Cairo: Memoir of a City Transformed

Ahdaf Soueif (Get this book)
A deeply personal, engaged tribute by the far-flung Egyptian novelist and journalist as she returned to witness the revolution in her hometown. It has taken the next generation, her children's, to prevail, and Soueif declares gallantly: "We follow them and pledge what's left of our lives to their effort." Early on, the author offers an in-the-moment account of the crucial first days of street action, often messy, confused and involving violent clashes with the police, though undertaken by friends, family and strangers alike with heartwarming camaraderie. Soueif offers both an extraordinary eyewitness document and a sense of the historical import of the revolution.--Kirkus

Our One Common Country: Abraham Lincoln and the Hampton Roads Peace Conference of 1865

James B. Conroy (Get this book)
A brilliant account of the doomed effort to end the Civil War through diplomacy. In February 1865 three "commissioners," all prominent members of the Confederate government, met with Abraham Lincoln and Secretary of State William Seward on a riverboat near Hampton Roads, Va., to explore the possibility of a negotiated end to the Civil War, an event briefly portrayed in the recent film Lincoln. The project appeared hopeless from the start; schemes were launched to derail the conference before it could begin, deftly defeated by further chicanery on the parts of the commissioners and Ulysses Grant. A splendid addition to any Civil War library.--Kirkus

America's Great Game: The CIA's Secret Arabists and the Shaping of the Modern Middle East

Hugh Wilford (Get this book)
By turns admiring and critical play-by-play of CIA Arabists as they directed the Cold War's Middle East chessboard. As the blowback from America's meddling in the Middle East continues to return in the form of the toppling of dictators long supported by Washington, Wilford spotlights the activities of several prominent CIA Arabists who helped manipulate the Cold War regimes in Egypt, Iran, Syria, Jordan and others, often to contradictory and devastating effect. A mostly insightful examination of these "Mad Men on the Nile."--Kirkus

My Promised Land: The Triumph and Tragedy of Israel

Ari Shavit (Get this book)
Israel has betrayed its best, truest self, argues Haaretz journalist and peace activist Shavit in this wrenching dissection of the nation's past and present. Born in 1957, the author is the descendant of intellectuals and idealists who brought Zionism to the shores of Palestine at the turn of the 20th century. Step by step, the author follows the Zionist dream as it played out in Israel. Kibbutz socialism initially had great success as the pioneer generation rebelled against the "daunting Jewish past of persecution and wandering." His effective mix of autobiographical reflections and interviews with key participants peters out toward the end into journalistic snippets, but that hardly muffles the overall impact of his anguished cri de coeur. Thoughtful, sobering reflections on a seemingly intractable conflict.--Kirkus

George Washington's Secret Six: The Spy Ring That Saved the American Revolution

Brian Kilmeade (Get this book)
A history of the Culper Spy Ring, without which, the authors argue, the Americans would not have won the Revolutionary War. Nathan Hale was America's first spy, and his execution forced Gen. George Washington to find a man who could develop a spy ring to help him drive the British from New York. Maj. Benjamin Tallmadge was Washington's choice to develop his spy network, and the six spies he recruited had an immense effect on the outcome of the war. While Kilmeade and Yaeger don't provide deep analysis, the narrative should please enthusiastic fans of the upheaval surrounding the founding of the United States. In a slim, quick-moving book, the authors bring attention to a group that exerted an enormous influence over events during the Revolutionary War.--Kirkus

Where Were You?: America Remembers the JFK Assassination

Gus Russo (Get this book)
The companion volume to a forthcoming NBC documentary on the Kennedy assassination. Investigative TV reporter Russo and prime-time producer Moses collaborated on canvassing a wide range of personalities, including politicians, news correspondents, actors, best-selling authors, photojournalists and widowed spouses. Participants were surveyed with key questions on how the Kennedy shooting impacted life personally and nationally with the resulting essays condensed from hourlong personal interviews, then divided into sections on the event's location (Dallas), its politics, culture, and the ensuing controversy and speculation. The themes of remembrance and appreciation remain constant throughout these pieces--all relevant and compiled with care. An engrossing, politically charged accompaniment to a TV event commemorating the 50th anniversary of the assassination.--Kirkus

A Short History of the Twentieth Century

John Lukacs (Get this book)
Compressed history as sharp and provocative as it is short. Though the matter-of-fact title might suggest a primer or student guide, renowned historian Lukacs demonstrates the argumentative power of the simple declarative sentence. "The twentieth century was--An? The?--American century," he writes. It "meant the end of the European age" and was "a short century, seventy-five years, from 1914-1989." True to that last declaration, Lukacs begins with the start of World War I and closes with the belated end of the Cold War, consistently contending that the Soviet Union was overrated as a threat to the United States and American primacy. A masterpiece of concision and a marvel of clear, controlled prose, a quality lacking in much academic writing.--Kirkus

Appomattox: Victory, Defeat, and Freedom at the End of the Civil War

Elizabeth R. Varon (Get this book)
What exactly was the meaning of the surrender at Appomattox? Robert E. Lee's surrender of his starving army to Ulysses S. Grant effectively brought the Civil War to an end; remaining military resistance collapsed shortly thereafter. But once the killing ceased and the Confederate troops had returned home under magnanimous surrender terms, what had truly been resolved? Slavery and secession were ended by force of arms; the South accepted that, however grudgingly. Yet many social and political questions remained to be settled by leaders from both sides of the conflict. A careful, scholarly consideration of how the ambiguities surrounding the defeat of the South resolved into the bitter eras of Reconstruction and Jim Crow.--Kirkus

Jefferson and Hamilton: The Rivalry That Forged a Nation

John Ferling (Get this book)
Two antithetical but complementary Founding Fathers, duly and exhaustively compared and contrasted. Despite the enormous research already done in fleshing out the lives of the multitalented, ambitious Jefferson and Hamilton, Ferling leaves no stone unturned in sifting through the biographies, walking readers through their respective childhoods, and flushing out influences that shaped their livelihoods and helped form their fundamental ideologies regarding the new nation. From hammering out constitutional liberties and building the nation's banking system to jockeying in early elections, Ferling draws crisp, sharp delineations between his two subjects.--Kirkus