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This is the folder for the HBC BOOK OF THE MONTH OFFERINGS. For those of you who like to read a book in a shorter time - we will be offering best selling books on a monthly basis.

We will list the books being selected here on this thread for a group read. Once we get rolling - there will be enough advance time to get your book and participate. These are quick reads and not like our regular offerings at the HBC but still good and deep discussions. We want to have something for everybody's reading style. Of course, the threads always stay open on the HBC. We want folks to read and enjoy all genres even though we are partial to History, Non Fiction and Historical Fiction and we are most interested in your starting and finishing a good book rather than how long it takes you to do so.

These selections could be best sellers, on the New York Times list, possible winners or even finalists for any number of awards - Pulitzer, National Book Award, etc to just name a few, other selections may be on best books of the year lists from a number of different organizations (NPR, Kirkus, The Economist, etc.) - but for the most part they are "books of the moment which have wide spread current interest".

We will keep the discussion moving and hope you will join us for the ride. These are month long offerings. The spotlighted discussions, buddy reads and other offerings at the HBC are all leisurely journeys through a book or subject and the discussions are spread over a few months or longer.

These are more fast paced.

Hello All - here are some of our upcoming book discussions for 2017 and into 2018:

These are the upcoming books for the Book of the Month Series which is very popular with all of you:

The December/January (2016) and February (2017) Book of the Month: - COMPLETE

Note: This is/was a long book - hence the need for three months - sort of apropos for the political season that we just completed

Democracy in America by Alexis de Tocqueville

by Alexis de Tocqueville

The March 2017 Book of the Month: - COMPLETE

Lindbergh by A. Scott Berg

by A. Scott Berg (no photo)

The April 2017 Book of the Month: - COMPLETE

Black Flags: The Rise of ISIS by Joby Warrick

by Joby Warrick

The May 2017 Book of the Month: - COMPLETE

Custer's Trials: A Life on the Frontier of a New America by T.J. Stiles

by T.J. Stiles (no photo)

The June 2017 Book of the Month: - COMPLETE

The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen

by Viet Thanh Nguyen

The July 2017 Book of the Month: - COMPLETE

Barbarian Days: A Surfing Life by William Finnegan

by William Finnegan (no photo)

The August 2017 Book of the Month: - COMPLETE

The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead

by Colson Whitehead

The March 2018 Book of the Month: - COMPLETE

H is for Hawk by Helen MacDonald

by Helen Macdonald

The April 2018 Book of the Month: - COMPLETE

Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis by J.D. Vance

by J.D. Vance

The May 2018 Book of the Month: - DELAYED AND WE ARE READING THIS CURRENTLY

Winter is Coming: Why Vladimir Putting and the Enemies of the Free World Must Be Stopped by Gary Kasparov

by Garry Kasparov

The June 2018 Book of the Month - DELAYED BUT COMING UP

The Black Presidency: Barack Obama and the Politics of Race in America by Michael Eric Dyson

by Michael Eric Dyson

The July 2018 Book of the Month - DELAYED BUT COMING UP

The Romanovs: 1613-1918 by Simon Sebag Montefiore

by Simon Sebag Montefiore

We look forward to your participation.

New Year - New Beginnings - welcome to the Book of the Month Series for 2017.

Good choices. I already read a few of them.

Great Helga. I hope you will join in on the conversation.

I will.

Some good selections on here, and a few I actually have on my bookshelf. Not sure my timing will coincide, but hope to participate in one or two of these. Good line-up.

Hope to have you join me Alisa - I like the company (smile) and of course yours.

Might join in May if I can squeeze in the time.

That would be nice Brina - event notifications will be sent out for all of these. The Lindbergh one is out.

by A. Scott Berg (no photo)

I saw for the March read but I have other commitments. Happy for the reminders so I can reserve books in advance.

That is good - Easier for the books of the months to give folks more of a heads up.

Hi,

I'm looking at this list am I'm noticing that the vast majority don't really classify primarily as history. Some are hardly history at all (H is for Hawk, Barbarian Days). Most of the ones that could be classified as history deal more with current politics or relatively recent events (Black Flag, Winter is Coming, The Black Presidency). Two of them are fictional novels (The Sympathizer, The Underground Railroad). Even those that could solidly be called history are biographies/memoirs about the life of a single person (Lindbergh, Custer's Trials).

I'm sure these are great book - all but two (H is for Hawk, The Black Presidency) are rated above or within a few points of 4.0, which on this site is usually the standard for a really good book. I'm also sure that the curators put a lot of thought into choosing these titles, and I don't want to put down any of their hard work. I'm just noting that the choices are quite peculiar.

There are so many really good real history books out there that can legitimately be called history, and this group has covered many of them over the years- The Day of Battle, Rubicon, Catherine the Great, Battle Cry of Freedom, A Distant Mirror. But why are there so few highly rated unambiguously history books? Classic titles like: The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, The Guns of August, Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee, Unbroken, Undaunted Courage, The Devil in the White City, A Short History of Nearly Everything, 1491, The Sleepwalkers, The Professor and the Madman, King Leopold's Ghost, The Making of the Atomic Bomb, The Gulag Archipelago, A People's Tragedy, Destiny of the Republic, A World Lit Only by Fire, Natasha's Dance, The Great Game, The Scramble for Africa, The Price of Glory, The Plantagenets, A History of the Jews, Crucible of War, Empires of the Sea, and so many more. I can go on on on, but I hope my point is clear: there are so many classics about general history that haven't been widely read that are so much more suited for a history book club than human interest memoirs, fictional novels, or political opinion books.

by Helen Macdonald
by William Finnegan(no photo)
by Joby Warrick
by Garry Kasparov
by Michael Eric Dyson
by Viet Thanh Nguyen
by Colson Whitehead
by A. Scott Berg (no photo)
by Max Hastings
by Tom Holland
by Robert K. Massie
by James M. McPherson
by Barbara W. Tuchman
by William L. Shirer
by Barbara W. Tuchman
by Dee Brown
by Laura Hillenbrand
by Stephen E. Ambrose
by Erik Larson
by Bill Bryson
by Charles C. Mann
by Christopher Clark
by Simon Winchester
by Adam Hochschild
by Richard Rhodes
by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
by Orlando Figes
by Candice Millard
by William Manchester
by Orlando Figes
by Peter Hopkirk
by Thomas Pakenham
by Alistair Horne
by Dan Jones
by Paul Johnson
by Fred Anderson (no photo)
by Roger Crowley

Joel, history has many facets and various genres involved - recent events count as history as do biographies and autobiographies. We also read historical fiction even though the BOTM - this month is considered a novel - the point of view and the actual historical events are quite accurate and poignant. The choices are made to appeal across a range of different group members from various countries and various backgrounds. The current book deals with Southeast Asia and Vietnam as well as the perspective of the Vietnam War from a person who was a Vietnamese by descent and was also a refugee. A great deal of history in our choices.

One other major point is that we are both a history and a non fiction book group so the other book of the month choices fall into that category.

I realize that you are relatively new to the group but we have already had many discussions about some of the books you cited: Catherine the Great, The Day of Battle, Rubicon, Battle Cry of Freedom and Distant Mirror are all ones we have completed. They are archived under specific topics of interest and the threads are there on our site.

We appeal to both history and non fiction readers as well as historical fiction. So we have a lot of non fiction topical folders too. Sometimes we even do a classic. We also do a Presidential Series and a Military Series so our interests are far reaching.

By the way, you can always sign up to lead a buddy read on a book of your choice; and I can help you do that.

In the meantime, this is just the list for the BOTM's which have a specific focus that you can read about in message one of this thread where it was explained.

Also we have quite a few multi thread discussions which do not move along as quickly including the one we have going on right now which deals with Roman History - SPQR.

There are a lot of places to get involved including our challenges - right now we have an Ireland challenge and a Japan challenge in gear and we have coming up the Koreas.

by Plato

by Robert K. Massie

by Barbara W. Tuchman

by James M. McPherson

by Rick Atkinson

by Tom Holland

These are the upcoming books - 2018 - and we are rescheduling the ones that were not able to be done as scheduled:

The March 2018 Book of the Month:

H is for Hawk by Helen MacDonald

by Helen Macdonald

The April 2018 Book of the Month:

Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis by J.D. Vance

by J.D. Vance

The May 2018 Book of the Month:

Winter is Coming: Why Vladimir Putting and the Enemies of the Free World Must Be Stopped by Gary Kasparov

by Garry Kasparov

The June 2018 Book of the Month

The Black Presidency: Barack Obama and the Politics of Race in America by Michael Eric Dyson

by Michael Eric Dyson

The July 2018 Book of the Month

The Romanovs: 1613-1918 by Simon Sebag Montefiore

by Simon Sebag Montefiore

We look forward to your participation.

I just finished Blood in the Water. Is this one being rescheduled?
by Heather Ann Thompson

Yes, I am moving it to a buddy read thread so that it is open ended and folks can join in and also read something else at the same time.

Look for the thread and event notification in the buddy read section by the end of the weekend.

On the citation - bookcover (you do not have to add the link) - everything else is perfect.

by Heather Ann Thompson