Last week, at my major book retailer day job, my boss watched me quickly pivot from recommending a sci-fi novel about a robot obsessed with soap operas (Martha Wells’ “All Systems Red,” the first in what fans fondly call “The Murderbot Series”) to suggesting a book about real life treasure hunters (Robert Kurson’s fantastic “Pirate Hunters”).
When the customer had gone, she turned to me and said, “Angie, actual question here: have you read every book in this store?”
“I’ve just got 16 years of product knowledge,” I confessed. “And a pathological need to encourage everyone around me to like the things I like.”
The hand selling is absolutely my favorite part of my nine-to-five job. And after spending the day curating a table of “unusual history” titles, I thought it was only right I share some of those gems with y’all, starting with:
1. “Gulp: Adventures on the Alimentary Canal” by Mary Roach
Mary Roach is a superb writer/polymath who’s covered a variety of topics – such as space travel, Spiritualism and sexuality, just to name three across several books, and you truly can’t go wrong with picking up any one of her titles.
But I have to recommend “Gulp,” which details the unusual science and historical discoveries surrounding the digestive system, out of purely self-serving reasons: Chapter five is all about a direct ancestor of mine, the French-Canadian voyageur Alexis St. Martin.
Alexis suffered a gut wound as a young man that resulted in a permanent opening into his stomach. A (very shady, very self-serving) Dr. Beaumont turned Alexis into his own personal guinea pig, studying the fluids he siphoned from the man and conducting odd experiments with food. Because of all of this, we know there are acids in the stomach that aid in digestion.
It feels fitting the most noteworthy figure in my family tree is a medical curiosity – but we’re all very proud of Alexis and his unique claim to fame, and give Roach’s assessment of him the proverbial stamp of approval.
2. “Ghostland” by Colin Dickey
Speaking of the strange and unusual: Dickey’s examination of the early days of Spiritualism and the rise of ghostly belief in America is a fascinating dive into both psychology and history.
Dickey doesn’t hesitate to shine a light on the darker sources of urban legends. The South, with its abundance of plantations, may have plenty of colorful stories about ghosts and tragedies, but that’s because so many of them are rooted in slavery and the Civil War.
And in the northern half of the country, rapid industrialization and the sicknesses that swept through major cities at the turn of the centuries only added further fuel to the fire of Spiritualism, making more and more people desperate to have proof of an afterlife, or willing to trust con artists in the hopes of communicating with a lost loved one.
All of this is wrapped up in frequently poetic, beautiful language, making “Ghostland” not just an informative book, but also a delight to read.
3. “Tough Mothers” by Jason Porath
With Mother’s Day right around the corner, now is the perfect time to snag a copy of “Tough Mothers,” the follow-up to Porath’s extremely successful “Rejected Princesses.”
A former animator for Dreamworks, Porath collected dozens of powerful ladies throughout history – most real, but some apocryphal – and paired succinct summaries of their influential lives with cartoony art.
These are ladies who are too wild, too violent, too complicated, too much to ever be given the Disney Princess treatment, but who absolutely deserve to have their stories spread far and wide.
“Tough Mothers” features mothers both literal (like Sojourner Truth, who sued to emancipate her son Peter from slavery) and figurative (like Mama Marsha P. Johnson, a trans icon who looked after the queer youth of New York City in the 70s and 80s).
And while some of the stories come with content warnings, there are plenty that are suitable for all ages, so this is a book you can read alone or with any teacup humans in your life.
4. “Shadow Divers” by Robert Kurson
With Mom covered, here’s something Dad will probably enjoy, especially if he’s as into WWII history as mine is.
In 1991, a team of divers discovered a peculiar wreck 60 miles off the coast of New Jersey. Following several years of retrieval efforts and investigation, the crew was able to prove that the wreckage belonged to a German U-boat that went down at the height of WWII – hundreds of miles closer to the U.S. than the closest recorded sinking.
Kurson has a knack for retelling nonfiction as if it were an action-packed adventure novel (see also the “Pirate Hunters” I mentioned above). And there’s no lack of drama in this story, with its history-rewriting discovery, the deaths of several divers in the pursuit of the truth and the dissolution of marriages and long-time friendships as tensions mounted.
5. “Dead Mountain” by Donnie Eichar
If you’ve spent any amount of time looking into unsolved mysteries, chances are good that you’ve already heard of the Dyatlov Pass. But in case you haven’t: in 1959 a group of Russian students hiked into the Ural Mountains and disappeared. Rescuers found their camp in a harrowing state of disarray, but it would be months before all of the bodies would be recovered.
Just what actually happened on that mountain? Was it a natural disaster, the result of a military test gone wrong, simple murder and madness, or even something paranormal? Over the decades, there have been dozens of theories and plenty of talk of Soviet cover-ups, but we still don’t have a definitive confirmation of the true events.
Eichar’s book is equal part recounting of the known evidence – including the photos taken by the ill-fated party and the teams of rescuers – as well as his own travelogue as he journeyed to Dyatlov Pass himself. It’s a relatively short and easy read, but it doesn’t provide any easy answers or pat closure. Instead, we’re left with plenty of questions and chilly unease.
But sometimes those are the best stories: the ones that shake you up, that are a little odd, and that leave you with plenty to think about.
ANGIE BARRY is a contributing columnist for Shaw Media. To suggest future topics for The B-List, which covers topics in pop culture, history and literature, contact her at newsroom@mywebtimes.com.