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[[Category:History|*]]
[[Category:New Reviews|History]]==History==__NOTOC__<!-- INSERT NEW REVIEWS BELOW HERE-->{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Edward B Barbier1785633457|title=Scarcity and FrontiersCharging Around: How Economies Have Developed Through Natural Resource ExploitationExploring the Edges of England by Electric Car|author=Clive Wilkinson
|rating=5
|genre=HistoryTravel|summary=Scarcity and Frontiers is an ambitious, fascinating book that examines how the world's economies have developed by exploiting natural resources. Throughout Clive Wilkinson has a history, states have responded to natural resource scarcity of travelling by developing new frontiers, hence the title. The book begins unconventional means with the development of agriculture along the banks of the Nile and runs right through to the present day, finally questioning whether we are entering a new era of natural resource scarcitypreference for slow travel.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0521701651</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=John Ashdown-Hill|title=The Last Days of Richard III|rating=4|genre=History|summary=The controversy surrounding King Richard III has meant that there have been far more biographies about him than on any other pre-Tudor monarch, some extremely partisan in exonerating him of the crimes laid at As he neared his door, some (a minority, it seems) more than keen to endorse eightieth birthday the Shakespearean portrait of a fiend in human shape, and others steering a middle course.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0752454048</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Helen Rappaport|title=Ekaterinburg: The Last Days idea of exploring the Romanovs|rating=5|genre=History|summary=The city edges of Ekaterinburg England in an electric car was once regarded as imperial Russia's gateway to the eastnot totally outrageous. In 1918 fact, it became symbolic with one of the most savage executions, or might one say liquidations, ever recorded in history – the cold-blooded annihilation of the former Tsar Nicholas II, should be a pleasant holiday for Clive and his wife Alexandra, their childrenJoan, the last remaining servants who had stayed with them in captivity, and their pet dogs.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099520095</amazonuk>shouldn't it?
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Paul Farley and Michael Symmons RobertsB09BLBP3P8|title=EdgelandsNeville Chamberlain's War: How Great Britain Opposed Hitler, 1939-1940|author=Frederic Seager
|rating=4.5
|genre=History
|summary=Around Received wisdom and simplified narrative often lead to misconceptions about history. One such is the middle scrubbing from the popular imagination of the last century and earlierearly days of World War II from 1939-40, books about known as the English countryside seemed very much in vogue. H.V. Morton's 'In Search of EnglandPhoney War'' . We remember Neville Chamberlain appeasing Hitler, war breaking out, and associated titles spring readily Churchill coming in to mindsave the day. Very little time is spent on this period in cultural reflections and yet, but there were a wealth of others, by authors who seemed intent on discovering the land for themselvesas Frederic Seager argues in this book, sometimes anxious to document it before it was goneof vital significance in how the war played out.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224089021</amazonuk>
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 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jonathan Clark3756228711|title=A World By ItselfCDC: A History of the British IslesThe happy years with a spectacular IT 'Phenomena'|author=Hans Bodmer
|rating=4
|genre=History
|summary=As one who has always felt most at ease with the standard chronological approach to ''The history, driven by events and major personalities, I found the close-on 700 pages of this volume fairly demanding reading in places. It is divided into six parts, each by a different contributor with the editor himself writing the fourth. Each part is divided into Material Cultures, followed by essays on topics (not for all sections) on Religious Cultures; Religion, Nationalism and Identity; and Political and National Cultures. What we have, therefore, is an overview development of events from each period, more thorough in some instances than others, and a certain amount IT could fill books of theorizing on the general social, political and even artistic background. A straightforward history through the ages – it is notseveral hundred pages.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0712664963</amazonuk>}}''
{{newreview|author=Peter Hart|title=Gallipoli|rating=4Author Hans Bodmer is quite right about that.5|genre=History|summary=Early in 1915 the Allied Powers attempted He has chosen to seize tell us about the Dardanellesshort, capture Constantinople and eliminate Turkeybut explosive, who had joined history of the Central PowersControl Data Company, from the First World War. The campaign ended in failure and retreatCDC, yet for many years it was portrayed as a brilliant strategy undermined by bad luck and incompetent commanders. This painstakingly-researched account shows that this was not the casewhom he worked. It was more a matter of a wild scheme which was poorly planned and doomed from the start, compounding the Allies' problems by diverting large numbers of troops from attacking Germans on the Western Front, where they would arguably have been better employed. In his introduction he calls the eight-month exercise 'an epic tragedy with an incredible heroic resilience displayed by the soldiers', yet ultimately 's a futile and costly sideshow for all the combatants.' It was a huge drain on Allied military resourcesfascinating tale, involving nearly half told in a million troops, with the British Empire losing about 205,000 – 115,000 killed, wounded or missing mixture of technological summary and 90,000 evacuated sick – while the French lost 47,000, and the Turkish over 251,000wry anecdote.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846681596</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Patrick Dillon Jeremy Dronfield and P J LynchDavid Ziggy Greene|title=The Story of BritainFritz and Kurt|rating=54|genre=Children's Non-FictionConfident Readers|summary=Author Patrick Dillon has put together a clearWe start with the pair of brothers Fritz and Kurt, well-written and beautifully concise story of Britaintheir muckers, summing up doing things any Jewish lad in 1930s Vienna would want to do – kicking things around the history of Britain and Ireland in a little over 320 pages. Significant eventsempty market place, ranging from helping the Norman Conquest neighbours, being dutiful when it comes to the South Sea Bubble, synagogue choir and groups of people ranging from highwaymen at a vocational school. Kurt has to make sure the Romantic poets, lamps are turned on at their very Orthodox neighbours' each dealt with in between 1 Friday night – the Sabbath preventing them for using anything nearly as mechanical and 3 pages written in Dillonworkmanlike as a light switch. But this is the time just before the Austrian leader is going to cave to Hitler's chattywill, easy and instead of having a national vote to read stylekeep the Nazis out, invite them in with open arms. There are also maps ''Kristallnacht'' happened in Vienna just as much as in Germany, including those as did all the round-ups of Jews. These in their turn leave the D-Day landings younger Kurt at home with his mother and sisters anxious to hear word of an evacuation to Britain or the Civil War battlesUS, a timeline for while Fritz and his father are, unknown initially to each major period (Middle Agesother, Tudors, Stuarts, Georgians, Victorians packed off on the same train to Buchenwald and Twentieth Century) and some gorgeous illustrations by former Kate Greenaway winner PJ Lynchthe stone quarry there. And us wondering how the titular event for the adult variant of all this could come about…|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1406311928</amazonuk>024156574X
}}
 {{newreview|author=Edward Pearce|title=Pitt the Elder: Man of War|rating=3.5|genre=Biography|summary=William Pitt the Elder, 1st Earl of Chatham, and Prime Minister from 1766 to 1768, has come down to us through the ages as the great eighteenth century equivalent of Winston Churchill, one of the great men of the British Empire in its earlier days, and the man who led England triumphantly through the Seven Years War of 1756-63. During the 'year of victories' in 1759, Quebec was captured, the combined English and Prussian forces defeated the French at Minden, and the army won a famous victory at Quiberon Bay. For this, Pitt took – or was accorded by generations of historians – much of the credit.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1845951433</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Tony JudtJohn Henry Phillips|title=The Memory ChaletSearch
|rating=5
|genre=Autobiography
|summary=In 2008 the historian Tony Judt was diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, a degenerative disorder that eventually results in complete paralysis for the sufferer. Unable to jot down ideas as they came to him, Judt had to rely on his memory to hold them until he had the chance to dictate his words to somebody else. His memory, which was already good, became exceptional. The progress of the disorder left Judt unable to move, but no mental deterioration or lack of sensation occurred, which he describes as a mixed blessing. He had to endure whole nights lying in the same position, unable to roll over or even to scratch an itch, a prisoner in his own body. To preserve his sanity during these tortuous nights he focussed on events from his own past, linking then with other events and ideas it had never occurred to him were connected. It was during these reveries that the essays in The Memory Chalet were not only conceived, but also developed in their entirety.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0434020966</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Adrian Johns
|title=Death of a Pirate: British Radio and the Making of the Information Age
|rating=4
|genre=History
|summary=If Archaeology cannot be child's play, when you are inclined 're scraping in the dirt looking to take your cues from the weekly reviewsfind what you can find, as often knowing there should be something there but not always confident what. Archaeology must be a fair bit harder when you set out to find some specific thing. This book is a case of the witty poet Gavin Ewart once expressed the matterlatter, you will doubtless find currently articles as varied as; Russell Brand predicting our author promises to locate the imminent decline topic of the BBC, various interpretations of liberalism and how these struggle titular search. And he really hasn't made it easy for expression in Coalition Government policy. There are concerns too about himself – the legislation governing the internet and references back to the Sixties battles betweensearch area is a wide one, on the one handtarget might not exist any more – oh, the unbridled self-expression of the free market andit's underwater, when he cannot dive. Latching on to a particular D-Day veteran through helping the otherheroic old man's visit back to France, our author has promised to find the virtues of self-restraint in such matters as the re-examination of the Lady Chatterley triallanding craft that delivered him to Normandy, now fifty years agoand that he was lucky to survive when it sank from beneath him. An unusual and quite intriguing book, Death of The secondary aim is to erect a Piratememorial to everyone else aboard, about the development vast majority of intellectual property and piracy whom perished. Who else would make such promises to someone in radio touches on all these contemporary concerns in a dramatic way. It combines the history of modern broadcasting with a crime story and consequent trial.their nineties?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0393068609</amazonuk>1472146182
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Mary BeardB09F4CTKJR|title=Pompeii: The Life of a Roman TownFlights for Freedom|author= Steven Burgauer
|rating=4.5
|genre=HistoryHistorical Fiction|summary=The introduction does not spare It's the reader later stages of World War I and the horror of United States has just entered the conflict. Petrol Petronus is a volcanic (Vesuvius) eruption in young American who has signed up and joined the year 79 CE17 Aero Squadron. As This company was the local residents literally ran for their lives clutching what they could easily carry ' ... a deadlyfirst US Aero Squadron to be trained in Canada, burning combination of gases, volcanic debris the first to be attached to the RAF and molten rock travelling at huge speed ...' leaves the reader with an horrific mental imagefirst to be sent into the skies to fight the Germans in active combat. All But before that last minute panicking was in vain. No one could survive such an onslaught. Nature at her very worst indeedcan happen, Petrol has to master flying the notoriously difficult but majestic Sopwith Camel.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846684714</amazonuk>
}}
 [[Category:History]]{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Simon Garfield0578761718|title=Just My Type: A Book About FontsThe Inspiring History of a Special Relationship|author=Nancy Carver
|rating=4.5
|genre=Humour
|summary=A quality typeface is a bit like a good referee at a football match in that you only really notice them if something has gone wrong. A referee is there to facilitate the players on the pitch, not to be the star of the show (though watching Match of the Day these past few weeks you'd often beg to differ). So it is with typefaces. A good type helps the reader, enhances the flow and makes the viewing experience easy and simple. Well sort of.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846683017</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Simone de Beauvoir
|title=The Second Sex
|rating=4
|genre=History
|summary=This book was first published in France in the late 1940s and was an instant success. Much praise is heaped upon it as we see from the back cover; but the line which resonates with me, is simply 'The Second Sex is required reading for anyone who believes in equality.' I happily put my hand up for that one, speaking, as it happens - as a 'second sex' individual. It struck me that wouldn't it be interesting to also have a male reviewer give this book his thorough and undivided attention?
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>009949938X</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Natalie Haynes
|title=The Ancient Guide to Modern Life
|rating=4
|genre=History
|summary=Haynes starts with the positive statement that we shouldn't throw the subject The church of ancient history straight St Mary Aldermanbuy had existed in the binCity of London from at least 1181, so to speakwhen it was first mentioned in records. Sadly, We should instead embrace itthe original church was destroyed in the Great Fire of London in 1666. It has lots to tell us if only we would listen. Chapter 1 entitled ''Old was rebuilt in Portland stone from a design by Sir Christopher Wren soon after the fire and then survived for centuries until World Order'' certainly grabbed my attention with War II, when it was again ruined by bombs during the line ..Blitz. But that wasn'Can politicians really make t the end of its story: after a positive difference phenomenal fundraising effort, the stones from the church's walls were transported to our lives Fulton, Missouri...' In 2010 when the role of politicians is at an all-time low There, in the eyes grounds of the votersWestminster College, this is an excellent question to kick off with. We zoom right back in time and explore how the Athenians lived. Apparently they were rather forward-thinking church was rebuilt and progressive people with ideas which could easily be put into use today. They also enjoyed true democracy. When Haynes was talking about politics generally I liked another sweeping statement of hers where she says ' ... that history teaches us we could offer our politicians serves as a hefty pay cut and still get plenty of perfectly competent candidates.' My inner voice was shouting out - make an immediate start on that one please. I won't spoil all the delicious details which led up memorial to this attention-grabbing statement but it really is food for thoughtWinston Churchill.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846683238</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Patricia Malcolmson and Robert Malcolmson (Editors)1784385166|title=Nella Last in the 1950s: The Further Diaries of Housewife, 49|rating=4|genre=History|summary=Nella Last wrote a regular diary for twenty-seven years. Two previous volumes, also edited by Patricia and Robert Malcolmson, deal with the Second World War and immediate [[Nella Last's Peace: The Post-war Diaries of Housewife 49 by Patricia Malcolmson (Editor), Robert Malcolmson (Editor)|post-War years]]. Now this third book starts with selections from 1950 and covers four years of social change as Britain moves into the reign of Elizabeth II.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846683505</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Kwame Anthony Appiah|title=The Honor Code: How Moral Revolutions Happen|rating=3.5|genre=History|summary=In the Preface, Appiah believes that morality is an extremely important area of our lives as we live them today. He goes on by saying that it's all very well thinking about morality - our morals - our own code of living - but it's the ultimate action which truly matters. Well, I would certainly agree with that. And as Appiah digs deeper into his subject, he tells his readers that he was struck by similarities between, for example, ''the collapse of the duel, the abandonment of footbinding, the end of Atlantic slavery.'' In the following chapters he debates the issues of those three major areas of morality. They were, Third Reich in short, moral issues on a very large scale.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0393071626</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Robert Temple|title=Egyptian Dawn100 Objects: Exposing the Real Truth Behind Ancient Egypt|rating=3.5|genre=A Material History|summary=This is latest book from Robert Temple in which he documents new theories on the Ancient Egyptians. There are some startling claims in the book, not least regarding the Pharaoh who built the Great Pyramid and the proposal that there were in fact two Egyptian civilisations that existed alongside each other in different parts of Egypt. If the author is correct in all of his assertions then it would certainly point to the location of amazing new archaeological discoveries and shine a new perspective on how we view the Ancient Egyptians and the Pyramids.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>071268414X</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewNazi Germany|author=Roy Vickery|title=Garlands, Conkers and Mother-Die: British and Irish Plant-LoreRoger Moorhouse
|rating=5
|genre=History
|summary=For many centuries, plants have not only had practical uses as food, remedies, textiles and dyes, What is the first image that comes to mind when you think of the Third Reich? Hitler? A swastika? The Nazi salute? The gate to a concentration camp? None of these are comfortable images but have also symbolic they are emblematic of the Third Reich's fascist regime in all its iniquity. But some objects and folkloric meaning in many different culturesimages from that time may be less familiar to you. The term ''plant-lore'' In this short volume, Roger Moorhouse has been coined attempted to describe the profusion of illustrate the customs and beliefs associated with plants, and this book gathers together many period of the plant-lore traditions Third Reich through one hundred of Britain and Irelandits material artefacts.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1441101950</amazonuk> 
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|author=Paul MathieuLun Zhang, Adrien Gombeaud, Ameziane and Edward Gauvin (translator)|title=The Masters of MantonTiananmen 1989: From Alec Taylor to George ToddOur Shattered Hopes
|rating=4.5
|genre=HistoryGraphic Novels|summary='Manton' is one I never really followed the events of those iconic names Tiananmen Square with much attention when it was playing out – someone in horse racing: the yard on second half of their teens has other priorities, you know. I certainly didn't know of the edge weeks of protests and hunger strikes from the students before the Marlborough Downs in Wiltshire massacre and currently the home birth of trainer Brian Meehan. But Paul Mathieu isnthe Tank Man image, I didn't looking at what's happening todayknow how the area had long been a venue for political protest, or even in the recent past; heand I didn's looking back at the men who made Manton t know more than a household name from when spit about the yard was built in 1870 through to George Todd's death in 1974people involved on either side. The first master was Alec Taylor – generally known as 'Old Alec Taylor', who came to Manton from Fyfield with This book is practically flawless in giving a string of classic winners to his name. He, his son, general browser'Young Alec', Joe Lawson and George Todd were s context for the great names whole season of protests back in just over a century at the yard1989.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>0955389402</amazonuk>1684056993
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Geert Mak0648684806|title=An Island in TimeClara Colby: The Biography of a VillageInternational Suffragist|author=John Holliday
|rating=4
|genre=HistoryBiography|summary=In the mid 1990s journalist and author Geert Mak returned The path of Clara Dorothy Bewick's life was probably determined when her family emigrated to his native Friesland and took up residence in the village of JorwertUSA. His aim At the time she was to investigate the quiet revolution going on in the agrarian communities not just of Holland three-years-old but because of the whole of Europe.  This some childhood ailment, she wasn't going allowed to be an outsider's viewsail with her parents and three brothers. Mak grew up Instead, she remained with her grandparents, who doted on her and saw that she received a good education, both in the northern Dutch province; he spoke the language; he knew the games and understood the peopleout of school. In a very real sense Mak She was going home… the only child in the household and finding that it scarcely existed any moreher childhood was glorious.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099546868</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Ian Mortimer|title=Medieval Intrigue: Decoding Royal Conspiracies|rating=4|genre=History|summary=Over By contrast, her family had become pioneer farmers in the last few years Dr Mortimer has established himself as one mid-west of the foremost writers of British historical biography covering the 14th United States and life was hard, as Clara was to find out when she and early 15th centuries. However his previous books have been quite accessible her grandparents eventually went to join the general as well as the scholarly readerfamily. This present volume is aimed more at the latter audienceClara would only know her mother for a few months: she was married for fifteen years, had ten pregnancies, assuming as it does a detailed knowledge of King Edward II seven surviving children and his successorsdied in childbirth not long after Clara arrived. This is hinted at in his introduction, in which he points out that 'history is As the most conservative of all professionseldest girl, a heavy burden would fall on Clara and Wisconsin was a radical historian is generally branded a maverick by the mainstreamrude awakening.'|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847065899</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Daniel Swift1783784350|title=Bomber County|rating=4|genre=This Golden Fleece: A Journey Through Britain's Knitted History|summary=Bomber County is, of course, Lincolnshire where squadrons of Beaufighters, Wellingtons, Halifaxes and Lancasters were huddled in hangars for combined raids against enemy targets in German occupied Europe. As the war progressed the targets escalated, from attacks against the German Fleet, the industrial complex of the Ruhr and later, with the aim of breaking enemy morale, the targets included the cities - including Hamburg, Berlin, Dresden and Cologne. Night after night, crews already warmly dressed in jerseys and thick woollen socks zipped themselves into flying suits and made their way towards the enemy coast. Conditions were cramped and the temperatures plummeted as they gained altitude flying by the light of the moon to their appointed destinations.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0241144175</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Richard Tarnas|title=The Passion of the Western Mind: Understanding the Ideas That Have Shaped Our World ViewEsther Rutter
|rating=5
|genre=History
|summary=With plaudits such as 'Ten years It was December and Esther Rutter was stuck in the makingher office job, writing to people she' d never met and a 'US Bestseller', this book has serious pedigreepreparing spreadsheets. It is a serious book in content alsoThe job frustrated her and even her knitting did not soothe her mind. At its very heart is January was going to be a time for making changes and she decided that she would travel the link between length and breadth of the disciplines of philosophyBritish Isles with occasional forays abroad, religion discovering and science. Small sentence, huge implications, Itelling the story of wool'm thinking right at s history and how it had made and changed the outsetlandscape. Where to begin? Well, all the chapters are usefully subShe'd grown up on a sheep farm in Suffolk -divided into bite'' a free-sized pieces. So, although this book may look daunting to some at first glance, range child on the subject matter can be broken down very easily. Therefore, it starts with a section headed farm'The Greek World View' - and as many might expectlearned to spin, covers Socrates, Plato knit and weave from her mother and Homerher mother's friend. This was in her blood.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184595162X</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jonathan Phillips1789017977|title=Holy WarriorsRonnie and Hilda's Romance: A Modern History of the CrusadesTowards a New Life after World War II|author=Wendy Williams
|rating=4
|genre=History
|summary=In this book, drawing on a wealth Ronnie Williams was the son of contemporary sources including chronicles, songs, sermons, travel diaries Thomas Henry Williams (known as Harry) and peace treaties, Ethel Wall. There's some doubt as well as the existing literature from earlier generations, Phillips explores to whether or not they were ever married or even Harry's birthdate: he claimed to have been born in depth the contradictions and the diversity of holy war1863, of friendships but he was already many years older than Ethel and alliances between Christians and Muslims, the launches of crusades against Christians, and calls for jihads against Muslimshe might well have shaved a few years off his age. In doing so he has written what is not so much For a general history, while the family was quite well-to-do but disaster struck in the 1929 Depression and five-year-old Ronnie had vividly brought to life adjust to a rich tapestry of figures and events, while devoting equal attention in very different lifestyle. One thing he did inherit from his father was his narrative need to the Christian be well-turned-out and Islamic point of viewthis would stay with him throughout his life. This traces the crusading impulse from He joined the conquest of Jerusalem army at eighteen in the First Crusade, launched by Pope Urban II in France in 1095, to today, and in the process helps us to understand the origins of some of the sensitivities which have led to many of the conflicts still raging in the world today1942.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184595078X</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Martin Davidson1980891117|title=The Perfect NaziG Engleheart Pinxit 1805: Uncovering My SS Grandfather's Secret Past and How Hitler Seduced a GenerationA year in the life of George Engleheart|author=John Webley
|rating=4.5
|genre=HistoryArt|summary=Meet Martin Davidson. NowGeorge Engleheart was one of the leading portrait miniaturists of Georgian London, when I start my reviews like that, normally it means he's with a career lasting from the 1770s to the main character, but he's not hereRegency era. He's big in the world was also one of BBC History documentaries, and grew up in the UKmost prolific, half Scottish and half Germanpainting nearly 5, knowing that many 000 miniatures altogether (over twenty of his older relatives lived through the Second World War. Foremost among them was his German grandfather, Bruno Langbehn, who would have been being of fighting age - in his 30s - during the Third ReichKing George III). Nothing much was ever said about Bruno's own history during Throughout most of that time he carefully recorded the warnames of each of his clients, except for many inflammatory, rising comments by Bruno himself. It took the old man and subsequently transcribed them into what is referred to die for the truth to be admitted by Martin's mother - their forefather was in the SSas his fee book.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0670916161</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Robert Darnton1789016304|title=The Case for BooksWar and Love: Past, PresentA family's testament of anguish, endurance and Futuredevotion in occupied Amsterdam|author=Melanie Martin|rating=45
|genre=History
|summary=Reading a book, whether for study or relaxation, Melanie Martin read about what happened to Dutch Jews in the sitting roomoccupied Amsterdam during World War II and was entranced by what she discovered, particularly in bed, on public transport, or almost anywhere else, has been one ''The Diary of everybodyAnn Frank'' but then realised that her own family's favourite activities for many a long yearstories were equally fascinating. A hundred and seven thousand Jews were deported from the city during the war years, but only five thousand survived and Martin could not just by visitors and contributors understand how this could be allowed to happen in a country with liberal values who were resistant to this siteGerman occupation. (Therein lies a paradoxMost people believed that the occupation could never happen: even those who thought that the Germans might reach the city were convinced that they would soon be pushed back, I hear you say). As Darnton points out that the Amsterdammers would never allow what happened to escalate in his introduction, the good old-fashioned book was not destroyed by newspapers (or magazines, for way that matter)it did, any but initial protests melted away as the organisers became more than television destroyed radio, or the internet circumspect. It's an atrocity on a vast scale but made people abandon TVup of tens of thousands of individual tragedies.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>158648902X</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=John Keegan1908745819|title=The American Civil War|rating=4|genre=History|summary=While before reading this book I considered myself to be vaguely familiar with the major facts about the American Civil War – the fight to liberate the slaves, the well-known battles, and the towering figures such as Abraham Lincoln, Ulysses S Grant, and Robert E Lee – I was keen to learn more about the war and get an in-depth view of it from a renowned historian. After finishing the book, I certainly consider myself to be far better informed on the military, and tactical, side of things, but found it a little lacking in certain other areas such as the causes and effects.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0712616101</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewSurfacing|author=David Howarth|title=We Die AloneKathleen Jamie
|rating=5
|genre=Biography
|summary=Consider taking a five day sail in a small fishing boat the height of the North Sea from Shetland, to try and establish, train and supply some potentially vital anti-German resistance in the far, far north of occupied Norway, your homeland. Imagine the sight of heavy naval parades where you intended to land, as galling proof that your intel is ages out of date. Ponder too the fact that you get reported to the Nazis due to the most ridiculous slight of fortune. All your colleagues are dead or captured, your equipment blown up with your trawler to keep it safe from Jerry hands, half your big toe has been shot off, and you're forced to go on the run in one of Europe's last, and coldest, wildernesses. And you have no idea whatsoever quite how bad this scenario is going to get.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847678459</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Norman Rose
|title=A Senseless Squalid War: Voices From Palestine 1890s - 1948
|rating=5
|genre=History
|summary=The reappearance of ''A Senseless, Squalid War'' in paperback will afford wider access to the balanced and detailed scholarship of Prof Norman Stone. This is a sad story of the Palestinian Mandate retold through the viewpoints of politicians and proponents; Arab, Jewish, British, French, German and American. It energetically conveys an understanding of the character of figures as disparate as David Ben Gurion, Richard Crossman, Haj Amin and David Lloyd George. Organisations, conferences and sticking points are deftly expounded. It does not lose sight the overarching motives and machinations of International Politics.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1845950798</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Paul Addison
|title=No Turning Back: The Peacetime Revolutions of Post-War Britain
|rating=4.5
|genre=History
|summary=In the opening chapter Addison, a child of the 1940s, starts by comparing the leaders of the peacetime administrations that did most to change the face of Britain after 1945. The first, Clement Attlee, was a modest, unassuming, even uncharismatic personality, yet he still led a genuinely radical and reforming government. As the second, his admirer Margaret Thatcher, would point out in her memoirs, not only did he achieve a great deal, but he did so because of, or perhaps despite, being all substance and no show.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0192192671</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Jonathan Green
|title=Murder in the High Himalaya
|rating=4.5
|genre=Politics and Society
|summary=The Himalayan mountains mean many things to different people. To the people of Tibet, trapped under the atheist occupiers from China, who ran the Dalai Lama out in the 1950s in their consuming urge for lebensraum and mineral mining, they are a near-impenetrable barrier, protecting their country from history's prior ravages, but keeping people who want out, very much in. To rich Westerners, they are a sparkling challenge - a task of the highest order, a box to tick on the way to self-fulfilment - something to be climbed, because they're there.
|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1586487140</amazonuk>
}}
 
{{newreview
|author=Brian W Pugh, Paul R Spiring and Sadru Bhanji
|title=Arthur Conan Doyle, Sherlock Holmes and Devon: A Complete Tour Guide and Companion
|rating=4
|genre=History
|summary=Sometimes when people suggest that you read a certain book, they tell you ''this one has your name on it''. Mostly we take them at their word, or not, but rarely do we ask them why they thought so unless it turns out that we didn't like the book. That's a rare experience. People who are sensitive to hearing a book calling your name, rarely get it wrong. In this case, I was told why. The Hound blurb speaks of the Baskervillesauthor considering ''an older, less tethered sense of herself.'' Older. Less tethered. That' is one s not a bad description of where I am. Add to that my love of the natural world, of those aspects of the poetic and lyrical that are about style not form, and substance most famous mystery novels of all, and also one of the most famous English novels set in Devonabout connection. This alone would probably give more or less enough material for an entire Of course, this book had my name on connections between the story and the location which inspired it. Yet the authors It was written for me. It would have found several more links between the county, and Conan Doyle alongside those associated with himits way to me eventually. The result has revealed much information of which even I, who am pleased to have lived in the county nearly all it fall onto my life, was previously unawarepath so quickly.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1904312861</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jenny Diski0857058320|title=The SixtiesLord Of All the Dead|author=Javier Cercas and Anne McLean (translator)
|rating=4
|genre=History
|summary=In ''Lord Of All the last few years, there have been many books of varying length about Dead'' is a journey to uncover the 60sauthor's lost ancestor's life and death. Most of them are relatively self-contained histories of Cercas is searching for the meaning behind his great uncle's death in the decadeSpanish Civil War. Manuel Mena, often fairly liberal in adopting their signposts as to when Cercas' great uncle, is the figure who looms large over the era began and endedbook. (Blame Philip LarkinHe died relatively young whilst fighting for Francisco Franco's famous poem forces. Cercas ruminates on why his uncle fought for this dictator. The question at the confusion, I hear you say)centre of this book is whether it is possible for his great uncle to be a hero whilst having fought for the wrong side.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846680042</amazonuk>
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 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Charlotte Moore0008294011|title=HancoxHow to Lose a Country: The 7 Steps from Democracy to Dictatorship|author=Ece Temelkuran
|rating=4.5
|genre=History
|summary=Hancox is the large imposing house A little while ago a friend asked me if I thought that we were living through what in rural Sussex where Charlotte Moore was brought up, and where she still lives. Although its origins are not fully documented, according years to local records it certainly existed come would be discussed by A level history students when faced with the mid-15th century, its name probably derived from that of John Handcocks, one of question ''Discuss the early ownersfactors which led to.. .'' In I agreed that she was right and wasn't certain whether it was a good or bad thing that we didn't know what is basically part family history and part biography of the house itself, the author traces its story back all 'this' was leading to lawyer John Dounton, the first owner about whom nothing substantial is known, who made extensive alterations to it in 1569. It then passed through the hands of several families until her ancestors acquired it in 1888I think now that I do know. In 1900 one We are in danger of them let losing democracy and whilst it to the Church 's a flawed system I can't think of England Temperance Society a better one, particularly as a drying-out house for the 'inebriatesbenevolent dictator', but the arrangement was terminated in 1907 and the family moved back inis as rare as hen's teeth.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0670915866</amazonuk>
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 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Frances Woodsford1788037812|title=Dear Mr BigelowThe Fraternity of the Estranged: A Transatlantic Friendship|rating=4|genre=Autobiography|summary=Meet Mister Bigelow. He's elderly, living alone on Long Island, New York, with some health problems but more than enough family and friends to get him by, and still a very active interest The Fight for Homosexual Rights in yachting, regattas and more. Meet, too, Frances Woodsford. She's reaching middle-age, living with her brother and mum in Bournemouth, and working for the local baths as organiser of events, office lackey and more. I suggest you do meet them, although neither ever met the other. Despite this they kept up a brisk and lively conversation about all aspects of life, from the late 1940s until his death at the beginning of the 60s. And as a result comes this bookEngland, of heavily edited highlights, which opens up a world of social history and entertaining diary1891-style comment.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099542293</amazonuk>}} {{newreview1908|author=Peter Ackroyd|title=Venice: Pure CityBrian Anderson|rating=45
|genre=History
|summary=Among Peter Ackroyd's recent works are 'biographies' Originally passed in 1885, the law that had made homosexual relations a crime remained in place for 82 years. But during this time, restrictions on same-sex relationships did not go unchallenged. Between 1891 and 1908, three books on the nature of London homosexuality appeared. They were written by two homosexual men: Edward Carpenter and John Addington Symonds, as well as the heterosexual Havelock Ellis. Exploring the margins of society and studying homosexuality was common on the river Thames. Now he gives similar treatment to VeniceEuropean Continent, basically a history but enlivened with his elegantbarely talked about in the UK, literary styleso the publications of these men were hugely significant – contributing to the scientific understanding of homosexuality, and what a previous reviewer has called his love beginning the struggle for recognition and equality, leading to the milestone legalisation of 'psychogeographical investigation'same-sex relationships in 1967.x|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099422565</amazonuk>
}}
 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Benedict Gummer1910593508|title=The Scourging Angel: The Black Death in the British IslesApollo|author=Matt Fitch, Chris Baker and Mike Collins|rating=4.5
|genre=History
|summary=The mid-fourteenth century was an unsettled time This incredible graphic novel is a love letter to the Moon landings and the passion for England. It was an age which saw the first phases of the protracted Hundred Years’ War with Francesubject drips off every Apollo by Matt Fitch, Chris Baker and Mike Collins. This is a story we know well and the Scottish war because of independencethis, which came the authors take a few narrative shortcuts knowing that we can fill in the blanks. These shortcuts are the only downside to an end with the capture of King David IIbook. As if these events were not enough, in 1346 there was the first case If you've ever read a comic book adaptation of a man in Europe contracting an unknown disease film you will be familiar with the slight feeling that rapidly swept across the continent, claiming the lives of millions, there are scenes missing and one medieval chronicler noted that 'the bodies looked like dialogue has been trimmed. This is a macabre lasagne: corpses piled row upon row separated only by layers of dirt'graphic novel that could easily have been three times as long and still felt too short.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099548836</amazonuk>
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 {{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Mary Beard1786331047|title=The ParthenonRace to Save the Romanovs: The Truth Behind the Secret Plans to Rescue Russia's Imperial Family|author=Helen Rappaport|rating=4.5
|genre=History
|summary=Despite The basic facts about the proliferation deaths of populist historians in print Nicholas and on televisionAlexandra, some of which were deliberately obscured at the time for various reasons, Professor Mary Beard continues to be a voice aparthave long since been established. Her conversational style For the last few months of writing belies their lives in Russia the academic research at its heartformer Tsar and Tsarina, their children and few remaining servants were held in increasingly squalid, humiliating captivity. This is serious history written as engagingly as a detective storyTo prevent them from being rescued, in July 1918 the revolutionary regime had them all shot and bayoneted to death in circumstances which, once the news was confirmed beyond all doubt, horrified their relatives in Europe.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846683491</amazonuk>
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{{newreview|author=Peter Beaumont|title=The Secret Life of War: Journeys Through Modern Conflict |rating=5|genre=Politics and Society|summary=Peter Beaumont is the Foreign Affairs editor at The Observer. He joined the paper in 1989 and has spent much of the intervening time dealing with the kind of 'foreign affairs' that is better described as 'war reporting'. 'The Secret Life of War' is a distillation of his years in the field. It is a book ill-served by both its title and its cover, except maybe insofar as both might serve Move on to sneak it onto the bookshelves of those who really need to read it, but probably wouldn't choose to do so were it more accurately wrapped.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099520982</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Nick Barratt|title=Lost Voices from the Titanic: The Definitive Oral History|rating=4.5|genre=History|summary=As Barratt points out in the opening pages, there are literally thousands of titles available about the sinking of the Titanic, at the time the largest, most expensive [[Newest Home and most luxurious ship ever built. His aim in this volume is to bridge the gap between another forensic examination of how it sank, and yet another re-run of what he calls the familiar stories of heroism and tragedy from literature in the public domain to provide the human story behind the disaster.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1848091516</amazonuk>}}Family Reviews]]