Non-Fiction

Diamond, Jared. Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies. Offers up some biological theories of world history.

Friedman, Tom. The World is Flat. Globalization.

Hersey, John. Hiroshima. Events of the August 6, 1945 atomic bombing of Hiroshima as told by the survivors.

Hochschild, Adam. King Leopold's Ghost: A Story of Greed, Terror, and Heroism in Colonial Africa.

Pomeranz, Kenneth. The World that Trade Created. Short stories about economics, trade, and history.

Standage, Tom. The World in Six Glasses. Entertaining history of the world focusing on six beverages.

Stearns, Peter. Cultures in Motion. Cross-cultural interactions in the world. Lots of maps.

Tuchman, Barbara. The Guns of August. History of the first month of World War I.

Yergin, Daniel. Prize, The Epic Quest for Oil, Money and Power. History of oil.

Fiction

Achebe, Chinua. Things Fall Apart. Late 19th century Africa and the effects of imperialism and missionaries.

Allende, Isabel. House of Spirits. Life in Chile from the beginning of the 20th century through the assassination of President Allende in 1973.

Buck, Pearl S., The Good Earth. A Chinese peasant rises from poverty in the 1920s.

Conrad, Joseph. Heart of Darkness. Novella about imperialism on the Congo.

de Bernieres, Louis. Birds Without Wings. Decline of the Ottoman Empire and the life of Mustafa Kemel Ataturk.

Dickens, Charles. Hard Times. England during the Industrial Revolution.

Koestler, Arthur. Darkness at Noon. A man's interrogation during the Moscow show trials of the 1930s.

Mathabane, Mark. Kaffir Boy. Apartheid in South Africa.

Orwell, George. Animal Farm. Allegorical fable about communism.

Singh, Khushwant. Train to Pakistan. Story of a village on the frontier between India and Pakastan in 1947, and the relation of the Muslims and Sikhs who live there.