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History and Current Events June 2019
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The Library Book
by Susan Orlean
April, 1986. Central Library, Los Angeles, CA. When the fire alarm sounded, most thought it was another false alarm. What followed was 7 hours of raging fire, four hundred thousand books destroyed, with over seven hundred thousand damaged.
Author Susan Orlean weaves a fascinating tale of fire and its aftermath, interspersed with what is essentially a biography of the library system of Los Angeles. If you are a non-fiction fan, you may find this one quite interesting!
- Judy
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| Furious Hours: Murder, Fraud, and the Last Trial of Harper Lee by Casey CepWhat it's about: how Harper Lee's obsession with a 1970s murder case inspired her to write a true crime book that she later abandoned.
Why you might like it: Furious Hours paints a compelling portrait of the elusive Lee, whose insecurities hindered her creative endeavors.
Book buzz: Killers of the Flower Moon author David Grann calls Furious Hours "a triumph on every level." |
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The theft of a decade : baby boomers, millennials, and the distortion of our economy
by Joseph C. Sternberg
A Wall Street Journalist, in this thought-provoking narrative that describes a new economic crisis, discusses how one generation pulled the rug out from under another, and the myriad consequences that has set in store for all of us. The millennial generation was the unfortunate victim of several generations of economic theories that made life harder for them than it was for their grandparents.
Then came the crash of 2008, and the Boomer generation's reaction to it was brutal: politicians and policy makers made deliberate decisions that favored the interests of the Boomer generation over their heirs, the most egregious being over the use of monetary policy, fiscal policy and regulation. For the first time in recent history, policy makers gave up on investing for the future and instead mortgaged that future to pay for the ugly economic sins of the present.
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| Ungovernable: The Victorian Parent's Guide to Raising Flawless Children by Therese OneillWhat it is: a tongue-in-cheek "guide" to Victorian-era child rearing, full of questionable advice from 19th-century medical texts.
Topics include: which toys will engender sexual deviancy; how much heroin is appropriate to take while pregnant; the best application of leeches to mend broken bones.
Author alert: Historian Therese Oneill is the author of Unmentionable: The Victorian Lady's Guide to Sex, Marriage, and Manners. |
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Sea stories : my life in special operations
by William H. McRaven
Sea Stories begins in 1960 at the American Officers' Club in France, where Allied officers and their wives gathered to have drinks and tell stories about their adventures during World War II -- the place where a young Bill McRaven learned the value of a good story. Sea Stories is an unforgettable look back on one man's incredible life, from childhood days sneaking into high-security military sites to a day job of hunting terrorists and rescuing hostages.
Action-packed, inspiring, and full of thrilling stories from life in the special operations world, Sea Stories is a remarkable memoir from one of America's most accomplished leaders.
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| D-Day Girls: The Spies Who Armed the Resistance, Sabotaged the Nazis, and Helped... by Sarah RoseWhat it is: a gripping tribute to the women spies employed by Britain's Special Operations Executive (SOE) during WWII, whose contributions were crucial to the war effort in occupied France.
Is it for you? This fast-paced blend of thriller, social history, biography, and romance offers something for every reader.
Try this next: Larry Loftis' suspenseful biography Code Name: Lise centers on Odette Sansom, one of the spies profiled in D-Day Girls. |
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