|summary=In simple terms the First World War, like most (if not all) conflicts has come down to us largely as a four-year sequence of events, an acknowledgement of defeat by one side, and a peace agreement. Yet there are many different ways of telling its history, and as Englund tells us in his preface, this is not a book about what it '''was''', but about what it was '''like'''. Though a series of snapshots in words, he shows us various stages of the conflict and its effect on people. His emphasis is not so much events and processes, but more the feelings, impressions, experiences and moods of individuals caught up in the period.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846683424</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Paul Oppenheimer
|title=Machiavelli: A Life Beyond Ideology
|rating=4
|genre=Biography
|summary=Machiavelli, 'the first philosopher to define politics as treachery', has probably been better known as an adjective, Machiavellian being a synonym for duplicity in statecraft, than as a historical person. Interestingly, the term 'Machiavel' became common in English usage as an adjective and noun around 1570, although none of his works were translated into the language for another seventy years or so after that.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847252214</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Clarissa Dickson Wright
|title=A History of English Food
|rating=5
|genre=History
|summary=Writing a history of English food, and to some extent drink, must be a daunting task, but as an experienced TV presenter (as one of the ''Two Fat Ladies'' with the late Jennifer Paterson) and as one who was born in the post-war rationing world in 1947, Clarissa Dickson Wright is well placed to do so.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1905211856</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Art Spiegelman
|title=MetaMAUS
|rating=5
|genre=Graphic Novels
|summary=Before the Holocaust was turned into [[The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas by John Boyne|a child-like near-fable for all]], and before it was the focus of superb history books such as [[Bloodlands: Europe between Hitler and Stalin by Timothy Snyder|this]], it became a family saga of a father relating his experiences to a son, who then drew it all - featuring animals not humans - [[Maus by Art Spiegelman|Maus]]. To celebrate the twenty-five years since then, we have this brilliant look back at the creation of an equally brilliant volume.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0670916838</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Philip Ardagh
|title=Philip Ardagh's Book of Kings, Queens, Emperors and Rotten Wart-Nosed Commoners
|rating=3.5
|genre=Children's Non-Fiction
|summary=If you deem a good children's historical trivia book to be one that tells you, the adult, something they didn't know about historical trivia, then this is a good example. I didn't know George V broke his pelvis when his horse fell on him, startled by some post-WWI huzzahs. I didn't know Charles VI of France nearly got torched in some drunken bacchanal. The length of time Charlemagne sat on a throne (over 400 whole years (even if he wasn't wholly whole all that time)) was news to me, as was the raffle that was held (more or less) for being the unknown soldier. Therefore this is a good book for children and the adults willing to instill some historical trivia into them.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0330471732</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Timothy Snyder
|title=Bloodlands: Europe between Hitler and Stalin
|rating=5
|genre=History
|summary=The first chapter is enough. I don't mean the preface, or introduction, that mean you start reading chapter one about an hour in, but chapter one itself, detailing as it does the way Stalin blatantly enforced collectivization on Ukraine's farms, thus killing off millions of local civilians. The seed stock ended up being taken away as part of the grain quota to feed the rest of the Soviet Union, and hardly anybody failed to go without at some point as a result. The first chapter here, then, is more than enough in telling us what we didn't know, explaining perfectly lucidly yet academically how and why what happened happened, and at times of quite gruesome anecdote and contemporary reportage, churning our stomachs and making us have second thoughts about reading on.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099551799</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Jeremy Paxman
|title=Empire: What Ruling the World Did to the British
|rating=5
|genre=History
|summary=In the 21st century, the British Empire may be an anachronism, something for which hand-wringing politicians and church leaders may be ever ready to apologise. Many of us have grown up just as the last imperial remnants were crumbling away. Yet its legacy is everywhere, and for better or worse will always be part of the very fabric of Britain. As Jeremy Paxman demonstrates in this excellent overview, published as a curtain-raiser to his series on the subject, it is never very far away from us. After a period of trying to distance ourselves from it, we seem to be on the verge of coming to terms with the simple truth that it was not so bad as it has sometimes been painted. Moreover, it should be remembered that even if Britain emerged from the Second World War battered and broke, it still possessed sufficient imperial presence to become one of the Permanent Five on the United Nations Security Council.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0670919578</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Sam Willis
|title=The Glorious First of June: Fleet Battle in the Reign of Terror
|rating=5
|genre=History
|summary=To be frank, I was not expecting a lot from this account of a famous maritime battle. Marine warfare histories can be rather dull, with lists of ships and mind-numbing detail that may appeal if you have an intimate knowledge of a warship's anatomy, but quite deathly for the rest of us. But I was gripped from the first page to the last by this really insightful account not just of the battle but of the whole political and historical events which inspired it.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1849160384</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=John Julius Norwich
|title=A History of England in 100 Places: From Stonehenge to the Gherkin
|rating=4.5
|genre=History
|summary=There are many different ways of telling the history of England (indeed just England, not Wales and Scotland, as the author makes clear). This takes a very simple and very effective approach to the matter, by focusing on a hundred specific places which somehow illustrate the nation's progress from prehistoric times to today, in chronological order.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848546068</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Nancy Mitford
|title=The Sun King
|rating=4
|genre=History
|summary=Nancy Mitford assumes that you'll need no introduction to Louis XIV, who ascended the throne when he was four years old and reigned for well over seventy two years. To put him in context his reign began before Charles I was executed in Whitehall, lasted through the English Civil War, Oliver Cromwell's Commonwealth, the reigns of Charles I, James II, William III and into the beginning of the reign of Queen Anne. He bridged the gap between the middle ages and the early modern era.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099528886</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreview
|author=Stephen O'Shea
|title=The Friar of Carcassonne: Revolt Against the Inquisition in the Last Days of the Cathars
|rating=4
|genre=History
|summary=It starts with a painting. The painting isn't the point: the subject is. In the Autumn of 1319 a Franciscan Friar stands before his accusers. Entitled ''L'Agitateur du Languedoc'' the artwork portrays the trial of Bernard Délicieux, the eponymous Friar of Carcassonne. Although O'Shea veers clear of telling us the outcome of the trial, one cannot help feeling that it wasn't an acquittal. Such things tended not to go down in history quite so resoundingly. Not in those days.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184668319X</amazonuk>
}}