English History Nonfiction

This is the ultimate book of weird history! Combining Volumes 1 and 2 in the “Weird Things in History and Why the Heck They Happened” series, this is your opportunity to jump into a time machine and visit some of the overlooked, the peculiar, and definitely the most amusing things that have influenced our contemporary world. Brace yourself for amusement and astonishment as you explore not only the 50 tales from the first two volumes but 5 additional historical events that you most likely won’t find in any school textbook! “Weird Things in History and Why the Heck They Happened” ...

2017 Audie Award Finalist for Non-Fiction The #1 NEW YORK TIMES Bestseller The basis for the PBS Ken Burns Documentary The Gene: An Intimate History From the Pulitzer Prize–winning author of The Emperor of All Maladies—a fascinating history of the gene and “a magisterial account of how...

Why do humans do such strange things? Oddities of the Human World: Strange Beliefs, Unusual Rituals, and the Surprising Histories Behind Them is a short, pocket-sized tour through some of the most curious corners of human culture. Nathaniel Hargrove explores how different societies celebrate, grieve, eat, dress, love, and believe in ways that can seem bizarre at first glance - but all have stories to tell. This is not an exhaustive academic textbook. It’s a compact, easy-to-read collection of cultural curiosities and weird history, perfect for curious readers who enjoy strange facts, ...

A journalist's twenty-year fascination with the Manson murders leads to shocking new revelations about the FBI's involvement in this riveting reassessment of an infamous case in American history. Over two grim nights in Los Angeles, the young followers of Charles Manson murdered seven people...

Step back in time and immerse yourself in the rugged landscapes, daring outlaws, fearless lawmen, and untamed frontier spirit that defined an era. Introducing The Greatest Stories of The Old West Ever Told – a captivating journey into the heart of the Wild West's most legendary tales! This book is a treasure trove of the Old West's most thrilling narratives, expertly curated to bring you the very best of this iconic period in American history. You'll meet legendary figures like: George Custer, the proud and overconfident Colonel and Civil War hero who led his army into a slaughter at the ...

Have you ever wondered if your favorite Christmas traditions are more pagan than Christian? Do you question what a decorated tree, Santa Claus, and gift-giving have to do with the birth of Jesus? Every year, as lights go up and carols play, questions arise about the true meaning of Christmas. We’re told our traditions were borrowed from pagans, that Santa was created by Coca-Cola, and that the entire celebration is more about shopping than salvation. But what is the real story? The Holy Night: The Sacred History of Christmas Through the Ages is a captivating journey that debunks the myths...

The Thirty Years War devastated seventeenth-century Europe, killing nearly a quarter of all Germans and laying waste to towns and countryside alike. Peter Wilson offers the first new history in a generation of a horrifying conflict that transformed the map of the modern world.

My Seditious Heart collects the work of a two-decade period when Arundhati Roy devoted herself to the political essay as a way of opening up space for justice, rights, and freedoms in an increasingly hostile environment. Radical and superbly listenable, the essays speak in a voice of unique spirit, marked by compassion, clarity, and courage. Roy offers a powerful defense of the collective, of the individual, and of the land, in the face of the destructive logic of financial, social, religious, military, and governmental elites.

The Autobiographical Story of the Opening of the Far North There was a time not so very long ago when the Hudson’s Bay Company ruled the north. A time of silky furs, Indian skirmishes, canoes, “jawbone”, dog sleds, traps, and sourdoughs. Adventure came easy in this silent land of the far north. Henry John Moberly surely had plenty of it. Nearly 50 years he spent among the native and white trappers as a fur trader, trapper, hunter, and explorer. Moberly opened many of HBC’s most remote Trading Posts. The struggles of the north, the unbearable cold, the humor of the frontiersmen, the ...

Fatal Appointment: The Assassination of President James A. Garfield It was the dawn of the modern age — and the death of a president who could have changed America forever. On a humid July morning in 1881, President James A. Garfield walked into a Washington, D.C. train station — smiling, unguarded, and unaware that a delusional man was waiting for him in the crowd. Two gunshots shattered the peace and hurled the United States into chaos. The assassin, Charles J. Guiteau, believed he was on a mission from God. The doctors who tried to save the president would, in their arrogance, become...

Robert Tombs' momentous The English and Their History is both a startlingly fresh and a uniquely inclusive account of the people who have a claim to be the oldest nation in the world. The English first came into existence as an idea, before they had a common ruler and before the country they lived in even had a name. They have lasted as a recognizable entity ever since, and their defining national institutions can be traced back to the earliest years of their history.

Spanning nearly a century of conflict, occupation, and revolution, The History of the Vietnam War: From Colonial Rule to Cold War Firestorm is a sweeping, human-centered account of one of the most complex wars in modern history. This powerful narrative takes readers beyond the battlefield and deep into the cultural, political, and personal dimensions of the Vietnam War. From the days of French colonization to the final evacuation from Saigon, this book offers a vivid retelling that is as emotionally gripping as it is historically grounded. Inside this book, you will discover: The roots of ...

Before the emperors, there was the Republic. Before the Republic fell, there was the Rubicon. History of the Roman Empire: Power, Betrayal, and the End of the Republic is a sweeping, uncompromising account of how one of history’s most sophisticated democracies collapsed into autocracy—not through foreign invasion or sudden catastrophe, but through internal corrosion, political violence, and the dangerous allure of strongmen. Based entirely on verifiable sources, this work strips away myth and romanticism to reveal the hard truths of Roman political decay and the rise of imperial power. ...

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER From the author of Killers of the Flower Moon, a page-turning story of shipwreck, survival, and savagery, culminating in a court martial that reveals a shocking truth. The powerful narrative reveals the deeper meaning of the events on The Wager, showing that it...

THE RUNAWAY NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER & ONE OF BARACK OBAMA’S FAVORITE BOOKS OF 2025 A NEW YORK TIMES TOP 10 BOOK OF 2025 ALSO NAMED A BEST BOOK OF 2025 BY NPR, VOGUE, TIME MAGAZINE, THE NEW YORKER, AND MORE “This is nonfiction that reads like fiction – the best kind. Elmhirst’s...

More than 40 million people consider themselves Irish American, and yet most of them do not truly understand the rich cultural history of their ancestors. From prehistoric times to the emigration of the Irish to Amerikay, this broad, yet comprehensive, history gives a general overview of the deep history of Irish Americans.

***NARRATED BY THE MAP MEN!*** *AN INSTANT INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER!* *An Audible Most Anticipated Listen!* From YouTube’s Map Men comes a funny and fascinating journey into the maps that messed up: big time! In their long-awaited debut, Mark Cooper-Jones and Jay Foreman (aka, the Map Men)...

The Devil in the City: The Shocking True Story of the Son of Sam and the Cult That Haunted New York New York, 1977. The heat was unbearable. The fear was worse. In a city already collapsing under crime, corruption, and decay, a faceless gunman began hunting young couples parked in quiet streets. He left behind bodies, letters, and a name that would haunt America forever—Son of Sam. But behind the bullets and headlines lay something even darker. A web of obsession, isolation, and whispered ritual that turned one man’s madness into a movement of terror. The True Story Behind the Summer of...

Discover the shocking truth about ancient Greece's most controversial women. While their Athenian sisters lived in seclusion, forbidden to leave their homes without permission, Spartan women ran naked in public, wrestled with men, and controlled vast wealth that made them the richest females in the ancient world. They were history's first female athletes, training from childhood in running, javelin, and combat sports. They owned 40% of Sparta's land and managed estates with complete autonomy. They chose their husbands, divorced at will, and wielded political influence that terrified the ...

"Not only an engrossing read about the distant past, both informative and entertaining, but also a profoundly thought-provoking view of our not-really-so-‘new’ present . . . All medieval history is here, beautifully narrated."—Wall Street Journal "A lively history . . . [Jones] has...