Rating: 8.3/10. Book about a recent expedition to explore a lost city in the jungles of Honduras. In 2015, a group of explorers and archaeologists discovered ancient ruins that were previously unknown to Europeans and had been abandoned for around 500 years; this book describes how this place was discovered, the expeditions to first study…
Category: World
Men of Maize by Miguel Angel Asturias
Rating: 7.0/10. Novel that is a work of Latin American magical realism by Guatemalan author and Nobel Prize winner in Literature, Miguel Ángel Asturias. It is challenging to pinpoint exactly what is happening or what the book is about. Broadly speaking, it depicts the struggles between the indigenous Maya people and the maize-growers from a…
A Ticket to the Grand Show by Neil McKinnon
Rating: 7.3/10. A Ticket to the Grand Show: Journeys Across Cultural Boundaries by Neil McKinnon A collection of travel notes from various countries that the author visited, mostly in the 80s-90s, and reflections on how cultures differ in ways that are non-obvious. Through numerous examples, both Canadians and other cultures perceive surprising differences, and being…
Sea People: The Puzzle of Polynesia by Christina Thompson
Rating: 8.4/10. Book covering the history of the Polynesians and how we came to know about them. The prologue begins in the Hawaiian Islands, first discovered by Cook in 1778 (one of the last major European discoveries. Cook’s arrival coincided with a festival, so he was initially warmly welcomed, but he was later killed there….
Tangi by Witi Ihimaera
Rating: 7.6/10. A notable New Zealand novel, published in 1973, it is one of the first novels by a Maori writer. It describes a tangi (a funeral), and there is not much plot in the novel, instead it follows the protagonist as he discovers his father has died, prompting him to return to his home…
Wanderers, Kings, Merchants by Peggy Mohan
Rating: 8.3/10. Wanderers, Kings, Merchants: The Story of India Through its Languages by Peggy Mohan Book about the languages of India and its history, written by a linguistics researcher, focusing on language change and how languages evolved through contact over time. It is an enjoyable read for anybody interested in linguistics, especially about languages that…
Growth of the Soil by Knut Hamsun
Rating: 7.4/10. Novel of Norwegian literature, won the Nobel Prize in 1920; it tells the story of a homesteader named Isak in Northern Norway around 1850. The narrative begins with Isak settling in an untouched wilderness, far from any other settlement, where he starts building a home from scratch. Shortly after, his wife, Inger, arrives…
Independent People by Halldor Laxness
Rating: 7.8/10. Work of Icelandic literature that won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1955, the novel focuses on a farmer named Bjartur and his quest for “independence,” which he defines as being free from debts and obligations to anyone else. The novel describes Bjartur’s life as a sheep farmer in the harsh Icelandic landscape,…
The Feast of the Goat by Mario Vargas Llosa
Rating: 8.2/10. Historical novel by a Peruvian novelist about Rafael Trujillo, the dictator of the Dominican Republic for 31 years from 1930 to 1961. The book is largely based on true historical events and includes many real historical figures, but also introduces some fictional characters and events. These never conflict with what might have actually…
Gone Viking by Bill Arnott
Rating: 7.7/10. This book is a travel diary journal about the Viking world, mostly taking place in locations visited by the Vikings, such as the UK, Iceland, and Scandinavia (although it’s not limited to these places and also describes places that have no connection to the Vikings, like Hawaii, Haida Gwaii, and Italy). The term…
The Gates of Europe: A History of Ukraine by Serhii Plokhy
Rating: 7.6/10. Book about the history of Ukraine from ancient times until 2021, when the book was written. Ukraine was always on the frontier between Europe and Asia, for most of his history, the area was known as “Rus” or “Little Russia”, but they rarely ever were able to form their own state, rather they…
One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
Rating: 7.7/10. A short novel that describes life in a Soviet Gulag in the Arctic in the 1950s. The author himself spent several years in the Gulag; this is one of the first published books that revealed the inner details of the Gulag system, and controversially, it was allowed to be published in the Soviet…