The Sheila Variations

I have been meaning to do a Part 2 to my Recommended Books: Fiction list – put together years ago. I wanted to recommend non-fiction, from history books to biographies to essays to whatever.

Here is the Non-Fiction list. I’ve separated out biographies/memoirs/correspondence/essays – of which I have an entire library – those will come at a later date.

These recommendations are all over the map. From gigantic tomes to slim volumes. From world history to the minutia of one chess tournament. I have my obsessions (the Balkans, Stalin, Soviet Russia, the American presidents), but then something else strikes my fancy that has nothing to do with anything I was interested in prior, and I run with it. I want to learn about science and the history of mathematics, even though I can barely add and still count on my fingers. I like to learn things from writers I care about, who can make me care about … big waves or poison or steroids, whatever it may be. Such is the power of a good story well told.

This list has no organizing principle, no rhyme or reason. But if you are looking for something to read – maybe you’ll find something of interest here. Every link is an Affiliate link. If you decide to buy, maybe you would be so kind to buy from these links, toss a couple pennies my way. I don’t have a Pay Pal or a Patreon. I don’t expect to be supported by my blog, never have. I do it for other reasons. But in these hard times, every little bit helps. I know we are all having hard times, so it’s not a requirement, just a full disclosure type thing.

NON-FICTION:

Black Lamb and Grey Falcon, by Rebecca West
This has to be one of the weirdest books ever. A 1,200 page book about one woman’s travels through Yugoslavia in the 30s, and what she observed and learned. Wow, sounds dreadful! It’s book many people own, but fewer have read. Because … damn, it’s long. But here’s the deal. Once you start it, you can’t stop. She’s one of my favorite writers. And this is not a work of objective journalism (no such thing, at any rate). It’s a perrsonal and exquisitely observed and researched TOME. I read it in my 20s. I have since read it 3 times in total. It’s why I became obsessed with Croatia – and particular Split – since I was 25. It’s why I finally went to Croatia, ultimately. I brought the book with me, even though it weighs 10 pounds, so I could read the passage about whatever place we were visiting.

Miracle At Philadelphia: The Story of the Constitutional Convention May – September 1787, by Catherine Drinker Bowen
To this day, Miracle at Philadelphia is the best “recounting” of the Constitutional Convention (outside of the original papers/speeches, collected by the Library of America, in their primary-source form). When I started getting interested in this whole period of American history, Mum and Dad both told me to read this one (as well as her book about John Adams’ experience of the American Revolution). I have since read it many times. You get a sense of the personalities, of the arguments, not to mention a good background in the Constitution (imperfect though it is) was hammered out of nothing. Essential reading.

Explaining Hitler: The Search for the Origins of His Evil, by Ron Rosenbaum
I really like Ron Rosenbaum’s work. And he is extremely cranky on Twitter in a refreshing and clarifying way. He is having NONE of this administration. What I like about his books (those I have read anyway) is the sense he brings of searching for the truth about a difficult subject, and in that search is his inherent acknowledgement that there will always be things we cannot really KNOW, and beware those who come up with easy answers too quickly. Here, he travels the world, basically, searching for truths about Hitler, the reasons WHY he became what he became. I wish Rosenbaum would take on Stalin, because honestly Stalin is even more of a mystery. But this is an extremely interesting book, filled with observations from many angles. Hitler as seen through a prism. Plus: Rosenbaum’s chapter on the courageous Munich Post is essential reading. (I’ll be saying that a lot here.)

The Guns of August, by Barbara Tuchman
One of the things I love about The Guns of August is that Barbara Tuchman came into the subject from the outside. She was not Inner Circle Historian, she was not establishment at all. But her book on the month leading up to the outbreak of World War I is still in print, and there have been so many books afterwards on the subject, but ALL of them (and I have read many) acknowledge her work. They have to. If they don’t, beware: they’re being shady. You gotta give the props. You are not inventing the wheel. And to this day, nobody made that incomprehensible time at least PARTIALLY comprehensible. If you haven’t read it, not sure what you’re waiting for.

The Carpet Wars, by Christopher Kremmer
I love this book so much. Christopher Kremmer travels along the ancient Silk Road, following the trail of socalled “Oriental carpets,” and it’s a look at business practices today – looping in how long these carpets have traveled the world – since antiquity. Highly recommended. I love books that look at a narrow subject – say, carpets – and through that narrow subject, you get the history of an entire vast region.

Unexpected Light, by Jason Elliot
Strangely: this is a travelogue, basically, but since it was published shortly before 9/11 – as in: the same year – it became a runaway bestseller. Jason Elliott travels through Afghanistan, a place he visited many times over the years, watching it transform (and not in a good way). You get the history, for sure, but you also get the contemporary rise of the Taliban, and the ominous changes they brought. 9/11 hasn’t happened yet but you can feel it on the rise. This isn’t so much a political book though as a beautifully written travel book, where you can see the light, see the mountains, and you hear people’s voices. He wasn’t there “officially.” He just loves Afghanistan and kept being drawn back there. A very tender and loving book (which also sets it apart from other books).

Catastrophe 1914: Europe Goes to War, by Max Hastings
Another good book about the leadup to World War 1. He acknowledges his debt to Barbara Tuchman. But it’s such a confusing subject – the whole war was so meaningless – it doesn’t hurt to have multiple perspectives.

The End: The Defiance and Destruction of Hitler’s Germany, 1944-1945, by Ian Kershaw
Kershaw is a master. This is a very upsetting book. Germany was already a nation of maniacs, but in the final year of the war they basically became a death cult, led there by their deranged leader. Kershaw is an amazing historian, and he really gives a sense of how bad it got on the ground, and how completely lacking in any kind of reason the situation got.

Mystery Train: Images of America in Rock ‘n’ Roll Music, by Greil Marcus
A change-up from all the tragedy. Marcus’ book is essential reading (a refrain). The chapter on Elvis – “Presliad” – is a stone-cold classic and a must-read for Elvis fans, even though he’s got many criticisms. His insights are invaluable. But the other chapters are essential today: on Sly and the Family Stone – and especially – ESPECIALLY – his chapter on Randy Newman. I honestly don’t think it can be topped, and this book was written decades ago – and is now in its 6th edition (or something like that). Timeless book.

Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game, by Michael Lewis
Yes, the whole “moneyball” concept went too mainstream, and everyone and their grandmother was moneyball-ing their lives. But as a baseball fan, as a Red Sox fan, this is a great book, filled with so many fantastic anecdotes. The change-up (so to speak) in thinking. Turned into a very good movie too. Love it.

A Nervous Splendor: Vienna 1888-1889, by Frederic Morton
I have a reader here to thank for pointing me in the way of this elegant and slim book, about one year in Vienna – a glorious year, artistically (the amount of artists and writers and painters and composers at work in Vienna at that time boggles the mind) – yet with such an uneasy undertone, a harbinger of things to come, not just in WWI but eventually … the Anschluss. The Anschluss didn’t happen overnight. The ground was ripe for it. Brilliant book.

Going Clear: Scientology, Hollywood, and the Prison of Belief, by Alex Gibney
As a longtime critic of this cult, I almost couldn’t believe it when this book (and documentary) came out. There are many events that led up to the downfall of this cult (and we’re still not done … although at this point they’re basically a real estate holding company, with dwindling numbers). There was Tom Cruise jumping on the couch. Before that, there was the South Park episode, one of the biggest chinks in the armor because so many people watched South Park. Then came Paul Haggis’ open letter which went viral. Major moment. Along the way there were multiple defections – Tory Christman – although you’d have to be a real insider to know about her (she has a YouTube channel – check her out). Jason Beghe was a much more high-profile defector. But still: these defections didn’t make really mainstream waves. Leah Remini’s defection was the BOMB that went off, and we still feel the reverberations today. Nothing will ever be the same again. But Gibney’s book is a huge part of it. People have shied away from writing about the cult, since they are so litigious. I am sure he continues to be harassed. But there’s enough of a groundswell now … safety in numbers. They can’t fight on every front at once.

Dot.con: How America Lost Its Mind and Money in the Internet Era, by John Cassidy
I lived through this period. I worked for a startup. I went through a feisty IPO. I made a lot of money. It was an insane time. We were selling nothing. It was just a website. The mania was infectious. Then came the downfall. I am fascinated by speculative bubbles – and this was really the only one I lived through and participated in in real time. There have been other bubbles in my lifetime – the housing crash, and etc. – and of course I felt the fallout. I lost my job (at that startup) in 2009 – like everybody lost their jobs. I’ve never had a regular job since. But Dot.con is a brilliant evocation of all the craziness of that era. And the startup I worked for is mentioned a couple of times!

Shakespeare After All, by Marjorie Garber
A couple years back, I read all of Shakespeare’s plays (or, I should say, re-read) in chronological order (I highly recommend this). I came to Shakespeare as an actor, which, in my opinion, is really the best way to come to him. You gotta get up in front of an audience and say those words, PLAY those words, to really get what he was about. So I never took a Shakespeare “class.” I ACTED in Shakespeare. So I decided, well, hell, I know all these plays, let me read them, and create my own CLASS. Along with each play, I read the introduction in the Riverside Shakespeare I own (and have owned since college) – these are, like, 30 page introductions. In-depth. And I went looking for a book for the general public, which was easily organized – this was key. And I came upon this book. It is organized chronologically (or as close as can be determined), and each play gets a 4 or 5 page essay. So it’s … not easy, but it’s definitely do-able in a day. Since I had read all the plays already and am extremely familiar with some of them (I can recite long passages from As You Like It, and Hamlet is also just “there” for me in my head) … I decided to read the Garber chapters first, to orient myself, to get a little knowledge before “going in.” This was such a fun self-imposed project and I would like to pass it on to you all.

Endurance: Shackleton’s Incredible Voyage, by Alfred Lansing
A favorite. I go back to it again and again and again.

Real Life Drama: The Group Theatre and America 1931-1940, by Wendy Smith
The only complete history of The Group Theatre. If you’re into 20th century culture, and you don’t know about The Group, then your education is incomplete. And there’s a way to remedy it … by reading this book. They really did change the world.

In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex, by Nathaniel Philbrick
An astonishing read, beautifully researched, about the incident that inspired Herman Melville to write Moby-Dick.

Touching the Void: The True Story of One Man’s Miraculous Survival, by Joe Simpson
I have nightmares about this. Written by the guy who actually survived … well, both parties survived but it is Simpson’s story that is extraordinary … Touching the Void is also a documentary, which I highly recommend. If you get vertigo, you may find it challenging. (I get vertigo, and I found it challenging). But even more challenging is living through the series of disasters these two young mountaineers endured – climbing a sheer-faced mountain in the Andes (and it sounds like they were pretty arrogant and didn’t really prepare properly). They did summit but hadn’t brought enough supplies (they thought it would be a quick descent.) Meanwhile a blizzard arrived, they ran out of fuel/food, and decided to attempt the descent in the teeth of this blizzard. It was also in the middle of the night. In the process of the descent, disaster strikes and the two are separated. Simpson lies with a broken leg INSIDE a crevasse of ice. So. To quote everyone on Twitter: “Let that sink in.” His story of how he made it back to base camp is one of those survival stories you can’t even believe really happened. The mental toughness it took for him to get out of there – especially how he chose to get out of the crevasse – nerves of steel. He’s basically not like other people. We have a lot to learn from him.

April 1865: The Month That Saved America, by Jay Winik
A pretty quick read, and one of those popular-history books, written for the layman, but it’s very good in laying down what happened during that month. These books make me sad now. I actually love our country. I know many don’t. But I do. And I am into “our stories.” And now they’ve … not been hijacked, but buried, betrayed. Anyway. It’s a good book.

The Smartest Guys in the Room: The Amazing Rise and Scandalous Fall of Enron, by Bethany McLean and Peter Elkind
I love books like this. WALK ME THROUGH IT. I love books about unreality-speculative-mania-“there’s no THERE there” in business. A really good read.

Hard News: Twenty-one Brutal Months at The New York Times and How They Changed the American Media, by Seth Mnookin
If you lived through this era, or … not an era, but a couple of years … the Jayson Blair years, you thought it was the end of The New York Times. I lived through this era. It was un-freakin-believable. A really interesting look at how technology changed the game, how technology allowed the sociopathic Blair to get away with what he got away with for as long as he did. Now he’s a life-coach. Typical grifter. It’s a tough subject. Jayson Blair brought a lot of ugly stuff to the surface.

The Fall of Yugoslavia: The Third Balkan War, by Misha Glenny
Once there was a Yugoslavia. Now there isn’t. Good riddance, I suppose. But the story of its downfall is just devastating in its genocidal fervor. I am so glad I finally visited the area. I will go back.

Reflections on the Revolution in France, by Edmund Burke
I mean, ya gotta read it. Come on. One of the most important books of political analysis in history. If you disagree with him, it’s irrelevant. Ya gotta read it.

Voices From Chernobyl: The Oral History of a Nuclear Disaster, by Svetlana Alexievich
She won the Nobel. Well-deserved. A short book, really. But I am not exaggerating when I say it took me forever to finish it. The book is so HEAVY – I had to keep putting it down. Taking a break. The refrain: Essential reading.

The Ghost Map: The Story of London’s Most Terrifying Epidemic–and How It Changed Science, Cities, and the Modern World, by Steven Johnson
This is a fantastic book and I don’t just say that because we are now experiencing a pandemic. I read this when it first came out (because pandemics are another one of my long-term interests. I wonder if it dates to my reading of The Stand, lo those many years ago). This is about the deadly cholera outbreak in London in 1854. Supposedly now a “modern” city, the Industrial Revolution flourishing, and etc. But they didn’t really “get” the thing about clean water and sewage, and they also hadn’t planned for the city to explode in population. The infrastructure wasn’t built to support such an influx of people. So why everybody was dying like flies was a mystery. A doctor and a priest – horrified and overwhelmed – determine to figure it out. They do. And in so doing, not only flatten the curve but push medical science forward.

Considerations on the Causes of the Greatness of the Romans and their Decline, by Montesquieu
Seriously. Read it. It’s better than Edward Gibbon, and I can only say that because I’ve read Gibbon. And it’s certainly one of those books I’m glad I read. But Montesquieu doesn’t go on and on and on about it. He gets in and gets out – AND he’s amazing at psychology. He kind of zeroes in on what some of these individuals were all about, so much so that you actually feel like you know them.

The Future Is History: How Totalitarianism Reclaimed Russia, by Masha Gessen
Yeah, so, you know. You probably should read this book.

Words Will Break Cement: The Passion of Pussy Riot, by Masha Gessen
Ibid.

The Brothers: The Road to an American Tragedy, by Masha Gessen
Idem.

Nicholas and Alexandra: The Classic Account of the Fall of the Romanov Dynasty, by Robert K. Massie
I went through a huge Romanov obsession. And so, of course, all roads lead to this book. It’s kind of the go-to, the Rosetta Stone of that fucked-up empire.

Helter Skelter: The True Story of the Manson Murders, by Vincent Bugliosi
Here’s the deal. I actually don’t believe in “Helter skelter” as a concept. In other words, I don’t think that was really the motive. I think Manson was full of shit, talking trash because he thought he was smart, and his middle-class white-girl followers were pliable, and not smart and on too many drugs, and ready to do anything basically to say “fuck you” to their middle-class suburban parents. I do not believe they were brainwashed, or poor helpless damsels. Nope. They do not get a pass. Linda Kasabian puts the lie to THAT for all time. I don’t believe it was a race war, although Manson was a white supremacist. I think his “race war” thing was a bunch of bullshit designed to make himself – a lifelong con-man-criminal – appealing to his hippie peace-love followers. Manson was NOT a hippie. I honestly believe that Manson had them go kill Tate et al. because he was pissed off at Terry Melcher. If Terry Melcher had still lived at Cielo Drive, Terry Melcher would have been killed. He was the real target. An added motive was to throw the suspicion off Bobby Beausoleil, in jail for the murder of Gary Hinman. And then Manson sent them off to kill the LaBiancas just to wreak havoc AND cover their tracks. I think it was all that petty. There was no organizing world-view or theory behind any of it. Bugliosi came up with the “helter skelter” theory – and it was a brilliant one – so that he could prosecute Manson for murder along with the girls, because Manson, remember, didn’t actually kill anyone. It was a huge gamble and it worked.

A Journal of the Plague Year, by Daniel Defoe
Remember what I said about having a long history of reading about every pandemic possible? Well this is the source, this is the one to read first. It’s a masterpiece.

The Mind of the South, by W.J. Cash
I came across this book when Peter Guralnick mentioned it in his two-volume biography of Elvis. He used W.J. Cash’s analysis – and he was a Southern man himself, so this was basically an insider telling the South’s dirty little secrets – to explain Vernon Presley, to explain Elvis’ people, and where they fit in the strict hierarchy of the South. The quotes Guralnick used intrigued me so I read it myself. Hoo boy can Cash WRITE. Not an EASY book though. He writes in a dialect, the Southern dialect, and you have to get into his rhythms. An illuminating book.

The Journalist and the Murderer, by Janet Malcolm
People are probably still pissed off at Janet Malcolm for this book. Joe McGuinness’ reputation never fully recovered. Now THAT’S journalism. OR, it’s unnecessary bullying, as some journalists probably still think. Malcolm was “calling out” journalists for the … ikkiness of journalism and specifically calling out McGuinness for breaking the contract, breaking the rules, by befriending family-annihilator Jeffrey MacDonald. Like I said, McGuinness’ reputation has never recovered. This book pissed so many people off but it is now a regular part of the curriculum in J-schools everywhere. So … point, Janet Malcolm.

Rawhide Down: The Near Assassination of Ronald Reagan, by Del Quentin Wilber
I read this book because my cousin Kerry recommended it and she has never led me astray. This is the story of the Secret Service detail of Ronald Reagan, as well as the FBI, who raced – in the wake of the assassination attempt – to handle/manage the situation – as well as try to figure out the motive. Once they did figure it out they were like … Come again? A gripping book, also a really good look at what the Secret Service does and how.

Assassination Vacation, by Sarah Vowell
God, I love her. I’m patriotic the way she is patriotic. And it’s not blind patriotism, not in the slightest. It’s not “my country right or wrong” at all. I believe in the ideals, and hold my country to account when it fails to live up to them. Like, er, now.

The Wordy Shipmates, by Sarah Vowell
I got into Sarah Vowell because my sister Siobhan recommended this book. She read out loud parts of it to me when we were home in Rhode Island and we were crying with laughter. “Seriously Elizabeth. Bring the axe.” We still quote that to each other. If you’re not familiar with Sarah Vowell, these are the two books I recommend starting with. The ones that made her famous. I need to catch up, she’s published quite a few books since.

The Shakespeare Wars: Clashing Scholars, Public Fiascoes, Palace Coups, by Ron Rosenbaum
Ron Rosenbaum again, only this time instead of searching for the truth about Hitler, he searches for the truth about Shakespeare, by wandering the earth, asking questions, laying out the authorship wars, talking to directors and actors … I owe Rosenbaum an enormous debt because an entire chapter is devoted to Stephen Booth’s edition of the Sonnets – in print for 40 years now. Rosenbaum interviews Booth and the whole thing was so intriguing I bought Booth’s edition of the Sonnets. SO GLAD I DID. Trust me: his footnotes are not like other people’s footnotes.

Isaac Newton, by James Gleick
I don’t know anything about science, but I do enjoy a book aimed at a general population that can explain what the fuss was about. I really enjoyed this biography!

The Great Influenza: The Story of the Deadliest Pandemic in History, by John Barry
Pandemic alert. So many people seem to not know about this, which is a disgrace and also not their fault. I don’t know what is considered “history” these days but a worldwide pandemic in 1918 seems like it should be required learning. You have to teach people the basic timeline of events. Otherwise you have all these bozos on Twitter thinking that “such and such is the first time this has EVER happened.” Look out: the hostility towards expertise and knowledge is also an epidemic.

The Great Crash 1929, by John Kenneth Galbraith
Again with the interest in speculative bubbles. I read this every couple of years. Maybe this book is controversial, I don’t know. I like how he … makes me understand what the fuck was going on.

Tulipomania : The Story of the World’s Most Coveted Flower & the Extraordinary Passions It Aroused, by Mike Dash
Speculative bubble alert! This story is NUTTY.

Public Enemies: America’s Greatest Crime Wave and the Birth of the FBI, 1933-34, by Bryan Burrough
A fascinating look at not just John Dillinger, but that whole wave of criminals, and the rise of the G-Man.

A Train of Powder, by Rebecca West
Broken record: Essential reading. Rebecca West is one of my favorite writers. This is her book about attending the Nuremberg Trials. It’s worth it for her description of Goering alone.

The New Meaning of Treason, by Rebecca West
Broken record again: READ REBECCA WEST. This is her book on all of the different treason trials in England post World War II. From Lord Haw Haw to the Profumo debacle.

Until Proven Innocent, by Stuart Taylor, Jr.
If you still refer to the Duke lacrosse team as “rapists,” you are perpetuating a LIE. They didn’t rape anyone. This is an upsetting book but it’s really important. Because listen, one day you could be put in their position. Don’t you want someone to stand up for you? Innocent until proven guilty is bedrock foundational shit.

Longitude: The True Story of a Lone Genius Who Solved the Greatest Scientific Problem of His Time, by Dava Sobel
I love Dava Sobel! This was my “way in.” My mother recommended it to me. Sobel is a popular science writer, and she opens up these little rifts in the narrative where she can dig in, focusing solely on one aspect. I had no idea about the issues with Longitude until I read this book and now I feel just that little bit smarter.

Among the Thugs, by Bill Buford
I have rarely had as claustrophobic an experience as reading this book. But it’s really really prescient. Among the Thugs was published in 1990. But the seeds of Brexit are in this book.

Game of Shadows: Barry Bonds, BALCO, and the Steroids Scandal that Rocked Professional Sports, by Mark Fainaru-Wada and Lance Williams
My family and I all read this on the same family vacation, passing the book around. “Can I have it next?” “I asked first.” Welcome to the O’Malleys on vacation.

The Planets, by Dava Sobel
I mean, this is astronomy for toddlers, but I consider myself a toddler when it comes to science, but I also … to put it simply … LOVE SPACE. I love the planets. Half of the feeds I follow on Insta and Twitter are “space feeds,” astronauts, the Hubble, NASA … I want to see pictures from outer space. I want to understand. Sobel is a gorgeous writer.

Galileo’s Daughter: A Historical Memoir of Science, Faith, and Love, by Dava Sobel
See above. I wonder if this is the one she is most known for. Again, she takes a world-famous figure and world-famous event – Galileo’s theories and eventual scandals – and gets into it from the side, through his formidable daughter, who may have lived in a convent but who had a questioning mind, an intelligent spirit. Like father like daughter.

Hidden Figures: The American Dream and the Untold Story of the Black Women Mathematicians Who Helped Win the Space Race, by Margot Lee Shetterly
I came to this because the movie was so fantastic. There’s even more information here, and it’s really in-depth and it opens up this whole slice of “hidden” history. Unforgettable people. RIP Katherine Johnson.

The Teammates: A Portrait of a Friendship, by David Halberstam
A slim book, but really emotional, 4 fascinating character studies. Ted Williams, Dom DiMaggio, et al.

With Their Backs to the World: Portraits from Serbia, by Asne Seierstad
I have many many books like this on the shelf, and I’m only listing a couple. Books written by journalists and/or locals about one specific country. Serbia will be on my next journey, along with Bosnia, and back to Croatia. I need to do more. I need to go to Sarajevo. And Mostar to see that BRIDGE. Although I suppose mentioning Bosnia in the same breath as Serbia is bad form. At any rate, this is a book by a Norwegian journalist, who was stationed in Serbia for a long time and got to know the people and fell in love with them. You meet a lot of people, you get perspective on them, you hear from them.

Among the Russians, by Colin Thubron
Colin Thubron wrote a series of books about traveling through Russia, pre-Berlin-Wall falling – basically in an unofficial capacity, meeting people, getting stopped at scary checkpoints, and trying to get the lay of the land. I love his writing.

Good Friday: The Death of Irish Republicanism, by Anthony McIntyre
I am biased. I know Anthony, and I stayed with him and his wife Carrie – a good friend – when I visited Belfast. They lived in one of the Catholic neighborhoods off the Falls Road. Where everyone has graffiti on their houses of guns and soldiers. Anthony was a member of the IRA, and was in prison for 18 years. In Long Kesh. He participated in the famous “blanket protest.” He has since become a dissident, so to speak, in his own country, attacking the IRA. It’s a complex subject and you can’t learn about it in a day. But knowing Anthony and reading his stuff (he’s also a journalist) has been very helpful. While in Belfast, we all went to visit Bobby Sands’ grave in Milltown Cemetery, a famous place, LOADED with historical context and open wounds and the memory of all the political funerals, which you would see on the news, with the pallbearers wearing masks, and etc. I bought his book from a bookstore in Belfast while I was there and he signed it.

Portrait of a Monster: Joran van der Sloot, a Murder in Peru, and the Natalee Holloway Mystery, by Lisa Pulitzer and Cole Thompson
I do love true crime although I admit that sometimes the writing leaves much to be desired. As well as the research. But THIS book is written by two prize-winning New York Times journalists with a lot of ORIGINAL research done (not always the case with true crime). They interviewed everyone. It’s a horrifying story and I’m so glad that asshole was caught, although I’m furious he wasn’t caught the FIRST time around.

Zero: The Biography of a Dangerous Idea, by Charles Seife
I learned so much! I can barely subtract in my head, so numbers just baffle me. (I blame my 4th grade teacher who literally shamed me when I couldn’t grasp fractions and sent me out into the hallway to “work it out myself.” A POX ON YOUR HOUSE, MISS ROGERS. If you’re reading: you were an awful teacher and you really did a number on me. I also felt that you didn’t like me. I was 9, but I think I was right.) ANYWAY. This is the “history” of Zero, and how it was resisted, or accepted, depending on the culture and the context. I have been meaning to read this one again.

The Wave: In Pursuit of the Rogues, Freaks, and Giants of the Ocean, by Susan Casey
This was great! Susan Casey is fascinated by big waves: what they are, HOW they are, the technology used to measure them and understand them, AND the daredevils who choose to SURF these monsters, or, like the documentary says, those who spend their free time “riding giants.”

The Lucifer Effect: Understanding How Good People Turn Evil, by Philip Zimbardo
Zimbardo is the controversial figure who thought up the Stanford Experiment, ran the Stanford Experiment, and then very quickly aborted the Stanford Experiment when events quickly spiraled out of control. This gave him a lifelong interest in “evil” and how people end up doing evil. He was brought in as a consultant during the whole Abu Ghraib debacle – he includes a chapter on that situation in his book, highlighting all of the different elements that have to be in place to turn people into cruel monsters. His work remains controversial, but still important, I think. The concepts are important to grasp, even if you disagree with his conclusions.

Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln, by Doris Kearns Goodwin
It’s as good and as important as everyone says.

The Great Terror: A Reassessment, by Robert Conquest
This cannot be overstated: this is one of THE books of the 20th century. Detailing the launching of Stalin’s Terror in the 30s, and how and why it occurred. Conquest wrote the book LONG before perestroika/glasnost, and so he was just guessing, really, based on samizdat literature and reading between the lines of official Soviet propaganda. The Left did not comport themselves well in this era of history. Useful idiots, you understand. And so because of this Conquest is viewed as a right-winger. (Eyeroll.) He was PILLORIED for this book, which made Russia “look bad.” Stalin wasn’t a “bad apple”. He created the society he wanted, and Socialism was vulnerable to a Strong Man. Stalin knew this and took advantage of it. Once the archives opened, post Soviet crack-up, Conquest was able to confirm his original guesses, and in many cases he realized he had under-estimated the numbers. By the MILLIONS. I will never understand those who just “write off” the fact that Stalin was responsible for the deaths of maybe 30 million people. When Conquest published this “reassessment”, adding all of the things he had learned, his pal Kingsley Amis joked that the new edition should be called I Told You So, You Fucking Fools. Pretty much.

Imperium, by Ryszard Kapuscinski
One of my favorite writers. Speaking of Russia, this is the book about Russia, pre-and-post Soviet crack-up. One of his first memories was Russian tanks rolling into his town in Poland. The man had a lot to say.

The Soccer War, Ryszard Kapuscinski
Maybe his best. Certainly his most well-known. If you were interested in getting to know this author, I would suggest you start here.

Balkan Ghosts: A Journey Through History, by Robert D. Kaplan
This was a really important book for me. It was the first of Kaplan’s books I read – this was the one that “made his name” – and he still publishes, on average, a book a year, for which I am very grateful. In this, he travels through the Balkans, using Rebecca West’s Black Lamb and Grey Falcon as a guide. He’s a gorgeous writer. Over the years, he has gotten some things wrong in terms of predictions – but that’s going to be the case with anyone engaged in the unfurling of present-day history. He has also been prophetic, eerily so, in other areas. You win some, you lose some. But this was my gateway drug. I highly recommend him. I brought this one on my trip to Croatia too. The whole book starts in the cathedral in Zagreb.

An Empire Wilderness: Travels into America’s Future, by Robert D. Kaplan
Kaplan has written books on Indonesia, Romania, the “stans”, the China Sea, the Indian Ocean (Monsoon) … he has been everywhere. Here, he takes a historian’s view of America, and what might be going on “out there” in America. This was published some time back, maybe 15 years ago? So again, there were some things he couldn’t predict. But he is eerily on target in other ways. He’s not an academic. I don’t think he even went to college. Or maybe a couple years? He learned by doing, he learned by being a freelance journalist. A tough gig. He did not come from an elite background. His dad was a truck driver. So Kaplan is truly a self-made man, which gives him a kind of perspective. Anyway, I love him, and I really recommend this one too (although I think all his work is great).

Imperial Grunts: On the Ground with the American Military, from Mongolia to the Philippines to Iraq and Beyond, by Robert D. Kaplan
Kaplan spent a couple of years, embedding himself with all the different branches of the U.S. military. He visited jungle hideouts of Special Ops dudes in Colombia. He was on the aircraft carriers who were so essential in helping getting aid to victims of the tsunami, a kind of display of “soft” power. I asked my Special Ops pal what he thought of Kaplan and he said, “He’s okay. A little too rah-rah about the military.” Remember: this comment is from someone who is CAREER military. Whose dad was MIA in Vietnam. Who came from a long line of soldiers. So … when this dude says “he’s too rah-rah about the US military” you MUST listen to him. But still, even with that: the book gives an amazing picture of how far and wide the military operates – in good and bad and sinister ways – and the title is great. See above his book title An Empire Wilderness. Kaplan’s perspective comes from antiquity – quotes from Herodotus and Tacitus and Thucydides and etc. pepper his books, even more so than recent writers. So he looks at America and sees an old-fashioned Empire. “Imperial Grunts” is his term for the men and women on the ground the world over. Anyway: well worth checking out, even if you dislike the subject.

Evil Genes: Why Rome Fell, Hitler Rose, Enron Failed, and My Sister Stole My Mother’s Boyfriend, by Barbara Oakley
I need to read this one again. It’s a crazy book – look at that title! – and I really loved it at the time.

Srebrenica: Record of a War Crime, by Jan Willem Honig
This is a very tough and very frightening read. It gives you a sense of the total hopelessness surrounding Srebeinica – the shameful hopelessness because there was a way to stop that genocide – but nobody did.

Black Hawk Down: A Story of Modern War, by Mark Bowden
I’ve read this classic many times. Bowden is just a master at putting you on the ground and giving a visceral sense of what that event was about, how it went wrong from the jump, and how each choice made along the way – each fateful choice – added up to basically a clusterfuck of errors, which had, of course, disastrous consequences. Even better, though, Bowden has interviewed everyone. The story was well-known but it had not yet been told (America was not really eager, I guess, to tell this story officially – it was so embarrassing and awful there was no real push to get the truth out). Bowden “got to” everybody, and so you get to know everyone, the medics, the guys on the ground, the guys who were captured and killed and dragged through the streets by a cheering crowd … My brother said he was reading this book on the subway and found it so stressful he got tunnel vision at one point, the beginning stages of a panic attack. Very important book and it made me a fan of Mark Bowden forever. I’ve read all his work.

The Lost Heart of Asia, by Colin Thubron
This is my favorite of the Thubron “Russa” trilogy. In it, he travels through all the “stans” – the forgotten desert countries – still under the Soviet thumb. Crushed and stifled.

The Gulag Archipelago Volume 1: An Experiment in Literary Investigation, by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
So important it can’t even really be measured. Yes, Solzhenitsyn transformed later, and seemed to look back yearningly to authoritarianism. Some felt betrayed. I think it shows his independence of spirit, he wasn’t going to be/do anything to please the Western intellectuals. He hated the West. You know. It’s complicated. What would our world be like if this book DIDN’T exist? I shudder to imagine.

We Wish to Inform You That Tomorrow We Will be Killed With Our Families: Stories from Rwanda, by Philip Gourevitch
Gourevitch is clearly inspired by Kapuscinski (see above). When I attended the tribute to Kapuscinski at the NYPL after he died, Gourevitch and Salman Rushdie co-hosted. You can feel the ghost of Kapuscinski in Gourevitch’s style. Similar to The Rape of Nanking, and the book about Srebrenica, this tells the story in excruciating detail, and the overwhelming feeling is one of dread and hopelessness, that this was a debacle that should have been stopped somehow, or avoided, but in order to do so you’d have to go back decades and decades. And so there’s a feeling of inevitability about the genocide which … is the worst feeling in the world. Like … human beings apparently are just ACHING for a chance to kill their neighbors …. there’s nothing that can be done to stop it.

Down with Big Brother: The Fall of the Soviet Empire, by Michael Dobbs
I highly recommend this book for anyone who might be “new” to understanding the Soviet Union and how and why it cracked up. This is a bit elementary for me, since I have done such deep dives into the subject – but it covers all the important ground, using as its structure George Orwell’s prophetic 1984. Dobbs looks at all of the factors contributing to the crack-up, and it was pressure from all sides. Dobbs writes in an engaging manner, and the chapter on the Chernobyl disaster, I think, is the best.

In Europe’s Shadow: Two Cold Wars and a Thirty-Year Journey Through Romania and Beyond, by Robert Kaplan
A more recent book of Kaplan’s, about his long love affair with Romania, dating back to the 1960s, early 1970s, when he found himself there, a freelance journalist with no outlet, nothing to do but wander around. The country hooked him in, and he kept going back, and he keeps going back. His editors encouraged him to get a little bit more personal in this one (Kaplan admitted this openly in his introduction), so he went back and rewrote it, including himself more. (He is always in his books. “I spoke to this person” “I drove through the jungle” “I did this or that …” but here he is more open about how rocky his beginnings were, how he could barely make a living …) He is such an illustrious “elite” now, participating in think tanks around the world and in Washington, on the board of this or that genius-group, with a regular presence in The Atlantic and a couple of other outlets … but his origins were the opposite of elite. He had no way “in.” No connections. His stuff is unclassifiable. He had to make his own way. So he wrote a lot about that in this book and it’s beautiful. Romania is obviously not his homeland, but he loves it dearly.

The Collapse of Communism, by the reporters at the New York Times
I can’t find a link to this on Amazon. I wonder if it was a limited edition or something? Here’s the story of how I found this book. I was down in Key West. I had gone down there to visit a sort-of ex, who had moved there suddenly. This guy. I had never been to Key West and I figured, “What the hell” lemme go visit him and see what’s up. Upon my arrival, I realized that he was not doing well, was descending into the underworld, basically, and had gotten some gigs as a sex worker, sort of. I stayed with him for one night – he was living in a crack house – literally – not a euphemism – and everyone was semi-chilled-out due to it being Key West, but I was like, “I very well could possibly be murdered in my sleep here.” So I snuck away and booked a room at the Holiday Inn. I avoided my ex for the rest of the trip – although I think we did go to Sloppy Joe’s together and sat in Hemingway’s seat at the bar. But in general, I was like: BYE. YOU DO YOUR SEX WORK AND SMOKE YOUR CRACK IMMA GONNA BE FAR AWAY. In my wandering around, I browsed the books sitting in a bin outside a second-hand bookstore. You know me and my interest in Communism and its collapse, and so this big BIG paperback – with its red and yellow cover – attracted my eye. I pulled it out. It’s a collection of every article (more or less) written by New York Times journalists, around the world, in the apocalyptic years of the collapse of Russia. From China to Romania to Moscow. And so you’re reading it in real time, when the journalists have no idea what’s happening either – or they can’t see the future – they just know that everything is changing too quickly to even report. It’s great to have this because it’s unedited. You’re going from article to article to article, day by day by day. If you lived through this time you know that there was nothing more MIND-BLOWING than watching the news. What’s happening TODAY?? So. The book was selling for 2 bucks or something. I bought it. I somehow tripped over The Green Parrot, a bar which now looms in my memory as one of the best bars in the world. I went there every day during my time in Key West, wearing a halter top and overalls, sat at the bar, drank Bloody Mary’s and read The Collapse of Communism. You can’t even make this shit up. I read it on the beach, I read it at the big port at sunset, I read it in my motel room at night. It’s one of the most fortunate random purchases I’ve ever made, especially since it seems to no longer exist in any form. It’s great because it’s in-the-moment reportage. A real tribute to journalists and what they provide.

Lives of the Poets, by Michael Schmidt
My copy of this book is – quite literally – falling apart. The covers – front and back – are long gone. The binding is on its last legs. It’s filled with my notes. I can’t say enough about this book. I think it’s a fantastic introductory course to the history of English language poetry. Michael Schmidt is not an academic. He is a publisher. Therefore, I find him readable. As a non-academic myself, I have such an issue with theory. I just don’t see literature through the lens of theory. And I won’t ever. I wasn’t raised in that tradition and it’s far too late now for me to absorb it. I find it all pretty incomprehensible. Schmidt just walks you through history, pulling out the poets along the way who left a mark, for this or that reason. He’s an amazingly engaging writer.

Cultural Amnesia: Necessary Memories from History and the Arts, by Clive James
I can’t believe I have never read this book before. Similar to Lives of the Poets, it’s a vast survey course – but it’s a very eclectic survey, with important (and sometimes almost forgotten) figures pulled out for James’ fascinating point of view. He goes way off the beaten track. He also strays from the subject at hand, using a quote from whatever person he’s discussing, as a launch-pad for his own ruminations. In this way, culture is kept alive. It must be alive if we are going to survive. This is a book that contains memories, keeps them safe. I also have expanded my reading list tenfold, based on the people he discusses. I mean, Hitler has a chapter, so there’s that. But James is also very well-versed in the “cafe culture” of Austria, Germany, etc. – and all of the figures who emerged from those cafes – eventually vanished in the one-two-punch cataclysm of WWI and WWII. But James is also really interested in the French Resistance era – those who resisted, those who collaborated – AND the fallout, still impacting French culture today. This book is indispensable and if you know James’ work, you know what a fun writer he is. You can practically hear him talking.

The Rape of Nanking: The Forgotten Holocaust of World War II, by Iris Chang
Essential book, as difficult it is to get through. I found it one of the most excruciating reads of my life. We all owe her a great debt for turning the spotlight onto this “forgotten holocaust.”

Founding Brothers: The Revolutionary Generation, by Joseph Ellis
I’d need to familiarize myself with the timeline, but I think this was the book that put Joseph Ellis over the edge into mainstream widespread popularity. Almost everyone I know read this book. It was my introduction to him. And it was my “gateway drug” to the rest of his stuff. I’ve read it all. One of the chapters here describes the famous secret meeting between Alexander Hamilton, Thomas Jefferson, and James Madison – which, if you didn’t know about it before, Lin Manuel Miranda has immortalized it with “The Room Where It Happens.” (Ellis chooses 6 events to illuminate the Revolution.)

Survival In Auschwitz, by Primo Levi
Levi’s Periodic Table, a memoir of his whole life, organized along the lines of the periodic table (he was a chemist) is also essential reading. But this clearly must be read. His insights into “the drowned and the saved” may still be unwelcome knowledge in certain circles. One of the most chilling things about this book is its tone. Primo Levi is not “in” the book – he doesn’t say “I felt” “I saw” – but he lays out how it worked down to the nitty-gritty of food, shoes, sleep, etc. It’s a brutal book. One of the things I most remember is his observation that criminal con-man types did all right and were more likely to be cunning enough and wily enough to survive – through bribery, blackmail, black market bribes, like, whatever. Criminals rose to the top – and there was a hierarchy. Law-abiding “rational” types were more often than not crushed into the passivity of despair. Primo Levi lays this all out unblinkingly.

The Poisoner’s Handbook: Murder and the Birth of Forensic Medicine in Jazz Age New York, by Deborah Blum
I loved this popular science book! Poisons! And how the development of forensics during the violent Jazz Age changed the game for murderers. They had to be much much more clever if they wanted to poison someone and have the poison go undetected. I learned a lot. This is really a science book, how different poisons work – and that’s fascinating – but it’s also a snapshot of an era.

1776, by David McCullough
Believe the hype.

The Disappearing Spoon: And Other True Tales of Madness, Love, and the History of the World from the Periodic Table of the Elements, by Sam Kean
Siobhan gave me this book. It was such a fun read! It’s about the periodic table, and Kean gets into the history of each element. His writing is often hilarious. I am curious about so many different things, but my knowledge base is extremely erratic. I can no longer read overviews of Communism’s collapse. I need way deeper dives because I have read so much about it. But science … I need a lot of hand-holding. This was a great science course (and speaking of which: one of my favorite electives in college was The History of Science. Not science per se, but the history of it. More my style/speed.)

Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil, by Hannah Arendt
You must read it. Even if only to disagree with her conclusions. Not reading it is not an option. #sorrynotsorry It’s kind of interesting, I’m reading the correspondence between Elizabeth Bishop and Robert Lowell right now – it’s taking me forever, Jeez Louise, they corresponded for almost the entirety of their lives – but they, of course, knew all the major players in their era, and were friendly with Hannah Arendt. This book went off like a BOMB in the culture, creating an uproar around it, from Jewish groups who objected to … I mean, if you can boil it down there’s one sentence in the book which basically describes how passively the Jews marched to their deaths … so, you know, Arendt was “asking for it” with that one. However; this was a woman who was denounced/imprisoned by the Gestapo and who then fled Germany shortly after Adolf Hitler came to power. Important perspective. But there was so much else that was controversial – and remains so to this day. There were public debates, public hearings, at one point Elizabeth Bishop – a year later – gets annoyed that yet another person has written an article about Hannah Arendt’s book. Bishop felt that by this point everyone just needs to LET IT GO. People still haven’t let it go. I’ve read it probably five times. It has that sometimes ponderous New Yorker house-style, but it’s a must-read, end-stop, don’t argue.

The Rasputin File, by Edvard Radzinsky
I love Radzinsky’s work and feel so fortunate I discovered it. The first one I read was his Stalin book (surprise surprise) but I moved on to read his book on Rasputin as well as his book about Nicholas and Alexandra. What makes Radzinsky unique is … he’s a man of the theatre. Not a historian or journalist. But he knows how to research. He knows how to be patient as he digs through unopened archives, reads old letters, puts together the picture – a picture that a century has tried to obliterate through obfuscation, destruction, out-and-out lies. ALSO: his writing style is a thing to behold. There’s almost a caress in his tone, like he’s whispering secrets in your ear. He’s not “over” any of this. He finds ALL of it extraordinary. He’ll lay out a scene, and then come back to it saying, essentially: “Let’s look at this again now. Can you not see the danger of this situation? What were these people THINKING?” He’s fantastic. Rasputin is so annoying you basically want to be one of the murderers – who had such a hard time killing him that freezing night in St. Petersburg. And Alexandra’s LOVE of this … grifter … I’m sorry … really led to the downfall of the monarchy and all of the horrors that followed. Nancy Reagon’s astrologer-friend is NOTHING compared to how far Rasputin infiltrated the family. It was all about the son’s hemophilia, a secret kept hidden from the populace (although everyone knew about it), and Alexandra believed Rasputin had magical powers, and he was a lucky charm for her son, and if she tossed him out they would be doomed. Nicholas was hen-pecked and pussy-whipped. Alexandra was FORMIDABLE. You did not say No to that woman. And she basically foisted this con-man into the center of events in Russia. It’s WILD.

Stalin: The First In-depth Biography Based on Explosive New Documents from Russia’s Secret Archives, by Edvard Radzinsky
This was the first one I read. Radzinsky follows the documents, uncovered from the archives after perestroika/glasnost. The thing about Stalin is: he did not leave a trail. He should have been named Plausible Deniability. His fingerprints do not exist, there is not a TRACE of him in the archives. You have to read between the lines. (This is what Robert Conquest did so brilliantly.) And so Radzinksy does his best to piece the story together, looking for Stalin, looking for his heavy hand in those archives. Stalin, unlike most dictators, was very very careful. I always remember Lenin’s description of Stalin in the early days of the Revolution: He was just a “grey blur.” (shivers.) Lenin eventually realized what Stalin was and tried to warn everyone before his death. But by that point it was too late. The grey blur was blurry no more.

The Nightmare Years 1930-1940, by William Shirer
I’ve read The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich (backstage, while doing a production of Macbeth, because of course). It’s a tough one, I won’t lie, although of course it has its place. But I like Shirer’s more personal volumes – his Berlin Diary is fantastic – but this one, his years as a journalist before all hell broke loose – on the ground in Europe – watching what was happening – is even better than Rise and Fall.

Fermat’s Enigma: The Epic Quest to Solve the World’s Greatest Mathematical Problem, by Simon Singh
Been meaning to read this one again. I don’t even understand what anyone is TALKING ABOUT, but I love books about obsessions, about mysteries, about people who can’t let it go.

The Origins of Totalitarianism, by Hannah Arendt
I feel the same way about this book as I feel about Eichmann in Jerusalem. You have to read it. Nothing going on today would really surprise you then. But you have to know these things first to recognize the signs. She diagnoses, with the confidence of someone who has studied her subject, who has lived it.

Women in Dark Times, by Jacqueline Rose
I just recently read this. I feel like it was actually written for me. And I almost never feel that way. Jacqueline Rose wrote a book about Sylvia Plath I have always loved – The Haunting of Sylvia Plath – and she is also profiled in Janet Malcolm’s amazing book about the problems with writing about Sylvia Plath (The Silent Woman) – and this is Rose’s latest. She profiles 4 or 5 women – two artists, one movie star (Marilyn Monroe), and one revolutionary (Rosa Luxembourg) … and I honestly think this book is what the current wave of feminism doesn’t want to acknowledge, deal with, incorporate or even talk about. Difficult women, dark women, who live in the uncertain depths, who acknowledge the “both/and” of life, who pay the price for not being “either/or”, who do not shout “GIRL POWER” but instead live in the uncertainties, the ambiguities, dealing with and grappling with the darkest shit imaginable with refreshing honesty, true freedom. God, I loved this book. There isn’t another book like this out there now. Olivia Laing’s work comes close to acknowledging all of these things – but her focus is more on male artists. (Her first book was about rivers and Virginia Woolf, so there is that.)

Crowds and Power, by Elias Canetti
One of the most important books of the 20th century. I have written about it here AD NAUSEUM. Elias Canetti’s exhaustive analysis of crowds and how they work and what it means in re: power has changed my thinking forever. Or … it has underlined what I have felt and experienced, AND I see current events through the filter of Crowds and Power. I have no idea how people are dealing without any frame of reference, or whose only frame of reference is an article published yesterday. Crowds and Power is the opposite of a comforting read. And I guess some people have found it challenging? I ate it UP.

Bobby Fischer Goes to War: How A Lone American Star Defeated the Soviet Chess Machine, by David Edmonds
Oh man you gotta read it. It’s a total blast. Cold War cray-cray + Chess.

Into Thin Air: A Personal Account of the Mt. Everest Disaster, by Jon Krakauer
Climbing mountains is not high on my bucket list. It doesn’t exist at all on my bucket list, although I suppose if I could be dropped on the top of Mount Everest by a helicopter, I would like to get a look at the view. Other than that, no thank you. I get vertigo when I “climb” my two-step stepladder to reach the top shelf of my bookcase. However, I am interested in survival stories, and stories about extreme weather. Also, literally everyone I knew read this book and practically at the same time. It is about a shit-show clusterfuck of epic proportions. Sherpas, and ladies with laptops, and inexperienced climbers, all struggling to survive this gigantic storm. Krakauer got a lot of shit for this book, by those who had been there, and I suppose I can see their point. But, you know, he’s the writer. They’re not. What else is he gonna do? NOT write about this huuuuuge event which made headlines around the world? Come on. It’s terrifying. Just reading the book gave me vertigo.

The Perfect Storm: A True Story of Men Against the Sea, by Sebastian Junger
I lived through this storm. I remember it well. It had no name. It wreaked havoc on my town. On many places. Junger’s book is very familiar to me. The fishing towns, the bars, the fishing industry, the lobster fishermen in particular – I know some lobster fishermen – Junger is not exaggerating about them in his descriptions. It’s such a dangerous job … they are just different from other people. I learned a lot in this book, about waves and storm systems, etc. You can tell how much Junger – a macho dude (doth he protest too much?) – is drawn to the guys who go through SERE training, the toughest training on the face of the EARTH. Like, he goes into this 20 page long love-note to all the things these guys go through and endure, just so they can be dropped into an ocean with 60 foot waves and go rescue people. It’s such a side note, though … it’s a tangent to the real story. But you can tell how much it turns Junger on to write about that training and those guys … it feels different than the rest of the book. I almost wish he’d write a whole book on the subject!

102 Minutes: The Unforgettable Story of the Fight to Survive Inside the Twin Towers, by Jim Dwyer and Kevin Flynn
I don’t know why I put myself through this. I lived it. I know all the stories. But I felt it was my duty to read this book, to honor the victims – and the survivors – and what they went through.

Now I Can Die in Peace: How The Sports Guy Found Salvation Thanks to the World Champion (Twice!) Red Sox, by Bill Simmons
The year this came out, the year after the world-shaking events of autumn 2004, my entire family gave it to one another for Christmas. We each needed a copy. Hey, Merry Christmas, Merry Christmas, thank you for my gifts, thank you! And then total silence reigned for the next couple of days as we all sat in the living room, fire in the fireplace, reading this book together. Re-living what had just happened. Occasionally we’d read passages aloud to each other. Occasionally one of us would burst out laughing. I have a picture of my dad sitting in his spot on the couch, reading this book. I treasure it.

In Search of Schrödinger’s Cat: Quantum Physics and Reality, by John Gribbin
An essential book, for me anyway. I’m sure for physics people it would be way too elementary. But I learned a lot and I thank Gribbin for helping me to “grok” – vaguely, but still – what Schrödinger’s Cat is all about.

It Came from Memphis, by Robert Gordon
One of the best books about Memphis and Memphis music in existence. It was Gordon’s first book – !!. Gordon, a Memphis local, lived through many of the events in the book, the development of the music scene – leaving Sun Records out of the picture, really, to get a sense of what else was going on – moving up through the 60s and 70s. I cherish the chapter on Big Star, and Alex Chilton. A high watermark in my whole LIFE was meeting Robert Gordon in 2018 – going to see If Beale Street Could Talk with him – and then, and THEN! – having him introduce my talk on Elvis’ movie career. I’ll honestly never get over it. I was starstruck only in the lead-up to meeting him. Once I met him, it was like I had known him forever. Very nice man. And he ushered me into the Pantheon of Important Elvis Writers – which I still can’t believe happened (at the link read his introduction of my talk) – and am extremely grateful and humble for.

The Federalist Papers, by Alexander Hamilton, James Madison and John Jay
I realize I am biased, but I don’t think you can be an informed American citizen without reading The Federalist Papers.

Where I Was From, by Joan Didion
One of her best, I think. I get it that so many people discovered her via The Year of Magical Thinking, which, okay, was amazing. But long-time fans had a weird response to that fervor. You need to read her political novels, her cultural writing, her journalism, to really understand what she was about. The Year of Magical Thinking was an anomaly, really. This one is about one of her enduring obsessions, the state “where she is from”, California. So it’s both memoir – her people, the history of Sacramento – as well as a look at it as a whole. Must-read Didion.

Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas: A Savage Journey to the Heart of the American Dream, by Hunter S. Thompson
I laughed so hard reading this book my face practically froze in a laughing mask. (The lawyer stuck on the carousel. Could not even deal with it, and I am laughing just thinking about it.) Oh, Hunter. How I miss you. Why did you check out? I’m not really over it.

Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail ’72, by Hunter S. Thompson
One of the best books about politics in American history. Also one of his best, for sure, and that’s saying something.

The Right Stuff, by Tom Wolfe
A masterpiece.

The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test, by Tom Wolfe
Another masterpiece.