Book picks similar to
Communism on Tomorrow Street: Mass Housing and Everyday Life after Stalin by Steven E. Harris


building-habitation
werewolf-white-northern-european
werewolfmachine-island
europe-siberia

The Ghost Ships of Archangel: The Arctic Voyage That Defied the Nazis


William Geroux - 2019
    Despite the risks, they had a better chance of survival than the rest of Convoy PQ-17, a fleet of thirty-five cargo ships carrying $1 billion worth of war supplies to the Soviet port of Archangel--the limited help Roosevelt and Churchill extended to Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin to maintain their fragile alliance, even as they avoided joining the fight in Europe while the Eastern Front raged.The high-level politics that put Convoy PQ-17 in the path of the Nazis were far from the minds of the diverse crews aboard their ships. U.S. Navy Ensign Howard Carraway, aboard the SS Troubadour, was a farm boy from South Carolina and one of the many Americans for whom the convoy was to be a first taste of war; aboard the SS Ironclad, Ensign William Carter of the U.S. Navy Reserve had passed up a chance at Harvard Business School to join the Navy Armed Guard; from the Royal Navy Reserve, Lt. Leo Gradwell was given command of the HMT Ayrshire, a fishing trawler that had been converted into an antisubmarine vessel. All the while, The Ghost Ships of Archangel turns its focus on Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin, playing diplomatic games that put their ships in peril.The twenty-four-hour Arctic daylight in midsummer gave no respite from bombers, and the Germans wielded the terrifying battleship Tirpitz, nicknamed The Big Bad Wolf. Icebergs were as dangerous as Nazis. As a newly forged alliance was close to dissolving and the remnants of Convoy PQ-17 tried to slip through the Arctic in one piece, the fate of the world hung in the balance.

A History of the Cuban Revolution


Aviva Chomsky - 2010
    Balances a comprehensive overview of the political and economic events of the revolution with a look at the revolution's social impact Provides a lively, on-the-ground look at the lives of ordinary people Features both U.S. and Cuban perspectives to provide a complete and well-rounded look at the revolution and its repercussions Encourages students to understand history through the viewpoint of individuals living it Selected as a 2011 Outstanding Academic Title by CHOICE

Kosovo: War and Revenge


Tim Judah - 2000
    Written by a seasoned journalist who witnessed the Balkan conflagration and its aftermath, it presents an analysis of the origins of the Serb-Albanian conflict, the course of the battle, the issues and personalities, and options for the future. In this second edition Tim Judah updates the story to, and beyond, the fall of Milosevic.

Doing the Best I Can: Fatherhood in the Inner City


Kathryn J. Edin - 2013
    Doing the Best I Can is a strikingly rich, paradigm-shifting look at fatherhood among inner-city men often dismissed as "deadbeat dads." Kathryn Edin and Timothy J. Nelson examine how couples in challenging straits come together and get pregnant so quickly--without planning. The authors chronicle the high hopes for forging lasting family bonds that pregnancy inspires, and pinpoint the fatal flaws that often lead to the relationship's demise. They offer keen insight into a radical redefinition of family life where the father-child bond is central and parental ties are peripheral.Drawing on years of fieldwork, Doing the Best I Can shows how mammoth economic and cultural changes have transformed the meaning of fatherhood among the urban poor. Intimate interviews with more than 100 fathers make real the significant obstacles faced by low-income men at every step in the familial process: from the difficulties of romantic relationships, to decision-making dilemmas at conception, to the often celebratory moment of birth, and finally to the hardships that accompany the early years of the child's life, and beyond.Read an excerpt here: Doing the Best I Can: Fatherhood in the Inner Cityby Kathryn Edin and Timothy J. Nelson by University of California Press

Occupy!: Scenes from Occupied America


Carla BlumenkranzAngela Y. Davis - 2011
    An unofficial record of this movement, Occupy! combines adrenalin-fueled first-hand accounts of the early days and weeks of Occupy Wall Street with contentious debates and thoughtful reflections, featuring the editors and writers of the celebrated n+1, as well as some of the world’s leading radical thinkers, such as Slavoj Žižek, Angela Davis, and Rebecca Solnit.The book conveys the intense excitement of those present at the birth of a counterculture, while providing the movement with a serious platform for debating goals, demands, and tactics. Articles address the history of the “horizontalist” structure at OWS; how to keep a live-in going when there is a giant mountain of laundry building up; how very rich the very rich have become; the messages and meaning of the “We are the 99%” tumblr website; occupations in Oakland, Boston, Atlanta, and elsewhere; what happens next; and much more.

Stalin: Triumph and Tragedy


Dmitri Volkogonov - 1989
    This book, the first of a trilogy written by Volkogonov on Stalin, Lenin, and Trotsky, takes advantage of the author's discoveries to reveal much heretofore unknown knowledge about Stalin's reign of terror in the early days of the Soviet Union. Photos.

How Race Survived US History: From Settlement and Slavery to the Obama Phenomenon


David R. Roediger - 2008
    Roediger explores how the idea of race was created and recreated from the 1600’s to the present day. From the late seventeenth century—the era in which DuBois located the emergence of “whiteness”—through the American revolution and the emancipatory Civil War, to the civil rights movement and the emergence of the American empire, How Race Survived US History reveals how race did far more than persist as an exception in a progressive national history. Roediger examines how race intersected all that was dynamic and progressive in US history, from democracy and economic development to migration and globalization.Exploring the evidence that the USA will become a majority “nonwhite” nation in the next fifty years, this masterful account shows how race remains at the heart of American life in the twenty-first century.

Between Dog and Wolf


Sasha Sokolov - 1980
    Language rather than plot motivates the story--the novel is often compared to James Joyce's "Finnegans Wake"--and time, characters, and death all prove unstable. The one constant is the Russian landscape, where the Volga is a more-crossable River Styx, especially when it freezes in winter. Sokolov's fiction has hugely influenced contemporary Russian writers. Now, thanks to Alexander Boguslawski's bold and superb translation, English readers can access what many consider to be his best work.