Stephen L. Carter, Columnist

Great History Books of 2016

Books about books, class, politics, presidents and consumerism.

December 27, 2016 at 1:30 PM UTC

Stephen L. Carter is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist, a professor of law at Yale University and author of “Invisible: The Story of the Black Woman Lawyer Who Took Down America’s Most Powerful Mobster.”

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Last year I inaugurated my list of some of the best history books of the year. With the end of the year upon us, it’s time for a second go-round. Regular readers know that I love history, and that I worry we pay far too little attention to it. So here are 11 of my favorite history books of the year. (I say “favorite” and not “best” because I don’t claim to have read everything. And I’m excluding books by people I know well.) There are my three favorites, and eight more that deserve honorable mention as truly excellent. All are in alphabetical order by author.

The favorites: