The Nonfiction Recommendations and Resources Thread

[Wordeater]

Stumbled across this one in a Sports Illustrated article this week.

'Harvesting Pa Chays Wheat' The Hmong and America's secret war in Laos.

Added to my current Wishlist.

WE

[BenG]

The Williamsburg Library has a list of narrative non-fiction writers, their usual subjects, and good starter titles.

http://www.wrl.org/books-and-reading...iction-writers

[kennyc]

My #1 nonfiction book is "The Immense Journey" by Loren Eiseley

it is readable on-line at: http://www.naderlibrary.com/immense.journey.htm

It always inspires me to read his work.

[stonetools]

Just finished reading
Imagine : How Creativity Works, Lehrer
A Planet of Virues, Zimmer
I recommend both. THey are science popuilarizers who do a great job of explaining the latest in science research on their respective topics.
NYT review on Lehrer HERE

NPR interview with Zimmer HERE

Am currently reading " The Swerve", Greenblatt.National Book Circle finalist. So far pretty good.

[Angst]

Originally Posted by cassidym

I can recommend just about anything by Bill Bryson especially The Mother Tongue which is a history of the English language. Also A Short History of Nearly Everything and At Home which is a history of private life (mostly homes) and how they got to be the way they are today.

I really enjoyed his A Short History of Nearly Everything. I also found Bryson's Dictionary of Troublesome Words very helpful in sorting out common language mistakes.

Originally Posted by Arkivaren

I recently stumbled upon () this one:
Alive in the Killing Fields: Surviving the Khmer Rouge Genocide
which looks interesting…with all the nice recommendations in this thread
I'll have to bump it down to no. 10 on my to-read-list though

The book is very short, and written from a 10 year old's perspective. I would also recommend The Road of Lost Innocence: The True Story of a Cambodian Heroine by Somaly Mam, Ayaan Hirsi Ali and Nicholas D. Kristof if you are interested in Cambodia.

[Angst]

Originally Posted by stonetools

Just finished reading
Imagine : How Creativity Works, Lehrer
A Planet of Virues, Zimmer
I recommend both. THey are science popuilarizers who do a great job of explaining the latest in science research on their respective topics.
NYT review on Lehrer HERE

NPR interview with Zimmer HERE

Am currently reading " The Swerve", Greenblatt.National Book Circle finalist. So far pretty good.

For those interested in Carl Zimmer's book, it is available for free this month, (May). From another thread:

Originally Posted by FlorenceArt

Carl Zimmer's A planet of viruses is the free e-book of the month at University of Chicago Press. And in ePub format too (with DRM).

[Lynx-lynx]

Just found this thread, and what a find!!

Is there any reason the thread seems to have been going through a lull? Maybe another thread started? Or .... ?

My mind goes blanko and splurt if I read too much fiction without having my non-fiction fill. So I've decided to read 2 to 1, two fict to 1 non-fict as a guideline. See how I go anyway!

Well, I'm on a mini project at the moment because, as I mentioned in another thread, I just happened to walk by a display book in the History section of my local library and picked up a book on Napoleon in Egypt. It turns out that that particular book wasn't worth reading at all because it just wasn't as well written or historically researched as it could have been (imo). But it sparked off the interest to pursue this as a topic.

At the moment I'm 4 chapters into Bonaparte in Egypt, J Christopher Herold, first published in 1962. This edition is the ebook version re-published in 2011, Fireship Press, and is well written and researched. And as a bonus all the reference links have worked so far!!!

I've got 3 other books, and historical viewpoints, as well; including GA Henty's book, Aboukir and Acre, initially published in 1899. These are the naval battles off Alexandria whereby Nelson annihilated the French fleet whilst it was waiting off shore after having off loaded all the land forces which had already marched to Cairo.

There's also Al-Jabarti's book that I want to acquire - he wrote a 'Chronicle' on the first 9 (?) months or so of Napoleon's stay in Cairo.

So - what's everyone else up to?

[kennyc]

The lull was just to wait on you.

I'm currently reading Neil DeGrasse Tyson's - Origins and enjoying it a lot. It's much better IMO than some of his other collections of articles/columns that his recent books seem to be. (they tend to be repetitive)
http://www.amazon.com/Origins-Fourte...degrasse+tyson

Also reading "In Short" - very short creative non-fiction pieces with some true gems in the batch.
http://www.amazon.com/Short-Collecti.../dp/0393314928

[kennyc]

Today is Lewis Thomas's birthday 11/25

Go read "Lives of a Cell"

Wonderful Stuff. A bit dated in some spots but the 'truths' are still as true as they were in '74 when it was released!

http://www.amazon.com/Lives-Cell-Not...3866113&sr=1-1

or any of his others:
http://www.amazon.com/Lewis-Thomas/e/B000APFUM8

Late Night Thoughts on Listening to Mahler's Ninth Symphony is quite stimulating as well:

http://www.amazon.com/Night-Thoughts...3866113&sr=1-4

[Lynx-lynx]

Thomas's books look interesting - so I checked my library - but no go.

Unusual, because my library continually astounds me with the breadth of the authors/titles it stocks (but I suspect not as broad in the area of the sciences as it could be).

[kennyc]

And unfortunately it doesn't appear to be available as an ebook.

[Billi]

Lynx-lynx, thanks for waking up this thread!

I'm currently reading Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer by Siddhartha Mukherjee.
It was the Pulitzer Price Nonfiction Winner in 2011 (and thus mentioned in post 24 here).

[Yvonne_Writes]

I have enjoyed:
Deadly Kingdom - Gordon Grice
An Utterly Impartial History of Britain - John O'Farrell
An Optimist's Tour of the Future - Mark Stevenson

[kennyc]

Finished In Short - great short creative non-fiction articles 3/5 stars but some true gems in the mix. All are good no stinkers in the batch. http://www.amazon.com/Short-Collecti.../dp/0393314928


Started In Fact - The best of creative non-fiction and the first entry "Three Spheres" by Lauren Slater totally blew me away (that's what the first one is supposed to do, right? ) but really it is an incredible and incredibly well written personal story.
http://www.amazon.com/Fact-Best-Crea...ywords=in+fact

[Lynx-lynx]

Kenny - would I be accurate in thinking that the authors have written what used to be called 'prose'? Essentially essays on topics/subjects.

And that in order to 'sell' or 'make attractive' the Prose genre they've re-labelled it 'The Short', or 'Creative Non-Fiction'.

Penny for your thoughts .....