Good History Book?

Rhino

I'm looking for a good history book that covers say the last 900 years or so and focuses mainly on "Western" history. Any thoughts?

Sentry

http://www.amazon.com/Daily-Show-Stewart-Presents-America/dp/B000EGF0RS/ref=pd_bbs_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1198740764&sr=8-2 (actually more informative then most K-12 text books)

http://www.amazon.com/Peoples-History-United-States-Present/dp/0060838655/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1198740834&sr=1-1


Both focused on America... but hey, that's western, right?

RiemannLives

A single really good history book is not going to cover such a broad topic.

I can highly recommend Barbara Tuchman's books (all of them) for both good scholarship and excellent writing. She gets some flack from certain historians for not making enough "original contributions" but that is just because they can't stand that she takes their boring ass tripe and makes it worth reading (without sacrificing historical accuracy).

I would especially recommend A Distant Mirror (14th century England and France), The Proud Tower (society in England at the end of the 1800s), The Guns of August (leadup and first month of World War I) and The Zimmerman Telegram (how the US got involved in WWI).

Just about any first / second year college level history book on European history will hit all the basics while at the same time being incredibly boring. Try and slog through one then pick more narrow areas to get more interesting materiel (and it is interesing!).

Murphy

Perhaps Civilisation, A Personal View by Kenneth Clark?

2868

Guns Germs and Steel?

DharmaBum

I have problems with many of his ideas and claims that the makes, but Howard Zinn's A People's History of the United States is a good read. Only because it gives you such a different view and opinion on American history than you would get from many other books, and historians.

Quid

2868 wrote: »

Guns Germs and Steel?

That focuses almost exclusively on how other cultures developed differently from Western society and covers a timespan a good bit larger than 900 years. Boring as Hell too.

Good information though.

Limp moose

I highly recommend the Zimmerman telegram as well. While it exclusively deals with ww1 and how we got involved the story is ridiculous. The kind of thing they should make a movie about. It was a great read. I remember one character who was a German agent who is literally a boris badenov type. And it all really happened.

Nitsuj82

Yeah, you're not going to find a book spanning 900 years that is little more than a survey of events. The really interesting books cover little more than 50 years or so. Is there a specific period that interests you?