The Young Charles Darwin

Keith Thomson (Yale University Press)

An account of the young naturalist’s formative years and of the birth and maturing of his theory, which considers the range of influences and ideas, the mentors and rivals, and the formal and informal education that shaped Charles Darwin and prepared him for his career of scientific achievement.

Saint Francis and the Sultan: The Curious History of a Christian-Muslim Encounter

John V. Tolan (Oxford University Press)

A study of the richly varied artistic responses to the meeting between Francis of Assisi and Sultan al-Malik al-Kamil in Egypt in 1219, from the thirteenth to the twentieth century, which provides and insight into the evolution of Western attitudes towards Islam and the Arab world over the past 800 years.

Islam’s War Against the Crusaders

W.B. Bartlett (The History Press)

A study of the Crusades from the Islamic point of view, which considers the effect of the crusades on the Holy Land and the response of the Muslim world to the invasions of European Crusaders.

God’s Crucible: Islam and the Making of Europe, 570-1215

David Levering Lewis (Norton)

An account of Islam’s collision with Dark Ages Europe and the ensuing political and cultural revolutions, from the fall of the Persian and Roman empires through to the rise of prophet Muhammad and the creation of Muslim Spain.

Assassins

Steven Parissien (Quercus)

The story of twenty centuries of political murder, from the Roman era to the present, including accounts of some of the most infamous assassinations in history, from the slaying of Julius Caesar in 44BC to the shooting of President Kennedy in 1963.

History of Men’s Fashion

Nicholas Storey (Pen & Sword)

A history of men’s fashion, which explores what to wear, where to purchase it and where to be seen wearing it, as well as revealing some of history’s worse fashion errors.

We Gave Our Today

William Fowler (Weidenfeld & Nicolson)

An eyewitness history of the British 14th Army, the largest army fielded by Britain and the Commonwealth during the Second World War, and of its long but ultimately successful campaign, under the leadership of General Slim, against the Japanese forces that invaded Burma.

Europe Since The Seventies

Jeremy Black (Reaktion Books)

An analysis of the social and economic development of Europe in the last four decades, which addresses environmental, demographic and cultural issues, as well as political, societal and economic matters, whilst also considering immediate subjects such as transport, crime and migration.

Going Dutch: How England Plundered Holland’s Glory

Lisa Jardine (HarperCollins)

An account of the relationship between Holland and Great Britain at the dawn of the modern age, which reveals how Holland had effectively conquered Britain before the coronation of William of Orange and Mary in April 1689, and how Anglo-Dutch relations laid the groundwork for the European Enlightenment and the Scientific Revolution.

The Artist, the Philosopher and the Warrior

Paul Strathern (Jonathan Cape)

An account of Leonardo da Vinci, Niccolo Machiavelli and Cesare Borgia’s travels in the Italian Romagna during the autumn of 1502 in the military campaign led by Borgia in an attempt to carve out his personal princedom.

Fabergé’s Eggs: One man’s masterpieces and the end of an empire

Toby Faber (Pan Books)

The story of the fifty jewelled eggs made by Carl Fabergé between 1885 and 1916, which were given by Russia’s two last emperor’s to their wives as Easter presents, and, since the demise of tsarist Russia, have become famous surviving symbols of the Romanov Empire.

Standing With Stones: A Photographic Journey Through Megalithic Britain and Ireland

Rupert Soskin (Thames & Hudson)

A photographic journey which explores over a hundred megalithic sites in the British Isles, from the southernmost tip of Cornwall to the Scottish isles, including well-researched sites such as Stonehenge as well as barely known places such as Fenworthy and Bleasdale.

For All the Tea in China: espionage, empire and the secret formula for the world’s favourite drink

Sarah Rose (Hutchinson)

The story of subterfuge, espionage and Robert Fortune, who, in 1848, was engaged by the East India Company to make a clandestine trip to China to uncover the secrets of Chinese tea in order to enable the East India Company to establish its own plantations in the Himalayas of British India.

Two Faiths, One Banner: When Muslims Marched with Christians across Europe’s battlegrounds

Ian Almond (I.B. Tauris)

An insight into how, in Europe, in the heart of the West, Muslims and Christians were often comrades-in-arms and repeatedly formed alliances to wage war against their own faiths and peoples, which questions the popular notion of an unbridgeable chasm between the Islamic world and Christendom.

Hitler’s Jihadis: Muslim Volunteers of the Waffen-SS

Jonathan Trigg (The History Press)

A analysis of the tens of thousands of Muslim volunteers who fought in the Waffen-SS, providing an insight into the pre-war politics that inspired these Islamic volunteers and the complexity that lies at the heart of the story of Hitler’s most unlikely troops.

The German Way of War

Robert M. Citino (University Press of Kansas)

An account of 300 years of Prussian and German military history, from the Thirty Years’ War to the Third Reich, which focuses on operational warfare to reveal the continuity in German military campaigns that relied, above all, on swift and decisive military operations.

Cruelty: Human evil and the human brain

Kathleen Taylor (Oxford University Press)

A study of the nature and origins of cruelty, which draws together aspects of psychology, sociology, philosophy and neuroscience, illustrated with examples from history and the arts.

People of the Long Barrows: Life, Death and Burial in the Earlier Neolithic

Martin Smith and Megan Brickley (The History Press)

A study of the lives of the communities that built the long barrows, the oldest known architecture in the British Isles often interpreted as houses for the dead, which explores the livelihoods of the barrow builders, their health and diet, as well as their burial rituals.

The Lost World of Communism

Peter Molloy (BBC Books)

An oral history of daily life behind the Iron Curtain based on first-hand testimonies of the people who lived in East Germany, Czechoslovakia and Romania during the Cold War era, from international figures such as Vaclav Haval and Lech Walesa, to figures of Eastern Europe’s intelligence and security services, to its ‘ordinary’ citizens.

A Concise History of Pakistan

M. R. Kazimi (Oxford University Press)

A political, intellectual, economic, diplomatic and cultural history of Pakistan, from Mehergarh to Musharraf, which examines contemporary crises in the perspective of the subcontinent’s ancient and medieval history to explain how Muslim nationalism emerged and how the community interacted with other communities in the region.