[Previous page History/Biography Book List] [You are now on a page filed as: Books on Modern Tragedies][Next page Book List for Religion ]
This page updated 3 March 2010
Stop Press: For a glance at a remarkable (and
hellish) art
gallery website designed in Slovakia by a young Australia spending
2001 there, Joel Byrnes, go to the URL below. The website needs FLASH
plugin to be appreciated, and is rather slow to load, but worth it.
The sound and visual effects are intriguing, and the better your
equipment, the better the effect. Highly recommended -Ed.
Check
out: http://www.adeptusproductions.com/gallery/
Said K. Aburish, Nasser: The Last Arab. Duckworth, 2005, 355pp.
Anonymous, A Woman In Berlin. Virago, 2005, 320pp. (A now-classic but still anonymous account of the degradation of the women of Berlin at the end of World War Two)
Paddy Ashdown, Swords and Ploughshares: Bringing Peace to the 21st Century. Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 2007, 338pp.
Nicholas Baker, Human Smoke: The Beginnings of World War II, the End of Civilisation. Simon and Schuster, 2008, 566pp.
Jasper Becker, Rogue Regime: Kim Jong Il and the Looming Threat of North Korea. Oxford University Press, 2005, 274pp.
Isaiah Berlin, The Soviet Mind: Russian Culture Under Communism. Brookings Institution, 2005. 242pp.
Benazir Bhutto, Reconciliation: Islam, Democracy and the West. Simon and Schuster, 2008, 328pp.
Michael Burleigh, Sacred Causes: Religion and Politics from the European Dictators to Al-Quaeda. Fourth Estate, 2006.
Tina Brown, The Diana Chronicles. Random House, 2007, 481pp. (On Lady Diana Spencer)
Recently publishedIn 2010
Barbara Demick, Nothing to Envy: Love, Life and Death in North Korea. Fourth Estate, 2010, 314pp. In 2009Leonard J. Davis, Obsession: A History. The University of Chicago Press. 2009, 290pp. (Australian reviewer thinks the author has got a great deal by the wrong handle.) Philipp von Boeselager, Valkyrie: The Plot to Kill Hitler. Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 2009. (By one of actual conspirators) Akbar Ganji, The Road to Democracy in Iran. Boston Review, 2009, 113pp. Timothy W. Ryback, Hitler's Private Library. Bodley Head, 2009, 278pp. Con Coughlin, Khomeini's Ghost: The Definitive Account of Ayatollah Khomeini's Islamic Revolution and Its Enduring Legacy. Macmillan, 2009, 370pp (Reviewer in Australia fails to find this book definitive) Stefan Aust, The Baader Meinhof Complex. Jonathan Cape, 2009, 458pp. (On Germany's home-grown terrorism group of the 1960s, "a deranged crusade") Irfan Yusuf, Once Were Radicals: My Years as a Teenage Islamo-Fascist. Allen and Unwin, 2009, 309pp. David Kilcullen, The Accidental Guerilla: Fighting Small Wars in the Midst of a Big One. Scribe, 2009, 346pp. (On ways to counter radical Islamic insurgency movements.) Eric D. Weitz, Weimar Germany. Princeton University Pres, 2009, 425pp. Jonathan Brent, Inside the Stalin Archives: Discovering the New Russia. Scribe, 2009, 335pp. Zhao Ziyang, Prisoner of the State: The Secret Journal of Premier Zhao Ziyang. Simon and Schuster, 2009, 306pp. (How a premier politician in China spent the last 16 years of his life under house arrest) Tim Newark, (Ed.), The Worldwide History of Warfare. Thames and Hudson, 2009, 320pp. (Superficial and selective, an Australan reviewer finds.) Aatish Taseer, A Stranger to History: A Son's Journey Through Islamic Lands. Text Publishing, 2009, 384pp. Farhad Khostrokhavar, Inside Jihadism: Understanding Jihadi Movements Worldwide. Paradigm Books, 2009, 321pp. Edward M. Kennedy, True Compass: A Memoir. Little, Brown, 2009, 532pp. (Autobiography, based on an oral history project seemingly designed to airbrush Kennedy) Francis Wheen, Strange Days Indeed. Fourth Estate, 2009, 344pp. (Yes, title from a phrase in a John Lennon song, on the madness and paranoia of the 1970s) Tim Soutphommasane, Reclaiming Patriotism. Cambridge University Press, 2009, 153pp. (Mostly about the UK. Should patriotism be a dirty word?) Con Coughlin, Khomeini's Ghost. Macmillan, 2009, 367pp. Gholam Reza Afkhami, The Life and Death of the Shah. Universty of California Press, 2009, 713pp. Janet Afary, Sexual Politis in Modern Iran. Cambridge University Press, 2009, 442pp. Ami Pedahzur, The Israeli Secret Services and the Struggle Against Terrorism. Columbia University Press, 2009, 215pp. Jeremi Suri, Henry Kissinger and the American Century. Harvard University Press, 2009, 358pp. Alec Russell, After Mandela: The Battle for the Soul of South Africa. Hutchinson, 2009, 310pp. Thomas E. Ricks, The Gamble: General Petraeus and the Untold Story of the American Surge in Iraq, 2006-2008. Allen lane, 2009, 394pp. Michel Foucault, The History of Madness. Routledge, 2009, 725pp. In 2008John Schumaker, In Search of Happiness: Understanding an Endangered State of Mind. Penguin, 2008. (Author is a New Zealand clinical psychologist. We are all drowning in our own shallowness, in mindless distraction, superficiality, vanity, triviality, ego, etc. See Essay in Weekend Sydney Morning Herald for 19-20 July 2008) Brett Bowden and Michael T. Davis, (Eds.), Terror: From Tyrannicide to Terrorism. UQP, 2008, 384pp. Benazir Bhutto, Reconciliation, Islam, Democracy and the West. Simon and Schuster, 2008, 328pp. Kasra Naji, Ahmadinejad. IB Taurus, 2008, 298pp. (On the leader of Iran, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad) Jane Mayer, The Dark Side: The Inside Story of How the War on Terror Turned into a War on America's Ideals. Scribe, 2008, 400pp. Paul Ginsborg, Democracy: Crisis and Renewal. Profile Books, 2008, 166pp (Headline of a review reads: "rethinking the end of history") Philip Zimbardo, The Lucifer Effect: Understanding How Good People Turn Evil. Rider and Co, 2008, 576pp. Ben Kiernan, Blood and Soil: A World History of Genocide and Extermination from Sparta to Darfur. Melbourne University Press, 2008, 768pp. M. W. Daly, Darfur's Sorrow: A History of Destruction and Genocide. Cambridge University Press, 2008, 388pp. Joost R. Hiltermann, A Poisonous Affair: America, Iraq and the Gassing of Halabja. Cambridge University Press, 2008, 346pp. Jacob Heilbrunn, They Knew They Were Right: The Rise of the neocons. Doubleday, 2008, 320pp. (The neocons influencing Pres. G. W. Bush didn't actually know how anything actually worked, the army, the UN, how human cultures react, etc etc) Bob Woodward, The War Within: A Secret White House History 2006-2008. Simon and Schuster, 2008, 487pp. Stephen Armstrong, WAR PLC: The Rise of The New Corporate Mercenary. Faber and Faber, 2008, 255pp. (On mercenaries. Most wars have been fought by mercenaries) Jim Molan, Running The War In Iraq. HarperCollins, 2008, 358pp. Benny Morris, 1948: The First Arab-Israeli War. Yale, 2008, 524pp. Giles Milton, Paradise Lost: Smyrna 1922: The Destruction of Islam's City of Tolerance. Sceptre, 2008, 426pp. Phillip Bobbitt, Terror and Consent: The Wars for the Twenty-First Century. Allen Lane, 2008, 688pp. Steve Coll, The Bin Ladens: The Story of a Family and Its Fortune. Allen Lane, 2008, 736pp. Russ Hoyle, Going to war: how misinformation, disinformation and arrogance led America into the Iraqui quagmire. St Martins Press/Faber USA, 2008, 544pp. David Sobek, The Causes of War. Polity Press, 2008, 240pp. In 2007Simon Sebag Montefiore, Young Stalin. Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 2007, 397pp. Charles L. Pritchard, Failed Diplomacy: the tragic story of how North Korea got the bomb. Brookings Institute Press, 2007, 228pp. Charles L. Pritchard, Failed Diplomacy: the tragic story of how North Korea got the bomb. Brookings Institute Press, 2007, 228pp. John C. Fortier and Norman J. Ornstein, Second-Term Blues: How George W. Bush Has Governed. Brookings Institution Press, 2007, 146pp. Tim Weiner, Legacy of Ashes: The History of the CIA. Allen lane, 2007, 702pp. Chalmers Johnson, Nemesis: The Last Days of the American Republic. Scribe, 2007, 354pp. Mark Barber, Urban Legends: An Investigation into the Truth Behind the Myths. Wakefield Press, 2007, 318pp. A. C. Grayling, Towards The Light: The Story of The Struggles for Liberty and Rights that Made the Modern West. Bloomsbury, 2007, 336pp. Nicolas Werth, Cannibal Island: Death in a Siberian Gulag. Princeton University Press, 2007, 223pp. George Tenet (with Bill Harlow), At the Center of the Storm: My Years at the CIA. HarperCollins, 2007, 549pp. Philip Zimbardo, The Lucifer Effect: Understanding How Good People Turn Evil. Random House, 2007, 576pp. John Gray, Black Mass: Apocalyptic Religion and the Death of Utopia. Allen Lane, 2007, 229pp. Thomas Homer-Dixon, The Upside of Down: Catastrophe, Creativity and the Renewal of Civilisation. Text Publishing, 2007. Bill Clinton (former President, USA), Giving: How Each Of Us Can Change The World. Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 2007, 284pp. In 2006In 2005Christopher de Bellaigue, In The Rose Garden Of The Martyrs: A Memoir of Iran. HarperCollins, 2005, 283pp. (On the dread divide in the world of Islam between Sunni and Shi'ite) Steve Coll, Ghost Wars: The Secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan and Bin Laden, from the Soviet Invasion to September 10, 2001. Penquin, 2005, 712pp. Chris Patten, Not Quite The Diplomat: Home Truths About World Affairs. Allen Lane, 2005, 304pp. David North, The Crisis of American Democracy. Mehring Books, 2005, 147pp. Craig Unger, House of Bush, House of Saud. Gibson Square, 2005, 355pp. In 2004Waleed Aly, People Like Us: How Arrogance is Dividing Islam and the West. Picador, 2007, 277pp. (Notes on how radical Muslims want to remake humanity, or the world, the deadly old dream of humanity revisited) Edward Said, Covering Islam: How the Media and the Experts Determine How We See the Rest of the World. Vintage, London, 1997. |
Carmen Callil, Bad Faith: A Forgotten History of Family and Fatherland. Random House, 2006. (A story on Louis Darquier, noted French collaborator with Germans in WWII)
Joseph J. Carr, The Twisted Cross: The Occult
Religion of
Hitler and the New Age Nazism of the Third Reich. Shreveport,
Louisiana, Huntingdon House, 1985.
Tim Carroll, The Great Escapers: The Full Story of the Second World War's Most Remarkable Mass Escape. Hardie Grant Books, 2005, 272pp.
Fidel Castro with Ignacio Ramonet, My Life. (Translated by Andrew Hurley). Allen Lane, 2007, 735pp.
Jung Chang and Jon Halliday, Mao: The Unknown Story. Jonathan Cape, 2005. (Much-acclaimed biography of one of the great criminals of history, though slowly being criticised for a bias of excessive hate)
General history, Peter Conradi, Hitler's Piano Player: The Rise and Fall of Ernst Hanfstaengl. Duckworth, 2005, 352pp.
M. W. Daly, Darfur's Sorrow. Cambridge University Press, 2008, 368pp.
David Day, Conquest: A New History of the Modern World. HarperCollins, 2005, 370pp.
Robert Draper, Dead Certain: The Presidency of George W. Bush. Free Press, 2007, 463pp.
Nic Dunlop, The Lost Executioner: A Story of the Khmer Rouge. Bloomsbury, 2005, 326pp.
Gwynne Dyer, War: The Lethal Custom. Scribe Publications, 2005, 484pp.
Richard J. Evans, The Third Reich in Power, 1933-1939. Penguin, 2006, 941pp.
Peter Ferguson, Darkness in Paris: The Allies and the Eclipse of France, 1940. Scribe, 2005, 341pp.
Isabella Ginor and Gideon Remez, Foxbats over Dimona: The Soviet's Nuclear Gamble in the Six-Day War. Yale University Press, 2007, 287pp. (Contentious argument that Moscow provoked the Israeli Six-Day War)
Alan Gill: Interrupted Journeys: Young Refugees from Hitler's Reich. Simon and Schuster, 2004, 306pp.
E. J. Gold, The Human Biological Machine as a Transformational Apparatus. The Labyrinth Trilogy. Book 1. Nevada City, IDHHB Inc., 1984, 1985.
Gordon Hahn, Russia's Islamic Threat. Yale University Press, 2007, 349pp.
Jana Hensel, After the Wall: Confessions From An East German Childhood And The Life That Came Next. Public Affairs Books, 2005, 180pp.
Ariel Heyanto, State Terrorism and Political Identity in Indonesia: Fatally Belonging. Routledge, 2007, 242pp.
Katrin Himmler, The Himmler Brothers. Macmillan, 2007, 333pp.
Ed Husain, The Islamist: Why I Joined Radical Islam in Britain, What I Saw Inside And Why I Left. Penguin, 2007, 288pp.
Zahid Hussain, Frontline Pakistan: The Path to Catastrophe and the Killing of Benazir Bhutto. I. B. Tauris, 2008, 220pp.
Lynn Hunt, Inventing Human Rights: A History. WW Norton, 2007, 272pp.
Paul Johnson, In Search of the Masters: Behind the Occult Myth. nd?
Christine Keeler with Douglas Thompson, Christine Keeler, The Truth At Last: My Story. Sidgwick and Jackson, 2001, 279pp.
Ben Kieman, Blood and Soil: A World History of Genocide and Extermination from Sparta to Darfur. Melbourne University Press, 2008, 724pp.
Ariel Levy, Female Chauvinist Pigs: Women and the Rise of Raunch Culture. Schwatz Publishing, 2005.
Deborah Lipstadt, History on Trial. HarperCollins, nd 2005-2006? (The now-famous case of British holocaust-denier David Irving suing Lipstadt for libel within her critical remarks on his writings. The judgement in the British courts, not US courts, was that Irving has been a liar, a falsifier of history - Prof. Lipstadt's website at: http://lipstadt.blogspot.com - David Irving's website at: www.fpp.co.uk - and the legal judgement in question is at: www.hdot.org)
James McConnachie and Robin Tudge, The Rough Guide to Conspiracy Theories. Rough Guide References, 2007, 420pp.
Caroline Moorehead, Human Cargo: A Journey Among Refugees. Chatto and Windus, 2005, 336pp.
Allan McKee, Katherine Albury and Catharine Lumby, The Porn Report. Melbourne University Press, 2008, 272pp.
Sarah Maddison and Sean Scalmer, Activist Wisdom. UNSW Press, 2007, 284pp.
W. Adam Mandelbaum, The Psychic Battlefield: A History of the Military-Occult Complex. New York: St. Martin's Press, 2000.
Bradley K. Martin, Under the Loving Care of the Fatherly Leader: North Korea and the Kim Dynasty. Thomas Dunne Books, 2005, 704pp.
Catherine Merridale, Ivan's War: The Red Army 1939-1945. Faber, 2006, 396pp.
Hugh Miles, Al-Jazeera: How Arab TV News Challenged The World. Abacus, 2005, 438pp.
Kerrie Murphy, TV Land. Wily, 2006, 260pp. (On the darker side of so-called reality-TV)
Walid Phares, The War of Ideas: Jihadism Against Democracy. Palgrave/Macmillan, 2007, 266pp.
Robert Pape, Dying to Win: The Strategic Logic of Suicide Terrorism. Scribe, 2005, 335pp.
Walid Phares, The War of Ideas: Jihadism Against Democracy. Palgrave/Macmillan, 2007, 266pp.
Ian Pfennigwerth, A Man of Intelligence. Rosenberg, 2006, 304pp. (On code-breaker Capt. Eric Nave (d.1993), and the knotty question of whether the Allies had advance warning of the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbour)
Phil Rees, Dining with Terrorists. Picador, 2005, 395pp.
Donald Rayfield, Stalin and his Hangmen. Penguin, 2005, 528pp.
History Geoffrey Robertson, The Tyrranical Brief. Chatto and Windus, 2005. (On rebel Oliver Cromwell and the death of Charles I of England)
Peter Rodgers,Herzel's Nightmare. Scribe, 2004, 144pp. (On the creation of the state of Israel, and rather despairing with it)
Allegra Stratton, The Mujahababes. MUP, 2006. (Young Middle Eastern Muslims from the trendy to the devout discuss their views on their world)
Peter Schrivers, The Unknown Dead: Civilians in the Battle of the Bulge. University Press of Kentucky, 2005, 430pp.
Andrew Scull, Madhouse: A Tragic Tale of Megalomania and Modern Medicine. Yale, 2005, 360pp. (Trends in treatment of the mentally ill in USA)
Robert Service, Comrades: A World History of Communism. Macmillan, 2007, 571pp.
Lynette Ramsay Silver, The Bridge At Parit Sulong. Watermark Press, 2005, 485pp (More on other atrocities by Japanese troops during World War Two)
Peter Stansky, The First Day of the Blitz. September 7, 1940. Scribe, 2007, 212pp.
Nicholas Stargardt, Witnesses of War: Children's Lives Under The Nazis. Cape, 2005, 509pp.
Sybille Steinbacher, Auschwitz: A History. Penguin, 2005, 160pp.
Joseph Stiglitz and Linda Bilmes, The Three Trillion Dollar War: The True Cost of the Iraq Conflict. Allen Lane, 2008, 311pp.
Damian Thompson, CounterKnowledge. Atlantic Books, 2008, 256pp. (So what about the Internet and all the religious fanaticism, pseudo-medical claptrap, porn, the views of ridiculous academics, and all those conspiracy theories it delivers us?)
James Traub, The Best Intentions: Kofi Annan and the UN in the Era of American World Power. Bloomsbury, 2007, 464pp.
James Traub, The Best Intentions: Kofi Annan and the UN in the Era of American World Power. Bloomsbury, 2007, 464pp.
Craig Unger, The Fall of the House of Bush. Scribner, 2008, 436pp. (On the ills of the presidency of George W. Bush)
More to come
Tim Weiner, Legacy of Ashes: The History of the CIA. Allen lane, 2007, 702pp.
Wynn W. Westcott, Numbers: Their Occult Power and Mystic Virtues. Santa Fe, Sun Books, 1983.
Bob Woodward, The Secret Man: The Story of Watergate's Deep Throat. Simon and Schuster, 2005, 232pp.
Zionism
Idith Zertal, Israel's Holocaust and the Politics of Nationhood. Cambridge University Press, 2007, 236pp. (How long can Israelis use their 1940s experience of The Holocaust as a guide to their other experiences? When do martyrs reach their use-by date?)
Jacqueline Rose, The Question of Zion. Melbourne University Press, 2007, 202pp.
Arthur Blech, The Causes of Anti-Semitism. Select Books, 2007, 440pp.
Jennifer Zeng, Witnessing History: One Woman's Fight For Freedom And Falun Gong. Allen and Unwin, 2005, 368pp.
Zimbabwe
How to ruin a marvellous bread-basket
country in Africa - Martin
Meredith, Mugabe: Power, Plunder, and the Struggle for
Zimbabwe. Public
Affairs/Perseus Book Group, 2008, 272pp,
Gugulethu
Moyo, (Ed.), The
Day After Mugabe: Prospects for Change in Zimbabwe.
Africa Research
Institute, 2008, 214pp. (Only available from the ARI)
Zionism
Idith Zertal, Israel's Holocaust and the Politics of
Nationhood.
Cambridge University Press, 2007, 236pp. (How long can Israelis use
their 1940s experience of The Holocaust as a guide to their other
experiences? When do martyrs reach their use-by date? What about
empathy-fatigue as a factor in world activism about anything? -Ed)
Jacqueline
Rose, The Question of Zion. Melbourne University
Press, 2007, 202pp.
Arthur Blech, The Causes of
Anti-Semitism. Select Books, 2007, 440pp.
Now return to the Index
Stop Press: For late entries
Karl Maler, Angola: Promises and Lies. Serif, 2008, 224pp.
Martha C. Nussbaum, The Clash Within: Religious Violence and India's Future. Harvard University Press, 2008, 432pp.
Simon Schama, The American Future: A History. The Bodley Head, 2008, 392pp.
Andrew Greig, Taming War: Culture and Technology for Peace. Peace Power Press, 2008, 314pp.
C. A. J. Coody, Morality and Political Violence. Cambridge University Press, 2008, 317pp.
Charles Guthrie and Michael Quinlan, Just War: The Just War Tradition: Ethics in Modern Warfare. Bloomsbury, 2008, 64pp.
Hugo Slim, Killing Civilians: Method, Madness and Morality in War. Hurst, 2008, 256pp.
Mark Mazower, Hitler's Empire. Penguin, 2008, 725pp.
Gigs van Hensbergen, Guernica. Bloomsbury, 2005, 373pp.
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