Finding good books
I recently came across this post whose author suggests ways they find good books to read. Here’s sharing some of their ideas:
Endnotes:
My most reliable method for finding books is in the endnotes of other books I enjoy. I don’t flip to every endnote, but if I’m reading a passage that intrigues me, I’ll look up the sourcing.
Personal recommendations:
Many books end up on my list via personal recommendations. I love talking about books and I get a lot out of reading what people recommend. They are often not the types of books I would pick out myself, for better and worse. But even if it’s not a book I liked I am usually glad I read it.
Catalogues of university presses:
Another way I find books is by paging through the seasonal catalogs for various university presses. Most of these books are written primarily for other researchers in the field. But sometimes I find gems in there on oddball subjects.
By subject of interest:
Some books get added to my list because there is a subject I want to read more about. My go-to resources here are the Ask Historians subreddit and fivebooks.com. These are my first steps in an intellectual journey. I’ll pick one or two books from there, usually a work from the late 20th or early 21st Century if I can. To my mind the finest historical scholarship occurred from roughly 1960 to 2010. It is recent enough that the endnotes will be a valuable resource for further reading, but not so recent you end up getting a more faddish interpretation of the period that may not stand the test of time.