The nonfiction book I think I've recommended to other people more often than any other is David Hackett Fischer's Albion's Seed. Fischer provides massive information on all sorts of aspects of American life, from preferred clothing styles to beliefs about the supernatural, just the sort of thing you might want to know about in writing a historical novel or making up a fantasy world. He traces all of them to differences in regional culture in the British Isles. And he also discusses how the various American lineages views different political values and how this affected the presidential elections.
I also have a lot of regard for Jane Jacobs' Systems of Survival, a kind of modern Platonic dialogue about ethics that makes as much sense as anything I've ever read on the subject, and that also makes lively reading, in a way that few professional philosophers are capable of.
Thank you! Your recommendations make everything sound good! I wish I had time to read them all, but I'll certainly put them on a possible to read list.
Have you read _Making Book_, Teresa Nielsen Hayden's prior collection of essays?
Did Hornfischer mention pistol shrimp, in his discussion of tactics? They were making sounds that jammed sonar. The Americans couldn't figure out how to counteract the jamming effect, so they took advantage of it, to hide their submarines.
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I also have a lot of regard for Jane Jacobs' Systems of Survival, a kind of modern Platonic dialogue about ethics that makes as much sense as anything I've ever read on the subject, and that also makes lively reading, in a way that few professional philosophers are capable of.
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Did Hornfischer mention pistol shrimp, in his discussion of tactics? They were making sounds that jammed sonar. The Americans couldn't figure out how to counteract the jamming effect, so they took advantage of it, to hide their submarines.
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I think he might have in the earlier book.
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