You're favourite educational books?

MagicMarker

I have a strange urge to push my IQ up a few points so am looking for recommendations on factual books. Any topic will do, be it history, psychology, philosophy, general knowledge?

Hit me!

Zaph

A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson is a good start.

DublinWriter

MagicMarker wrote: »

Hit me!

Ok, usually I'm not an undercover member of the spelling/grammar police, but given mistake in your topic title and its context, I'd recommend Eats, Shoots and Leaves by Linn Truss.

MagicMarker

Thanks for that, and just for you, i'm not even going to edit it.

rain on

DublinWriter wrote: »

Ok, usually I'm not an undercover member of the spelling/grammar police, but given mistake in your topic title and its context, I'd recommend Eats, Shoots and Leaves by Linn Truss.

Neither am I, but you really should check out How To Spell My Name by Lynne Truss

OP - off the top of my head because I don't have my books to hand, some of my favourite non-fiction books are:
Steven Pinker - The Language Instinct (linguistics) and How The Mind Works (neuroscience/psychology)
Richard Dawkins - The Blind Watchmaker (evolutionary theory)
VS Ramachandran - Phantoms In The Brain (neuroscience)
BR Myers - A Reader's Manifesto (literary criticism)

mcgovern

Anything by Ray Kurzweil, though it can be rather heavy going at times.
Good if you want to know what technology will be like in 50 - 100 years time!

ashyle

Sophie's World Jostein Gaarder- Philosophy..easy to read and recounts the history of phil. in novel format. vary nace!!

It wasn't me!

Hawking's A Brief History of Time is surprisingly easy and interesting to read, engaging book, enjoyable and recommended.

A narrative history with a lot going for it is Rubicon, by Tom Holland. It's Roman history, from the first century BC onwards, and is really interesting if you like classical history at all.

Dades

If you haven't - read Cosmos, by Carl Sagan.

Just a fantastic look at a science, the world, the cosmos of course and humankind, written in the most accessible manner.
The reviews on Amazon say it all.

I found "A Short History of Nearly Everything" annoying to read after a while. Brilliant for reference, but somewhat overwhelming on a straight read through.

Valmont

DublinWriter wrote: »

Ok, usually I'm not an undercover member of the spelling/grammar police, but given mistake in your topic title and its context, I'd recommend Eats, Shoots and Leaves by Linn Truss.

Weird, I thought the exact same thing. It was an ironic title considering the nature of the thread:D

Valmont

It wasn't me! wrote: »

A narrative history with a lot going for it is Rubicon, by Tom Holland. It's Roman history, from the first century BC onwards, and is really interesting if you like classical history at all.

A brilliant book, if only all historical books were like it. Plus, the Romans had an exceptionally interesting history. I should point out that 'Persian Fire', another Tom Holland history book, bored my pants off, I couldn't even get half way

remus808

Alexander: A New Past is another great one in terms of classical history... Oh how I wish I was studying History

brianthebard

yeah studying history rawks.

Suggestions: Anything by Karen Armstrong, but possibly start with A short history of myth or Freud, Civilisation and its discontents. I should be able to think of more but I'm drawing a blank, especially in relation to history, although A history of globalisation(Authors?) was good.

gaf1983

The Shackled Continent: Africa's Past, Present and Future by Robert Guest, he's The Economist's Africa correspondent and it offers a history to Africa's problems and also case studies of where things have improved there.

If it's random facts your after, try stuff by Bernard Werber, a French writer. Not much of his stuff is translated though. He has one book which definitely is, The Empire of the Ants, which is about an ant empire in a Paris apartment from an ant's perspective.

I would also recommend Robert Harris for his 'faction' - novels based around historical events. I've only read his two Ancient Rome ones, Pompeii and Imperium, but will definitely read his other more modern stuff soon - Fatherland, Enigma and The Ghost

Dades

gaf1983 wrote: »

I would also recommend Robert Harris for his 'faction' - novels based around historical events. I've only read his two Ancient Rome ones, Pompeii and Imperium, but will definitely read his other more modern stuff soon - Fatherland, Enigma and The Ghost

Hi two "faction" books are a good read alright. Good yarns with some historical perspective thrown in.
'Fatherland' is brilliant, but I found 'The Ghost' quite weak tbh.

Lands Leaving

Anything by Naomi Klein or Chomsky

The Classical World by Robin Lane Fox