Which of these non fiction books would you recommend/read first?

[ShelfObsessed]

Hopefully the pictures of my Kindle collection work.

I’ve been in a reading slump for months and part of that is due to book paralysis as I’m terrible at choosing books.

I want to select 5 of these to read soon. Which would you suggest or which do you think you’d like to read to help me to narrow my Kindle selection down?

TIA

I've read Prairie Fires and the Charles Dickens biography and really liked both.

I really enjoyed Entangled Life. Much more fascinating than it sounds.

I haven’t no but I’ve been meaning to read Educated for some time now so that’s definitely going on the list too. Thank you!

I've read The Mitford Girls and the Charles Dickens, I'd go for the Mitford Girls out of the two.

Of those I’d choose a double bill of The Mitford Girls and Kick or Prairie Fires

Prairie Fires is epic, she covers so much ground.

I would read Tunnel 29 and the ones about Sophie Scholl and Sylvia Plath.

Edit: to add Plath. Didn’t realise there was a third pic.

Entangled Life was mind-blowing!

Prairie Fires is really good but it does help to be a massive Laura Ingalls Wilder fan.

I’d start with the Tomalin Dickens biography, then The Mitford Girls, then William Dalrymple’s Anarchy, then Prairie Fires.

The Mitford girls and Chinese parents book. Both good

I've not read any of those books but I loved Mary S. Lovell's biography of Bess of Hardwick Hall so I'd go for the Mitford Sisters first. Prairie Fires is consistently highly rated on 50 bookers so I'd read that (love the Little House books). And finally, I love William Dalrymple on the Empire podcast and so I'd read The Anarchy third (I've got his White Mughals book on my TBR).

I’ve just read Prairie Fires, and it suffers from several problems to do with the source material. The part to do with Laura’s childhood as fascinating because it teases out fact from the carefully curated fiction of the Little House books, but then there are decades of her and Almanzo barely getting by in the Ozarks when all she does is give speeches and write folksy columns about being a farm wife where we spend much more time with her unstable, unpleasant daughter Rose, who hated Laura even though she seemed unable to stop being enmeshed with her. Once they start collaborating on the LH books, it gets interesting again, as we see things Laura wanted to put in and Rose took out, but again, that’s quite short, and surrounded by reams on Rose’s horrible obsessive politics and fallings out with people.

Loved Entangled Life

Children of Radium - I haven't read it yet, but I really want to

I really enjoyed Entangled Life. Fascinating.

I haven’t read any of the others though

@ShelfObsessed I'd go with Tunnel 29 first. It’s a real page-turner.

I'm a huge Dickens nerd and love the Tomalin biog but if you’re not really into all things Dickens it might drag a bit. Prairie Fires is also good but similarly, it’s long and you need to be quite invested in LIW, I think.

Coffee with Hitler is jaw-dropping but pretty fact-heavy and not a quick read. That’s not to condemn it at all, but if you’re in a slump, it might be better to start with something really gripping?

Not on the High Street is OK but I found it a bit underwhelming - pity, as I like Annie Gray normally.

I heard Children of Radium when it was on R4 as Book of the Week and it was fascinating but pretty grim. Good, though (I then bought it when it popped up as a deal).

I don’t know the others on your list (apart from Entangled, The Mitford Girls and the Post Office one) but I'm going to investigate them!

I haven't read any of these, so can't help with selection, but I will say one tip for decision paralysis is to stick all the titles into a random list generator and let it choose for you. Or look at the last digit of the time, and pick that number.

The main cure for decision paralysis is to find a way to force a decision and then in a case like this, just stick to it because it's not like you're rejecting the other options, you'll get to them eventually. (Sometimes you can use the random chance way to force a decision but then if you have a strong feeling against it, follow the feeling instead, either way the point is to stick with the choice you make!)

I've not read most of these but I enjoyed The Weirdest People on Earth, as a data geek 🤓

I'd line up the history books and read them all.