NONFICTION -- History

The Great Upheaval: America and the Birth of the Modern World 1788-1800
By Jay Winik
Did you know that Napoleon cheated at cards, or that he read The Koran while en route to Egypt with his army? Were you aware that George Washington’s false teeth were made of hippopotamus ivory? Colorful details about people and events in the history of the United States, Russia and France of this period make this an engrossing book. Lurid accounts of the French Revolution and the bloody Russo-Turkish war provide a view of history at the ground level. ISBN: 006008314X
–Suzanne Fisher

A Magnificent Catastrophe: The Tumultuous Election of 1800
By Edward J. Larson
Thomas Jefferson and John Adams faced off in the campaign of 1800 which, according to historian Larson, was the first contested presidential election. Both the Republican and the Federalist parties indulged in bitter partisan wrangling and mud-slinging and invented lies about their opponents. “Politics are such a torment that I would advise every one I love not to mix with them,” Thomas Jefferson wrote to his daughter Martha during the campaign. ISBN: 0743293177
–Suzanne Fisher