Here is a list of some of the books that I am reading (or acquired and added to my to-be-read pile since the last On Today’s Bookshelf post) either in hardcover or in ebook form:
Nonfiction –
- Harry Truman and the Struggle for Racial Justice by Robert Shogan
- The Chosen Few: How Education Shaped Jewish History, 70-1492 by Maristella Posttiani & Zvi Eckstein
- Destiny of the Republic: A Tale of Madness, Medicine, and the Murder of a President by Candice Millard
- The Last Campaign: How Harry Truman Won the 1948 Election by Zachary Karabell
- The Spanish Inquisition: A Historical Revision by Henry Kamen
- Ghettostad: Lodz and the Making of a Nazi City by Gordon J. Horwitz
- Eichmann’s Jews: The Jewish Administration of Holocaust Vienna, 1938-1945 by Doron Rabinovici
- The Decline and Fall of the British Empire 1781-1997 by Piers Brendan
- The History of the Renaissance World by Susan Wise Bauer
- The Heavens are Empty: Discovering the Lost Town of Trochenbrod by Avrom Bendavid-Val
- Understanding the Book of Mormon by Grant Hardy
- Would You Kill the Fat Man? The Trolley Problem and What Your Answer Tells Us About Right and Wrong by David Edmonds
- A World Without Jews: The Nazi Imagination From Persecution to Genocide by Alon Confino
- Anti-Judaism: The Western Tradition by David Nirenberg
- The Internal Enemy: Slavery and the War in Virginia 1772-1832 by Alan Taylor
- Glorious Misadventures: Nikolai Rezanov and the Dream of a Russian America by Owen Matthews
- An Idea Whose time Has Come: Two Presidents, Two Parties, and the Battle for the Civil Rights Act of 1964 by Todd S. Purdum
- The Story of the Jews: Finding the Words 1000 BC-1492 AD by Simon Schama
- The Counter-Revolution of 1776: Slave Resistance and the Origins of the United States of America by Gerald Horne
- Lawrence in Arabia: War, Deceit, Imperial Folly and the Making of the Modern Middle East by Scott Anderson
- Zealot: The Life and Times of Jesus of Nazareth by Reza Aslan
- Sisters: The Lives of America’s Suffragists by Jean H. Baker
- The Slave Next Door: Human Trafficking and Slavery in America Today by Kevin Bales
- Red Mutiny: Eleven Fateful Days on the Battleship Potemkin by Neal Bascomb
- Wilson by Scott A. Berg
- Wondrous Beauty: The Life and Adventures of Elizabeth Patterson Bonaparte by Carol Berkin
- Lucrezia Borgia by Sarah Bradford
- The Boys in the Boat: Nine Americans and Their Epic Quest for Gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympics by Daniel James Brown
- To Kill Rasputin : The Life and Death of Gregori Rasputin by Andrew Cook
- The Wars of Reconstruction: The Brief, Violent History of America’s Most Progressive Era by Douglas R. Egerton
- The Borgias and Their Enemies: 1431-1519 by Christopher Hibbert
- Voting for Hitler and Stalin: Elections under 20th Century Dictatorships edited by Ralph Jessen & Hedwig Richter
- Social Democratic America by Lane Kenworthy
- Death in the City of Light: The Serial Killer of Nazi-Occupied Paris by David King
- The Tigress of Forli: Renaissance Italy’s Most Courageous and Notorious Countess, Caterina Riario Sforza de’ Medici by Elizabeth Lev
- Russian Roulette: How British Spies Thwarted Lenin’s Plot for Global Revolution by Giles Milton
- The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander
Fiction –
- Blood Land by R.S. Guthrie
- Cauldron of Ghosts by David Weber & Eric Flint
- Rex Regis by L.E. Modesitt, Jr.
- Like a Mighty Army by David Weber
- The One-Eyed Man by L.E. Modesitt, Jr.
- Blood of Dragons by Robin Hobb
- Words of Radiance by Brandon Sanderson
- One Thousand White Women: The Journals of May Dodd by Jim Fergus
- The Complete Malazan Book of the Fallen by Steven Erikson (a 10-book omnibus)
- The Bat by Jo Nesbo
- The Kingdom of Gods by N.K. Jemisin
- Death Is Not the End by Ian Rankin
- The Ludwig Conspiracy by Oliver Potzsch
- The Hangman’s Daughter by Oliver Potzsch
- The Dark Monk by Oliver Potzsch
- Freeman by Leonard Pitts
- The Magician’s Assistant by Ann Patchett
- The Madonnas of Leningrad by Debra Dean
- The Book Thief by Markus Zusak
- The Impeachment of Abraham Lincoln by Stephen L. Carter
- Witch Wraith by Terry Brooks
- Mrs. Lincoln’s Dressmaker by Jennifer Chiaverini
I acquired most of the nonfiction books in hardcover and most of the fiction books in ebook.
Alas, I wish I could say that the above list represents all of the books I have added to my library since the last listing, but it doesn’t. I calculated that if I retired today and read four books every week, I would need more than 30 years to read all of the books I have acquired. Fortunately, most of the books are in ebook form (I have acquired more fiction than nonfiction) and I am trying to restrain my purchases.
I have found this to be the primary negative to my being an editor — I never seem to have enough books on hand, always want more, and spend much more than I should on books. On the other hand, editing provides me with a sufficient income to support my book addiction.
I admit that feeding my book addiction was less costly before ebooks. The ease of storage of ebooks encourages me to acquire books for future reading that I wouldn’t acquire if I had to acquire them in print form; in the latter case, I would wait until I had reduced my to-be-read pile significantly.
I also note that once I started acquiring ebooks, I also increased my hardcover acquisitions. My son claims (tongue in cheek) he will be able to have a comfortable retirement just from the sale of my library.
What books have you acquired in recent months that you would recommend being added to the TBR pile?