What a year!

Nonfiction that tackles a single, momentous year examining its cultural, political and historical significance to help readers better understand our current lived experience.

Updated April 13, 2026
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1929 : The Inside Story of the Greatest Crash in Wall Street History
Sorkin, Andrew Ross.
Paper Book
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER "It is one of the best narrative histories I've read." --The Wall Street Journal A New York Times Notable Book of 2025 * One of Barack Obama's Favorite Books of 2025 * Named a BEST BOOK OF 2025 by The Washington...
The 1619 Project a new origin story
Hannah-Jones, Nikole
Paper Book
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * NAACP IMAGE AWARD WINNER * A dramatic expansion of a groundbreaking work of journalism, The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story offers a profoundly revealing vision of the American past and present. "[A] groundbreaking compendium . . ....
1491 : new revelations of the Americas before Columbus
Mann, Charles C.
Paper Book
NATIONAL BESTSELLER * A groundbreaking work of science, history, and archaeology that radically alters our understanding of the Americas before the arrival of Columbus in 1492--from "a remarkably engaging writer" (The New York Times Book Review).   Contrary to what...
The year 1000 : when explorers connected the world -- and globalization began
Hansen, Valerie
Paper Book
From celebrated Yale professor Valerie Hansen, a groundbreaking work of history showing that bold explorations and daring trade missions connected all of the world's great societies for the first time at the end of the first millennium. People often believe that the years...
One summer : America, 1927
Bryson, Bill
Paper Book
A Chicago Tribune Noteworthy Book A GoodReads Reader's Choice In One Summer Bill Bryson, one of our greatest and most beloved nonfiction writers, transports readers on a journey back to one amazing season in American life. The summer of 1927 began with one of the...
Paris 1919 : six months that changed the world
MacMillan, Margaret
Audiobook
The world will never see another peace conference like the one that took place in Paris in 1919. For six months, the world's major leaders - including Woodrow Wilson, president of the United States, David Lloyd George, prime minister of Great Britain, and Georges Clemenceau, prime minister of France...
Pandemic 1918 : eyewitness accounts from the greatest medical holocaust in modern history
Arnold, Catharine
Audiobook

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