Times: Elites, Counter-Elites, and the Path of Political Disintegration
by Peter Turchin
Peter Turchin, one of the most interesting social scientists of our age, has infused the study of history with approaches and insights from other fields for more than a quarter century. End Times is the culmination of his work to understand what causes political communities to cohere and what causes them to fall apart, as applied to the current turmoil within the United States. Back in 2010, when Nature magazine asked leading scientists to provide a ten-year forecast, Turchin used his models to predict that America was in a spiral of social disintegration that would lead to a breakdown in the political order circa 2020. The years since have proved his prediction more and more accurate, and End Times reveals why--
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Rush: Revolution, Madness, and Benjamin Rush, the Visionary Doctor Who Became a Founding Father
by Stephen Fried
The monumental life of Benjamin Rush, medical pioneer and one of our most provocative and unsung Founding Fathers FINALIST FOR THE GEORGE WASHINGTON BOOK PRIZE - AMERICAN LIBRARY ASSOCIATION NOTABLE BOOK OF THE YEAR By the time he was thirty, Dr. Benjamin Rush had signed the Declaration of Independence, edited Common Sense, toured Europe as Benjamin Franklin's protégé, and become John Adams's confidant, and was soon to be appointed Washington's surgeon general. And as with the greatest Revolutionary minds, Rush was only just beginning his role in 1776 in the American experiment. As the new republic coalesced, he became a visionary writer and reformer; a medical pioneer whose insights and reforms revolutionized the treatment of mental illness; an opponent of slavery and prejudice by race, religion, or gender; an adviser to, and often the physician of, America's first leaders; and the American Hippocrates. Rush reveals his singular life and towering legacy, installing him in the pantheon of our wisest and boldest Founding Fathers. Praise for Rush Entertaining . . . Benjamin Rush has been undeservedly forgotten. In medicine . . . [and] as a political thinker, he was brilliant.--The New Yorker Superb . . . reminds us eloquently, abundantly, what a brilliant, original man Benjamin Rush was, and how his contributions to . . . the United States continue to bless us all.--The Philadelphia Inquirer Perceptive . . . [a] readable reassessment of Rush's remarkable career.--The Wall Street Journal An amazing life and a fascinating book.--CBS This Morning Fried makes the case, in this comprehensive and fascinating biography, that renaissance man Benjamin Rush merits more attention. . . . Fried portrays Rush as a complex, flawed person and not just a list of accomplishments; . . . a testament to the authorial thoroughness and insight that will keep readers engaged until the last page.--Publishers Weekly (starred review) [An] extraordinary and underappreciated man is reinstated to his rightful place in the canon of civilizational advancement in Rush. . . . Had I read Fried's Rush before the year's end, it would have crowned my favorite books of 2018 . . . [a] superb biography.--Brain Pickings
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Focus on: Native American Heritage Month
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| The Free and the Dead: The Untold Story of the Black Seminole Chief, the Indigenous Rebel... by Jamie HolmesJournalist and historian Jamie Holmes’ fast-paced account of the Seminole Wars (1817-1858), America’s longest military engagement until the Vietnam War, reveals little-known aspects of the conflict and spotlights the diversity of the Seminole Nation, which included formerly enslaved Africans. Further reading: Osceola and the Great Seminole War: A Struggle for Justice and Freedom by Thom Hatch. |
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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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Native Nations: A Millennium in North America
by Kathleen Duval
PULITZER PRIZE WINNER - NATIONAL BESTSELLER - A magisterial overview of a thousand years of Native American history (The New York Review of Books), from the rise of ancient cities more than a thousand years ago to fights for sovereignty that continue today WINNER OF THE BANCROFT PRIZE, THE CUNDILL HISTORY PRIZE, AND THE MARK LYNTON HISTORY PRIZE Long before the colonization of North America, Indigenous Americans built diverse civilizations and adapted to a changing world in ways that reverberated globally. And, as award-winning historian Kathleen DuVal vividly recounts, when Europeans did arrive, no civilization came to a halt because of a few wandering explorers, even when the strangers came well armed. A millennium ago, North American cities rivaled urban centers around the world in size. Then, following a period of climate change and instability, numerous smaller nations emerged, moving away from rather than toward urbanization. From this urban past, egalitarian government structures, diplomacy, and complex economies spread across North America. So, when Europeans showed up in the sixteenth century, they encountered societies they did not understand--those having developed differently from their own--and whose power they often underestimated. For centuries afterward, Indigenous people maintained an upper hand and used Europeans in pursuit of their own interests. In Native Nations, we see how Mohawks closely controlled trade with the Dutch--and influenced global markets--and how Quapaws manipulated French colonists. Power dynamics shifted after the American Revolution, but Indigenous people continued to command much of the continent's land and resources. Shawnee brothers Tecumseh and Tenskwatawa forged new alliances and encouraged a controversial new definition of Native identity to attempt to wall off U.S. ambitions. The Cherokees created institutions to assert their sovereignty on the global stage, and the Kiowas used their power in the west to regulate the passage of white settlers across their territory. In this important addition to the growing tradition of North American history centered on Indigenous nations, Kathleen DuVal shows how the definitions of power and means of exerting it shifted over time, but the sovereignty and influence of Native peoples remained a constant--and will continue far into the future. An essential American history--The Wall Street Journal
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On savage shores : how indigenous Americans discovered Europe
by Caroline Dodds Pennock
Drawing on surviving their literature and poetry, one of the worlds foremost authorities on Mesoamerica presents a sweeping account of the Indigenous American presence in, and impact on, early modern Europe, shattering our previous Eurocentric understanding of the Age of Discovery. Illustrations.
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Contact your librarian for more great books!
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