Hacker News Books

Books I've give away this year:

- "In the Garden of Beasts", Erik Larson: An excellent history of diplomatic relations between the US and Germany leading up to WWII.

- "Dune", Frank Herbert: Most of you are probably familiar with this book.

Couple of good books to read (or listen to) for context:

“In the Garden of Beasts,” Larsen

“The Coming of the Third Reich,” Evans

The book about pre-war Berlin, "In the Garden of Beasts" recounts the experience of American Ambassador to Germany, William Dodd. As ambassador he and his family had many direct encounters with the German government of the time.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_the_Garden_of_Beasts

> some guy who literally said he got the job because he was friends with Obama

There are two kinds of U.S. ambassadors:

1) Career foreign service people

2) Friends of the presidential administration at the time

Examples of the latter aren't hard to find. Off the top of my head I'm familiar with William Timken, a US businessman who was appointed Ambassador to Germany by George W. Bush because he was a huge supporter [0,1]. Colloquially we could say he got the job because "he was a friend of Bush."

I remember being surprised to learn that US Ambassadors were (maybe still are) individually responsible for paying for a good part of their formal duties as Ambassadors(eg throwing parties, travel, etc). So historically, having wealthy people in the role was a requisite. I gleaned this from reading "In the Garden of Beasts" by Erik Larson [2].

The bits I have cobbled together suggest there is an interesting history surrounding the practice of selecting and acting as a US Ambassador.

[0] https://2001-2009.state.gov/outofdate/bios/t/53349.htm

[1] https://www.spiegel.de/international/spiegel/us-german-relat...

[2] https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/9938498-in-the-garden-of...

any history book by Ben MacIntyre is a terrific read. He has written sseveral about WWII: I've read Agent Zig-Zag and Operation Mincemeat. He also wrote a good book about the spy Kim Phiulby, A Spy Among Friends.
Another great book about WWII is Citizens of London by Lynne Olson.
One of the best books I've read recently is Peter Frankopan's The Silk Roads that fills in the gaps of history for Westerners. Jaw-dropping details on almost every page--such as the real meaning of the Italian greeting ciao ("I am your slave") because Italian ports were the ceneter of the Roaman slave trade--they had to import 450,000-500,000 per year to keep the empire humming...and the origin of the word slave from the Slavs who were captured by the red-haired Vikings as they moved south...knowns as the Russes, who became known as the Russians..

some others--
The Swerve by Stephen Greenblatt
The Food Explorer by Daniel Stone
anything by Erik Larson but especially Isaac's Storm (about the Galveston hurricane of 1900) and In the Garden of Beasts (about the American ambassort to 1930s Nazi Germany)
Travels with Herodotus and Shah of Shas by Ryszard Kapuscinski
The Poisoner’s Handbook by Deborah Blum
Parisians by Graham Robb

The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine - Michael Lewis. A highly-entertaining insider's view of the mortgage/financial debacle.
http://www.amazon.com/Big-Short-Inside-Doomsday-Machine/dp/0...

In the Garden of Beasts: Love, Terror, and an American Family in Hitler's Berlin - Erik Larson
Highly entertaining non-fiction that reads like fiction. Accounts of the build-up to hitler's Germany like you're actually there.
http://www.amazon.com/Garden-Beasts-Terror-American-Hitlers/...