What I like about non-fiction is that it covers such a huge territory. The best non-fiction is also creative.
~Tracy Kidder
Take some time this summer to read some fantastic Pulitzer Prize winning non-fiction titles. Available at your local library.
Slavery by Another Name: The Re-Enslavement of Black Americans from the Civil War to World War II by Douglas A. Blackmon (Doubleday) Pulitzer winner, 2009
The Years of Extermination: Nazi Germany and the Jews, 1939-1945 by Saul Friedländer (HarperCollins) Pulitzer winner, 2008
The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11 by Lawrence Wright (Alfred A. Knopf) Pulitzer winner, 2007
SAU call number: HV6432.7 .W75 2006
Imperial Reckoning: The Untold Story of Britain’s Gulag in Kenya by Caroline Elkins (Henry Holt) Pulitzer winner, 2006
SAU call number: DT433.577 .E45 2005
Ghost Wars by Steve Coll (The Penguin Press) Pulitzer winner, 2005
Gulag: A History by Anne Applebaum (Doubleday) Pulitzer winner, 2004
SAU call number: HV8964.S65 A67 2003
“A Problem From Hell:” America and the Age of Genocide by Samantha Power (Basic Books) Pulitzer winner, 2003
Carry Me Home: Birmingham, Alabama, the Climactic Battle of the Civil Rights Revolution by Diane McWhorter (Simon & Schuster) Pulitzer winner, 2002
SAU call number: F334.B69 N449 2001
Hirohito and the Making of Modern Japan by Herbert P. Bix (HarperCollins) Pulitzer winner, 2001
SAU call number: DS889.8 .B59 2000
Embracing Defeat: Japan in the Wake of World War II by John W. Dower (W.W. Norton & Company/The New Press) Pulitzer winner, 2000
Annals of the Former World by John McPhee (Farrar) Pulitzer winner, 1999
SAU call number:QE77 .M38 1998
Look for future posts on suggested Pulitzer Prize winning titles in history.
What an odd and depressing collection of recommendations for summer non-fiction reading-war-slavery, imprisonment. We live in a time when the average person in the U.S. and developed countries has the best way of life ever!! It is not based on slavery, but on the advances of science and engineering and the free enterprise system. Human potential is limited only by imagination. Please expand your view and get past the silly 1960’s notions of the evils of the western world. There are wonderful and fantastic things happening. Try looking for them.
Thanks for your comment, Dave. The theme for our summer reading suggestions this year is Pulitzer Prize Winners. This is a list of the winning titles in non-fiction for the last ten years. Please feel free to use the comments field to make reading suggestions of your own. I’d love to know what you’re reading and what you think about it. Again, thanks for the feedback.
~Leslie