Book recommendations thread

nuac · 10-09-2018 7:10pm

Anatom wrote: »

Working my way through "Citizen Clem: A Biography of Atlee" by John Bew.

It is a very interesting read, about a period I think many people overlook. We know a lot (or we think we do) about the wartime activities from a military perspective, but the impact of the Labour Party during the war years, and of Atlee and his government in the immediate post-war period is largely overlooked. He also comes across very, very well I think. I'd recommend it.

I recall Attlee visiting Mayo c, 1947. His secretary Beevor lived in Newport. He visited his friend Mayor Freyer, an author and retired Labour MP who lived ar COrrymore House, Keel. There was little security or fuss about his visit.

Altho he was a less flamboyant character than Churchill he won that post war election,

Corrymore had previously been the residence of a landlord's agent, who later moved to manage an estate on the shores of Lough Mask. He was a most oppressive agent. Some of the local fenians wanted to shoot him, but the local priest persuaded the tenants and all in the area to shun him and cease all contact. He had to call on the British Army to protect imported workers to try to harvest his crops. He had to return to England, but did get into the history books and many dictionaries, That was Captain Boycott

ancapailldorcha · 10-09-2018 7:13pm

oscarBravo wrote: »

I finished it recently: it should be required reading. Excellent, excellent book.

Just bought it. In the meantime, I've moved onto David Cay Johnston's The Making of Donald Trump. So far so depressing.

ancapailldorcha · 29-09-2018 8:14pm

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

Just bought it. In the meantime, I've moved onto David Cay Johnston's The Making of Donald Trump. So far so depressing.

This was a fairly bleak read to be honest. I've made no secret of my opinion of Trump and this was a book which portrayed him as being a venal, deceitful, manipulative individual without a shred of kindness or decency. Johnston's Trump could be a supervillain were he not so catastrophically incompetent or able to have normal interactions with people.

The book describes specific episodes of Trump's business career as opposed to being a chronicle. It opens detailing his cutting off his great nephew's health insurance as a baby due to his parents getting largely cut out of Fred Trump's will and moves onto his sabotage of the USFL, a burgeoning competitor to the NFL, bankruptcies and ruined casinos, deals with shady characters linked to the Genovese and Gambesino crime families, selling his name to anyone willing to stump up the capital regardless of their ability to deliver on property projects and his abuse of the law to silence criticis and punish disloyalty and slights, real or perceived.

It's a book which will readily conform to many people's confirmation bias, myself included with some unease on my part. David Cay Johnston is a Pulitzer Prize-winning author so his pedigree is in no doubt. That said, he never misses an opportunity to illuminate the reader regarding how his insight enabled him to predict much of the results of Trump's election. I think it would have worked better as a longer work in the form of a detailed history about Trump though it does serve as an excellent series of highlights regarding the subject.

mistermatthew · 14-11-2018 10:16pm

Hi,

I'm looking for a biography on John Hume, perhaps with a bit of commentary on the general events in the North occurring at the time too.

What is the best John Hume book out there, or book about the major events in the north focused around John Hume?

ancapailldorcha · 15-11-2018 12:25am

Mod: Moved to the book recommendation thread.

ancapailldorcha · 02-12-2018 8:32pm

oscarBravo wrote: »

I finished it recently: it should be required reading. Excellent, excellent book.

Starting it now.

The New Tsar: The Rise and Reign of Vladimir Putin (Steven Lee Myers).

I've had this on my list for years. A holistic treatise on Vladimir Putin, Myers starts from his father's time in the second World War through to the conclusion of the Olympics at Sochi. It begins describing the circumstances Putin's parents found themselves in at his birth, his childhood and fondness for sports before his choice to join the KGB after seeing a spy series called The Shield and the Sword. It chronicles Putin's unremarkable time spent in East Germany before his return to St. Petersburg and his entry into politics where he is eventually made president by a desperate Boris Yeltsin. It seems to be very well researched with quotes from people like Putin's Judo teacher from his childhood (who has since become very wealthy) as well as various journalists and Kremlin sources. Myers does an excellent job of giving the reader a good sense of who Putin is and why he acts the way he does. An excellent read.

How to be right:... in a world gone wrong (James O'Brien).

In a lot of ways, this is exactly what you'd expect. O'Brien is a left leaning liberal and this shows heavily throughout the book. I found myself disagreeing at a few points but he is more lucid that I expected once he swaps the mic for a keyboard.

O'Brien segments the book into chapters with each one dealing with a different topic such as feminism, LGBT rights, Brexit, Trump, etc... He does an excellent job of explaining his views and the logic behind them. However, I can see how some people might find him a tad patronising based on this book. For example, he espouses the idea that Brexit voters were misled by scheming press barons.

Ultimately though, this is a book which feels like a companion to his LBC talkshow. If you dislike James O'Brien, this is unlikely to convince you otherwise so you may not enjoy this. If you like James O'Brien, it's one which you'll no doubt enjoy immensely. Caveat Emptor.

ancapailldorcha · 11-03-2019 7:46pm

Factfulness: Ten Reasons We're Wrong About the World – and Why Things Are Better Than You Think (Hans Rosling, Ola Rosling & Anna Rosling Rönnlund).
Hans Rosling presents and debunks various myths about how we perceive the world using personal anecdotes and data. It's an excellent, highly readable little book with some great plots and Rosling argues his points with great passion and rigour.

oscarBravo · 10-04-2019 8:10pm

Not a recommendation - it hasn't been published yet - but Open Borders could be an interesting read when it comes out.

I found Caplan's The Myth of the Rational Voter interesting. I don't agree with everything he says, but certainly with enough of it to be prepared to read more.

And, of course, Zach Weinersmith is awesome.

ancapailldorcha · 10-04-2019 8:57pm

The English & Their History (Robert Tombs).

This one might be controversial. It was published in 2014 and so just before 2016 Brexit referendum.

First, the positive. Tombs rights eloquently as one might expect from a Professor of History at the University of Cambridge. The book appears to be well researched and I certainly enjoyed learning about the origins of various English institutions like Parliament and the Monarchy. There's also some dry wit here which helps as this is certainly a tome at just over 1,000 pages.

However, there are a few issues. I purchased this hoping to get a better appreciation of the history of the country I'm living in. While I certainly got that, much of the book is focused on the past century. The Romans, the Saxons, the Angles, Picts, Scots, Celts, etc are dispensed with in the first few pages of the book. Tombs defines "England" as beginning in 1066 with the Norman Conquest. As time progresses, the book offers more and more detail which leads me to the next issue. It becomes clear before going too far in that Tombs is of a certain... highly enthusiastic and patriotic pro-British mindset. He has a tendency to compare Medieval England with, say present day Nigeria and this something which occurs multiple times. The other thing I found a tad irksome was his borderline obsession with seemingly skimming over certain events such as the famines in Ireland and India during the Empire or the 40,000 people who died in concentration camps. They tend to be glossed over on the basis that nothing much could have been done anyway. In terms of things like the abolition of slavery, Magna Carta, Parliament, Democracy and so on, we're given hefty expositions of English Exceptionalism and how England was always ahead of its European neighbours, especially France.

I certainly don't regret reading this book and consider it important that I try and read opinions I'll disagree with so I think that it's worth reading in that regard. The preceding paragraph is simply meant as a caveat empor as the book is quite large and meaty. It isn't easy to distill a thousand years of history of one of the world's most influential nations into a thousand pages in fairness to Tombs. If you're averse to Toryist bordering on Jingoistic interpretations of history, you may wish to avoid this. Otherwise, it makes for an excellent primer on England's endlessly fascinating history.

ancapailldorcha · 10-04-2019 9:05pm

The Border: The Legacy of a Century of Anglo-Irish Politics (Diarmaid Ferriter)

I only recently finished this.

I would consider it a reasonable primer to anyone who might be confused about the Irish border. Note that the book's primary focus is the history of the border. People like Ian Paisley, Gerry Adams, John Hume, etc are barely mentioned and aren't introduced properly at all. Ferriter is clearly well read as one might expect and cites from an eclectic array of sources. He livens up the narrative of life in the border communities in the decades following the Partition of Ireland with trivia (such as the border running through one family's house for instance).

It's towards the end of the book that the flaws become apparent. This has clearly been rushed out due to Brexit. Not necessarily a bad thing but if you don't know who Gerry Adams is, you won't find out here. There is very little detail on the drafting of the Good Friday Agreement. Mo Mowlam is never mentioned if I recall correctly. It's a shame but a look at the author's other work shows that his books tend to be over three times the size as this. I felt another few hundred pages to flesh out the likes of Paisley, Adams, McGuinness, etc would have been very welcome and constructive.

It's does a serviceable job of providing a background of how the border came to be and how communities there have been affected by it. Anyone looking for a deeper understanding of Northern Irish and Irish politics might be better off looking elsewhere.

Naydy · 12-04-2019 1:06pm

Could someone kindly recommend me a book which explains different political systems/voting systems/electoral systems etc for a total layperson? There's so many when I go looking that I don't know where to start. I'm reasonably intelligent (I swear! :P) and don't mind how long/short the book is, I have just never bothered to learn a thing about them before and feel it's high time I should...

Thanks

eire4 · 08-06-2019 8:56pm

The New Confessions of an Economic Hitman by John Perkins. If you want to learn all about how nasty underhanded and imperialist the US is in its foreign policy then read this book. It shows just how self serving they are with the author being involved for many years himself. In particular one chapter describes how the US's cozy relationship with the authoritarian regime in Saudi Arabia came into being.
For a country that claims to be a democracy and about defending freedom around the world this book is a real eye opener into who and what the US really is.

Cal4567 · 16-06-2019 12:27pm

Naydy wrote: »

Could someone kindly recommend me a book which explains different political systems/voting systems/electoral systems etc for a total layperson? There's so many when I go looking that I don't know where to start. I'm reasonably intelligent (I swear! :P) and don't mind how long/short the book is, I have just never bothered to learn a thing about them before and feel it's high time I should...

Thanks

The Politics Book by DK

ancapailldorcha · 18-07-2019 11:14am

Yes to Europe! (Robert Saunders).

For all of the posts I have on the subject, I was surprised when it occurred to me that I actually knew very little about the original 1975 referendum where the UK voted to remain in the EU.

Enter Robert Saunders' wonderful new book. I came across the author when he guest-starred on the Remainiacs podcast. I found him quite impressive and so picked this up fairly sharpish. Saunders is a senior lecturer in modern British History at QMUL so his academic credentials are sound.

The book opens by painting a picture of early seventies Britain. Trade with the Commonwealth was decreasing while the European Community was increasing in size and importance. The Heath Tory government took Britain into the then EEC. It describes the process which led the divided Labour party under Harold Wilson to call the referendum and the reasons offered by both parties both for and against it from arguments like a referendum being necessary since both major parties agreed on the EEC so there was no opportunity for the electorate to vote against membership to Margaret Thatcher's abrasive dismissal of the concept of referenda as a "device of dictators and demagogues".

The author then goes on to describe the two campaigns, Britain in Europe and the National Referendum Campaign. The elites, the artisans, the media, businesses and tycoons were very much on the Remain side of the referendum while the leave side exhibited queer bedfellows such as paramilitaries in Northern Ireland opposing membership.

In addition to providing a historical overview of the referendum campaign, Saunders also tries to portray life in seventies Britain for various demographics and how they interacted with the referendum campaigns along with their opinions of the common market. This was the highlight of the book IMO. Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales each get a chapter devoted to them as do women, ethnic minorities, the Churches and employers. Soverignty and the British Empire also receive special attention from the author.

This is a superb primer to anyone wishing to understand why Britain voted to remain in 1975. The main issues were security of food supply, national security in the cold war, food prices and job. Sovereignty and immigration barely featured for most people. However, once the referendum was won, Britain in Europe, largely comprised of various apparatus from the Conservative party disbanded while the NRC remained and evolved, playing a huge part in the rise of Euroscepticism over the following decades.

padjocollins · 18-07-2019 12:43pm

bottle of lies : Katherine Eban . great book about the rise of generic drugs the whole drug industry , patents, money and the battle for integrity when cheating is always an option.

oscarBravo · 18-07-2019 5:08pm

Fantasyland: How America Went Haywire: A 500-Year History, by Kurt Andersen.

A fascinating, amusing look at how the USA is basically built on delusion, which made the rise of Trump - or someone like him - pretty much inevitable.

Rjd2 · 19-09-2019 9:23am

Could anyone recommend me a decent book on World War 1 please?:o

Ladjacket · 12-11-2019 1:42pm

My girlfriend was saying she would love to know more about the history of NI and would love to read up on it - what would be a good book to give her a background to NI and where we are today?

kowloon · 19-11-2019 1:26pm

Rjd2 wrote: »

Could anyone recommend me a decent book on World War 1 please?:o

Hew Strachan wrote a good account, John Keegan is always good and Norman Stone has a book on the entire war as well as one focusing on the Eastern Front which usually doesn't get much love from western authors who are drawn more to the trenches than the more fluid East.

oscarBravo · 19-11-2019 1:38pm

oscarBravo wrote: »

Not a recommendation - it hasn't been published yet - but Open Borders could be an interesting read when it comes out.

I found Caplan's The Myth of the Rational Voter interesting. I don't agree with everything he says, but certainly with enough of it to be prepared to read more.

And, of course, Zach Weinersmith is awesome.

Updated to a recommendation. Very interesting book, and makes its case very well.

ancapailldorcha · 22-11-2019 8:59pm

Fantasyland: How America Went Haywire: A 500 Year History (Kurt Andersen).

Fantasyland is Kurt Andersen's thesis that Americans are naturally more susceptible to fantasies of various forms and have been throughout their history. He tracks America from it's origins as a haven for European religious fanatics and English fortune seekers who never let something as small as a complete lack of gold blunt their enthusiasm. The book examines various fads and fantasies that have permeated and spread through US culture over the centuries as well as a selection of individuals who peddle such fantasies either sincerely or duplicitously such as homeopthy, pentecostalism, anti-vaxxers, climate change skeptics, gun enthusiasts, Mormonism, live action roleplayers (LARPers), P.T. Barnum, Ronald Reagan, Joseph Smith, Davy Crockett, Walt Disney &, yes, Donald Trump.

It's important to note that this is a book focused on America's cultural history. I expected to see a bit more politics but if you want to read about the far right in the US, the GOP, the situation regarding firearms or anything like that, a book with a narrower scope might be a better fit for you. I'm not sure that I buy into the entirety of the author's theory, for example the part about the suburbs comprising a part of what Andersen terms "the Fantasy-Industrial complex". However, he does make a compelling case for why various fads, religions, scams and branches of anti-scientific thought seem to find more fertile soil in America than in Europe. The result is a fascinating though somewhat depressing read.

ancapailldorcha · 22-11-2019 9:35pm

Prisoners of Geography: Ten Maps That Tell You Everything You Need to Know About Global Politics (Tim Marshall).

Prisoners of Geography is Tim Marshall's attempt to explain the rationale of various leaders throughout history. Marshall devotes a chapter to a different region of the world, sometimes encompassing a whole continent like Europe or just one or two countries like the Koreas and Japan. I hadn't really appreciated the role that Geography plays in the motives of world leaders and in shaping the history of the world. Marshall highlights examples like England's rich forests providing an abundance of timber with which to build a navy or Europe's temperate climate and easily navigable rivers. The author employs Geography to explain the annexation of Crimea by Putin as well as Xi Jinping's Belt & Road initiative.

Like Fantasyland, Prisoners has a broad scope and so is therefore lacking in a fair bit of detail. It does, however make for a superb primer to world affairs.

finbarrk · 30-03-2021 7:51am

ancapailldorcha wrote: »

Prisoners of Geography: Ten Maps That Tell You Everything You Need to Know About Global Politics (Tim Marshall).

Prisoners of Geography is Tim Marshall's attempt to explain the rationale of various leaders throughout history. Marshall devotes a chapter to a different region of the world, sometimes encompassing a whole continent like Europe or just one or two countries like the Koreas and Japan. I hadn't really appreciated the role that Geography plays in the motives of world leaders and in shaping the history of the world. Marshall highlights examples like England's rich forests providing an abundance of timber with which to build a navy or Europe's temperate climate and easily navigable rivers. The author employs Geography to explain the annexation of Crimea by Putin as well as Xi Jinping's Belt & Road initiative.

Like Fantasyland, Prisoners has a broad scope and so is therefore lacking in a fair bit of detail. It does, however make for a superb primer to world affairs.

Read that a few years ago. It's very good.

Brussels Sprout · 02-12-2021 6:14pm

Could anyone recommend a book on the first 50 years of the Irish state/republic?

lulublue22 · 20-02-2022 4:30pm

just saw this thread - Can anyone recommend reading material that deals with the breakup of the USSR and or the roots of the current Ukraine conflict and any recommendations for a broad overview of Eastern European history since the cold war.

tks

beggars_bush · 10-03-2022 9:12pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118663727#Comment_118663727

Shadow State

Deals with Russian infiltration of western countries

Ben Done · 10-03-2022 9:49pm

About a third of the way through Peter Pomerantsev's

Nothing is True and Everything is Possible: Adventures in Modern Russia

"A journey into the glittering, surreal heart of 21st century Russia: into the lives of Hells Angels convinced they are messiahs, professional killers with the souls of artists, bohemian theatre directors turned Kremlin puppet-masters, supermodel sects, post-modern dictators and oligarch revolutionaries.

This is a world erupting with new money and new power, changing so fast it breaks all sense of reality, where life is seen as a whirling, glamorous masquerade where identities can be switched and all values are changeable. It is home to a new form of authoritarianism, far subtler than 20th century strains, and which is rapidly expanding to challenge the global order.

An extraordinary book - one which is as powerful and entertaining as it is troubling - Nothing is True and Everything is Possible offers a wild ride into this political and ethical vacuum".

Highly recommended.

Ben Done · 10-03-2022 9:55pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118663727#Comment_118663727

Having read Anne Applebaum"s excellent Twilight of Democracy, another of her books I've seen recommended due to the current situation is next on my reading list -

Red Famine: Stalin's War on Ukraine

Meticulously researched, blisteringly written -- Dominic Sandbrook ― The Sunday Times (Books of the Year)

Magisterial and heartbreaking -- Simon Sebag Montefiore ― Evening Standard

Compelling in its detail and in its empathy -- Nick Rennison ― The Sunday Times

Her account will surely become the standard treatment of one of history's great political atrocities -- Timothy Snyder ― Washington Post

HalloweenJack · 04-04-2022 11:13am

Red Famine is a great read, full of detailed information and gives a good insight into historic Russian attitudes to Ukraine.

Her book on the gulags is brilliant too.

I'm reading Prisoners of Geography at the moment and it also has some good explanations of how the Ukraine situation came about (I'm reading a 2019 revised edition). Its packed with great insights into the mindest of countries and what motivates them, would definitely recommend it.

Sophia Petrillo · 04-04-2022 11:15am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2056088794/book-recommendations-thread

Good idea.

Manach · 08-04-2022 10:44pm

As a starting point for anyone journey into conservatism is the late great polymath Roger Scruton work "How to Be a Conservative".

HalloweenJack · 26-04-2022 1:52pm

Why I'm No Longer Talking To White People About Race.

The title grabs the attention but it is a brilliant read and really helps you get inside the experiences of people of colour in the UK and gives you an idea of what privilege is if you don't think it exists (I'm white, middle-class, straight).

There are some great points to take from it, especially why being 'colour-blind' is nonsense. By saying that, you are denying that people of colour DO have different experiences and ignoring a key factor in problems they have experienced.

I'd highly recommend it.

friendlyfun · 24-05-2022 12:41pm

The Tyranny of Merit by Michael Sandel.

Hermy · 24-05-2022 4:50pm

I tried watching a YouTube talk he gave on the subject but didn't get very far.

What are your thoughts on the book?

Terrier2023 · 23-04-2023 12:15pm

The Madness of Crowds =Douglas Murray is a very balanced read. Like him or loathe him this book is good.

Hamsterchops · 21-12-2023 12:21am

The New Puritans

By Andrew Doyle.

With a deep and thought provoking subject matter, tackling a major social issue of our time in the context of the trials of the past, an analogy that will shock you, a best seller, a must read, super stocking filler ......

Brussels Sprout · 29-02-2024 5:00pm

Doppelganger - Naomi Klein

For years Naomi Klein was mixed up online with the feminist writer, Naomi Wolfe. This was only a mild irritation for Klein until Naomi Wolfe went down the Covid Conspiracy rabbit hole and became a full on disinformation grifter and regular guest on Steve Bannon's podcast. Now Klein was getting @'d by people angrily reacting to Wolfe's own tweets. This led Klein into an odd sort of fascination with Wolfe and what took her (and others like her) down the rabbit hole.

One of the reasons that I was interested in this is that I myself got them confused. I saw Wolfe tweet something deranged during the Pandemic and thought to myself "Wow that's the lady who wrote 'No Labels'. Can't believe that that's what she believes now."

I've read several books on Disinformation but this was hands down the best yet. Klein really explores the area and the motives for the creators and consumers in a way that's both thoughtful and empathetic. She has several fascinating insights and theories on such things like: Why were Wellness influencers in particular so prone to becoming Covid conspiracy theorists, why some parents with autistic children (which Klein is herself) are so desperate to blame the MMR vaccines for their children's condition and why Libertarians in particular were so angry about mass covid vaccination programs.

HalloweenJack · 01-03-2024 12:27pm

I listened to her talk about the book on Blindboy's podcast a while back. It definitely sounded like an interesting read while also going deeper into online rabbit holes.

Thanks for reminding me about it.

eire4 · 09-05-2024 6:33pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121833419#Comment_121833419

I have read a few of her earlier books No Labels and The Shock Doctrine both of which I would highly recommend. Thanks for the heads up on Doppelganger. I have that on my to buy list now.

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