Major funding for backstory is provided by an anonymous donor, the National

Dowment for the Humanities, the University of Virginia, the Joseph and Robert

Cornell Memorial Foundation, and the Arthur Vining Davis foundations.

From Virginia Humanities, this is backstory.

Welcome to backstory, the show that explains the history behind today's headlines.

I'm Joanne Freeman.

I'm Ed Ayers.

And I'm Brian Ballot.

If you're new to the podcast, we're all historians and each week we explore

the history of one topic that's been in the news.

If you come by the backstory office, you'll see that we get

sent scores of historical books each year, from scholarly monograines to new

biographies to big bold takes on the American past.

But which ones are any good?

So today, we're devoting the whole show to talking about the history books we

recommend as summer reads.

Throughout the show, Brian, Joanne and I will share our recommendations.

Our guest, Liza Mendy and Christina Baker Klein, will chime in too.

All our recommendations will be on our website at backstoryradio.org.

Okay, so Brian, start us off.

What do you recommend we read this summer?

Joanne and Ed, I think you know what I normally read over the summer.

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