Each semester you are asked to read a book and write 3-4 page book review. You must include the page numbers from which you drew your questions and answers. At the top of the first page, write your name, the name of the book, author, and ISBN (found on the back of the book). Each book review will count as a test grade. For the first semester, choose from among the first set of books and for the second semester, choose from among the second set of questions.
We will set aside some class time to report out to your classmates your assessment of your book of choice. What is important to know? What you liked and/or didn’t like about the author’s assessment of your topic? Read at least one critique of the book? What was said of the book and/or author’s bias/perspective? What connections can you make to our studies in class? Are there any connections to today? Due dates for each TBA.
BOOK REVIEW CHOICES
Any medieval history book by Joseph and/or Frances Gies
Aquinas by Frederick Copleston
Montaillou: The Promised Land of Error by Emmanuel LeRoy Landurie
Growing Up in Medieval London: The Experience of Childhood in History by Barbara Hanawalt
The Medieval Underworld by Andrew McCall
The Return of Martin Guerre by Natalie Davis
Renaissance Lives by Theodore K. Rabb
A Distant Mirror (part 1) by Barbara Tuchman
A Distant Mirror (part 2) by Barbara Tuchman
Brunelleschi's Dome: How a Renaissance Genius Reinvented Architecture by Ross King
Memory Cathedral: A Secret History of Leonardo da Vinci* by Jack Dann
Suleiman the Magnificent by Roger B. Merriman
Here I Stand: A Life of Martin Luther by Roland H. Bainton
Luther the Reformer: The Story of the Man and His Career by James M. Kittleson
John Calvin: A Sixteenth-Century Portrait by William J. Bouswana
Thomas More by Anthony Kenny
The Private Life of Henry VIII by N. Brysson Morrison
The Children of Henry VIII by Alison Weir
The Virgin Queen by Christopher Hibbert
Popular Culture in Early Modern Europe by Peter Burke
The Cheese and the Worms: The Cosmos of a Sixteenth-Century Miller by Carlo Ginzburg
Rembrandt and His World by Christopher White
Rubens and His World by Christopher White
Cavaliers and Roundheads by Christopher Hibbert
Louis XIV and the Greatness of France by Maurice Ashley
Louis XIV: A Royal Life by Olivier Bernier
Peter the Great and the Emergence of Russia by B.H. Sumner
Catherine the Great: A Short History by Isabel de Madariaga
Catherine the Great by Zoe Oldenorg
A Tale of Two Cities* by Charles Dickens
The French Revolution by J.F. Bosher
Napoleon by Felix Markham
Lord Nelson by David and Steven Howarth
Rebel Against the Future: The Luddites and Their War on the Industrial Revolution by Kirkpatrick Sale
The Royal Victorians: King Edward VII, His Family and Friends by Christopher Hibbert
Queen Victoria by Cecil Woodham-Smith
Hard Times* by Charles Dickens
The Guns of August by Barbara Tuchman
Nicholas II: The Last of the Tsars by Marc Ferro
Mussolini's Roman Empire by Denis Mack Smith
Hitler and Geli by Ronald Hayman
The Patriots Revolution: How Eastern Europe Toppled Communism and Won Its Freedom by Mark Frankland
The Three Lives of Charles de Gaulle by David Schoenbrun
A History of Knowledge: Past, Present, and Future by Charles Van Doren
Sophie's World: A Novel About the History of Philosophy* by Jostein Gaarder with Paulette Moller (translator)
*This is a work of fiction.