Meta-list for best non-fiction books of 2009
I've been reading lots of year-end "best of" lists, from serious outlets that is, and these are the books which I see recurring with special frequency:
1. Richard Holmes, The Age of Wonder: How the Romantic Generation Discovered the Beauty and Terror of Science.
2. Cheever: A Life, by Blake Bailey.
3. David Grann, The Lost City of Z: A Tale of Deadly Obsession in the Amazon.
4. Gordon Wood, Empire of Liberty: A History of the Early Republic.
5. Columbine, by David Cullen.
8. By Greg Grandin, Fordlandia: The Rise and Fall of Henry Ford's Forgotten Jungle City.
9. Liaquat Ahamed, Lords of Finance: The Bankers Who Broke the World.
10. Pops: A Life of Louis Armstrong, by Terry Teachout.
I thought all of those were well done but Lords of Finance was the only one I loved. My favorites are here and Lords arguably would be third on that non-fiction list of two. In fairness to the authors I've only browsed Gordon Wood (report coming soon) and I haven't yet read Pops but suspect I might like it very much (report coming soon).
If you wish, you can dig into some of the book source lists I used for this meta-list here. Have someone ready to throw you a rope.
Here are some "best albums" lists, if you wish to wade through those. They are harder to aggregate and I haven't found a useful way of doing it.