Some of the best non-fiction books I have read. Some of them are not necessarily well written, and would not win prices for excellent language; at least one of them is actually annoying in that respect, but I have included them because the subject is interesting/important. I am sure I have forgotten some, but there you go. Teflon brain.
The art of looking sideways
Alan Fletcher
This is how it looks like inside my head. It a fountain of musings, facts, the odd, solid, and whimsical. It is design, doodles, unfinished thoughts, images, drawings. It is colours, shapes and wisdom. It is a delight and frustration at the same time – if I could show what goes on in my head, this is pretty much it..
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I should have stayed home
Roger Rapoport, Marguerita Castanera
Very funny. About all the glorious trips and travels that goes wrong. A collections of discomfort, disaster and disappointments. Timbuktu is not like you’d think. Not a homage to the well-planned, but rather an honest picture of how things can go, regardless of preparations.
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the IRA
Tim Pat Coogan
There’s a lot of junk about the IRA out there; a lot of rubbish. This is not without it’s faults and exhausting going-ons, but it is one of the better ones.
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All the trouble in the world – the lighter side of famine, pestilence, destruction and death
P.J O’Rourke
O’Rourke should not be read in one sitting – he can be exhausting and a little too much. But he IS funny, cynical and sometimes, dead on. All the trouble in the world is not always what it looks like, or what some would like us to believe.
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The great war for civilisation – the conquest of the middle east
Robert Fisk
Depressing, informative, exhausting and impressive. It is very good, and the good Mr. Fisk is a relentless journalist, not letting sleeping dogs lie.
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Thinking with type
Ellen Lupton
Despite this being part of the curriculum, it is very, very good! Hah! Imagine that – a first class book in an educational institution… what marvels…
It gives a good, sensible introduction to typography, without the annoying, sentimental waffle often found in such books.
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The elements of typographic style
Robert Bringhurst
Clearly for the especially interested – but the book on the subject. In-depth, clear and sharp.
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Neither here nor there
Bill Bryson
Mr. Bryson can be a little too much too, and sometimes rather predictable. But his travels around Europe is very funny, and combining his experiences with the ones he had as a youth doing the same trip, is hilarious. Personally, I am fond of the story about the german restaurant, the incomprehensible menu and the threat of calf brain.
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Three in norway by two of them
anon
Hysterically funny, and should maybe belong under fiction for the many tall tales and absolute nonsense. But the descriptions of norway and inhabitants are spot on..
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Out of Africa
Isak Dinesen /Baroness Karen von Blixen-Finecke
Never mind the film. The book is beautiful, intelligent. Her view on her time in Africa very interesting, and the stories she tells vivid and touching.
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Hidden agendas
John Pilger
Well. Good old Mr. Pilger seems to repeat himself endlessly, so one book will do. He is relentless in his digging for truth, and like a dog with a bone, will not let go. Bless him.
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Those are real bullets, aren’t they?
Peter Pringle, Phillip Jacobson
There is a large pile of books on Bloody Sunday, but this is the best to my knowledge. There is a limit to how interested I am in reading about bullet entry angles over and over, when we all know what went on. They got the new inquiry, and we are still waiting to hear it.
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We wish to Inform you that tomorrow we will be killed with our families
Philip Gourevitch
The awful story of the genocide in Rwanda.
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Tyranny of the Moment: Fast and Slow Time in the Information Age
Thomas Hylland Eriksen
Brilliant thoughts on time.
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Color – travels through the paintbox
Victoria Finlay
This is the book with the annoying language and irritating fancies and guesswork. But the subject is immensely interesting, and her travels to all sorts of odd places entertaining. The myths and stories well researched; the fascinating conflicts and wars fought over colours fantastic.
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The ice master
Jennifer Niven
The mad story of the polar expedition of the ship Karluk and it’s crew. It is a story of survival, cruelty and a mad scientists’ need for self-promotion, but most of all it is a story of how tragedy can split men and bring out the worst in them. The crew and scientists of the expedition survives or dies along social divides, rather than work together. Revealing and terrifying.
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The politics of nationalism and ethnicity
James G. Kellas
Interesting. Don’t think I need to say more than that.
Excellent list; bookmarking now…
Thank you! A little eccentric, maybe. :-)
Hi, Boblets,
Obviously, I’m doing some catching up in your blog! I want to read The Ice Master. I suspect there may be useful/illuminating lessons there for those of us who still are dealing with scars left by Hurricane Katrina and its devastation of New Orleans. Lunch over now, but I’ll be back to check out the fiction!
Linda
I am honoured, Linda! Hope you enjoy it, and feel free to add books, I may have read them :-).
The Ice master is amazing, facinating and scary – and it makes a lot of sense. Hollywood have taught us that desperate hardship brings out heroes in ordinary people, when it can just as well be the opposite.
looking at this list, i do regret not having met you…
(and now i’m off to see if my friends have any of the above for me to read. thanks for the tips!)
ah, Nicolien – we might yet! I hope we will, too, and it is a small world.
And may I recommend my best fiction list too.. :-)