Books on U.S. History

... Read The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution Summary

The Immortal Irishman: The Irish Revolutionary Who Became an American Hero (2016), by American author and journalist Timothy Egan, is a biography of Thomas Francis Meagher, an Irish revolutionary and American Civil War hero who later became the governor of the Montana Territory. Egan's narrative captures Meagher's tumultuous journey, from his fight for Irish independence to his contributions in America, focusing on broader themes of exile, resilience, and identity. Egan contextualizes Meagher’s life against the... Read The Immortal Irishman Summary

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot is a non-fiction book that tells the story of Lacks and her HeLa cells, or the immortal cell line that doctors retrieved from her cervical cancer cells. Crown Publishing Group published the book in 2010, and it won a National Academies Communication Award the following year. This guide refers to the Crown 2010 first edition. Henrietta Lacks was a black American woman who died of cancer... Read The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks Summary

The Inconvenient Indian: A Curious Account of Native People in North America is a 2012 nonfiction book by Thomas King about the history of relations between Indigenous people and American settler colonialism. King is a novelist of Cherokee descent, and The Inconvenient Indian is his first book of nonfiction. The book was awarded the CBA Libris Award for Best Non-Fiction Book in 2013. This guide follows the first edition of the book.Content Warning: Both the... Read The Inconvenient Indian Summary

... Read The Indifferent Stars Above Summary

... Read The Indigo Girl Summary

American author and historian David McCullough’s debut book, The Johnstown Flood (1968), is a work of social history that chronicles the Johnstown Flood of 1889, a deluge of water and debris that tore through a steel community in Central Pennsylvania, killing more than 2,000 people and causing millions of dollars in damage. The flood resulted from a dam bursting in the mountains above Johnstown. The dam had been somewhat hurriedly built to create a lake... Read The Johnstown Flood Summary

... Read The Killer Angels Summary

The Kingdom of Matthias: A Story of Sex and Salvation in 19th Century America is a work of non-fiction published in 1994 by Oxford University Press. Historians Paul Johnson and Sean Wilentz tell the little-known story of Matthias the Prophet in a dramatic and well-documented account that blends biography with true crime. The authors recount events that occurred during the Second Great Awakening, a Protestant religious revival in the United States that reached its peak... Read The Kingdom Of Matthias Summary

... Read The Kingdom, the Power, and the Glory Summary

Joseph M. Marshall III, who is from the Sicangu Oglala tribe, grew up on the Rosebud Sioux Indian Reservation. He was raised by his maternal grandparents, who told him stories about Lakota traditions and culture. These stories transmit the virtues of Lakota culture, including humility, perseverance, respect, honor, love, sacrifice, truth, compassion, bravery, fortitude, generosity, and wisdom. He dedicates a chapter to each of these virtues, which are at the foundation of Lakota culture. The... Read The Lakota Way Summary

Susan Orlean, longtime staff writer at The New Yorker and best-selling author of The Orchid Thief, returned to narrative nonfiction with The Library Book (2018). Through the story of the Los Angeles Central Library, Orlean provides a history of libraries, examining what we stand to lose as the world’s base of knowledge transitions into the digital realm. Orlean received a Goodreads Choice Awards nomination for Best Nonfiction and a place on Reese Witherspoon’s Hello Sunshine... Read The Library Book Summary

... Read The Light We Carry Summary

... Read The Light We Lost Summary

The Lost City of the Monkey God: A True Story is a New York Times best-selling nonfiction book written by journalist and novelist Douglas Preston and published by Grand Central Publishing in 2017. Preston’s book follows the history of various expeditions in search of the legendary Lost City of the Monkey God in the La Mosquitia region of Honduras. Most of the book covers an aerial lidar survey and a ground expedition organized and led... Read The Lost City of the Monkey God Summary

... Read The Magic Barrel Summary

... Read The Magnificent Lives of Marjorie Post Summary

... Read The Making of Asian America Summary

Recognized for its depth of research into history’s most powerful device of war, historian Richard Rhodes’ The Making of the Atomic Bomb (1987) documents the development of the atomic bomb in the 1930s and 1940s, from its conception to its deployment as part of an atrocity committed by the United States against Japan. Rhodes provides extensive background on the personal histories and scientific achievements of the group of international scientists who collectively brought the atomic... Read The Making of the Atomic Bomb Summary

... Read The Man of the Crowd Summary