History audiobooks, 2023 edition

In 2023, I listened to thirty-eight audiobooks that covered history, broadly defined. Some of these I had skimmed earlier, but this was my first time reading them straight through. Once again, I am glad to see so many recent university-press titles being released in this format.

I offer this list to let people know what’s out there on audio, without reviews or recommendations. But you can hear my praise for His Majesty’s Airship on Drafting the Past, episode 38. And in case you were wondering, I did teach an aviation history course this year.

Publication details come from Google Books. Please let me know if you spot any errors, such as the date of the paperback in place of the original publication date.

For previous years, see History audiobooks, 2022 edition and its links.

  1. Ackerman, Elliot. The Fifth Act: America’s End in Afghanistan. Penguin, 2022.
  2. Bruntlett, Melissa, and Chris Bruntlett. Building the Cycling City: The Dutch Blueprint for Urban Vitality. Island Press, 2018.
  3. Bunch, Will. After the Ivory Tower Falls: How College Broke the American Dream and Blew Up Our Politics—and How to Fix It. Harper Collins, 2022.
  4. Chachra, Deb. How Infrastructure Works: Inside the Systems That Shape Our World. Penguin, 2023.
  5. Cohen, Richard. Making History: The Storytellers Who Shaped the Past. Simon and Schuster, 2022.
  6. Colwell, Chip. Plundered Skulls and Stolen Spirits: Inside the Fight to Reclaim Native America’s Culture. University of Chicago Press, 2019.
  7. Cowie, Jefferson. Freedom’s Dominion: A Saga of White Resistance to Federal Power. Basic Books, 2022.
  8. Elmore, Bartow J. Seed Money: Monsanto’s Past and Our Food Future. W. W. Norton, 2021.
  9. Ferreiro, Larrie D. Churchill’s American Arsenal: The Partnership Behind the Innovations That Won World War Two. Oxford University Press, 2022.
  10. Fritzsche, Peter. Hitler’s First Hundred Days: When Germans Embraced the Third Reich. Oxford University Press, 2021.
  11. Gage, Beverly. G-Man: J. Edgar Hoover and the Making of the American Century. Penguin, 2022.
  12. Gandt, Robert L. Skygods: The Fall of Pan Am. Morrow, 1995.
  13. Gerstle, Gary. The Rise and Fall of the Neoliberal Order: America and the World in the Free Market Era. Oxford University Press, 2022.
  14. Goodheart, Adam. The Last Island: Discovery, Defiance, and the Most Elusive Tribe on Earth. David R. Godine, 2023.
  15. Goodman, Carly. Dreamland: America’s Immigration Lottery in an Age of Restriction. UNC Press, 2023.
  16. Gwynne, S. C. His Majesty’s Airship: The Life and Tragic Death of the World’s Largest Flying Machine. Simon and Schuster, 2023.
  17. Hemmer, Nicole. Partisans: The Conservative Revolutionaries Who Remade American Politics in the 1990s. Basic Books, 2022.
  18. Hernández, Kelly Lytle. Bad Mexicans: Race, Empire, and Revolution in the Borderlands. W. W. Norton & Company, 2022.
  19. Higham, Robin, and Mark Parillo, eds. The Influence of Airpower upon History: Statesmanship, Diplomacy, and Foreign Policy since 1903. University Press of Kentucky, 2013.
  20. Hodes, Martha. My Hijacking: A Personal History of Forgetting and Remembering. HarperCollins, 2023.
  21. Horowitz, Andy. Katrina: A History, 1915–2015. Harvard University Press, 2020.
  22. Kelley, Robin D. G. Hammer and Hoe: Alabama Communists during the Great Depression. UNC Press Books, 1990. 25th-anniversary edition, 2015.
  23. Kessner, Thomas. The Flight of the Century: Charles Lindbergh and the Rise of American Aviation. Oxford University Press, 2010.
  24. Laslie, Brian D. The Air Force Way of War: U.S. Tactics and Training after Vietnam. University Press of Kentucky, 2015.
  25. Lepore, Jill. If Then: How the Simulmatics Corporation Invented the Future. Thorndike Press, 2021.
  26. Lichtenstein, Nelson, and Elizabeth Tandy Shermer, eds. The Right and Labor in America: Politics, Ideology, and Imagination. University of Pennsylvania Press, 2016.
  27. Matzen, Robert. Mission: Jimmy Stewart and the Fight for Europe. Paladin Communications, 2016.
  28. Milov, Sarah. The Cigarette. Harvard University Press, 2019.
  29. Negroni, Christine. The Crash Detectives: Investigating the World’s Most Mysterious Air Disasters. Penguin, 2016.
  30. Oreskes, Naomi. Why Trust Science? Princeton University Press, 2021.
  31. Rauchway, Eric. The Great Depression and New Deal: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford University Press, 2008.
  32. Sabin, Paul. Public Citizens: The Attack on Big Government and the Remaking of American Liberalism. W. W. Norton, 2021.
  33. Spinney, Laura. Pale Rider: The Spanish Flu of 1918 and How It Changed the World. Public Affairs, 2017.
  34. Sturkey, William. Hattiesburg: An American City in Black and White. Harvard University Press, 2019.
  35. Sutter, Joe. 747: Creating the World’s First Jumbo Jet and Other Adventures from a Life in Aviation. Harper Collins, 2010.
  36. Thompson, Elizabeth F. How the West Stole Democracy from the Arabs: The Syrian Congress of 1920 and the Destruction of Its Liberal-Islamic Alliance. Grove/Atlantic, 2021.
  37. Zamoyski, Adam. Napoleon: A Life. Basic Books, 2018.
  38. Zegart, Amy B. Spies, Lies, and Algorithms: The History and Future of American Intelligence. Princeton University Press, 2023.