Popular North American Historical Books
Find historical books written by authors from North America for the next part of the Read Around The World Challenge. (151)
81.
Shakespeare: The World as Stage by Bill Bryson EN
Country: North America / 
United States of America
United States of America
Description:
William Shakespeare, the most celebrated poet in the English language, left behind nearly a million words of text, but his biography has long been a thicket of wild supposition arranged around scant facts. With a steady hand and his trademark wit, Bill Bryson sorts through this colorful muddle to reveal the man himself. Bryson documents the efforts of earlier scholars, from today's most respected academics to eccentrics like Delia Bacon, an American who developed a firm but unsubstantiated conviction that her namesake, Francis Bacon, was the true author of Shakespeare's plays. Emulating the st... continue
82.
Shanghai Immortal by A. Y. Chao EN
Country: North America / 
Canada
Canada
Description:
This richly told adult fantasy debut teems with Chinese deities and demons cavorting in jazz age Shanghai. Half vampire. Half fox-spirit. All trouble. Pawned by her mother to the King of Hell as a child, Lady Jing is half-vampire, half-hulijing fox-spirit and all sasshole. As the King's ward, she has spent the past ninety years running errands, dodging the taunts of the spiteful hulijing courtiers, and trying to control her explosive temper - with varying levels of success. So when Jing overhears the courtiers plotting to steal a priceless dragon pearl from the King, she seizes her chance to e... continue
83.
Soldiers and Kings: Survival and Hope in the World of Human Smuggling by Jason De León EN
Country: North America / United States of America
United States of America
Description:
WINNER OF THE 2024 NATIONAL BOOK AWARD FOR NONFICTION A TIME 10 Best Nonfiction Book of 2024 • An NPR Book We Love 2024 • A New York Times Notable Book of 2024 • A Boston Globe Best Book of 2024 “A work of extraordinary reportage and compassion...[it] will shock you, move you, and leave you changed.” —Matthew Desmond, Pulitzer Prize-winning and New York Times bestselling author of Evicted and Poverty, by America “An enlightening, frightening, unforgettable read.” —Sandra Cisneros, bestselling author of The House on Mango Street An intense, intimate and first-of-its-kind look at the world of hu... continue
84.
Stories and Poems of a Class Struggle / Historias y poemas de una lucha de clase s by Roque Dalton EN
Country: North America / 
El Salvador
El Salvador
Description:
Poems of revolution by one of Latin America’s most beloved poets One of Latin America’s greatest poets, Roque Dalton was a revolutionary whose politics were inseparable from his art. Born in El Salvador in 1935, Dalton dedicated his life to fighting for social justice, while writing fierce, tender poems about his country and its people. In Stories and Poems of a Class Struggle, he explores oppression and resistance through the lens of five poetic personas, each with their own distinct voice. These poems show a country caught in the crosshairs of American imperialism, where the few rule the man... continue
85.
The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story by Nikole Hannah-Jones EN
Country: North America / United States of America
United States of America
Description:
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • NAACP IMAGE AWARD WINNER • A dramatic expansion of a groundbreaking work of journalism, The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story offers a profoundly revealing vision of the American past and present. “[A] groundbreaking compendium . . . bracing and urgent . . . This collection is an extraordinary update to an ongoing project of vital truth-telling.”—Esquire NOW AN EMMY-WINNING HULU ORIGINAL DOCUSERIES • FINALIST FOR THE KIRKUS PRIZE • ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: The Washington Post, NPR, Esquire, Marie Claire, Electric Lit, Ms. magazine, Kirkus Reviews, Bookli... continue
86.
The Afghan Campaign by Steven Pressfield EN
Country: North America / United States of America
United States of America
Description:
In words that might have been ripped from today's combat dispatches, Steven Pressfield, the bestselling novelist of ancient warfare, returns with a riveting historical novel that re-creates Alexander the Great's invasion of the Afghan kingdoms in 330 B.C., a campaign that eerily foreshadows the tactics, terrors, and frustrations of contemporary conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. Narrated by Matthias, a young infantryman in Alexander's army, The Afghan Campaign explores the challenges, both military and moral, that Alexander and his soldiers face as they embark on a new type of war and are forc... continue
87.
The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton EN
Country: North America / United States of America
United States of America
Description:
Winner of the 1921 Pulitzer Prize, The Age of Innocence is Edith Wharton's masterful portrait of desire and betrayal during the sumptuous Golden Age of Old New York, a time when society people "dreaded scandal more than disease." This is Newland Archer's world as he prepares to marry the beautiful but conventional May Welland. But when the mysterious Countess Ellen Olenska returns to New York after a disastrous marriage, Archer falls deeply in love with her. Torn between duty and passion, Archer struggles to make a decision that will either courageously define his life--or mercilessly destroy ... continue
88.
The Bad-Ass Librarians of Timbuktu and Their Race to Save the World’s Most Precious Manuscripts by Joshua Hammer EN
Country: North America / United States of America
United States of America
Description:
Describes how a group of Timbuktu librarians enacted a daring plan to smuggle the city's great collection of rare Islamic manuscripts away from the threat of destruction at the hands of Al Qaeda militants to the safety of southern Mali.
89.
The Bermuda Triangle by Charles Berlitz, Joseph Manson Valentine EN
Country: North America / United States of America
United States of America
Description:
Since 1943 hundreds of plane and ships, and thousands of people, have disappeared in the ocean between Bermuda and the Florida coast, the Bermuda Triangle. Charles Berlitz set out to investigate and has spoken to numerous people who have escaped the terrifying forces of the Bermuda Triangle.
90.
The Black Jacobins : Toussaint L'Ouverture and the San Domingo Revolution by C.L.R. James EN
Country: North America / 
Trinidad and Tobago
Trinidad and Tobago
Description:
A powerful and impassioned historical account of the largest successful revolt by enslaved people in history: the Haitian Revolution of 1791–1803 “One of the seminal texts about the history of slavery and abolition.... Provocative and empowering.” —The New York Times Book Review The Black Jacobins, by Trinidadian historian C. L. R. James, was the first major analysis of the uprising that began in the wake of the storming of the Bastille in France and became the model for liberation movements from Africa to Cuba. It is the story of the French colony of San Domingo, a place where the brutality o... continue