FREE/BARGAIN — Non-Fiction

[Cactus Chef]

The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind by Julian Jaynes is on sale for $2.99 on Amazon:

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B009MBTRHA

At the heart of this classic, seminal book is Julian Jaynes's still-controversial thesis that human consciousness did not begin far back in animal evolution but instead is a learned process that came about only three thousand years ago and is still developing. The implications of this revolutionary scientific paradigm extend into virtually every aspect of our psychology, our history and culture, our religion—and indeed our future.

“Don’t be put off by the academic title of Julian Jaynes’s The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind. Its prose is always lucid and often lyrical…he unfolds his case with the utmost intellectual rigor.”—The New York Times

“When Julian Jaynes . . . speculates that until late in the twentieth millennium BC men had no consciousness but were automatically obeying the voices of the gods, we are astounded but compelled to follow this remarkable thesis.”—John Updike, The New Yorker

“He is as startling as Freud was in The Interpretation of Dreams, and Jaynes is equally as adept at forcing a new view of known human behavior.”—American Journal of Psychiatry

Not sure I agree with the book's theory, but I enjoyed reading it nonetheless.

Amazon-only price, I'm afraid. Bit odd, I've definitely seen that price before as a publisher sale. Good luck getting Kobo to price match, if interested.

[salty-horse]

The Once and Future Sex: Going Medieval on Women's Roles in Society by Eleanor Janega is $2 in the US (Kobo, Amazon)

What makes for the ideal woman? How should she look, love, and be? In this vibrant, high-spirited history, medievalist Eleanor Janega turns to the Middle Ages, the era that bridged the ancient world and modern society, to unfurl its suppositions about women and reveal what’s shifted over time—and what hasn’t.

Enshrined medieval thinkers, almost always male, subscribed to a blend of classical Greek and Roman philosophy and Christian theology for their concepts of the sexes. For the height of female attractiveness, they chose the mythical Helen of Troy, whose imagined pear shape, small breasts, and golden hair served as beauty’s epitome. Casting Eve’s shadow over medieval women, they derided them as oversexed sinners, inherently lustful, insatiable, and weak. And, unless a nun, a woman was to be the embodiment of perfect motherhood.

In contrast, drawing on accounts of remarkable and subversive medieval women like Eleanor of Aquitaine and Hildegard of Bingen, along with others hidden in documents and court cases, Janega shows us how real women of the era lived. While often mothers, they were industrious farmers, brewers, textile workers, artists, and artisans and paved the way for new ideas about women’s nature, intellect, and ability.

In The Once and Future Sex, Janega unravels the restricting expectations on medieval women and the ones on women today. She boldly questions why, if our ideas of women have changed drastically over time, we cannot reimagine them now to create a more equitable future.

[salty-horse]

The Fire Next Time by James Baldwin is $2 in the US (Kobo, Amazon)

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • The book that galvanized the nation, gave voice to the emerging civil rights movement in the 1960s—and still lights the way to understanding race in America today. • "The finest essay I’ve ever read.” —Ta-Nehisi Coates

At once a powerful evocation of James Baldwin's early life in Harlem and a disturbing examination of the consequences of racial injustice, the book is an intensely personal and provocative document from the iconic author of If Beale Street Could Talk and Go Tell It on the Mountain. It consists of two "letters," written on the occasion of the centennial of the Emancipation Proclamation, that exhort Americans, both black and white, to attack the terrible legacy of racism.

Described by The New York Times Book Review as "sermon, ultimatum, confession, deposition, testament, and chronicle … all presented in searing, brilliant prose," The Fire Next Time stands as a classic of literature.

[salty-horse]

Lobbying for Zionism on Both Sides of the Atlantic by Ilan Pappe is $1 in the US (Kobo, Amazon)

In 1896, a Jewish state was a pipe dream. Today the overwhelming majority of Jews identify as Zionists. How did this happen?

Ilan Pappe unveils how over a century of aggressive lobbying changed the map of the Middle East. Pro-Israel lobbies convinced British and American policymakers to condone Israel’s flagrant breaches of international law, grant Israel unprecedented military aid and deny Palestinians rights. Anyone who questioned unconditional support for Israel, even in the mildest terms, became the target of relentless smear campaigns. Lobbying for Zionism on Both Sides of the Atlantic shows us how an unassailable consensus was built – and how it might be dismantled.

[salty-horse]

The Origins of Totalitarianism by Hannah Arendt is $2 in the US (Kobo, Amazon)

Hannah Arendt’s definitive work on totalitarianism—an essential component of any study of twentieth-century political history—now with a new introduction by Anne Applebaum.

In recent years, The Origins of Totalitarianism has become essential reading as we grapple with the rise of autocrats and tyrannical thought across the globe.

The book begins with the rise of anti-Semitism in central and western Europe in the 1800s and continues with an examination of European colonial imperialism from 1884 to the outbreak of World War I.

Hannah Arendt then explores the institutions and operations of totalitarian movements, focusing on the two genuine forms of totalitarian government in our time, Nazi Germany and Stalinist Russia, which she adroitly recognizes were two sides of the same coin, rather than opposing philosophies of Right and Left. From this vantage point, she discusses the evolution of classes into masses, the role of propaganda in dealing with the nontotalitarian world, the use of terror, and the nature of isolation and loneliness as preconditions for total domination.

This edition includes an introduction by Anne Applebaum—a leading voice on authoritarianism and Russian history—who fears that “once again, we are living in a world that Arendt would recognize.”

[salty-horse]

The Forbidden Garden of Leningrad by Simon Parkin is £3 in the UK (Kobo, Amazon)
Short Bluesky thread about it by the author

FINALIST FOR THE ORWELL PRIZE FOR POLITICAL WRITING 2025
An Economist Book of the Year

In the summer of 1941, German troops surrounded the Russian city of Leningrad - now St Petersburg - and began the longest blockade in recorded history. By the most conservative estimates, the siege would claim the lives of three-quarters of a million people. Most died of starvation.

At the centre of the embattled city stood a converted palace that housed the greatest living plant library ever amassed - the world's first seed bank. After attempts to evacuate the collection failed, and as supplies dwindled, the scientists responsible faced a terrible decision: should they distribute the specimens to the starving population, or preserve them in the hope that they held the key to ending global famine?

Drawing on previously unseen sources, The Forbidden Garden of Leningrad tells the remarkable and moving story of the botanists who remained at the Plant Institute during the darkest days of the siege, risking their lives in the name of science.

[mitford13]

Black Lamb and Grey Falcon by Rebecca West is $1.99 at Amazon

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B000SEGMT6/

[salty-horse]

Oathbreakers by Matthew Gabriele & David M. Perry is $2 in the US (Kobo, Amazon)

The authors of The Bright Ages return with a “real-life Game of Thrones”(New York Times Book Review)—the story of the Carolingian Civil War, a bloody, protracted battle pitting brother against brother, father against son, that would end an empire, upend a continent, and redefine the future of Europe

By the early ninth century, the Carolingian empire was at the height of its power. The Franks, led by Charlemagne, had built the largest European domain since Rome in its heyday. Though they jockeyed for power, prestige, and profit, the Frankish elites enjoyed political and cultural consensus. But just two generations later, their world was in shambles. Civil war, once an unthinkable threat, had erupted after Louis the Pious’s sons tried to overthrow him—and then placed their knives at the other’s neck. Families who had once charged into battle together now drew each other’s blood.

The Carolingian Civil War would rage for years as kings fought kings, brother faced off against brother, and sons challenged fathers. Oathbreakers is the dramatic history of this brutal, turbulent time. Medieval historians David M. Perry and Matthew Gabriele illuminate what happens when a once unshakeable political and cultural order breaks down and long suppressed tensions flare into deadly violence. Drawn from rich primary sources, featuring a wide cast of characters, packed with dramatic twists and turns, this is history that rivals the greatest fictional epics—with consequences that continue to shape our own world.

Oathbreakers offers lessons of what deep cracks in a once-stable social and political fabric might reveal, and the bloody consequences of disagreeing on facts and reality. The Civil War at the heart of this tale asks: who is “in” and who is “out”? And what happens when things fall apart?

[salty-horse]

Riot. Strike. Riot: The New Era of Uprisings by Joshua Clover is FREE on Verso Books' website

Political theorist Joshua Clover theorizes the riot as the form of the coming insurrection

Baltimore. Ferguson. Tottenham. Clichy-sous-Bois. Oakland. Ours has become an “age of riots” as the struggle of people versus state and capital has taken to the streets. Award-winning poet and scholar Joshua Clover offers a new understanding of this present moment and its history. Rioting was the central form of protest in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, yet it was supplanted by age of the glorious strike and labour protests of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. From, from the seventies on, we're seen a return of the strike - now changed along with the coordinates of race and class.

From early wage demands to recent social justice campaigns pursued through occupations and blockades, Clover connects these protests to the upheavals of a sclerotic economy in a state of moral collapse. Riot.Strike.Riot is a tour de force of political and theoretical analysis.

[salty-horse]

The Hidden Life of Trees by Peter Wohlleben is $2 in the US (Kobo, Amazon)

One of the most beloved books of our time: an illuminating account of the forest, and the science that shows us how trees communicate, feel, and live in social networks. After reading this book, a walk in the woods will never be the same again.

Are trees social beings? In The Hidden Life of Trees forester and author Peter Wohlleben convincingly makes the case that, yes, the forest is a social network. He draws on groundbreaking scientific discoveries to describe how trees are like human families: tree parents live together with their children, communicate with them, support them as they grow, share nutrients with those who are sick or struggling, and even warn each other of impending dangers. Wohlleben also shares his deep love of woods and forests, explaining the amazing processes of life, death, and regeneration that he has observed in his woodland.

Includes a Note From a Forest Scientist by Dr.Suzanne Simard

Published in Partnership with the David Suzuki Institute

[salty-horse]

The Biggest Prison on Earth by Ilan Pappe is $1 in the US (Kobo, Amazon)

Shortlisted for the Palestine Book Awards 2017

A powerful, groundbreaking history of the Occupied Territories from one of Israel's most influential historians

From the author of the bestselling study of the 1948 War of Independence comes an incisive look at the Occupied Territories, picking up the story where The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine left off.

In this comprehensive exploration of one of the world’s most prolonged and tragic conflicts, Pappe uses recently declassified archival material to analyse the motivations and strategies of the generals and politicians – and the decision-making process itself – that laid the foundation of the occupation. From a survey of the legal and bureaucratic infrastructures that were put in place to control the population of over one million Palestinians, to the security mechanisms that vigorously enforced that control, Pappe paints a picture of what is to all intents and purposes the world’s largest ‘open prison’.

[salty-horse]

Close to the Machine by Ellen Ullman is $3 on Amazon.com (Kobo is full price but should be eligible for price matching)

With a New Introduction by Anna Wiener

In 1997, the computer was still a relatively new tool---a sleek and unforgiving machine that was beyond the grasp of most users. With intimate and unflinching detail, software engineer Ellen Ullman examines the strange ecstasy of being at the forefront of the predominantly male technological revolution, and the difficulty of translating the inherent messiness of human life into artful and efficient code. Close to the Machine is an elegant and revelatory mediation on the dawn of the digital era.

[Aleron Ives]

$13 isn't much of a sale. I think you mean $3.

[salty-horse]

Sorry, I'm using the Kobo data to create the post and forgot to update the price.

[salty-horse]

The Dawn of Everything by David Graeber and David Wengrow is $4 in the US (Kobo, Amazon)

A dramatically new understanding of human history, challenging our most fundamental assumptions about social evolution—from the development of agriculture and cities to the origins of the state, democracy, and inequality—and revealing new possibilities for human emancipation.

For generations, our remote ancestors have been cast as primitive and childlike—either free and equal innocents, or thuggish and warlike. Civilization, we are told, could be achieved only by sacrificing those original freedoms or, alternatively, by taming our baser instincts. David Graeber and David Wengrow show how such theories first emerged in the eighteenth century as a conservative reaction to powerful critiques of European society posed by Indigenous observers and intellectuals. Revisiting this encounter has startling implications for how we make sense of human history today, including the origins of farming, property, cities, democracy, slavery, and civilization itself.

Drawing on pathbreaking research in archaeology and anthropology, the authors show how history becomes a far more interesting place once we learn to throw off our conceptual shackles and perceive what’s really there. If humans did not spend 95 percent of their evolutionary past in tiny bands of hunter-gatherers, what were they doing all that time? If agriculture, and cities, did not mean a plunge into hierarchy and domination, then what kinds of social and economic organization did they lead to? The answers are often unexpected, and suggest that the course of human history may be less set in stone, and more full of playful, hopeful possibilities, than we tend to assume.

The Dawn of Everything fundamentally transforms our understanding of the human past and offers a path toward imagining new forms of freedom, new ways of organizing society. This is a monumental book of formidable intellectual range, animated by curiosity, moral vision, and a faith in the power of direct action.