36 books for history lovers
It’s been a fantastic year for new history books, but which titles absolutely demand attention? Here's an index of our books of the year 2018 – as chosen by our panel of historians and experts – to help you choose the perfect book for a history fan this Christmas…
The full list of our Books of the Year 2018 was published in the Christmas 2018 issue of BBC History Magazine, on sale now. If you're a subscriber to BBC History Magazine, click here to read full reviews from our panel of historians and experts, including picks by Tracy Borman, Rana Mitter, Alison Weir and Simon Sebag Montefiore…
Medieval
The Restless Kings: Henry II, His Sons and the Wars for the Plantagenet Crown
by Nick Barratt (Faber and Faber) Chosen by Laura Ashe
The Western Wind
by Samantha Harvey (Jonathan Cape) Chosen by Nick Rennison
Spy stories
Invisible Agents: Women and Espionage in Seventeenth-Century Britain
by Nadine Akkerman (Oxford University Press) Chosen by Leanda de Lisle
Rise and Kill First: The Secret History of Israel’s Targeted Assassinations
by Ronen Bergman (Random House) Chosen by Simon Sebag Montefiore
The Spy and the Traitor: The Greatest Espionage Story of the Cold War
by Ben Macintyre (Viking) Chosen by Simon Sebag Montefiore
Asian history
The British in India: Three Centuries of Ambition and Experience
by David Gilmour (Allen Lane) Chosen by Dominic Sandbrook
A Business History of India: Enterprise and the Emergence of Capitalism from 1700
by Tirthankar Roy (Cambridge University Press) Chosen by Andrew Roberts
The Great Flowing River: A Memoir of China from Manchuria to Taiwan
by Ch’i Pang-yuan (Columbia University Press) Chosen by Rana Mitter
The Indian Empire at War: From Jihad to Victory, The Untold Story of the Indian Army in the First World War
by George Morton-Jack (Little, Brown) Chosen by Andrew Roberts
Tudors and Stuarts
Henry VIII and the Men Who Made Him
by Tracy Borman (Hodder and Stoughton) Chosen by Alison Weir
Heretics and Believers: A History of the English Reformation
by Peter Marshall (Yale University Press) Winner of the 2018 Wolfson History Prize
Patriot or Traitor: The Life and Death of Sir Walter Ralegh
by Anna Beer (Oneworld) Chosen by Tracy Borman
The Poison Bed
by Elizabeth Fremantle (Pegasus) Chosen by Leanda de Lisle
Thomas Cromwell: A Life
by Diarmaid MacCulloch (Allen Lane) Chosen by Leanda de Lisle and Laura Ashe
A Tudor Christmas
by Alison Weir and Siobhan Clarke (Jonathan Cape) Chosen by Tracy Borman
Empires
American Empire: A New Global History
by AG Hopkins (Princeton University Press) Chosen by Dominic Sandbrook
Lords of the Desert: Britain’s Struggle with America to Dominate the Middle East
by James Barr (Simon and Schuster) Chosen by Peter Frankopan and Dominic Sandbrook
Ottoman Odyssey: Travels Through a Lost Empire
by Alev Scott (Riverrun) Chosen by Rana Mitter
Modern history
The Colour of Time: A New History of the World, 1850-1960
by Marina Amaral and Dan Jones (Head of Zeus) Chosen by Laura Ashe
Crashed: How a Decade of Financial Crises Changed the World
by Adam Tooze (Allen Lane) Chosen by Anne Applebaum
Crucible: Thirteen Months that Forged Our World
by Jonathan Fenby (Simon and Schuster) Chosen by Rana Mitter
The Road to Unfreedom: Russia, Europe, America
by Timothy Snyder (Bodley Head) Chosen by Anne Applebaum
Crime and punishment
The Gallows Pole
by Benjamin Myers (Bluenose) Winner of the Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction
Only Killers and Thieves
by Paul Howarth (One) Chosen by Nick Rennison
Georgian and Victorian
Mrs Whistler
by Matthew Plampin (The Borough Press) Chosen by Nick Rennison
Napoleon: The Man Behind the Myth
by Adam Zamoyski (William Collins) Chosen by Anne Applebaum
Nelson in Naples: Revolution and Retribution in 1799
by Jonathan North (Amberley Publishing) Chosen by Andrew Roberts
Now We Shall Be Entirely Free
by Andrew Miller (Sceptre) Chosen by Nick Rennison
The ancient world
Empires and Exchanges in Eurasian Late Antiquity
edited by Nicola di Cosmo and Michael Maas (Cambridge University Press) Chosen by Peter Frankopan
Rome Resurgent: War and Empire in the Age of Justinian
by Peter Heather (Oxford University Press) Chosen by Simon Sebag Montefiore
Royal life
Behind the Throne: A Domestic History of the Royal House
by Adrian Tinniswood (Jonathan Cape) Chosen by Alison Weir
Kensington Palace: Art, Architecture and Society
by Olivia Fryman, Sebastian Edwards et al (Yale University Press) Chosen by Tracy Borman
Ma’am Darling: 99 Glimpses of Princess Margaret
by Craig Brown (Fourth Estate) Winner of the James Tait Black Prize for Historical Biography
Windsor Castle: A Thousand Years of a Royal Palace
by Steven Brindle (Royal Collection Trust) Chosen by Alison Weir
Social history
All Among the Barley
by Melissa Harrison (Bloomsbury) Chosen by Nick Rennison
A Field Guide to the English Clergy
by Fergus Butler-Gallie (Oneworld) Chosen by Peter Frankopan
Click here to find out more about the books featured in this year's list.
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