by Nicholson Baker (2009)
With original and controversial insights brought about by meticulous research, 'Human Smoke' re-evaluates the political turning points that led up to the Second World War, and in so doing challenges some of the treasured myths we hold about how war came about and how atrocities like the Holocaust were able to happen.
Patrick Wright
A look at the war machine that has dominated military theory and practice throughout the twentieth century explores the tank as a cultural and social object, revealing how the tank became the symbol of technological futurism and inevitable progress, as well as of totalitarian oppression.
Neil Miller
**From Amazon.com:** A unique and hugely absorbing narrative history of gay life--from Oscar Wilde to the 25th anniversary of Stonewall--by the award-winning journalist and distinguished author of Out in the World. Miller accompanies his narrative with essays and excerpts from contemporary and historical writings. Photos and line drawings.
Lawrence Wright
We first meet Larry Wright in 1960. He is thirteen and moving with his family to Dallas, the essential city of the New World just beginning to rise across the southern rim of the United States. As we follow him through the next two decades--the civil rights movement, the Vietnam War, the devastating assassinations of John F. Kennedy, Robert Kennedy, and Martin Luther King, Jr., the sexual revolution, the crisis of Watergate, and the emergence of Ronald Reagan--we relive the pivotal and shocking events of those crowded years.
Joyce Appleby
With its deep roots and global scope, the capitalist system provides the framework for our lives--a framework of constant change, sometimes measured and predictable, sometimes drastic and out of control. Yet what is now ubiquitous was not always so. Capitalism took shape centuries ago, starting with a handful of isolated changes in farming, trade, and manufacturing, clustered in early-modern England. Astute observers began to notice these changes and consider their effects. Those in power began to harness these new practices to the state, enhancing both. A system generating wealth, power, and new ideas arose to reshape societies in a constant surge of change. Approaching capitalism as a culture, as important for its ideas and values as for its inventions and systems, award-winning historian Joyce Appleby gives us a fascinating introduction to this most potent creation of mankind from its origins to the present.--From publisher description.