Recently Mentioned Books

For history, read up on eighteenth century scientific societies, Robert Darnton on the rise of publishing and the book trade, Habermas on the coffeehouse debate culture and the public sphere, and Brewer and McKendrick on the rise of consumer society in England.  Try Wikipedia for Catherine the Great, Frederick the Great, and other rulers of the time.  There is also Margaret C. Jacob, The Radical Enlightenment , and books on 18th century Freemasonry .  The French Revolution seems to require its o...

What an excellent title, the subtitle is The Wild Saga of the Kidnapping, Crimes and Trial of Patty Hearst , and the author is Jeffrey Toobin.  Our age is actually not that crazy by historical standards.  Yet here are the last four sentences:

Abigail Tucker, The Lion in the Living Room: How House Cats Tamed Us and Took Over the World

Derek Thompson, Hit Makers: Why Things Become Popular

Daniel J. Levitin, A Field Guide to Lies: Critical Thinking in the Information Age

The author is Nancy Tomes and the subtitle is How Madison Avenue and Modern Medicine Turned Patients into Consumers .  Here is one excerpt:

I have been reading Carlos M.N. Eire, Reformations: The Early Modern World, 1450-1650 .  Yes I know it is 893 pp., but it is actually one of the most readable books I have had in my hands all year.

Do read the whole thing .  You can buy the Sanandaji book here .

So yes, buy this book but do not read it, for the temerity will rise in your soul.

That is from James Proctor, Faroe Islands .  Here is some Faroese on YouTube .  Here is a short (2:32) Faorese drama , with profanity in Faroese, subtitles too.

5. John Hardman, The Life of Louis XVI .  I’m only about fifty pages into this one, but so far it is a first-rate biography, both detailed and conceptual in nature, likely to make the list of the year’s best non-fiction books.

4. Mats Lundahl, The Political Economy of Disaster: Destitution, plunder and earthquake in Haiti .  More of a potpourri of Haitian economic history than what the titles indicates, the best 20 percent of this book has insights you won’t find in other places.  For me that is a high hit rate, I liked it.

3. The Curse of Cash , by Kenneth Rogoff.  The quality of argumentation and presentation is high, as one would expect from a Ken Rogoff book.  Still, I don’t think it has so much to convince those who might be worried about a currency-less surveillance Panopticon, or those who think negative interest rates are mostly a contractionary and not-so-useful tax on financial intermediation.

2. Abraham Hoffman, Unwanted Mexican Americans in the Great Depression .  The best and most readable book I have found on the deportation of Mexicans during the Great Depression, most of all during the 1931-1935 period.  Reading up on this era puts today’s America in useful perspective .

1. Samuel Fleischacker, The Good and the Good Book: Revelation as a Guide to Life .  A nice, articulate, and well-reasoned account of how a reasonable person might turn to faith and believe that faith and reason are compatible.  The author is a well-known Adam Smith scholar.

The third edition is now out , and the authors are James D. Gwartney, Richard L. Stroup, Dwight R. Lee, Tawni H. Ferrarini, and Joseph P. Calhoun.

There are two new and interesting books with that same title.  The first is by William I. Brustein and Louisa Roberts, and it has the subtitle Leftist Origins of Modern Anti-Semitism .  Think of it as a short overview of what the subtitle promises, with chapters on the Enlightenment, France, Germany, and Great Britain.  The second, by Michele Battini, has the subtitle Capitalism and Modern Anti-Semitism , and is longer and perhaps more exotic.  Here is one summary sentence: “My hypothesis is tha...

There are two new and interesting books with that same title.  The first is by William I. Brustein and Louisa Roberts, and it has the subtitle Leftist Origins of Modern Anti-Semitism .  Think of it as a short overview of what the subtitle promises, with chapters on the Enlightenment, France, Germany, and Great Britain.  The second, by Michele Battini, has the subtitle Capitalism and Modern Anti-Semitism , and is longer and perhaps more exotic.  Here is one summary sentence: “My hypothesis is tha...

5. Helen DeWitt, The Last Samurai .  First published in 2000 to strong critical acclaim, the publisher ended up going bankrupt and this more or less fell off the map, until its recent reissue.  If I count it as a new edition, it is my favorite fiction book of the year so far.  I don’t think all parts of the novel work equally well, but the best parts are superb and most of all it is a book written for smart people .  Even before finishing, I went and ordered everything else she has done .  That ...

4. Samuel Arbesman, Overcomplicated: Technology at the Limits of Comprehension .  I was very happy to blurb this book: “Why can’t we understand technology anymore? In this consistently entertaining and insightful book, Arbesman offers a necessary guide to where we are headed and why everything seems so strange along the way.”  Here are a variety of positive reviews .

3. Adolfo Bioy Cesares, La invención de Morel .  One of the better short Spanish-language novels, ever.  I’ve already started my reread.  Borges, Cortázar, Carpentier, and García Márquez all expressed their admiration for it .  Imagine a mysterious island that becomes more rather than less strange as the story develops, and characters start to wonder if they are living inside a simulation.

2. Christopher Goscha, The Penguin History of Modern Vietnam .  The best general history of Vietnam I know, and it does not obsess over “the Vietnam War.”  Readable and instructive on pretty much every page.

1. Charles Clover, Black Wind, White Snow: The Rise of Russia’s New Nationalism .  Lots of detail, not just the usual BS, scary too.  Too much detail, too scary, thus a good book.

3. eBook sale on Virginia Postrel’s The Future and its Enemies .  They’re still with us!

Here is the link , and my previous extra book offer still stands (for now!).