Use Fun Nonfiction to Cure at-Home Blues

Many folks tell me their forced COVID-19 at-home time has become 1) a surprising reprieve from their usual hectic life, or 2) a numbing stretch of isolated boredom. It means, either way, there's more room for contemplation, enrichment and education in our lives, and there are some bestselling nonfiction books waiting to not only help fill the void but provide perspective in our current crisis. Just start with picks on the New York Times' nonfiction bestsellers list. For those obsessed with understanding pandemic challenges, there's The Great Influenza, by John M. Barry, an overview of the 1918 flu epidemic and a cautionary tale for the current large-scale outbreak. For those obsessed with the unifying power of great rhetoric and leadership (or lack of both), there is No. 1 on the list, The Splendid and the Vile, by the inimitable Erik Larson, about how British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, with stirring and calculated speeches, brought his nation back from the brink during the 12 turbulent months of the Blitz, stretching from May of 1940 to May of 1941, based not only on documents of the powerful but moving stories of the powerless he inspired. Meanwhile, the Smithsonian Magazine has some nonfiction suggestions that may be apropos, too, such as Roadside Americans: The Rise and Fall of Hitchhiking in a Changing Nation, by Jack Reid. If you are my age or older, you can remember when hitchhiking was still a common mode of travel for the young, poor or free-spirited, relying on an assumption of communal good will. Reid traces its evolution from the Great Depression to the mid-1970s, when hitchhiking became a "taboo form of mobility reserved for desperate and often unsavory individuals." The shift in attitudes corresponds to a shift in culture and politics that is still with us, and it's worth considering the price of that loss of communal trust now that we must all pull together. And if you're looking to find and inspire your inner warrior in a crisis, read The War Queens: Extraordinary Women Who Ruled the Battlefield, by father-daughter duo Jonathan W. Jordan and Emily Anne Jordan. The authors present women leaders, from England’s Elizabeth I to modern figures like Golda Meir, who defied gender conventions to protect their kingdoms and even lead troops on the battlefield. For more ideas, see https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/five-new-nonfiction-books-read-while-youre-stuck-home-180974524/

Our Obsession With True Crime Tales

True crime stories, especially those focused on possible miscarriages of justice, are making their own headlines right now, and I admit to binging on Netflix's controversial "Making a Murderer," which raises questions of official misconduct in the murder convictions of Steven Avery and Brendan Dassey; the "Serial" podcast about Adnan Syed's 15-year-old murder conviction, which helped win him a hearing to seek a new trial; and now the FX miniseries about the O.J. Simpson case. Add in the growing number of TV true-crime series and fictionalized crime shows, and you may see a new addiction to televised reality mayhem. True-crime writing, on the other hand, is an old genre, littered with both lurid hack jobs and Pulitzer Prize-worthy insight. On the list of must-reads, I would recommend Pulitzer-winning The Executioner's Song by Norman Mailer about murderer Gary Gilmore's life and death; Edgar Award-winning The Devil in the White City, in which Erik Larson chillingly parallels a 1893 Chicago World's Fair architect building the fair's White City with serial murderer H.H. Holmes building a murder castle; Helter Skelter, Vincent Bugliosi's famed take on the Manson murders; The Onion Field, LAPD veteran Joseph Wambaugh's gripping tale of a policeman murdered in a Bakersfield onion field and its aftermath; In Cold Blood by Truman Capote, a literary exploration of the tragic intersection of two killers and a rural Kansas family; Homicide by David Simon, creator of "The Wire," about real detectives on the mean streets of Baltimore; and Mind Hunter by John Douglas, the eminent FBI profiler's exploration of twisted criminal minds. All have had tremendous impact. But before you jump into the grim details, you may want to ask yourself why you can't resist peeking at gory crime scenes and disturbed minds. See if you recognize yourself in these theories about our true-crime obsession by best-selling authors, journalists, psychologists, sociologists, movie directors and more: http://www.hopesandfears.com/hopes/now/question/216997-why-are-people-obsessed-with-true-crime