My Favorite Reads of ’24

I believe the Blogger’s Manual allows me up to a week after New Year’s Day to reflect back on the previous 12 months. Since we’re still in that window I’d like to recap my ten favorite books of 2024. These are not necessarily books published last year, but just books I happened to read in ’24. Here they are.

The Bloody Shirt by Stephen Budiansky. This is one of three books I read last year which gave me a much better understanding of the periods just before or just after the Civil War. The literal “bloody shirt” was a blood-soaked garment that was allegedly brought to the floor of the House of Representatives in 1871 and waved about by Republicans as evidence of brutal attacks by Southerners on freed slaves, white Republicans and Federal troops. While the shirt waving never happened, Southern Democrats portrayed it essentially as an example of what we might call today “virtue signaling” on the party of Radical Republicans. The book starts with that, but then goes on to describe the real atrocities committed by Southerners intent on resisting Reconstruction and the eventual loss of will on the part of the North, the retreat from Reconstruction and the resulting century of what was essentially an extension of slavery.

The Fall of the House of Dixie by Bruce Levine. Just as The Bloody Shirt describes Reconstruction, Levine’s book provides a riveting description of the culture and politics of the Old South which Reconstruction was intended to replace. There are aspects of that culture that would be comical if they weren’t ultimately so tragic. Southern plantation owners had a ridiculous sense of “honor” and felt the need to be deeply offended by the smallest slight. That played a role in sparking the Civil War. More important was the overall social structure in which poor whites, who could never afford slaves, supported and fought and died for a system that was not in their best economic interests because slaves gave them a lower rung on the social ladder to look down on.

The Demon of Unrest by Erik Larson. I’ve loved everything Larson has written, starting with Devil in the White City and his latest book before this one, The Splendid and the Vile. This book completed my Civil War trilogy last year. It covers the period from Lincoln’s election in 1860 to the attack on Fort Sumter that sparked the Civil War. What I learned was how reluctant most Southern states were to leave the Union and how desperate Lincoln was to keep the border states in the fold. In late 1860 and early 1861 a bloody and long civil war did not seem inevitable. It was dozens of incremental events and decisions that led us along that path.

Hellbound on His Trail by Hampton Sides. Sides is a master storyteller. I especially enjoyed his 2014 book In the Kingdom of Ice, which tells the story of 1870’s polar expedition that gets trapped in the ice. Hellbound was an earlier book (2010) that provides an account of the manhunt to find James Earl Ray, the assassin of Martin Luther King, Jr. Along the way, Sides writes Ray’s biography. He’s the consummate loser, but he also has inherited the virulently racist culture of the Old South. Reading this one in the context of the three previous books helps make sense of it.

Countdown 1960 by Chris Wallace. The former Fox newsman has hit on a simple and compelling formula to recount history. He reports on events as they mounted toward a specific day and well-known result. So, in Countdown 1945 he told the history of the development of the nuclear bomb ultimately dropped on Hiroshima on August 6, 1945. In Countdown 1960 he recounts events leading up to the November presidential election that year. That could be well-trodden territory, but Wallace’s account brings out details of John Kennedy’s connections to organized crime leaders and Richard Nixon’s grace in accepting a result that was, at best, questionable. There’s no absolute proof that JFK stole the election, but there’s no question that his allies in Illinois and Texas manufactured votes for him. That part of the story is told with restraint. This isn’t an expose. But overall Kennedy comes out worse and Nixon better than is common belief.

Escape From the Deep by Alex Kershaw. Kershaw is another of my favorite writers. He writes mostly about WW II. This one is about an American submarine disabled on the floor of the ocean and the struggle of its sailors to escape. They use a technique taught to them in submariners school that had never actually worked in the past. It’s a harrowing account to say the least.

The Bedford Boys by Alex Kershaw. I enjoyed Escape so much that I grabbed another of his books, this one about the soldiers from Bedford, Virginia who signed up for the Army during the Depression simply to have a job. They find themselves thrown into the first wave on D-Day, in part because, as National Guard troops, they’re considered canon fodder. In fact, because they had joined long before America entered WW II, they were older than most other troops. That day Bedford lost 19 of its sons in a town of only 3,000 people.

Supreme City by Donald Miller. Miller has written two of the best books I’ve read about cities, this one and City of the Century about Chicago. Miller planned a third book about L.A. in his trilogy. I hope it appears someday. Supreme City tells the story of New York in the 1920’s and 30’s, a city of big characters — gangsters, actors, real estate moguls and politicians. Like City of the Century, Miller has a knack for getting at the heart of a city, what its soul is about.

City of Scoundrels by Gary Krist. In 1919 things were looking up for Chicago. Like New York at the same time, things were bustling as the country shook off the constrictions of WW I. Then, over a mere 12 days that summer, everything went to hell. A blimp crash in the Loop killed a dozen people followed quickly by a race riot on the city’s South Side. Then the city was crippled by a transit strike and the week was topped off by the gruesome murder of a young girl. Krist’s book is a study of how a vibrant city, a place with a lot of people and a lot of energy can do wonderful things — or horrible things. And it’s a story of civic capacity — what resources does a city have in place to deal with catastrophes? In this case, not enough.

War on the West by Douglas Murray. Why is the West so self-loathing? That’s the question Murray tries to answer in this riveting book. It’s a familiar theme to YSDA readers. We champion free speech, free markets, reason, the rule of law — all those things that have built the prosperity and freedom we enjoy today. And yet, the very beneficiaries of all this — especially on the left — see only “oppression.” Another good book along these same lines is Jonah Goldberg’s Suicide of the West and only tangentially related, but also very good, is Stephen Pinker’s Enlightenment Now.

Well, that’s my list for 2024. I’m looking forward to more good reading in the new year. Who knows? Maybe I’ll even read a novel.