Recommend to me your books!

[DNK]

Looking for a new read. The criteria are as follows:

1. Non-fiction. It can be subjective all it wants, but I want it to be effectively useful for the gaining of knowledge on past/present events/times/perspectives.

2. Not a textbook. I already have all the dry academic literature I can handle. I need something that I'm going to want to actually pick up. I've been sitting on "A Peace to End All Peace" for ages now... it really was a long war, huh?

3. Needs to be a highly regarded work. No riff raff or stuff you liked personally, even if no one's heard of it. I can fill in the smaller works later.

4. Needs to be an eye-opener. I don't want to read nice stories about stuff I already learned in school. I want perspectives and thoughts and knowledge that will probably be new to me. The subjects themselves can be familiar, but I want viewpoints beyond the average academic. First person accounts a huge plus.

5. See #4. That's the key right there.

EDIT: Along the lines of "The Great War for Civilisation" (Fisk, Robert) - really, another that is what I'm looking for.

 

[Gooblah]

The Peloponnesian War by Donald Kagan;

Basically, it takes both the Spartan and Athenian veiwpoints into account, and details the military tactics, specific battles, and political machinations going on before and during the war. His writing style is pretty dynamic as well.

I'm not sure if it fits Point 3, though. The author is a Sterling Professor of Classics and History at Yale and his course 'The Origins of War' is one of the most popular. I'm not sure what literary awards it has won, though.

 

[OttoManD]

Read something by Rory Stewart. Places in Between or Prince of the Marshes.

alternately, Michael Oren, Power Faith and Fantasy. Not first person, but great.

 

[Chazumi]

As a huge sci-fi fan:

Rama series by Arthur C Clarke

Riverworld Series, Phillip Jose Farmer

Isaac Asimov's essay compilations (various works)

Ender's Game series, Orson Scott Card (grew up near my hometown)

 

[a_propagandist]

1. Non-fiction. It can be subjective all it wants, but I want it to be effectively useful for the gaining of knowledge on past/present events/times/perspectives.

As a huge sci-fi fan:

Rama series by Arthur C Clarke

Riverworld Series, Phillip Jose Farmer

Isaac Asimov's essay compilations (various works)

Ender's Game series, Orson Scott Card (grew up near my hometown)

Er...

But, in the case of fiction, Life of Pi is pretty good; it has some zoology that I would consider somewhat truthful at the very least.

 

[DNK]

The Peloponnesian War by Donald Kagan;

Basically, it takes both the Spartan and Athenian veiwpoints into account, and details the military tactics, specific battles, and political machinations going on before and during the war. His writing style is pretty dynamic as well.

I'm not sure if it fits Point 3, though. The author is a Sterling Professor of Classics and History at Yale and his course 'The Origins of War' is one of the most popular. I'm not sure what literary awards it has won, though.

Will this be another "A Peace to End All Peace"? It sounds like it. Still, I've always wanted to read up on my Ancient history. Thanks.

Read something by Rory Stewart. Places in Between or Prince of the Marshes.

alternately, Michael Oren, Power Faith and Fantasy. Not first person, but great.

Prince of the Marshes looks interesting, although PFF looks a little too dry.

As a huge sci-fi fan:

Rama series by Arthur C Clarke

Riverworld Series, Phillip Jose Farmer

Isaac Asimov's essay compilations (various works)

Ender's Game series, Orson Scott Card (grew up near my hometown)

Non-fiction?

 

[OttoManD]

Oh, you're a Fisk fan then. have you read Pity the Nation?
Jason Burke, On the Road to Kandahar, Peter Bergen, Holy War Inc.

 

[Ansar]

Mein Kampf (?).

 

[Narz]

Edit : nevermind, first recommendation was not non-fiction

Try this one. Best non-fiction I've read to completion in the last six months or so.

 

[Perfection]

STEPHEN PINKER'S, WORDS AND RULES OR THE LANGUAGE INSTINCT OR BOTH

Cuz Pinker rules.

 

[DNK]

Oh, you're a Fisk fan then. have you read Pity the Nation?
Jason Burke, On the Road to Kandahar, Peter Bergen, Holy War Inc.

No, not Pity yet. The Burke one looks really interesting, I might just have to get it.

Mein Kampf (?).

Interesting idea, but I'd rather not get into a deep psychological analysis of the author, which I would be doing with every sentence.

Edit : nevermind, first recommendation was not non-fiction

Try this one. Best non-fiction I've read to completion in the last six months or so.

Ishmael looked good, actually. Semi-non-fiction.

How much does the Scarcity title have in terms of first person accounts and uses of 80-00s example conflicts? Is it just theorizing and analysis? I'm looking for more of a human piece in terms of narrative style.

Thought of another book that I absolutely loved:
Beirut Fragments (Makdisi). Not so much for its exceptional political and historical analysis, but for the first person account of a major conflict, and the way it affects the individual.

 

[aneeshm]

Dawkins' "The Selfish Gene". After that, Marc Hauser's "Moral Minds". Finally, Steven Pinker's "The Blank Slate".

 

[Fifty]

Learn about politics in a way that avoids the leftist propaganda slant of the liberal academy and the liberal mainstream media:

 

[Godwynn]

New perspectives to you?

Alan Greenspan's The Age of Turbulence

I am enjoying it so far.

 

[DNK]

Learn about politics in a way that avoids the leftist propaganda slant of the liberal academy and the liberal mainstream media:

Spoiler :

There aren't the words in English to describe my rejection of that idea, sorry. Thanks for the suggestion, though

 

[DNK]

New perspectives to you?

Alan Greenspan's The Age of Turbulence

I am enjoying it so far.

I hear bad things about Greenspan, though - or at least not so flattering things.

I would be down for an economics book, but it sounds a little dry for me right now anyway. Plus, I also am currently mid-way through a rather long economics textbook that is getting as equally small reading time as A Peace...

I'm picky, no?

 

[Godwynn]

I hear bad things about Greenspan, though - or at least not so flattering things.

I would be down for an economics book, but it sounds a little dry for me right now anyway. Plus, I also am currently mid-way through a rather long economics textbook that is getting as equally small reading time as A Peace...

I'm picky, no?

The book is half autobiography, half economics. He uses his own personal experiences and gives tales of first hand accounts of the fall of the Berlin Wall and the USSR and the economic affects of each. I'm still reading through it myself.

 

[pau17]

Alexis De Tocqueville's "Democracy in America". Interesting account by a French aristocrat/intellectual that toured the US around 1830 and wrote down his observations of American culture, philosophy, politics, customs, etc. It's good as a piece of history as well as theory, and a lot of what he says is dead-on and relevant even today. And it's also sort of first-person as you requested.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democracy_in_America

There's the wiki, but the book is a lot more than that. It's quite hefty and is good for the anecdotes as well as the main arguments.

 

[LightFang]

Freakonomics is interesting because there are anecdotes and stuff. It's not dry in the latest. The author...he's not a traditional economist

 

[pau17]

Some other suggestions:

Henry Kissinger's "Diplomacy": reads a bit like a textbook regarding international relations in the Western world in the last few centuries, but rich with detail and insight, especially from Kissinger himself regarding his life experiences

Joseph Schumpeter, "Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy": Interesting argument about capitalism and its future (he thinks it will yield to socialism, but not because he wants it to but rather because it has certain self-defeating features)

Max Weber: any of his essays; kind of dense but profound stuff about politics, religion, modernity, etc. (although I would not recommend the Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, which is a simpler, sociological, and more criticized work of his); kind of depressing because he's so cynical about the rationalization of modern society