Thread by @CPhilHeller

#MyYearInBooks again had me focused on non-fiction, mostly on the crusades and ancient rome, but also some other topics and the occasional fiction. @goodreads

Some of the books that I liked a lot are listed below.🧵

goodreads.com/user/year_in_b…

1) "Crusading Warfare, 1097-1193" by R.C. Smail
A brief and concise introduction to the stated topic. While the book is by now a bit dated, I found it to be very readable for a non-specialist.

2) "Victory in the East: A Military History of the First Crusade" by John France

Starts a bit slowly with various campaigns in Western Europe I was not particularly interested in, but after that it was a nice in-depth presentation of the first crusade.

3) "The First Crusade: The Call from the East" by Peter Frankopan @peterfrankopan

Gives the very interesting Byzantine background to the first crusade and shows how the Byzantine emperor Alexios Komnenos tried to use the crusaders for his purposes with mixed success.

4) "Rome at War: Farms, Families, and Death in the Middle Republic" by Nathan Rosenstein

Tries to quantitatively assess whether warfare in the middle republic impoverished small farmers by withdrawing needed labour (probably not as small farms probably had a labour surplus).

5) "Chernobyl: The History of a Nuclear Catastrophe" by Serhii Plokhy @SPlokhy

Detailed account of the accident in Chernobyl. While "Chernobyl" is often taken as an example of the dangers of nuclear power, I came away seeing it as more of an example of the dangers of communism.

6) "Nuclear Folly: A History of the Cuban Missile Crisis" by Serhii Plokhy @SPlokhy

Extremely good book on the Cuban missile crisis featuring lots of material on the USSR's perspective and why the missiles were deployed in Cuba in the first place.

7) "The Grand Strategy of the Roman Empire from the First Century AD to the Third" by Edward N. Luttwak @ELuttwak

While this books is controversial among ancient historians, I enjoyed it. The controvers appears to be whether ancient states even had "grand strategies".
...

... but to me, as an economist, I felt quite comfortable and at home with analyses of actual behaviour "as if" there had been a grand strategy.

8) "The Voltage Effect: How to Make Good Ideas Great and Great Ideas Scale" by John List @Econ_4_Everyone

Great book popularizing some of John's research and work at companies, showing how to apply economic techniques in business settings.

9) "Artillery in the Era of the Crusades: Siege Warfare and the Development of Trebuchet Technology" by Michael S Fulton

Very cool study applying physics to study how effective siege artillery may have been.

10) "Baseball Trust: A History of Baseball's Antitrust Exemption" by Stuart Banner

Very readable history of why baseball has an exemption under US antitrust law. I suspect that an earlier application of economics to antitrust law in sport may have led to a different outcome.

There are many more I also enjoyed, so the list here is somewhat random. I also finally listened to Hyperion/Fall of Hyperion by Dan Simmons, which various ranking algorithms had for years suggested to me. I am glad they did, as I enjoyed both.