Nonfiction Archives - Brooke's Reviews and Sweeps

Save the Cat! Writes a Novel

By Brookelorren on May 7, 2020May 7, 20202 Comments

Hello! Welcome to the Save the Cat! Writes a Novel Blog Tour! I was lucky enough to be chosen to review this amazing book. If you’ve ever wanted to write a novel, or have written a novel and want to make it better, this book may help you out.

The first time I heard of Save the Cat! was at an Ask Me Anything with Marie Lu. She suggested it for people who want to learn to write. Pffft! I’ve already written five novels! I’m actually not sure how many books I had written at the time, but I had written several. I believe when I finish writing Saving Adelinetta, it will be my tenth novel.

But! For me, the more I write, the closer I become to having a book I want to send out to agents, the more I want to learn. What makes a successful story? Even if I have this story now, how can I write another one? How do I write a story that people will want to read? This is one of the beautiful things about Save the Cat! It’s a book that brand-new storytellers can use to put together their first novel, as well as a book that intermediate storytellers can use to make sure their books are ones that people will want to read.

What’s in the Book?

Save the Cat! Writes a Novel can be broken up into three different sections:

An introduction to the Save the Cat beats.
How these beats are used in different kinds of stories.
Pitching and troubleshooting your novel.

If you read any part of this book, you’ll definitely want to use the first section for reference. You might think Jessica Brody made these up, but they’re actually pretty much universal to most successful stories. I wrote The Brightness of Shadow without knowing about these beats. You know what? I pretty much hit all the beats without even knowing what they were. However, Save the Cat has further information and examples about things to include in the beats. As I’m revising my book, I’m using this book to help me. Additionally, I have some unfinished books I’m working on. These beats have and will help me finish these books.

This book spends a majority of its time giving examples of different types of stories that can be written using these beats. By types of stories, I don’t mean genre (romance, mystery) or category (young adult, middle grade). An example of a story type is an underdog story or a road trip. Perhaps there are other story types than the ten mentioned here, and books can fit into more than one story type, but if you read through the examples in this book, you should be able to get a good idea of how story beats fit into the kind of story you want to tell.

The final section of the book deals with how to pitch your book and deal with any problems you may have. If you’re going to query your book, you need to write a query letter. And probably a synopsis. There’s a chapter for that. The final chapter deals with other problems writers might have.

Conclusion

Do you want to write a novel? Have you written a novel? Save the Cat! Writes a Novel can help you with that. It’s a book I plan to use in the future (and have used it to put together something of an outline of a fanfic I plan to write at some point, The Rift). This book can help most people plan out their next book. Even if you’re a pantser, Save the Cat! can give you an idea of where your characters should go next. I highly recommend it.

In addition to Save the Cat! Writes a Novel, Jessica Brody has written several other books. I reviewed Sky Without Stars on this blog before. I really have to review its sequel, Between Burning Worlds, because it’s amazing.

Want to learn more about Save the Cat! Writes a Novel? Follow the blog tour! Also, you can learn more about how to save the cat (including the new software, which I haven’t tried) over at savethecat.com.

About the Author:

Jessica Brody worked for MGM Studios as manager of acquisitions and business development before becoming an internationally best-selling author of more than fifteen novels for adults and teens including The Geography of Lost Things, The Chaos of Standing Still, A Week of Mondays, and Better You Than Me. She travels the country teaching Save the Cat! workshops to novelists.

Fallen Glory

By Brookelorren on April 22, 2020April 21, 2020Leave a Comment

I have recently been trying to read more nonfiction. The real world is so interesting and it’s fun to find out more. Fallen Glory wouldn’t have been my first choice of nonfiction books though: the lives and deaths of history’s greatest buildings. I don’t know a lot about architecture. However, when I went to the Penguin Teen Tour in March, Marie Lu said she was reading this book, and the way she described it made it seem amazing (she was right).

Fallen Glory is not just a book about a bunch of destroyed buildings. It tells the story of the people that created the buildings and the people that destroyed the buildings. At times, it is a sad reminder of our lost history. For example, the first chapter is the story of the Tower of Babel. While we don’t know exactly where the exact site for the tower was, this book tells about some of the possibilities. It also tells the story of many of the artifacts of the time that were lost during the Iraq War, when thieves broke into an area museum and ransacked it.

It’s the story of buildings lost in both ancient and modern times, from Asia to America, with stops in the Middle East and Europe. With this as a backdrop, the author, James Crawford, weaves a compelling story. Chapter eight, for example, tells the story of the Nika riots in Constantinople. While you may or may not have heard of them before, Crawford gives all the background information you need to know for this to be an interesting story. Even if you’ve never heard of the Emperor Justinian and his wife Theodora before.

The book tells stories of the obscure, such as Vilcabamba, to the well-known, like the Bastille. Not knowing about the former didn’t make it less interesting than the latter. Crawford is a great storyteller.

I thought one of the most interesting stories was the chapter on GeoCities, which wasn’t even a real city in the first place. Crawford tells how it was developed and later became popular. Eventually it was bought out by Yahoo! I could write a lot about Yahoo! I remember when they were so small that they still added their entries by hand. Yahoo! eventually closed down GeoCities, and in that one moment, years of early Internet history was erased (although some people were able to archive a lot of the site).

Conclusion

I really liked Fallen Glory. It’s not just a book about buildings: it’s a book about the societies that built the buildings, lived with the buildings, and watched its destruction. The stories it told were interesting. Some buildings I had heard of before, but others were new. Whether they were new to me or not, the stories brought a fresh perspective to the locations. If you’re interested in history ranging from the Tower of Babel to the 21st century, you may enjoy this book.

Satellite Bible Atlas

By Brookelorren on August 28, 2019September 2, 2019Leave a Comment

I recently finished reading the Satellite Bible Atlas by William Schlegel. This is the best book of Bible maps I’ve ever seen. If you have a Bible, you probably have a few maps in the back of your book… but none of them are likely to compare with the vast variety of maps assembled here.

After a few general maps of the Levant, the Satellite Bible Atlas is arranged in chronological order. It starts with Abraham and moves all the way through the years of early Jewish rebellion in the Roman world. As the settlement names change over time, the adjoining maps also change. Each map is accompanied by a page of explanation. Often, the explaining page will include quotes from the Bible or even archaeological tablets that have been found discussing the events from that time period.

Sometimes when I read the Bible, my eyes glaze over at all the place names I don’t recognize. Maybe it’s just me, but probably not. This book helps me visualize where most of these places are. It’s certainly not a book that you’ll want to read in a day. It’s not meant to be a page-turner like a lot of books I review here. However, this is a book that you can use as a reference book. Even though I’ve finished reading the book, I’ll probably refer back to many of these maps again at some point in the future.

I’d recommend the Satellite Bible Atlas to several types of people. If you’re interested in ancient maps, if you want to know where all those little towns in the Bible are, or if you’re interested in ancient history, you might like this book. Otherwise, you probably won’t find this book to be very interesting. But if you are, then this is the best collection of Biblical-era maps I have seen.

Killing Patton

By Brookelorren on August 15, 2019August 14, 20194 Comments

I recently read Killing Patton, one of the books in Bill O’Reilly’s Killing series. These books always talk about the death of the main person in the book’s title. They also say a lot about the times in which the book was set. George Patton’s death was one that I’ve seen the history channel talk about before, and it seemed interesting.

Prior to reading this book, I didn’t know a lot about Patton, other than he was a famous general. I also knew he was buried in Luxembourg, because I saw his grave when I went on vacation in Germany. World War II happened before my parents were even born. It’s one of those world events that is slowly receding into the mists of history. This book provides a lot of insight into that war. The section covering Patton’s death is a very small fraction of this book.

Killing Patton, in addition to discussing the general’s military genius and his insensitivity towards people with PTSD (back then known as “shell shock”) talks about other aspects of the war as well. It discusses some of the battles that led to victory in Europe, Hitler’s demise, and some of the horrific things that happened to people in the concentration camps (even after their release). It even talks a little bit about Stalin and why the Russians celebrate New Years’ with Christmas trees, even to this day.

The style of this book is similar to the other Killing books, with a close third person perspective. It sticks to the facts, while trying to bring the story to life.

If you’re interested in George Patton, World War II, or enjoy Bill O’Reilly’s other Killing books, you might want to read Killing Patton. If you’re already an expert on the European theater during World War II, this book might not bring any new information. It’s also a book solely about Patton’s death and it’s associated conspiracy theories. If you’re looking for a book that pushes conspiracy theories, O’Reilly’s books are not for you. I enjoyed it, and maybe you will as well.

Killing Kennedy

By Brookelorren on June 27, 2019June 6, 20192 Comments

Recently, I’ve started to put more audiobooks into my life. I haven’t been reading as many non-fiction books as I would like, so I decided to read Bill O’Reilly’s Killing Kennedy as an audiobook. It was really good and I learned a lot.

If you’re not familiar with O’Reilly’s Killing series, he takes a topic and writes all about the events that lead to the person’s death. The books are written in a narrative style, so they’re fairly entertaining. In the past, I’ve read Killing Lincoln, Killing Reagan, and Killing the Rising Sun.

Killing Kennedy starts off during World War II, where Kennedy is first tested as a leader. After his boat sinks, he saves the people on his crew through quick thinking, a lot of swimming, and a little bit of luck. If it wasn’t for this incident (and the death of his older brother), we might not have ever heard much from the Kennedys.

Most of the book focuses on the time when Kennedy was president. O’Reilly discusses some of the major events of his time in office, such as the Bay of Pigs and the Cuban Missile crisis. The book also discusses Kennedy’s personal life, including his dalliances outside of his marriage to Jackie, the loss of his child Patrick, and his love for his children. It also covers some of the major social movements of the time, such as the civil rights movement.

Of course, since this is a Killing book, Kennedy has to die sometime. We’re introduced to the character of Lee Harvey Oswald long before he makes his fateful shots. Killing Kennedy follows Oswald from his days in the Soviet Union, where he meets his wife Marina, all the way through his death at the hands of Jack Ruby.

Although there are conspiracy theories surrounding Kennedy’s death, O’Reilly makes no judgement about them one way or another. Just as he does in Killing Lincoln, O’Reilly states the facts and lets you come to your own conclusions. He goes into a lot of detail about what happened that morning, including Jackie’s reaction and what some people noticed prior to the shooting.

If you’ve ever wondered about Kennedy’s time in office or about his assassination, Killing Kennedy is a great book. I highly recommend it and will be reading more books in the Killing series in the future.

Book Places I Don’t Want to Visit

By Brookelorren on February 26, 2019February 25, 201930 Comments

Today is Top Ten Tuesday, and the topic is supposed to be “Places Mentioned in Books That I’d Like to Visit” but I actually did that topic in October, and I’m not sure too much has changed since then. So I’m going to go the opposite direction and do places I DON’T want to visit. Some of the places I wouldn’t want to visit are dependent on the time frame too. If that’s the case, I’ll mention that.

I suppose if they do the topic of “Bookish Places I Don’t Want to Visit” as an official topic in a few months, maybe I’ll have more places I do want to visit by then. Anyway, as always, TTT is hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl.

The setting of Red Queen – Nope. It might be an okay place ten years after the conclusion of War Storm, but during the series, I don’t think so. There’s a war going on, and it doesn’t really matter if you’re a red or a silver, it’s not really an appealing place. I think I’ll skip a vacation here.

Pre-Revolutionary War France (Enchantée) – There are a lot of historical places I’d like to visit, but if I were to visit the time period of Enchantée, I’d want to do it as an observer only. This would have been a nightmare of a place. First, if you’re poor, you’re probably starving. The crops had been terrible and there really wasn’t enough food for everybody. If you were rich, you were expected to be the king’s lapdog. No thanks. I wouldn’t mind seeing this place in a holodeck as a ghost where nobody could see me, but I don’t really want to live here.

Ukraine during the Holodomor (Red Famine). Another real place and real time period I wouldn’t want to visit, except as one of those ghosts that couldn’t interact or be seen by anybody else. The Holodomor was a time period in the last century where Stalin tried to starve the Ukrainians because they wouldn’t go along with his farm collectivization program. I haven’t read this book yet, but I know enough about this ugly little period of history that I don’t want to go there.

Several locations in The Last Year of the War. I would not have wanted to be set to one of the Japanese/German internment camps that the United States set up during World War II, despite the propaganda videos that show how happy the people were in them (I’m sure they weren’t). Then, I wouldn’t want to be in Germany or Japan during the end of World War II or right afterwards. I have a German textbook that was printed in the 1970s and even then, local calls were still expensive to make and most people didn’t have phones. That was 30 years after the war ended! So no, I think I’ll avoid taking a trip to this location.

Australia of A Thousand Perfect Notes. I absolutely adore Australia. I spent five weeks there many years ago, and it was wonderful. I spent time in Sydney, Cairns, Brisbane, even went to Canberra… and I loved it. But the people in A Thousand Perfect Notes have really rough lives. I’d love to visit Australia again someday, bu I’ll skip this particular neighborhood, if at all possible.

Weep of Strange the Dreamer. I’d love to visit Lazlo’s library, but Weep would have been a terribly depressing place. There’s this big monstrous metal structure hanging over the city, casting a shadow over the whole place, the whole town has recent memories of how the gods used to steal the people away, no thanks. I might want to visit the setting of this series after the conclusion of Muse of Nightmares, but not before.

Thule, Queen of Air and Darkness. I love the Los Angeles setting of The Dark Artifices, but I wouldn’t want to live in Thule, which is an alternate world that split off when… well, I wont give spoilers, but something bad happened during The Dark War in Thule. We’ll see more of Thule in The Wicked Powers, which I’m glad about, but I don’t want to visit Thule, even if I want to read about it.

The world of An Ember in the Ashes. I doubt it matters whether you are in a powerful position or not in this world, it seems like a terrible place to live. You’d always live in fear, and war comes to the land. Maybe this place won’t be so bad after Ember 4 (I don’t know), but as it stands now, I’ll stay away.

Brazil of Never Stop Walking. There are probably a lot of wonderful places to visit in Brazil. I wouldn’t pass up a trip there if offered. However, the particular locations that Christina Rickardsson talks about in her memoir… I’ll stay very far away from. Places where corrupt police shoot children, where kids live on the street and are vulnerable to exploitation or might have to kill to live… I’ll stay away from there.

Germany before World War II (Defying Hitler). Maybe Germany would be a good place to avoid entirely between say… 1900 and 1960? But I would’t want to spend too much time there in the days leading up to World War II, when people were trying to live with runaway inflation. After inflation was under control, they had to live with Adolph Hitler’s rise to power. No thanks.

So there you have it. Ten places mentioned in books that I wouldn’t want to visit. I look forward to seeing the places that you would like to visit, or maybe you went another direction like I did.

Books That Have Been on My TBR the Longest

By Brookelorren on February 5, 2019February 4, 201929 Comments

It’s Tuesday again, and Welcome to this week’s Top Ten Tuesday! As always, Top Ten Tuesday is hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl. Today’s topic was supposed to be “Upcoming Releases I’m On the Fence About” but it seemed a little negative to me and I just put a book on my TBR suddenly without thinking about it much, so I’m doing “Books on MY TBR the Longest that I Still Haven’t Read”. It goes well with the most recent TBR additions, which we did last week. So here goes:

One of the oldest books on my TBR is 1453: The Holy War for Constantinople and the Clash of Islam and the West. These books with the years on them are usually pretty interesting. Lately, I’ve found that history is a great way to find ideas for the books I’m writing too. This book has been on my TBR forever.

To be honest with you, I’m actually not grabbing the books added last on my TBR. I have some entries from 2013… and then they go straight to 2018. So I’m going to mix it up a bit because otherwise it would be really boring. A Court of Thorns and Roses was one of my oldest 2018 adds.

You’ll probably see a pattern between the oldest books on my TBR and the books I added in 2018. Anyway, New Deal or Raw Deal? was a book I added in 2013. There’s a lot of controversy regarding the whole New Deal and I don’t think there’s a clear-cut answer, because it did some good things and some not-so-good things. I suppose what we’re going through today might be looked upon history the same way. Anyway, here’s another book to learn about the past.

Kingdom of Back by Marie Lu is another one of my oldest TBR entries from 2018. It’s going to have to stay on my TBR for about another year, because it’s not supposed to be released until 2020. I think it’s supposed to come out in the spring though, so maybe I can start begging for an ARC by the end of this year at least?

The Real Thomas Jefferson: The True Story of America’s Philosopher of Freedom is another book I added in 2013. These books are really thick, but the type is pretty large. I still haven’t read this one yet though.

Here’s another book that has been on my TBR for a while that hasn’t been released yet. I’m pretty sure I’ll be reading Kingdom of Back long before I end up reading The Winds of Winter.

Throughout history, most of the world’s population has not lived under conditions that we would consider to be free. The Miracle of Freedom: 7 Tipping Points that Saved the World covers seven major events form history, going all the way back to the days of the Assyrians, that led to freedom for people. And I still haven’t read this book, even though I put this on my list in 2013.

All the Little Lights by Jamie McGuire sounded like a good book, and I added it to my Goodreads to try to win a contest, but I still haven’t read it yet. It still sounds like a good book, about two people who become friends, are separated, and then are reunited again, with some trouble brewing too.

Blacklisted by History: The Untold Story of Senator Joe McCarthy sounds like an interesting book. This was another period of history where a lot of people didn’t trust each other. I still haven’t read this book yet, but I really should someday.

When I first heard of the Holodomor, where Stalin tried to starve the Ukrainians, I thought it was a fascinating period of history that I wanted to learn more about. Red Famine: Stalin’s War on Ukraine sounded like an interesting book when it came out, but there was a wait list at the library and I didn’t want to wait for it. When I last went to Barnes and Noble with some money to spend, they didn’t have it. So I still haven’t read it.

So there you have it: some of the oldest books on my TBR. I think I’ll read A Court of Thorns and Roses fairly soon… I am on the waiting list at the library for it… but who knows when I’ll get to the others. What’s one of the books that have been on your TBR for a LOOOONG time? I’m looking forward to seeing what books people are on the fence about this week!

Next week: My favorite couples in books.

The Young Adult Writer’s Journey Begins… Here?

By Brookelorren on November 26, 2018Leave a Comment

I recently finished reading The Young Adult Writer’s Journey by Janet Schrader-Post and Elizabeth Fortin-Hinds. It is a book written for authors who would like to write young adult books. I thought the book was useful and well-written, although I don’t exactly think that this book contains a lot of information that you wouldn’t find elsewhere.

The newer you are to young adult literature, the more helpful I think this book will be to you. It goes into The Hero’s Journey, what teenager’s lives are like, and general things to keep in mind when writing young adult books. There’s also information about marketing your book (because you are going to need to market your book, whether you self-publish or go the traditional route with an agent).

<span style="display: inline-block; width: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 0;" data-mce-type="bookmark" class="mce_SELRES_start"></span>There’s a lot of information here that is pretty basic, especially if you have been doing your research for a while (and I recommend that). One of the biggest recommendations that I have if you’re going to write YA books is to read YA books. The authors of this book don’t place a lot of emphasis on that, but it really helps you get a feel for the books that people are actually reading these days. YA is a rapidly shifting genre, and if you read a lot of YA books and read this book, then you might think that there’s a little bit in this book that’s slightly outdated.

While The Young Adult Writer’s Journey does have some good information about story arcs, promotion, and the like, I wouldn’t stop my learning with just this book. Get on book Twitter. See what actual teen book readers are saying about Young Adult books. Read actual YA books. While this is a quick read that you might want to use for reference now and again, it is by no means complete, nor does it represent the latest in YA.

Are You Addicted to Outrage?

By Brookelorren on September 24, 20184 Comments

Last Tuesday was an amazing day for new releases. One of the new releases that I was looking forward to was Addicted to Outrage, the new release by Glenn Beck.

As with all of my political reviews, I first need to state my views. I am a conservative libertarian. I voted third party in the last election, mostly because I think that character matters. I’m willing to listen to everybody though. Somebody who was really smart once suggested that you should never be the smartest person in the room. I don’t necessarily think that’s talking about IQ. I think that it means that you should realize that other people know things that you don’t and you can learn from them.

If you want to get the book in a nutshell, I’ll give you a quote from the first chapter: “We many times — not always, but much of the time — are saying almost the same exact thing, just with different words.” Since we have so much in common, why are we arguing with each other?

Our words can make a difference in other people’s lives. This is why, lately, I’ve tried to send compliments to authors when I love their books. I’ve also tried to focus on sharing articles that are less divisive, that more of us can agree with. I’ll leave the more divisive issues to other people.

Addicted to Outrage is a book that encourages us to calm down and try to treat each other civilly. There might be things that we disagree with, but arguing with people and calling people names is not going to make them change their minds. Being respectful of people might actually allow us to get along and help repair this broken country.

We need to look at ourselves. I love how in chapter 7, Beck calls out both sides on their hypocrisy. His words contain humor, making the book interesting.

Addicted To Outrage tells us why it’s so important at this time in history to get along with others. There are a lot of problems that this world will be facing in the next 5, 10, 20 years. For example, as artificial intelligence is able to do more and more, jobs are going to be lost. How are we going to deal with this? Conservatives and liberals have different ideas. Can we be absolutely sure that our “side” is right? Rather than fighting about it, we need to get together and try to understand one another in order to try to come up with a solution. As Glenn states, “we are not talking to each other or growing more compassionate toward our fellow man at a time when we need it most.”

Learning Something

There are some pretty scary things coming along. The machines that we will be programming to drive our cars (as one example) are going to have to make life and death decisions. Should it hit the bus of school children, or hit the bus containing Bill Gates and Elon Musk? China already has a social scoring system; will our AI give priority to the lives of people with higher social scores?

Not only do many of us demonize people on the “other side”, we also demonize historical figures. The world is a complex place, and our opinions are not always derived from simple facts. For example, some of us criticize Washington and Jefferson for owning slaves, but it was actually against the law to free your slaves, except upon your death (and you couldn’t even do that if you were in debt, like Jefferson was). Are we any better? Almost all of us use some sort of electronics that were created under slave-like conditions. There are more slaves today than in the days before the Civil War. I’m sure that none of us like that, but probably a lot of people feel as helpless as I am about doing something about it.

As you read Addicted to Outrage, you might learn about other things, like the tragedy that occurred in “Black Wall Street.” Or that even though Churchill was a great war hero, he was also a flawed individual that did some not-so great things (maybe the same is true about us). There are good and bad things about the United States, and this book touches upon a little of both.

Doing Something

We might not be able to end slavery (as an example) but we can do something to reduce the anger in our lives. It has to start with us, after all. The last section of Addicted to Outrage talks about what we can do about our problems with anger.

<span style="display: inline-block; width: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 0;" data-mce-type="bookmark" class="mce_SELRES_start"></span>Part of it is to try to acknowledge when someone is trying to find common ground with you, and take what you can get. Beck tells the story of how his grandfather, who grew up in an age where blacks were discriminated against, once told him00 in the early 1970s “No matter what anyone says about coloreds, they are just like you and me.” Almost nobody talks like that anymore. If one did, it would probably seem offensive, but in this case, Glenn’s grandfather was trying. I love this quote: “Can we not look into one another’s heart and see how hard we are trying?” We don’t need to vilify people that are trying to understand our point of view and don’t quite grasp what we mean.

I love one of the quotes towards the end of the book: “We must not become what we say we are against.”

It might be difficult to change, to become nicer people. Some people might not even like it. It might not feel good, at first, to be kind to others and bite back a snarky retort, especially if they are not nice to us. But maybe, like many risks, it’s one worth taking. As Glenn says on page 303 “Risk big, win big — do whatever homework is necessary, but don’t let your fear prevent you from rolling the dice!”

Back to School with Nonfiction: Top Ten Tuesday

By Brookelorren on August 28, 2018August 13, 201825 Comments

So it’s time for the kids to go back to school. My daughter started public school for the first time about two weeks ago, my boy started his homeschool coop last week, and our “Lastname Christian Academy” officially starts the Monday after Labor Day. For today’s Top Ten Tuesday Topic (hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl) we are doing a back to school edition. This week, I will be posting some of my favorite nonfiction books. They’re in no particular order.

The Fourth Turning has got to be one of my favorite nonfiction books. It was my favorite book that I read for the first time in 2016. It came out in 2007, but it’s very relevant today. I just love how this book describes how history runs in cycles, and it is so amazing how this book is laid out. If you like this book, Pendulum is also a good book with the same idea, but I liked this one immensely better, even though this one is older.

I first read The Discoverers by Daniel J. Boorstin in college, and not for an assignment; it just looked interesting. The book details the history of discovery, from things as simple as the clock and the calendar to more modern inventions, like navigation. I’ve read this book twice, but it’s been a while since I’ve read it last. I’ve also read a few of his other books; they’re also outstanding. A couple of years ago I was able to find a copy of The Creators in hardback at a library book sale and I had to get that one too, even though I had already read it.

If you are a homeschooler, then you are probably familiar with Susan Wise Bauer’s Story of the World series (they’re very popular). She also has written a set of history books for adults: The History of the _______ World (she has books for the Ancient World, Medieval World, and Renaissance World). They’re all great. If you think you know history because you studied it in high school, you probably are missing a lot. Some of the stories in these books are quite brutal, and I don’t think that they’d get taught in high school just for the brutality factor alone (history can be pretty nasty at times). These are really thick books, and you probably won’t finish it in a day or two like you can with most novels, but you can learn a lot from them.

One of my favorite history books is A History of Modern Europe by John Merriman. I bought the third edition (pictured in the photo here) because if you buy the brand new edition, it’s really expensive. There’s over 1400 pages of text here, so you won’t get this one read in one sitting either, but the book is very readable.

After the Flood by Bill Cooper is a lot shorter and a lot less academic, but I found it to be really interesting nonetheless. I think it’s fairly typical for people living today to think of the ancient world being full of unintelligent people who didn’t know much, but I’m pretty sure that was not the case. This book talks about some of the ancient records that shows that more than likely, ancient people in places like modern-day Britain already had knowledge of the Judeo-Christian God before the arrival of the Roman missionaries that started showing up there after the time of Jesus. I found the ancient geneological records to be fascinating.

I read The History of the Franks by Gregory of Tours in college, but I also reread it once after that. The stories here are pretty fascinating. It’s hard to tell at times what in this book is real and what was exaggeration. Whether some of the tales are made up or not, what is apparent is that there was corruption in the early medieval period just as much as there is now.

If you’re looking for a reading challenge, then you might want to try tackling Gibbon’s The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (unabridged edition). My Kindle says that I still have about 75 hours left in this book, and I’m 2 % of the way through (probably part of that is chapter indexes though). I read the abridged edition years ago, but I’d like to one day read the entire thing, because there’s some fairly interesting stories here (although the reading is not the easiest).

There are several different Kindle editions of this book floating around, some free, some you have to pay for, but I’ve found that this particular edition is the best, because 1) the footnotes are all there and linked, and 2) all six volumes of this book are all together. I’ve downloaded a few copies of this book and have decided on reading this particular edition because it seems to have the best formatting.

I love 1421: The Year China Discovered America, because there is so much about the ancient and even medieval world that we don’t understand. If you like the History Channel shows where they go look at unexplained evidence and try to figure out what it all means, then you might be interested in reading this book too. I’ve always wanted to read his other book, 1434: The Year a Magnificent Chinese Fleet Sailed to Italy and Ignited the Renaissance, but I could never remember the title, but I finally found it. Now that it’s on my Goodreads TBR, I’m more likely to read it.

So far, all the books I’ve put on this list have been history books, which is most of the nonfiction that I read (well, that and political fiction) but I do read whatever nonfiction looks interesting. Freakonomics is a thought-provoking non-history nonfiction book. It explores the economic factors behind things like drug dealing, danger, abortion, and other subjects, but not in a boring way. I haven’t read this book in a long time, but now that I’m talking about it here, I want to read it again.

Wildcard seems to be one of the most anticipated books of the year, and if you’ve read Warcross already, then you probably remember that there’s a place that Emika goes to that is the dark side of Warcross. It’s actually based on a real thing called The Dark Net. While I was reading Warcross, I was reminded about the things that I read about in this book, including the Assassination Market (which is a real thing). If you find those sorts of dark things interesting, you might be curious to read this book. It’s a fairly easy and enjoyable read.

So that’s this week’s Back to School edition of Top Ten Tuesday. Stay tuned for next week where I talk about books that that were made into movies, and which one was better (because I don’t really watch too many movies or TV shows and I’m certain that most of you aren’t interested in watching something like Кухня, so I’m straying off topic a little).