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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Ian MortimerEdward W Said|title=1415: Henry V's Year of Glory|rating=5|genre=History|summary=The medieval, in fact time-honoured, view of King Henry V as one Representations of England's greatest heroes was propagated though not originated by Shakespeare, and again more recently to some extent by Olivier's portrayal in film. At least one historian has called him ''the greatest man that ever ruled England''.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224079921</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Toby Lester|title=The Fourth Part of the World: The Epic Story of History's Greatest MapIntellectual
|rating=4.5
|genre=HistoryPolitics and Society|summary=In 2003 a map was bought for $10 million, Edward Said's ''Representations of the highest price ever paid publicly for Intellectual'' is less a historical document, by the Library strict theory of Congress, where it is now on permanent public display. No ordinary map, this is sometimes described as America's birth certificatewhat intellectuals are and more a passionate argument for what they should be. It is Said clearly rejects the sole survivor comfortable image of a thousand copies printed early in the 16th century, and was discovered by accident in some archives in intellectual as a German castle in 1901detached expert speaking only to other specialists. The sale and story behind it intrigued Toby Lester so much that Instead, he was inspired to discover moreinsists on the intellectual as a public figure, often awkward, abrasive, and this book unpopular, who speaks truth to power even when it is the resultinconvenient or risky.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1861978030</amazonuk>1804272248
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Jenifer RobertsJacqueline Rose|title=The Madness of Queen Maria: The Remarkable Life of Maria I of PortugalWomen in Dark Times|rating=4.5
|genre=Biography
|summary=Born in 1734 in Lisbon, at that time ''The world of the richest and most opulent city in Europe, Maria was destined to become unconscious is not the first female monarch in Portuguese history. Married to her uncle Infante Pedroantagonist of political life, seventeen years her senior, she had six children (outliving all but one of them)its steadfast companion, and became Queen in 1777. A conscientious woman, she had the misfortune to be born in during the hidden place or backdrop where any true revolution must begin…'age of reason', when church and state were vying for supremacy. Instinctively a supporter of the old religion, with a humanitarian approach to state affairs, she was no Queen Elizabeth, no Catherine the Great, and wore her crown rather reluctantly.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>095455891X</amazonuk>}}
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Stella Tillyard Mary McCarthy|title=A Royal Affair: George III and His Troublesome SiblingsMemories of a Catholic Girlhood
|rating=4
|genre=BiographyAutobiography|summary=King George III was not Mary McCarthy describes herself as an ''amateur architect'', obsessively digging into the luckiest of English sovereigns. America, and then his sons, in that order, gave him no end of grief, and past to piece together the last few years broken mosaic of his her life were clouded by madness. It is thus often overlooked that, before these troubles arose to haunt this most conscientious monarch, he also had a thankless task in trying to control his siblings.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099428563</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Andy Beckett |title=When the Lights Went Out: Britain She attributes her ''burning interest in the Seventies|rating=5|genre=History|summary=Having grown up during the era and followed the major news stories in the papers as they happened, I was fascinated past'' to find everything (wellher orphanhood, nearly everything) in the 500as she lacked any second-page narrative that comprises this book. It was quite a rocky ride hand memories from the election of Edward Heath her parents, who died in June 1970 through the three-day week1918 flu epidemic. This memoir chronicles her early years, record British inflation and the IMF rescuebeginning with her orphanhood in Minneapolis, industrial disputes and picket battles at Saltley and GrunwickMinnesota, where she lived under the Gay Liberation Front harsh guardianship of her late father's Irish Catholic parents and the stirrings of the green movement, the rise of Arthur Scargill, her abusive Uncle Myers and the discovery of North Sea oilAunt Margaret. Then there was the survival of James Callaghan's minority administration despite the oddsLater, and thanks largely she moved to Seattle to his adroit handling of the situation in keeping both Tony Benn live with her maternal grandparents—her grandmother being Jewish and the Lib-Lab pact on board, followed by the winter her grandfather Presbyterian—who provided her with a different kind of discontent, culminating in Thatcher at No 10upbringing.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>057122136X</amazonuk>1804271659
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Ian Mortimer 1785633457|title=The Time Traveller's Guide to Medieval EnglandCharging Around: A Handbook for Visitors to Exploring the Fourteenth CenturyEdges of England by Electric Car|author=Clive Wilkinson
|rating=5
|genre=HistoryTravel|summary=What would happen if we twenty-first century people took Clive Wilkinson has a history of travelling by unconventional means with a trip back in time to the fourteenth century? It would be very like visiting another country. Even our landscape would be greatly changedpreference for slow travel. Ian Mortimer takes this approach and, applying As he neared his theory eightieth birthday the idea of living history, treats his readers to an objective and entertaining view exploring the edges of one of the most stereotypical centuries England in medieval historyan electric car was not totally outrageous. The fourteenth century has not only castlesIn fact, knightsit should be a pleasant holiday for Clive and his wife, tournamentsJoan, and wars, but also gave birth to many of the creative minds associated with medieval England like Chaucer and the Gawain-poet.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1845950992</amazonuk>shouldn't it?
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Alison WeirB09BLBP3P8|title=The Lady in the TowerNeville Chamberlain's War: The Fall of Anne Boleyn|rating=5|genre=History|summary=Wot? More Tudors? SorryHow Great Britain Opposed Hitler, yes. Come on, be honest: you love 'em, I love 'em, we all love 'em. My favourite writer of popular history is adding to the market writing for a third time about possibly history's most dramatic rise and fall 1939- that of Anne Boleyn, second of Henry VIII's six wives. The book covers only a very short period, covering her arrest, trial and execution. She had been the scandal of Europe, this woman; had captured a king, unseated a queen, and promoted a new religion. Her fall couldn't have been swifter, harder or more ruthless and her little neck was severed on a scaffold at the Tower of London. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>0224063197</amazonuk>}} {{newreview1940|author=Tracy Borman |title=Elizabeth's Women: The Hidden Story of the Virgin QueenFrederic Seager
|rating=4.5
|genre=History
|summary=I enjoyed history at school Received wisdom and whilst we didn't always work our way through it chronologically I came, over time, simplified narrative often lead to have a working knowledge of the ancient Egyptians, Greeks and Romans. I knew misconceptions about the rise of Christianity and spoke knowledgeably about medieval England, the Renaissance and the Reformation but was perhaps less taken by the Industrial Revolution and all that followedhistory. I was au fait with One such is the east but it was mainly scrubbing from the perspective popular imagination of exploration – or even exploitation. It was an education based on the virtues early days of World War II from 1939-40, known as the solid''Phoney War''. We remember Neville Chamberlain appeasing Hitler, war breaking out, whiteand Churchill coming in to save the day. Very little time is spent on this period in cultural reflections and yet, Englishas Frederic Seager argues in this book, Christian middle classes and it completely ignored histories from was of vital significance in how the perspective of other religionswar played out.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1586486063</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Elliott J Gorn 3756228711|title=Dillinger's Wild RideCDC: The Year That Made Americahappy years with a spectacular IT 'Phenomena's Public Enemy Number One|author=Hans Bodmer
|rating=4
|genre=History
|summary=John Dillinger was born and brought up in Indiana. His childhood was no better and no worse than most but ''The history of the early part development of his adult life was to be blighted by a spell in prison when he was convicted IT could fill books of an attack on a man in a botched hold-upseveral hundred pages. Hoping for leniency he pleaded guilty but was sentenced to a lengthy term of imprisonment, whilst the man with him pleaded not guilty and when convicted received a shorter sentence. It's easy to see where Dillinger's contempt for the law was spawned.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0195304837</amazonuk>}}
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Conn Iggulden and David Iggulden|title=The Dangerous Book of Heroes|rating=3|genre=History|summary=For most of us (well, for me certainly) the word 'hero' summons an image of capes, spandex and garish primary colours. Conn Jeremy Dronfield and David Iggulden have written a book about the other kind – the every day heroes from history, who achieve incredible things without the aid of superpowers. From household names like Horatio Nelson and Winston Churchill, to lesser known people, like Aphra Behn and Hereward the Wake, ''The Dangerous Book of Heroes'' covers a comprehensive range of characters from the history of the British Empire. From campaigners for political change, brilliant battle strategists to daring explorers, each and every one of the people in this book lived brilliant lives and changed the world forever.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>000726092X</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Timothy Brook Ziggy Greene|title=Vermeer's Hat: The seventeenth century Fritz and the dawn of the global worldKurt
|rating=4
|genre=HistoryConfident Readers|summary=If a picture paints a thousand wordsWe start with the pair of brothers Fritz and Kurt, and their muckers, doing things any Jewish lad in 1930s Vienna would want to do – kicking things around the empty market place, then Timothy Brook provides helping the dictionary we can use neighbours, being dutiful when it comes to the synagogue choir and at a vocational school. Kurt has to make sense of sure the lamps are turned on at their very Orthodox neighbours' each Friday night – the vocabularySabbath preventing them for using anything nearly as mechanical and workmanlike as a light switch. Using five paintings by But this is the seventeenth century Delft artist Johannes Vermeer along with a blue and white porcelain plate and time just before the works of two of VermeerAustrian leader is going to cave to Hitler's contemporarieswill, Brook demonstrates how the far flung corners and instead of having a national vote to keep the seventeenth century world were drawn together by Nazis out, invite them in with open arms. ''Kristallnacht'' happened in Vienna just as much as in Germany, as did all the ambitions round-ups of European merchants Jews. These in their turn leave the younger Kurt at home with his mother and sisters anxious to hear word of an evacuation to Britain or the ability of AsiaUS, Africa while Fritz and his father are, unknown initially to each other, packed off on the Americas same train to provided Buchenwald and the materials to fulfil themstone quarry there. And us wondering how the titular event for the adult variant of all this could come about…|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1846681200</amazonuk>024156574X
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Pete Brown John Henry Phillips|title=Hops and Glory: One Man's The Search for the Beer That Built the British Empire|rating=4|genre=Travel|summary=Being a beer writer can't be the easiest route to respect in journalism. But with this book Pete Brown has done much to counter the sceptical, even dismissive, attitudes which must surround his trade and its subject matter. He has attempted to combine a history of British imperialism and the brewing industry with the comic 'quest' genre of travel writing. Against all the odds, he has largely succeeded.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0230706355</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Michael Haag |title=The Templars: History and Myth: From Solomon's Temple to the Freemasons|rating=4.5
|genre=History
|summary=Despite being very descriptive, the title of 'The Templars: History and Myth: From SolomonArchaeology cannot be child's Temple to the Freemasonsplay, when you' still doesn't cover re scraping in the full scope dirt looking to find what you can find, 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 Michael Haag's book. Notwithstanding its relatively modest page countthe latter, ''Templars'' not only manages as our author promises to place locate the fascinating tale topic of the Knightstitular search. And he really hasn' astonishing rise and spectacular fall in t made it easy for himself – the search area is a rich historical contextwide one, but also provides an entertaining account of the Templarstarget might not exist any more – oh, and it' s underwater, when he cannot dive. Latching on to a particular D-Day veteran through helping the heroic old man'afterlife': from s visit back to France, our author has promised to find the Masonic lore of the title landing craft that delivered him to novelsNormandy, films and games that he was lucky to conspiracy theoriessurvive when it sank from beneath him. There The secondary aim is also to erect a travel guide and good list memorial to everyone else aboard, the vast majority of source materials for further readingwhom perished.Who else would make such promises to someone in their nineties?|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1846681537</amazonuk>1472146182
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Andrew Wheatcroft B09F4CTKJR|title=The Enemy at the Gate: Habsburgs, Ottomans and the Battle Flights for EuropeFreedom|author= Steven Burgauer
|rating=4.5
|genre=HistoryHistorical Fiction|summary=The battle for Europe which Andrew Wheatcroft describes in such vivid detail is the culmination of a power struggle between the Ottoman empire, based in Constantinople, and the Habsburg domain in Vienna, which had lasted for around 250 years prior to the final solution. These two centuries and more of struggle between them led to the decision by the sultan of Turkey, hungry for more territory, and his ministers in 1682 to lead their army against the Habsburgs at Vienna with the ultimate objective of capturing the city, and It's the ensuing siege a year later. Some historians have seen this as a crucial moment in the history stages of conflicts between the east World War I and the west, although others consider its status as one of United States has just entered the defining events somewhat over-estimatedconflict. Whatever the truth of the matter, the book that tells the story Petrol Petronus is a vivid chronicle of war in the 17th century.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1844137414</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Matthew Cobb |title=The Resistance: The French Fight Against the Nazis |rating=3.5|genre=History|summary=''Allo, Allo'', ''The Secret Army'' and numerous films have painted a fairly romantic picture of the resistance — beret-wearing men and women young American who dart about blowing has signed up trains and shooting Nazisjoined the 17 Aero Squadron. The reality, according to Matthew Cobb's ''The Resistance'', This company was somewhat different. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>184737123X</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=David Downing |title=Sealing Their Fate: 22 Days That Decided the Second World War|rating=4|genre=History|summary=In this detailed volume, David Downing makes a convincing argument that first US Aero Squadron to be trained in the brief 22-day period between 17 November and 8 December 1941Canada, the actions of first to be attached to the various Axis powers RAF and their Allied opponents marked the beginning of first to be sent into the end of a war that still had several years left skies to run – fight the turning point famously described by Churchill as ''the end of the beginning''Germans in active combat. After Pearl Harbor, America entered the war, making it a true world war - though it was actually Hitler But before that declared war on Americacan happen, ironically – on 11 December, just after these events take place. ''Sealing Their Fate'' opens with Petrol has to master flying the launch of the Japanese fleet and ends with that same fleet's attack on Pearl Harbor, notoriously difficult but it's not specifically about Japan and Americamajestic Sopwith Camel.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847371310</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Richard D Ryder|title=Nelson, Hitler and Diana|rating=4|genre=Popular Science|summary=Was Horatio Nelson, a navy officer of great renown, forever thrusting himself into the limelight, doing it because his mother passed away when he was nine? Was Hitler overly affected by his father dying in a time of paternal disapproval, and a kind of Oedipal reaction to being the man in the house making him suffer when she herself died? And can Diana, Princess of Wales' parents' divorce lead to a claim she was a sufferer of borderline personality disorder?|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1845401662</amazonuk>
}}
{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=William Blades, Randolph G. Adams, Bagher Bachchha (Editor) 0578761718|title=Enemies The Inspiring History of Booksa Special Relationship|author=Nancy Carver
|rating=4.5
|genre=History
|summary=William Blades, a Victorian printer and bibliographer, is best remembered as The church of St Mary Aldermanbuy had existed in the biographer City of William Caxton. He also wrote this very concise work on the threats to books London from such enemies as fireat least 1181, water, gas and heat, dust and neglect, and ignorance and bigotry. In the process he slips when it was first mentioned in several interesting historical factsrecords. Sadly, The chapter on fire notes the vast destruction of books original church was destroyed in the Great Fire of London in 1666, as well as . It was rebuilt in Portland stone from a design by Sir Christopher Wren soon after the Gordon Riots just over a century later, fire and closer to his own timethen survived for centuries until World War II, when it was again ruined by bombs during the destruction Blitz. But that wasn't the end of its story: after a priceless law library at Strasbourgphenomenal fundraising effort, ravaged by the shells of stones from the German army during church's walls were transported to Fulton, Missouri. There, in the Franco-Prussian war grounds of 1870Westminster College, the church was rebuilt and today serves as a memorial to Winston Churchill.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1904799361</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Paul R Spiring (Editor) 1784385166|title=The World Third Reich in 100 Objects: A Material History of Vanity Fair - Bertram Fletcher RobinsonNazi Germany|author=Roger Moorhouse
|rating=5
|genre=Biography History|summary=Every now and then, you What is the first image that comes across a really sumptuous book, where just turning and looking at the pages takes to mind when you into another world. Such is think of the case with this one. ''Vanity Fair'' was Third Reich? Hitler? A swastika? The Nazi salute? The gate to a gentler Victorian forerunner concentration camp? None of these are comfortable images but they are emblematic of the Third Reich''Private Eye''s fascist regime in all its iniquity. Subtitled, ''A Weekly'' ''Show of Political, Social, But some objects and Literary Wares'', it appeared between 1868 and 1914images from that time may be less familiar to you. Like the more successfulIn this short volume, longer-lasting ''Punch'', it began with radical aspirations, intending ''Roger Moorhouse has attempted to expose what'' [illustrate the editor] ''perceived to be period of the'' ''vanities Third Reich through one hundred of the elite social classes''. However its satire was gently humorous rather than malicious, and almost everybody who was portrayed in its pages was flatteredmaterial artefacts.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1904312535</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|author=Phil Robins Lun Zhang, Adrien Gombeaud, Ameziane and Edward Gauvin (translator)|title=Can I Come Home, Please?Tiananmen 1989: Our Shattered Hopes
|rating=4.5
|genre=Children's Non-Fiction Graphic Novels|summary=Using I never really followed the sound archives events of Tiananmen Square with much attention when it was playing out – someone in the Imperial War Museum and second half of their teens has other primary sourcespriorities, this affecting volume gives an overview you know. I certainly didn't know of the progress weeks of Nazism as seen through protests and hunger strikes from the eyes of children in different parts of Europe. The simplicity students before the massacre and the birth of the language used in Tank Man image, I didn't know how the area had long been a venue for political protest, and I didn't know more than a spit about the transcribed interviews means it people involved on either side. This book is accessible to children from Y6, yet remains useful to GCSE students as practically flawless in giving a succinct, linear timeline general browser's context for the whole season of WW2protests back in 1989.|amazonukisbn=<amazonuk>1407109030</amazonuk>1684056993
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Keith Miller0648684806|title=St Peter's (Wonders of the World)|rating=4.5|genre=History|summary=It is hugeClara Colby: not only in space but in time and structure; and in the non-material sphere of the complex interplay of meanings, symbols and significances. Miller's book, intentionally combining cultural and political history, art criticism and travel writing, manages to reflect that hugeness without weighting the reader down with too much austere detail.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1861979088</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Richard Mullen and James Munson|title=The Smell of the Continent|rating=5|genre=History|summary=When Frances Trollope landed at Calais in the 1830s, she overheard a conversation between two travellers, the younger commenting on the dreadful smell, the older and more experienced telling him it was ''the smell of'' ''the continent''.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0230741908</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Jennifer Worth|title=Farewell To The East End|rating=4|genre=Autobiography|summary=I am interested in social history and, as a mother, the job of midwives fascinates me. Combining these two subjects, ''Farewell to the East End'' is a riveting read. The author Jennifer Worth was a midwife and nurse, working with the nuns at Nonnatus House in the East End of London and this volume (her third book on this topic) covers the 1950s.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0297844652</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewInternational Suffragist|author=Kate Williams|title=Becoming QueenJohn Holliday
|rating=4
|genre=Biography
|summary=ItThe path of Clara Dorothy Bewick's a story which has been told by many authors during the last century. The Victorian age, or at any rate the woman who gave life was probably determined when her name family emigrated to the era, came about largely if not wholly because of a crisis of sorts among King George III's familyUSA. By At the time his seven surviving sons reached middle ageshe was just three-years-old but because of some childhood ailment, they had managed she wasn't allowed to produce one legitimate child between them, namely Princess Charlottesail with her parents and three brothers. Her unexpected deathInstead, she remained with her grandparents, who doted on her and the need for at least some if not all of the others to do their dynastic duty and produce an heir or twosaw that she received a good education, resulted both in an undignified mass scramble to the altarand out of school. Edward, Duke of Kent won She was the only child in the lotteryhousehold and her childhood was glorious. It was he and his wifeBy contrast, a widow with two small children by her first marriage, whose daughter Victoria became family had become pioneer farmers in the saviour mid-west of the royal succession.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0099451824</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Martyn Downer|title=The Queen's Knight|rating=4.5|genre=Biography|summary=The title sounds more indicative of a novel by [[:Category:Dorothy Dunnett|Dorothy Dunnett]] or Jean Plaidy than a biography. Then a brief prologue starts the story at the very endUnited States and life was hard, as Clara was to find out when Queen Victoria receives she and her grandparents eventually went to join the unexpected news of the death of Sir Howard Elphinstonefamily. An equally short first chapter gives us Clara would only know her mother for a glimpse of the man some thirty few months: she was married for fifteen years earlier , had ten pregnancies, seven surviving children and died in the thick of battle at the Crimea. Only childbirth not long after that do we 'reach' his birth in 1829Clara arrived. Sometimes rules are meant to be brokenAs the eldest girl, a heavy burden would fall on Clara and it's Wisconsin was a good way of introducing this very interesting life. As the husband of his subject's great-great-granddaughter, the author is well qualified to write itrude awakening.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>055215508X</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Ruth Maier, Jamie Bulloch (Translator) and Jan Erik Vold (Editor)1783784350|title=Ruth Maier's DiaryThis Golden Fleece: A Young GirlJourney Through Britain's Life Under Nazism|rating=3.5|genre=Autobiography|summary=I was looking forward to reading Ruth Maier's Diary as I am interested in the history surrounding World War Two and its victims and survivors. I am especially fascinated by social history and how the lives of ordinary people were affected by events beyond therir control. Ruth was born in 1920 and died on arrival in Auschwitz in 1942, aged only twenty-two. She was born in Austria and lived there with her parents and sister, Judith. But in 1939, life there was becoming much harder for Jews, so Judith was sent to England and Ruth to Norway, where she lived with the Strom family in Lillestrom.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846552141</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewKnitted History|author=Katherine Ashenburg|title=Clean: An Unsanitised History of WashingEsther Rutter
|rating=5
|genre=History
|summary=Although maybe not the first book youIt was December and Esther Rutter was stuck in her office job, writing to people she'd never met and preparing spreadsheets. The job frustrated her and even her knitting did not soothe her mind. January was going to be drawn to – a history of personal hygiene perhaps doesn't seem time for making changes and she decided that appealing – but if you had overlooked this excellent book, you she would have missed out on an enjoyable travel the length and informative bookbreadth of the British Isles with occasional forays abroad, full discovering and telling the story of fascinating facts wool's history and a jolly good read. Attitudes towards how it had made and rituals of cleanliness have certainly changed over the last two thousand years and this book chronicles many of them, largely landscape. She'd grown up on a sheep farm in Europe Suffolk - '' a free-range child on the farm'' - and the US. Cultural differences with regard learned to cleanliness and body odour (and yesspin, Napoleon knit and Josephine do get a mention here, although it transpires that they both took daily baths) are discussed at length, weave from the Greeks her mother and Romans to the present dayher mother's friend. This was in her blood.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846681014</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Jean Hatzfeld1789017977|title=The Strategy Of Antelopes: Rwanda After the Genocide|rating=5|genre=Politics Ronnie and Society|summary=''Life offers me smiles, and I owe it my gratitude for not having abandoned me in the marshes.'' ''I've known the defilement of a bestial existence.'' ''Who's going to say that word, forgiveness? It's outside of human nature.'' So say some of the survivors of the Rwandan genocide of 1994, when 800,000 Tutsis were murdered by their fellow Hutu citizens. Jean Hatzfeld talked to both Tutsis and Hutus then, publishing two award-winning books. In The Strategy of Antelopes, he returns to Rwanda to talk to the same people and explore life after genocide. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846686865</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Iain McCalman|title=DarwinHilda's ArmadaRomance: Four Voyagers to the Southern Oceans and Their Battle for the Theory of Evolution|rating=3.5|genre=Biography|summary=A look at Darwin's journey on The Beagle, as well as journeys by Joseph Hooker, Thomas Huxley and Alfred Wallace. Darwin's Armada provides Towards a broad overview that strikes a different tone to other books in a crowded market. Casual readers who usually steer clear of non-fiction will enjoy it.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>184737266X</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewNew Life after World War II|author=Thomas Robisheaux|title=The Last Witch of Langenburg: Murder in a German VillageWendy Williams
|rating=4
|genre=History
|summary=In rural Germany, a long long time ago… A woman passes through Ronnie Williams was the village, handing out good cheer son of Thomas Henry Williams (known as Harry) and cakesEthel Wall. One family dismiss the foodThere's some doubt as to whether or not they were ever married or even Harry's birthdate: he claimed to have been born in 1863, but he was already many years older than Ethel and even their dog is seen to avoid ithe might well have shaved a few years off his age. She visits For a second while the family, was quite well-to-do but disaster struck in the 1929 Depression and urges Anna, five-year-old Ronnie had to adjust to a young new mother, still convalescing as is the norm, to try one of the cakesvery different lifestyle. Anna does. But the friends by her bedside seem One thing he did inherit from his father was his need to think be well-turned-out and this might not be a good ideawould stay with him throughout his life. They may be correct, as before He joined the night is out she is deadarmy at eighteen in 1942.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0393065510</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Doris Kearns Goodwin1980891117|title=Team G Engleheart Pinxit 1805: A year in the life of RivalsGeorge Engleheart|author=John Webley
|rating=4.5
|genre=BiographyArt|summary=This hefty tomeGeorge Engleheart was one of the leading portrait miniaturists of Georgian London, with a career lasting from the cover tells us, is '1770s to the book that inspired Barack Obama'Regency era. For what it's worth, Obama's name appears no less than nine times on He was also one of the cover and spinemost prolific, while Lincoln's appears only sixpainting nearly 5, and 000 miniatures altogether (over twenty of them being of King George III). Throughout most of that time he carefully recorded the names of the author a mere twoeach of his clients, and subsequently transcribed them into what is referred to as his fee book.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0141043725</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=James J O'Donnell1789016304|title=The Ruin War and Love: A family's testament of the Roman Empireanguish, endurance and devotion in occupied Amsterdam|author=Melanie Martin|rating=45
|genre=History
|summary=Melanie Martin read about what happened to Dutch Jews in occupied Amsterdam during World War II and was entranced by what she discovered, particularly in ''The Decline and Fall Diary of the Roman EmpireAnn Frank'' is the traditional starting point for those studying the demise of Rome. Gibbonbut then realised that her own family's masterwork suggests that stories were equally fascinating. A hundred and seven thousand Jews were deported from the great empire collapsed in large part due to violent invasions from barbarians such as city during the Visigothswar years, Vandals but only five thousand survived and other non-RomansMartin could not understand how this could be allowed to happen in a country with liberal values who were resistant to German occupation. In ''The Ruin of Most people believed that the occupation could never happen: even those who thought that the Germans might reach the Roman Empire'' classical scholar James J. O'Donnellcity were convinced that they would soon be pushed back, that the Amsterdammers would never allow what happened to escalate in line with much modern revisionist thinking, turns this argument on the way that it head. Rather than being a destructive influencedid, but initial protests melted away as the barbarian kings within the empire tried to retain the good things about Roman ruleorganisers became more circumspect. The real blame for the fall It's an atrocity on a vast scale but made up of tens of thousands of Rome can in fact be attributed to Emperor Justinianindividual tragedies.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1861979355</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Patrick Wright1908745819|title=A Journey Through Ruins: The Last Days of London |rating=4|genre=Politics and Society|summary=My good mood evaporated when Sue, my Bookbag partner, asked me if I'd read and review A Journey Through Ruins. She was right to ask because Thatcher's Britain is certainly an area of interest to me. The thing is, times are depressing enough. Margaret Hilda's neo-liberal legacy is crashing around us. Jobless queues are lengthening. Roofs are disappearing from over people's heads. The rampant cronyism and venal nature of our economic and political elites are slowly exposing themselves in ways likely to send my blood pressure soaring. |amazonuk=<amazonuk>0199541949</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewSurfacing|author=David Grann|title=The Lost City of Z: A Legendary British Explorer's Deadly Quest to Uncover the Secrets of the AmazonKathleen Jamie
|rating=5
|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'For King and Country – Voices from 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 blurb speaks of the First World Warauthor considering '' is an anthology older, less tethered sense of herself.'' Older. Less tethered. That's not a bad description of writings edited by Brian MacArthurwhere I am. It features around 450 pages Add to that my love of journalsthe natural world, poemsof those aspects of the poetic and lyrical that are about style not form, articles and memories substance most of those involved in WWI. These factual accounts cover all kinds of styles, lengths and subject matterabout connection. Of course, but each one is hopefully able this book had my name on it. It was written for me. It would have found its way to give the reader a real taste of a time most of us are too young me eventually. I am pleased to remember first-handhave it fall onto my path so quickly.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0349120293</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Nechama Tec0857058320|title=DefianceLord Of All the Dead|author=Javier Cercas and Anne McLean (translator)|rating=4.5
|genre=History
|summary=In this thoroughly researched history, Nechama Tec challenges ''Lord Of All the notion that European Jews went passively Dead'' is a journey to their deaths during WW2uncover the author's lost ancestor's life and death. Instead, she presents us with a history of Cercas is searching for the activities of meaning behind his great uncle's death in the Bielski brothersSpanish Civil War. Manuel Mena, headed by the charismatic Tuvia BielskiCercas' great uncle, which resulted in is the saving of around 1,200 Jews figure who spent looms large over the latter part of WW2 hidden in nomadic villages in book. He died relatively young whilst fighting for Francisco Franco's forces. Cercas ruminates on why his uncle fought for this dictator. The question at the forests centre of western Belorussia. No Jew was turned away by the Bielskis – the camp worked together this book is whether it is possible for his great uncle to provide be a hero whilst having fought for the sick, elderly and children. Through mutual cooperation, great bravery and huge physical effort, these Polish Jews survived, turning notions of Jewish passivity on their headwrong side.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0195385233</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Thomas Buergenthal 0008294011|title=A Lucky Child|rating=3.5|genre=History|summary=I have read How to Lose a lot of books on the Holocaust and many survivors' tales, as well as biographies and memoirs of those who didn't survive – most famously, ''Country: The Diary of Anne Frank''. So I was very interested 7 Steps from Democracy to read A Lucky Child by Thomas Buergenthal, who was only ten years old when he was incarcerated in Auschwitz in August 1944.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846681782</amazonuk>}} {{newreviewDictatorship|author=Quentin Letts |title=50 People Who Buggered Up Britain|rating=3.5|genre=History|summary=In a rather less permissive age, 20 or 30 years ago, I suspect that the author might have been at the top of some people's list of culprits for using that naughty b-word. Good grief, man, you can't possibly have that in a book title, what!|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1845298551</amazonuk>}} {{newreview|author=Nicola Sly |title=Dorset Murders (True Crime History)Ece Temelkuran
|rating=4.5
|genre=History
|summary=Having examined A little while ago a number of true crime cases from Bristol friend asked me if I thought that we were living through what in her [[Bristol Murders years to come would be discussed by Nicola Sly|last book]], A level history students when faced with the question ''Discuss the author factors which led to...'' I agreed that she was right and wasn't certain whether it was a good or bad thing that we didn't know what all 'this' was leading to. I think now does the same for largely rural yet not always idyllic Dorsetthat I do know. Twenty two murders, committed between 1818 We are in danger of losing democracy and 1946whilst it's a flawed system I can't think of a better one, come under particularly as the microscope in these pages'benevolent dictator' is as rare as hen's teeth.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>0750951079</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Adrian Desmond and James Moore 1788037812|title=Darwin's Sacred CauseThe Fraternity of the Estranged: RaceThe Fight for Homosexual Rights in England, Slavery and the Quest for Human Origins1891-1908|author=Brian Anderson
|rating=5
|genre=Popular ScienceHistory|summary=This probably won't be Originally passed in 1885, the only time you are told through 2009 law that it would have been Charles Darwin's 200th birthday had made homosexual relations a crime remained in place for 82 years. But during this yeartime, restrictions on same-sex relationships did not go unchallenged. Between 1891 and that it is 150 years since ''On The Origin 1908, three books on the nature of Species'' first homosexuality appeared. This book however declares that second anniversary to be slightly They were written by two homosexual men: Edward Carpenter and John Addington Symonds, as well as the heterosexual Havelock Ellis. Exploring the margins of less importancesociety and studying homosexuality was common on the European Continent, when you factor but barely talked about in the biggest section UK, so the publications of his evolutionary thinking Darwin left out these men were hugely significant – contributing to the scientific understanding of that book – that homosexuality, and beginning the struggle for recognition and equality, leading to the milestone legalisation of human evolutionsame-sex relationships in 1967.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846140358</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Stefan Aust1910593508|title=The Baader-Meinhof ComplexApollo|author=Matt Fitch, Chris Baker and Mike Collins
|rating=5
|genre=History
|summary=There are not that many non-fiction books in translation concerning vaguely-remembered foreign terrorist gangs that become eminently faithfulThis incredible graphic novel is a love letter to the Moon landings and the passion for the subject drips off every Apollo by Matt Fitch, successful Chris Baker and Mike Collins. This is a story we know well and dramatic cinema filmsbecause of this, for the simple reason authors take a few narrative shortcuts knowing that it would be impossible we can fill in the blanks. These shortcuts are the only downside to make such movies from the great majority book. If you've ever read a comic book adaptation of such booksa film you will be familiar with the slight feeling that there are scenes missing and that dialogue has been trimmed. Here, though, it comes across This is a graphic novel that could easily have been three times as seeming almost easylong and still felt too short.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1847920454</amazonuk>
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{{newreviewFrontpage|authorisbn=Adam Roberts1786331047|title=The Wonga CoupRace 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=The chances are that you've never heard basic facts about the deaths of Nicholas and Alexandra, some of Macias Nguema. You probably don't know his nephewwhich were deliberately obscured at the time for various reasons, Obiang Nguema eitherhave long since been established. They're certainly up there For the last few months of their lives in Russia the Premier League of killing former Tsar and disappearanceTsarina, alongside the likes of Pol Pot their children and modern day tyrants like Robert Mugabefew remaining servants were held in increasingly squalid, humiliating captivity. The fact that the Nguemas are dictators To prevent them from being rescued, in July 1918 the tiny west African state of Equatorial Guinea meant they largely slipped off revolutionary regime had them all shot and bayoneted to death in circumstances which, once the radar of western consciousnessnews was confirmed beyond all doubt, horrified their relatives in Europe.|amazonuk=<amazonuk>1846682347</amazonuk>
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