I like memoirs and stories of real events...
Me, too. Ah, found the book about Custer. It's called
Son of the Morning Star; Custer and the Little Bighorn. I strongly recommend this book. It's written in a style that I adore. It starts during the battle, then backtracks and sidetracks, telling little backstories about no-name soldiers who survived the peripheral battles but who had trouble later in life, died old and happy in Brooklyn, stories of the natives, their cultures, along with bits and pieces from Custer's life. It's a wonderfully entertaining read.
By Michaelflanaganf - Being a librarian in the Bay Area I'm aware of a whole plethora of books that came out last year for the 100 year anniversary of the quake - one (which I haven't read) is '1906' by James Dalessandro.
One of my favorite books that takes place in this era in San Francisco is 'The Barbary plague : the Black Death in Victorian San Francisco' by Marilyn Chase. It's about the politics surrounding Bubonic Plague in San Francisco at the turn of the century - particularly regarding the racism towards the Chinese here. And there is a whole world of information about how San Francisco changed due to the plague - there was originally a poultry industry in the South of Market neighborhood that moved north. I was also interested that the endemic plague that exists in the Southwest originally came from this infestation in San Francisco.
Crack in the Edge of the World is a bit drier than I prefer, but it still has a core of very interesting reading. My favorite little trivia tidbit is how Charles Richter – he of the Richter Scale – was a vegetarian and a nudist and – from all his writings – quite a playboy who had innumerable conquests and ‘varied’ sexual activities.
As a friend of mine said, “Ah, why we love Californians…”
Thanks for the recommendation of
The Barbary Plague. Just my type of reading.
