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Books & Bites
Bingo? Try these books about American history!
Updated June 30, 2026
Jessamine County Public Library
Books and Bites
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Days without end : a novel
Barry, Sebastian
Paper Book
COSTA BOOK OF THE YEAR AWARD WINNER LONGLISTED FOR THE 2017 MAN BOOKER PRIZE "A true leftfield wonder: Days Without End is a violent, superbly lyrical western offering a sweeping vision of America in the making."--Kazuo Ishiguro, Booker Prize winning...
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Forget the Alamo : the rise and fall of an American myth
Burrough, Bryan
Paper Book
Every nation needs a creation myth, and Texas's myths bite deep. In the past forty-some years, waves of revisionists have come at this topic, and at times have made real progress toward a more nuanced and inclusive story that doesn't alienate anyone. The fight over the Alamo's meaning has become...
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The gunfighters : how Texas made the West wild
Burrough, Bryan
Paper Book
Named a Best Book of 2025 by Bloomberg "One hell of a good read." --The New York Times "One of the most important books written on the American West in many years." --True West Magazine From the New York Times bestselling author...
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Ring shout : or, Hunting Ku Kluxes in the end times
Clark, P. Dje?li?
Paper Book
Nebula, Locus, and Alex Award-winner P. Djèlí Clark returns with Ring Shout, a dark fantasy historical novella that gives a supernatural twist to the Ku Klux Klan's reign of terror "A fantastical, brutal and thrilling triumph of the imagination...Clark's combination of...
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My dear Hamilton : a novel of Eliza Schuyler Hamilton
Dray, Stephanie
Paper Book
USA Today Bestseller "An edge-of my sear immersion into historical events...No study of Alexander Hamilton would be complete without reading this book." --Karen White, New York Times bestselling author "The best book of the year!" --Kate Quinn, New York Times bestselling...
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An indigenous peoples' history of the United States
Dunbar-Ortiz, Roxanne
Audiobook
New York Times Bestseller This American Book Award winning title about Native American struggle and resistance radically reframes more than 400 years of US history A New York Times Bestseller and the basis for the HBO docu-series Exterminate All the...
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The great contradiction : the tragic side of the American founding
Ellis, Joseph J.
Paper Book
A major new history from our most trusted voice on the Revolutionary era, the author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning Founding Brothers and the National Book Award winner American Sphinx, and featured in THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION, a film by Ken Burns, Sarah Botstein, and David Schmidt,...
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This Vast Enterprise: A New History of Lewis & Clark
Fehrman, Craig
Paper Book
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * A major revisionist history of the Lewis and Clark expedition: For the first time in a generation, This Vast Enterprise offers a fresh and more accurate account of one of the most important episodes in American history, humanizing forgotten figures and...
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American Rambler: Walking the Trail of Johnny Appleseed
Fitzgerald, Isaac
Paper Book
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * New York Times bestselling author Isaac Fitzgerald sets off into the heart of America, following the path of the legendary Johnny Appleseed on an epic journey that both takes him far from home and brings him closer to it. "Rollicking,...
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The widow of the south
Hicks, Robert
Paper Book
Reminiscent of Cold Mountain and Enemy Women, Robert Hicks' gripping debut novel, based on the incredible true story of Carrie McGavock--a woman whose life was forever changed by the Civil War--is exquisitely packaged with endpapers and compelling interior photographs.
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Abigail Adams
Holton, Woody.
Paper Book
In this vivid new biography of abigail adams, the most illustrious woman of America's founding era, prize-winning historian Woody Holton offers a sweeping reinterpretation of Adams's life story and of women's roles in the creation of the republic.Using previously overlooked documents from a host of...
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Barracoon : the story of the last "black cargo"
Hurston, Zora Neale
Paper Book
One of the New York Times' Most Memorable Literary Moments of the Last 25 Years! * New York Times Bestseller * TIME Magazine's Best Nonfiction Book of 2018 * New York Public Library's Best Book of 2018 * NPR's Book Concierge Best Book of 2018 * ...
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Dear Abigail : the intimate lives and revolutionary ideas of Abigail Adams and her two remarkable sisters
Jacobs, Diane.
Paper Book
For readers of the historical works of Robert K. Massie, David McCulough, and Alison Weir comes the first biography on the life of Abigail Adams and her sisters. nbsp; "Never sisters loved each other better than we."--Abigail Adams in a letter to her sister Mary, June...
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The hunger
Katsu, Alma
Ebook
"Supernatural suspense at its finest...The best thing about The Hunger is that it will scare the pants off you."--The New York Times Book Review "Deeply, deeply disturbing, hard to put down, not recommended reading after dark."--Stephen King A tense and...
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The Foursome
Kline, Christina Baker
Paper Book
NATIONAL BESTSELLER From #1 New York Times bestselling author Christina Baker Kline comes a boldly original reimagining of the astonishing true story of two sisters in nineteenth-century North Carolina -- Kline's own distant relatives -- who married world...
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Book of ages : the life and opinions of Jane Franklin
Lepore, Jill
Ebook
National Book Award Finalist From one of our most accomplished and widely admired historians, a revelatory portrait of Benjamin Franklin's youngest sister and a history of history itself. Like her brother, Jane Franklin was a passionate reader, a gifted writer, and an...
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The good lord bird
McBride, James
Paper Book
Henry Shackleford is a young slave living in the Kansas Territory in 1857, the region a battlefield between anti and pro slavery forces. When John Brown, the legendary abolitionist, arrives in the area, an arguement between Brown and Henry's master quickly turns violent. Henry is forced to leave...
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1776
McCullough, David G.
Paper Book
America's beloved and distinguished historian presents, in a book of breathtaking excitement, drama, and narrative force, the stirring story of the year of our nation's birth, 1776, interweaving, on both sides of the Atlantic, the actions and decisions that led Great Britain to undertake a war...
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American Struggle: Democracy, Dissent, and the Pursuit of a More Perfect Union: An Anthology
Meacham, Jon
Paper Book
INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER . The author of The Soul of America unites centuries of essential American voices to understand our national debates and divisions from 1619 to the present, with his signature commentary on the consequential speeches, letters, and essays that led us...
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Wild girls : how the outdoors shaped the women who challenged a nation
Miles, Tiya
Audiobook
Harriet Tubman, forced to labor outdoors on a Maryland plantation, learned from the land a terrain for escape. Louisa May Alcott ran wild, eluding gendered expectations in New England. The Indigenous women's basketball team from Fort Shaw, Montana, recaptured a sense of pride in physical prowess as...
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Destiny of the Republic : a tale of madness, medicine and the murder of a president
Millard, Candice.
Paper Book
James A. Garfield was one of the most extraordinary men ever elected president. Born into abject poverty, he rose to become a wunderkind scholar, a Civil War hero, and a renowned and admired reformist congressman. Nominated for president against his will, he engaged in a fierce battle with the...
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When Trees Testify: Science, Wisdom, History, and America's Black Botanical Legacy
Montgomery, Beronda L
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Beloved : a novel
Morrison, Toni.
Paper Book
Winner of the Pulitzer Prize, Toni Morrison's Beloved is a spellbinding and dazzlingly innovative portrait of a woman haunted by the past, presented here in stunning hardcover with an introduction by A. S. Byatt. Named by The Atlantic as one of the Great American...
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By the fire we carry : the generations-long fight for justice on native land
Nagle, Rebecca
Paper Book
"No part of the judiciary exposes the chasm between American ideals and institutional practice like federal Indian law. In By the Fire We Carry, Nagle, a Cherokee journalist, turns a case most Americans haven't heard of into a legal thriller." --New York Times Book Review NATIONAL...
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The traitor's wife : the woman behind Benedict Arnold and the plan to betray America
Pataki, Allison.
Paper Book
A riveting work of historical fiction, The Traitor's Wife tells the little known but explosive story of Peggy Shippen Arnold, the cunning young wife of Benedict Arnold and mastermind behind one of the most shocking acts of...
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Beaverland : how one weird rodent made America
Philip, Leila
Paper Book
An intimate and revelatory dive into the world of the beaver--the wonderfully weird rodent that has surprisingly shaped American history and may save its ecological future. From award-winning writer Leila Philip, Beaverland is a masterful work of narrative science writing,...
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Rise to rebellion
Shaara, Jeff
Audiobook
Rise to Rebellion
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Monument : poems : new and selected
Trethewey, Natasha D.
Paper Book
Urgent new poems on race and gender inequality, and select poems drawing upon Domestic Work, Bellocq's Ophelia, Native Guard, Congregation, and Thrall, from two-time U.S. Poet Laureate and Pulitzer Prize winner Natasha Trethewey. Layering joy and urgent defiance--against...
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The American Revolution : an intimate history
Ward, Geoffrey C.
Paper Book
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * From the award-winning historian and filmmakers of The Civil War, Baseball, Jazz, The Roosevelts, and others: a richly illustrated, human-centered history of America's founding struggle--expanding on the landmark, six-part PBS series ...
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African American poetry : 250 years of struggle & song
Young, Kevin
Paper Book
A literary landmark: the biggest, most ambitious anthology of Black poetry ever published, gathering 250 poets from the colonial period to the present Across a turbulent history, from such vital centers as Harlem, Chicago, Washington, D.C., Los Angeles, and the Bay Area, Black...
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