Top Hacker News Book Recommendations in History (all time)

All Time Past 6 Months

Metropolis: A History of the City, Humankind's Greatest Invention

Ben Wilson

4.5 on Amazon

6 HN comments

In the Garden of Beasts: Love, Terror, and an American Family in Hitler's Berlin

Erik Larson, Stephen Hoye, et al.

4.5 on Amazon

6 HN comments

The Poisoner's Handbook: Murder and the Birth of Forensic Medicine in Jazz Age New York

Deborah Blum

4.6 on Amazon

6 HN comments

These Truths: A History of the United States

Jill Lepore and Recorded Books

4.6 on Amazon

6 HN comments

In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex

Nathaniel Philbrick

4.6 on Amazon

6 HN comments

Call Sign Chaos: Learning to Lead

Jim Mattis, Bing West, et al.

4.7 on Amazon

6 HN comments

Band of Brothers: E Company, 506th Regiment, 101st Airborne from Normandy to Hitler's Eagle's Nest

Stephen E. Ambrose

4.8 on Amazon

5 HN comments

A World Undone: The Story of the Great War, 1914 to 1918

G. J. Meyer, Robin Sachs, et al.

4.7 on Amazon

5 HN comments

The Emperor's Handbook: A New Translation of The Meditations

Marcus Aurelius , David Hicks, et al.

4.7 on Amazon

4 HN comments

The Butchering Art: Joseph Lister's Quest to Transform the Grisly World of Victorian Medicine

Lindsey Fitzharris

4.8 on Amazon

4 HN comments

White Trash: The 400-Year Untold History of Class in America

Nancy Isenberg

4.4 on Amazon

4 HN comments

The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt

Edmund Morris, Mark Deakins, et al.

4.7 on Amazon

4 HN comments

The Billion Dollar Spy: A True Story of Cold War Espionage and Betrayal

David E. Hoffman

4.7 on Amazon

4 HN comments

The House of Morgan: An American Banking Dynasty and the Rise of Modern Finance

Ron Chernow, Robertson Dean, et al.

4.5 on Amazon

4 HN comments

The Vietnam War: The Definitive Illustrated History

DK and Smithsonian Institution

4.8 on Amazon

3 HN comments

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christkvonJuly 23, 2019

I just finished reading «the butchering art» about Jospeh lister and revolution of medicinal science. They mentioned the great stink and how it related to the miasma theory. Great book, author was on Joe Rogan as well.

christkvonOct 21, 2020

You might find the book The Butchering Art: Joseph Lister's Quest to Transform the Grisly World of Victorian Medicine interesting. Crazy to think that the training to become a surgeon led to a lot of people dying from cutting into infected cadavers during training.

paperwasp42onOct 25, 2020

Wonderful article, and reminds me of "The Butchering Art" by Lindsey Fitzharris. Truly eye-opening as to how recently surgery became a viable treatment, and how much determination (and dumb luck) it took to get us here.

vo2maxeronDec 2, 2019

Just finished The Butchering Art by Lindsey Fitzharris. I can’t express strongly enough my gratitude that if I were to need surgery, it wouldn’t be in an operating room where “the screams of those struggling under the knife mingled discordantly with everyday noises drifting in from the street below: children laughing, people chatting, carriages rumbling by.”

Currently reading These Truths: A History of the United States by Jill Lapore where she argues for the pressing relevance of our foundational principles. It’s a hefty tome of about 800 pages, so I still have a ways to go.

Next up are two books which have been featured in several end of year lists: Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland by Patrick Radden Keefe and Exhalation by Ted Chiang.

Reading aloud with my 10 year old daughter: Little Women by Louisa May Alcott (Penguin’s 150th anniversary annotated edition with a Patti Smith foreword). Enough said about how influential this experience is for both of us.

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