Non-Fiction: American Culture and History
Explore a curated list of essential American books on culture, fiction, and history. Dive into non-fiction works that reveal the rich tapestry of the U.S. heritage and societal evolution.
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The Dark Side of the Diamond
by Roger I. Abrams
Roger Abrams Discusses the Vices of Baseball and How They Reflect Who We are as Americans. Telling Stories of Baseball History That are Often Overlooked, …
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The Defining Moment
by Jonathan Alter
In this dramatic and authoritative account, the author shows how Franklin Delano Roosevelt used his famous "fear itself" speech and the first 100 days in …
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My Face Is Black Is True
by Mary Frances Berry
Acclaimed historian Mary Frances Berry resurrects the remarkable story of ex-slave Callie House who, seventy years before the civil-rights movement, demanded reparations for ex-slaves. A …
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Opening Day
by Jonathan Eig
A chronicle of the 1947 baseball season during which Jackie Robinson broke the race barrier is a sixtieth anniversary tribute based on interviews with Robinson's …
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What's the Matter with Kansas?
by Thomas Frank
With a New Afterword by the Author The New York Times bestseller, praised as "hilariously funny . . . the only way to understand why …
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The Wrecking Crew
by Thomas Frank
From the bestselling author of What's The Matter With Kansas?, an exposé of the Washington conservatism has built: how it works, how it doesn't, and …
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Acres of Skin
by Allen M. Hornblum
Publisher Fact Sheet Shatters the silence on the medical experiments that were conducted on the inmates of Philadelphia's Holmesburg Prison from the 1950s to the …
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Flag Burning and Free Speech
by Robert Justin Goldstein
When Gregory Lee Johnson burned an American flag as part of a political protest, he was convicted for flag desecration under Texas law. But the …
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Dispatches
by Michael Herr
Written on the front lines in Vietnam, Dispatches became an immediate classic of war reportage when it was published in 1977. From its terrifying opening …
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The Devil in the White City
by Erik Larson
#1 NATIONAL BESTSELLER • NATIONAL BOOK AWARD FINALIST • From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Splendid and the Vile comes the …
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Sin in the Second City
by Karen Abbott
Step into the perfumed parlors of the Everleigh Club, the most famous brothel in American history-and the catalyst for a culture war that rocked the …
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Manias, Panics, and Crashes
by Charles P. Kindleberger
Manias, Panics, and Crashes, Fifth Edition is an engaging and entertaining account of the way that mismanagement of money and credit has led to financial …
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What This Cruel War Was Over
by Chandra Manning
Using letters, diaries, and regimental newspapers to take us inside the minds of Civil War soldiers—black and white, Northern and Southern—as they fought and marched …
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Undue Risk
by Jonathan D. Moreno
Exploring the history of the use of human subjects in atomic, biological, and chemical warfare by the U. S. Government, the author reveals details and …
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Polio
by David M. Oshinsky
[This book] tells the ... story of the polio terror and of the intense effort to find a cure, from the March of Dimes to …
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A Problem from Hell
by Samantha Power
In her award-winning interrogation of the last century of American history, Samantha Power—a former Balkan war correspondent and founding executive director of Harvard's Carr Center …
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How the Other Half Lives; Studies Among the Tenements of New York, by Jacob A. Riis; With Illustrations Chiefly from Photographs Taken by the Author.
by Jacob A. Riis
No summary available.
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Rough Crossings
by Simon Schama
If you were black in America at the start of the Revolutionary War, which side would you want to win? When the last British governor …
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The Partisan Press
by Si Sheppard
This book is the first to place the contemporary debate over media bias in historical context, illustrating how partisan bias in the American media has …
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In Pharaoh's Army
by Tobias Wolff
Despite his impressive credentials as a paratrooper and former Green Beret, Tobias Wolff recognises in himself laughably little talent for the military life and no …
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The Last Battle
by Ralph Wetterhahn
The final battle of the Vietnam War left three forgotten marines on a Cambodian beach, a fact the Pentagon didn't admit for 20 years. The …
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Talking Right
by Geoffrey Nunberg
Geoffrey Nunberg breaks new ground with this fierce and funny narrative of how the political right has ushered in a new world order, aided unwittingly …
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The Way We Talk Now
by Geoffrey Nunberg
A linguist's insightful look at our language, its lessons, and its liabilities.
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The Years of Talking Dangerously
by Geoffrey Nunberg
Numberg writes there has never been an age as wary as ours of the tricks words can play. These are the years of talking dangerously, …
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Hegemony or Survival
by Noam Chomsky
"Reading Chomsky today is sobering and instructive . . . He is a global phenomenon . . . perhaps the most widely read voice on …
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You Can't be Neutral on a Moving Train
by Howard Zinn
"An inspiring autobiography . . . in the tradition of Martin Luther King's 'Letter from a Birmingham Jail.'" -Maureen Corrigan, Fresh Air, National Public Radio …
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Lies My Teacher Told Me
by James W. Loewen
Criticizes the way history is presented in current textbooks, and suggests a fresh and more accurate approach to teaching American history.
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The Big Sort
by Bill Bishop
In the tradition of The Affluent Society and Bowling Alone, a book that will redefine the way Americans think about themselves for decades to come. …
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Fast Food Nation
by Eric Schlosser
Fast food has hastened the malling of our landscape, widened the chasm between rich and poor, fueled an epidemic of obesity, and propelled American cultural …
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In Defense of Food
by Michael Pollan
#1 New York Times Bestseller from the author of This is Your Mind on Plants, How to Change Your Mind, The Omnivore's Dilemma, and Food …
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The Omnivore's Dilemma
by Michael Pollan
"Outstanding . . . a wide-ranging invitation to think through the moral ramifications of our eating habits." —The New Yorker One of the New York …
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Bright-sided
by Barbara Ehrenreich
Exposes the downside of America's penchant for positive thinking, which the author believes leads to self-blame and a preoccupation with stamping out "negative" thoughts on …
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This Land Is Their Land
by Barbara Ehrenreich
Denounces the twenty-first-century's first political decade as the cruelest in memory, in a report that analyzes such modern challenges as political and corporate corruption, the …