"This provocative work should be required reading as it challenges everything one thinks one knows about the history and future of humanity. I was riveted, irritated, and ashamed. The author's catty tone also makes this an amusing and eye-opening read."

"One of my favorite history books. It’s a story about the creation of the Oxford English Dictionary and of an epistolary and academic friendship between two men, one of whom (unbeknownst to the other) was an inmate at an insane asylum."

"With all of its inevitable sins of omission and generalization, this great compilation of Western philosophical ideas and currents from pre-Socratic times until the middle of the 20th century is an invaluable and accessible guide to our shared social history."

"A brilliant Pulitzer Prize-winning book about how the modern world was formed, analyzing how societies developed differently on different continents. I like how this is written from a biologist’s point of view rather than purely based on history or anthropology."

"A true story, which I love. Edmund de Waal writes the story of his family and the destruction of it through WWII. It’s told through the history of a collection of Japanese netsuke miniature sculptures. A beautiful and moving story."

"Zelig, by Woody Allen, just because I think it’s one of the most ingenious pieces of faux filmmaking and yet it’s hilarious and it has a sort of brilliant sense of history and a touch of absurdity and madness to it."

"Kinetic, profane, and operatic. This movie has the most simply badass shot in motion picture history: Robert De Niro sitting at a bar sucking down a cigarette as the camera slowly pushes in with “Sunshine of Your Love” on the soundtrack."

"Wasson bellydives into one of the deepest pools in Hollywood history. Along the way, he tells revealing stories about Jack Nicholson, Roman Polanski, and legendary producer Robert Evans—as well as dark secrets behind the making of Academy Award winner Chinatown."