OUR FAVORITE BOOKS OF 2024
Our editorial team takes an ecumenical approach to our reading, seeking out excellent titles on a range of themes that interest us from a variety of publishers. We are fortunate to have had the pleasure to select from a bumper crop of edifying releases this year, and it is our pleasure to share with you a handful of those that captured our attention. Whether you are browsing on behalf of your personal library or seeking a gift for a friend or family member, we hope that these suggestions will provide you with some useful ideas.
And of course, if the history of geographical exploration intrigues you, we would be remiss if we did not also invite you to take a look at our own inaugural non-fiction title, Captain John Wood’s A Journey to the Source of the River Oxus, or for the fiction-minded, our first novel, a fresh paperback edition of John Buchan’s 1916 classic of wartime espionage, Greenmantle.
With our warmest wishes as we approach the chilly conclusion of 2024, and in great anticipation of the spirited discussions and exciting new titles to come in the new year, we remain, yours, &c.
The Ozymandian editorial team
The Untold Story of Books: A Writer’s History of Book Publishing
Michael Castleman
This book arrived on our doorstep as a joyful surprise one Friday evening earlier this year, sent by a treasured old friend with whom we had discussed our vision for creating a community-centric publishing operation that could give a new voice to the past. Castleman provides an insightful analysis of the book-publishing industry beginning with the days of Johannes Gutenberg, continuing through the rise of industrial printing and publishing’s ascendancy into the realms of big business, and finally reaching the contemporary digital era, where he speculates on how technology and competitive dynamics in the industry will shape the years to come. Informed by his decades of experience as an author, it offers a thoughtful insider’s perspective on the industry, and pleasantly, for a reader, it also tells its story with verve and at a rollicking pace.
Farnsworth’s Classical English Argument
Ward Farnsworth
Reading the latest installment in Ward Farnsworth’s excellent Classical English series is like eating an heirloom tomato fresh off the garden vine. It’s delicious, and it’s good for you. Drawing on the argumentation of Churchill, Lincoln, and other eminent practitioners, he offers a masterclass in debating technique supported by hundreds of carefully selected examples. Whether digested systematically or browsed at leisure, it will undoubtedly reward its readers.
The End of Everything: How Wars Descend into Annihilation
Victor Davis Hanson
Ever since first encountering his work on warfare in Ancient Greece in college, we have admired the depth of Victor Davis Hanson’s expertise and the clarity and power of his prolific historical writing. This thought-provoking book analyzes the downfalls of classical Thebes, Carthage, the Byzantines, and the Aztecs and invites us to contemplate our own contemporary situation with a greater wariness of how quickly the unthinkable can become the inevitable.
A History of the Muslim World: From Its Origins to the Dawn of Modernity
Michael Cook
Princeton professor Michael Cook’s magisterial history of the Muslim world has undoubtedly staked its claim among the definitive reference works in its field. Despite its vast scope and hefty weight in the hand, the book also strives to make its content accessible to the reader with helpful orientations at the beginning of each chapter, a collection of prefatory maps, and digestible divisions that facilitate selective browsing on topics of particular interest.
The Damascus Events: The 1860 Massacre and the Making of the Modern Middle East
Eugene Rogan
Oxford professor Eugene Rogan’s book chronicles the outbreak and aftermath of sectarian violence in Ottoman Damascus in 1860, in which a violent mob burned churches, razed monasteries, and massacred thousands of residents of the city’s Christian quarter over the course of eight terrifying days. A sobering reminder that such violence is not only a contemporary phenomenon, and an important work for understanding the history of modern Syria in particular, and the modern Middle East in general.
Should any of the titles above pique your interest, we have included Amazon links below for your convenience. Please note that we may be eligible for an affiliate referral incentive from Amazon for your purchase if you use these dedicated link buttons. We thank for your support of our mission.
