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lillycoyote's avatar

What's the best non-fiction book you have read recently?

Asked by lillycoyote (24875points) June 20th, 2009

I’m currently reading The Zookeeper’s Wife by Diane Ackerman. It’s about a family who ran the zoo in Warsaw, about their struggle to survive and to rescue Jews in Nazi occupied Poland. It’s quite a story and a terrific book. There so much great non-fiction being written today, I think, I hardly ever read novels any more. So what are you all reading, what’s out there that’s good in your opinion, that you’re enjoying? Anything you would recommend? The subject matter isn’t that important to me, a good writer can make things I didn’t even know I was interested in absolutely fascinating. Though, I’m done with books on Holocaust related subjects for a while. I’ve read two in the last six months at that about my limit for the year. Maybe something light and breezy for a change?

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31 Answers

YARNLADY's avatar

Standard and Poor’s Guide to Money and Investing

kevbo's avatar

Everything I want to do is illegal

rooeytoo's avatar

Born to Run: A Hidden Tribe, Superathletes, and the Greatest Race the World Has Never By Christopher McDougall.

It’s funny, interesting with intriguing ideas about the human body and what it is capable of. Also includes different theories on nutrition. It is a good book even for people who are not particularly interested in running.

SeventhSense's avatar

@MacBean
Two very different books but similar titles.
Freud would have a field day :)

DarkScribe's avatar

I am re-reading Malleus Maleficarum for the third time. Just to remind me why the Christian Church cannot legitimately deny being evil in both practice and intent. It is only because of atheist that the Church no longer has such life and death power – it was not something that it voluntarily surrendered.

If the Church had been unopposed then this book would still be being used to day. The expression “Smokin’ Hot Chick” would be more reminiscent of Witch burnings than Playboy.

RedPowerLady's avatar

Schuyler’s Monster:

When his daughter Schuyler was eighteen months old, a simple question by her pediatrician set in motion a slow transformation for Robert Rummel-Hudson, from a sarcastic, befuddled dad to the very last thing any new father or mother ever expects or desires to become: a special needs parent. Armed with nothing more than his love for his tenacious little girl and his determination to defeat her rare and invisible disorder, he fought his own depression, his past family dysfunction and the nagging suspicion that he was not the right person for the job. In doing so, he discovered a sense of purpose and responsibility, and became the father and advocate that Schuyler needed to help fight her monster.

Schuyler’s Monster is more than the memoir of a parent dealing with a child’s disability. It is the story of the relationship between a unique and ethereal little girl floating through the world without words, and her earthbound father. It is the story of a family struggling to find the answers to a child’s dilemma, but it is also a chronicle of their unique relationships, formed without traditional language against the expectations of a doubting world.

Ultimately, it is the tale of a little girl who silently teaches a man filled with self-doubt how to be the father she needs.

Mtl_zack's avatar

My dad read, and I plan on reading a book about Einstein and his theories. It’s relatively easy to read and the science is explained in layman’s terms according to my dad.

jeffgoldblumsprivatefacilities's avatar

Walden – Henry David Thoreau

juwhite1's avatar

The APA Style Manual… for those of you who understood that, I feel sorry for you. For those that could actually relate, my deepest sympathies!

lillycoyote's avatar

@juwhite1 The APA Style Manual, a rollicking good read that one was!

juwhite1's avatar

Yeah… an absolute thriller! Actually, I’m working on my dissertation, and that damn book keeps saving me, even though I hate the book.

benjaminlevi's avatar

International Military Trials: Nurenberg

EmpressPixie's avatar

Michael Pollan’s In Defense of Food. It’s really interesting and about something we can’t avoid.

AstroChuck's avatar

It’s a tie between The Mother Tongue by Bill Bryson and Augustus by Anthony Everitt.

Jeruba's avatar

I’m very much enjoying Descartes’ Bones, by Russell Shorto, but I can’t yet say I have read it. It’s one of those that I am currently reading.

kenmc's avatar

What We Say Goes buy Noam Chomsky.

Recipes For Disaster: An Anarchist Cookbook by the Crimethink Worker’s Collective

evelyns_pet_zebra's avatar

Iwo Jima by Richard F. Newcomb

cyndyh's avatar

The last nonfiction I read was The Pluto Files by Neil deGrasse Tyson. That was really a fun read.

I’m currently reading Longitude by Dava Sobel. I’ve just started it, so the jury is still out on that one.

There’s a lot of nonfiction that I read in bits and pieces. If I read the whole book through without skipping around then it’s a good read. Otherwise I’m just in it to get information out of whichever chapter or section I’m reading. I tend to read more fiction these days.

essieness's avatar

I enjoyed My Lobotomy by Howard Dully.

Staalesen's avatar

D&D dungeon master guide….Its not fiction, its about it :p

brettvdb's avatar

I just finished reading The World Without Us, by Alan Weiss (i think thats his name!) Currently reading The Varieties Of The Scientific Experience by Carl Sagan

buster's avatar

Public Enemies by Bryan Burrough. Its an book about the early thirties depression era crime waves. It is eyewitness accounts, F.B.I. files, and the history and demise of John Dillinger, Bonnie and Clyde, Pretty Boy Floyd, Babyface Nelson, the Barker Gang and other notable criminals. They call those guys “Yeggmen” in the book. After I read it I wanted to rob a bank!

mbubbles's avatar

Wide awake. by david someone or other. it is a really good book. i absolutely recommend it. it’s about gay rights and it takes place in the future. maybe it;s meant more for people my age, but i still think every single one of you should go out to your library right now and check it out. Wide Awake, people. Don’t forget!!

kruger_d's avatar

The Hot Zone by Richard Preston

jamielynn2328's avatar

A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, by Dave Eggers

brettvdb's avatar

Finished the Varities of the Scientific Experience by Carl Sagan – it’s great, Carl has a way of inspiring like noone else.

Currently reading A Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawking.

tiffyandthewall's avatar

elliott smith by autumn de wilde. it’s got more photos than words, but it’s sort of an oral biography, and it’s beautiful. the pictures tell just as much of a story as the words.

i’m also reading how to read literature like a professor. it’s for school. but it’s not too bad. i’m in the middle of it, and though i haven’t read the majority of the books he mentions, i am so relieved that it isn’t horrible and written in typical textbook language, that it is a wonderful book to me.

MacBean's avatar

I just finished Weird New York. I love my state. :D

alekseistevens's avatar

autism’s false prophets by paul offitt

TexasDude's avatar

I can’t recall the title or author off the top of my head, but it’s a massive, richly illustrated (drawings and photographs) tome about the history and technology of WWI.

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