Book Clubs: History

Past Books:

2025

• November: The Indifferent Stars Above by Daniel James Brown
• December: Fifth Sun by Camilla Townsend
• October: The Golden Road by William Dalrymple
• September: NORCO '80 by Peter Houlahan
• August: Double Cross: The True Story of the D-Day Spies by Ben Macintyre
• July: The Great Morality by John Kelly
• June: The Zulus at War by Adrian Greaves & Xolani Mkhize
• May: The Lost City of the Monkey God: A True Story by Douglas Preston
• April: Fortune’s Bazaar: The Making of Hong Kong by Vaudine England
• March: Six Women of Salem by Marilynne Roach
• February: America's Deadliest Election: The Cautionary Tale of the Most Violent Election in American History by Jung Chang
• January: The Wagner: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny, and Murder by David Grann

2024

• December: Epic Encounters: Culture, Media, and U.S. Interests in the Middle East since 1945 by Melani McAlister
• November: Toward the Setting Sun: John Ross, the Cherokees, and the Trail of Tears by Brian Hicks
• October: Journey: a Novel  by James Michener
• September: Operation Mincemeat: How a Dead Man and a Bizarre Plan Fooled the Nazis and Assured an Allied Victory by Ben Macintyre
• August: The Woman Who Smashed Codes: A True Story of Love, Spies, and the Unlikely Heroine Who Outwitted America’s Enemies by Jason Fagone
• July: Gallop Toward the Sun: Tecumseh and William Henry Harrison's Struggle for the Destiny of a Nation by Peter Stark
• June: The Poisoner's Handbook: Murder and the Birth of Forensic Medicine in Jazz Age New York by Deborah Blum
• May: Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel
• April: The Last Slave Ship by Ben Raines
• March: Who Killed Jane Stanford by Richard White
• February: The Cajuns: Americanization of A People by Shane Bernard
• January: A Cajun Girl's Sharecropping Years by Viola Fontenot

2023

• December: White Lies: The Double Life of Walter F. White and America's Darkest Secret by A.J. Baime
• November: Dagger John: Archbishop John Hughes and the Making of Irish America by John Loughery
• October: The Professor and the Madman: A Tale of Murder, Insanity, and the Making of the Oxford English Dictionary by Simon Winchester
• September: The Brothers: John Foster Dulles, Allen Dulles & Their Secret World War by Stephen Kinzer
• August: Behind the Beautiful Forevers by Katherine Boo
• July: The Wright Brothers by David McCullough
• June: The Writing of the Gods: the Race to Decode the Rosetta Stone by Edward Dolnick
• May: River of the Gods: Genius, Courage, and Betrayal in the Search for the Source of the Nile by Candice Millard
• April: Mutinous Women: How French Convicts Became Founding Mothers of the Gulf Coast by Joan DeJean
• March: American Passage: The History of Ellis Island by Vincent J. Cannato
• February: The Yellow House: a Memoir by Sarah M. Broom
• January: The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot

2022

• December: The Three-Cornered War: The Union, the Confederacy, and Native Peoples in the Fight for the West by Megan Kate Nelson
• November: Island on Fire: The Revolt That Ended Slavery in the British Empire by Tom Zoellner
• October: The Great Secret: The Classified World War II Disaster that Launched the War on Cancer by Jenant Conant
• September: If Then: How the Simulmatics Corporation Invented the Future by Jill Lepore
• August: Backrooms and Bayous: My Life in Louisiana Politics by Robert Mann
• July: American Scripture: Making the Declaration of Independence by Paula Meier
• June: The Strange Case of Dr. Couney: How a Mysterious European Showman Saved Thousands of American Babies by Dawn Raffel
• May: The Medici: Power, Money and Ambition in the Italian Renaissance by Paul Strathern
• April: American Sherlock: Murder, Forensics, and the Birth of American CSI by Kate Winkler Dawson
• March: The Myth of Seneca Falls: Memory and the Women's Suffrage Movement, 1848-1898 by Lisa Tetrault
• February: City of a Million Dreams: A History of New Orleans at Year 300 by Jason Berry
• January: Terror to the Wicked: America's First Trial by Jury, that Ended a War and Helped to Form a Nation by Tobey Pearl

2021

• December: The Plantagenets: The Warrior Kings and Queens Who Made England by Dan Jones
• November: Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents by Isabel Wilkerson
• October: The Map That Changed the World: William Smith and the Birth of Modern Geology by Simon Winchester
• September: Peter the Great: His Life and World by Robert K. Massie
• August: The Gatekeepers: How the White House Chiefs of Staff Define Every Presidency by Chris Whipple
• July: Teche: A History of Louisiana's Most Famous Bayou by Shane K. Bernard
• June: Shadow Divers: The True Adventures of Two Americans Who Risked Everything to Solve One of the Last Mysteries of World War II by Robert Kurson
• May: Say Nothing: a True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland by Patrick Radden Keefe
• April: Longitude: The True Story of a Lone Genius Who Solved the Greatest Scientific Problem of His Time by Dava Sobel
• March: Rising Tide: The Great Mississippi Flood of 1927 and How it Changed America by John M. Barry
• February: The Fighters: Americans in Combat in Afghanistan and Iraq by C.J. Chivers
• January: Hidden History of Acadiana by William Thibodeaux

2020

• December: Paris 1919: Six Months That Changed the World by Margaret MacMillan
• November: Challenging the Pacific:  The First Woman to Row the Kon-Tiki Route by Maud Fontenoy
• October: The Triumph of Christianity by Bart Ehrman
• September: The Radium Girls: The Dark Story of America's Shining Women by Kate Moore
• August: The Worst Hard Time: The Untold Story of Those Who Survived the Great American Dust Bowl by Timothy Egan
• July: The Storm Before the Storm: The Beginning of the End of the Roman Republic by Mike Duncan
• June: Lafayette in the Somewhat United States by Sarah Vowell
• May:  In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex by Nathaniel Philbrick
• April: Aloha Rodeo: Three Hawaiian Cowboys, The World's Greatest Rodeo, and a Hidden History of the American West by David Wolman
• March: The Secret War: Spies, Ciphers, and Guerillas by Max Hastings
• February: The Accident of Color: a Story of Race in Reconstruction by Daniel Brook
• January: The Pioneers: The Heroic Story of the Settlers Who Brought the American Ideal West by David McCullough

2019

• December: Dad's War Photos: Adventures in the South Pacific by Neal Bertrand
• November: Seven Years in Tibet by Henrich Harrier
• October: The Genius of the System: Hollywood Filmmaking in the Studio Era by Thomas Schatz
• September: The Field of Blood: Violence in Congress and the Road to Civil War by Joanne Freeman
• August: Leadership in Turbulent Times by Doris Kearns Goodwin
• July: Don't Make Me Pull Over!: An Informal History of the Family Road Trip by Richard Ratay
• June: The Great Halifax Explosion: a World War I Story of Treachery, Tragedy, and Extraordinary Heroism by John U. Bacon
• May: The Fiery Trial: Abraham Lincoln and American Slavery by Eric Foner
• April: Destiny of the Republic: A Tale of Madness, Medicine, and the Murder of a President by Candice Millard
• March: The Ten-Cent Plague: The Great Comic-Book Scare and How It Changed America by David Hadju 
• February: Free at Last: A Documentary History of Slavery, Freedom, and the Civil War by Ira Berlin
• January: Hitler's Man in Havana: Heinz Lüning and Nazi espionage in Latin America by Thomas Schoonover

2018

• December: Endurance: Shackleton's Incredible Voyage by Alfred Lansing
• November: General Fox Conner: Pershing’s Chief of Operations and Eisenhower’s Mentor by Stephen Rabalais
• October: Stalin's Englishman: Guy Burgess, the Cold War, and the Cambridge Spy Ring by Andrew Lownie
• September: Guns, Germs and Steel: the Fate of Human Societies by Jared Diamond
• August: Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI by David Grann
• July: The Doomsday Machine: Confessions of a Nuclear War Planner by Daniel Ellsburg
• June: A Case for Solomon: Bobby Dunbar and the Case that Haunted a Nation by Tal McThenia
• May: Grant by Ron Chernow
• April: The Road Not Taken: Edward Lansdale and the American Tragedy in Vietnam by Max Boot