Here are 53 books that Embassies in Crisis fans have personally recommended if you like
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I am a speaker, author, and academic. Originally from Rome, I now live in the Netherlands, where I lecture and do research on international and diplomatic history. My book examines the ethical and pragmatic dilemmas that characterized the making of the German-Israeli relationship after the Holocaust at the outset of the global Cold War. I value good reads and excellent conversations, and I held visiting fellowships in, among others, Berlin, Jerusalem, and Oxford. My work won a Dutch National Research Council grant, a major research grant from the Alfred Landecker Foundation, and the LNVH award for ‘Distinguished Women Scientists.’ These days, I divide my time between Rome, Berlin, and Utrecht.
Set in 1933-1934 Berlin, the book follows the U.S. Ambassador to Nazi Germany, William E. Dodd, and his daughter Martha, as they witness and experience the early years of Hitlerian rule in Germany.
It is a work of novelistic history that reads like a thriller assessing the dilemmas of diplomacy in the face of dictatorships.
It's Berlin, 1933. William E. Dodd, a mild-mannered academic from Chicago, has to his own and everyone else's surprise, become America's first ambassador to Hitler's Germany, in a year that proves to be a turning point in history. Dodd and his family, notably his vivacious daughter, Martha, observe at first-hand the many changes - some subtle, some disturbing, and some horrifically violent - that signal Hitler's consolidation of power. Dodd has little choice but to associate with key figures in the Nazi party, his increasingly concerned cables make little impact on an indifferent U.S. State Department, while Martha is drawn…
I am a speaker, author, and academic. Originally from Rome, I now live in the Netherlands, where I lecture and do research on international and diplomatic history. My book examines the ethical and pragmatic dilemmas that characterized the making of the German-Israeli relationship after the Holocaust at the outset of the global Cold War. I value good reads and excellent conversations, and I held visiting fellowships in, among others, Berlin, Jerusalem, and Oxford. My work won a Dutch National Research Council grant, a major research grant from the Alfred Landecker Foundation, and the LNVH award for ‘Distinguished Women Scientists.’ These days, I divide my time between Rome, Berlin, and Utrecht.
This is a book on one of the most dramatic periods in international history. Why were political leaders and diplomats in the 1910s unable to stop the world’s descent into chaos and global conflict?
In addition to providing exceptional detail on key historical episodes, the book also highlights how easy it is for localized conflict to escalate and expand, with disastrous consequences.
In The Sleepwalkers acclaimed historian and author of Iron Kingdom, Christopher Clark, examines the causes of the First World War.
SUNDAY TIMES and INDEPENDENT BOOKS OF THE YEAR 2012
The moments that it took Gavrilo Princip to step forward to the stalled car and shoot dead Franz Ferdinand and his wife were perhaps the most fateful of the modern era. An act of terrorism of staggering efficiency, it fulfilled its every aim: it would liberate Bosnia from Habsburg rule and it created a powerful new Serbia, but it also brought down four great empires, killed millions of men and destroyed…
I am a speaker, author, and academic. Originally from Rome, I now live in the Netherlands, where I lecture and do research on international and diplomatic history. My book examines the ethical and pragmatic dilemmas that characterized the making of the German-Israeli relationship after the Holocaust at the outset of the global Cold War. I value good reads and excellent conversations, and I held visiting fellowships in, among others, Berlin, Jerusalem, and Oxford. My work won a Dutch National Research Council grant, a major research grant from the Alfred Landecker Foundation, and the LNVH award for ‘Distinguished Women Scientists.’ These days, I divide my time between Rome, Berlin, and Utrecht.
The cyberspace is one of the new frontiers of global diplomacy, this is clear.
What this book also makes clear is that the core tenets of diplomatic practice–for example, about how to coordinate policies and maintain dialogue with partners and competitors alike–remain valid in times of massive online disinformation campaigns and cyberattacks.
The world has been sleep-walking into cyber chaos. The spread of misinformation via social media and the theft of data and intellectual property, along with regular cyberattacks, threaten the fabric of modern societies. All the while, the Internet of Things increases the vulnerability of computer systems, including those controlling critical infrastructure. What can be done to tackle these problems? Does diplomacy offer ways of managing security and containing conflict online?
In this provocative book, Shaun Riordan shows how traditional diplomatic skills and mindsets can be combined with new technologies to bring order and enhance international cooperation. He explains what cyberdiplomacy…
I am a speaker, author, and academic. Originally from Rome, I now live in the Netherlands, where I lecture and do research on international and diplomatic history. My book examines the ethical and pragmatic dilemmas that characterized the making of the German-Israeli relationship after the Holocaust at the outset of the global Cold War. I value good reads and excellent conversations, and I held visiting fellowships in, among others, Berlin, Jerusalem, and Oxford. My work won a Dutch National Research Council grant, a major research grant from the Alfred Landecker Foundation, and the LNVH award for ‘Distinguished Women Scientists.’ These days, I divide my time between Rome, Berlin, and Utrecht.
This is a classic ancient Indian text on diplomacy and one of the earliest books written in secular Sanskrit.
This book is many things–including one of the most comprehensive manuals on statecraft, which makes for a fascinating read and an important corrective to Western-centric conceptualizations of the history of diplomacy.
A comprehensive guide to everything you need to know about the principles of politics, statecraft, and warfare tactics. What makes a king powerful? What makes a kingdom undefeatable? What makes a government efficient? Kautilya' s Arthashastra answers all these questions and explores much more in this beautiful deluxe edition.A timeless classic from one of the greatest thinkers and strategists!• An easy-to-understand translation of the ancient Sanskrit text• A treatise on politics, philosophy, and military strategy• Discover why we need laws for efficient governance• A peak into one of the best minds of the Indian subcontinent• Text that had a major…
The World At War, the first and arguably best documentary about the Second World War, was on television when I was 14. It fuelled my interest in history, especially about the reasons for the rise of the Nazis. History has many lessons to teach–if we are willing to listen–and one of the great teachers is Germany between the wars. It was a time of extremes: economic crises, social unrest, much of which was caused by the Nazis, and a flourishing bohemian, liberal culture. This febrile environment in which characters struggle with their personal conflict makes for great story-telling potential.
As I read this riveting account, I felt like I was watching the events leading to the Munich Agreement of 1938. We all know the result of the agreement, but this book is much more than a historical account of what happened.
Harris tells the story through two friends who met at Oxford University in the 1920s. Now, one is an aide to British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain, and the other a senior German Foreign Office official. They join forces to try to stop Chamberlain from signing the agreement.
I was impressed with the skillful way Harris revealed the story, which the exemplary writing is matched in detail and tension.
At twenty-six I was living in Wuhan. I had been in China for a couple of years and was looking for a change. Not ready to go back home to New Zealand, I made my way across Europe, through the USA, and on to Argentina. Since that visit, I’ve followed Argentina's economic crises and scoured its newspapers for quirky crime stories. I started to send out true crime articles to various magazines. Eventually, I had enough material to write a novel. For years I’ve wanted to find a literary yet straightforward crime novel set in Argentina. The search goes on, but below are the best I’ve come across so far.
An atheist doctor, a former priest with wavering faith, and a whiskey-sodden British consul in sweltering Northeastern Argentina. The Honorary Consul has all the elements of a classic Greene novel. The author in his autobiography ‘Ways of Escape’ said it was his favourite work. Over the river from the small town of Corrientes is Paraguay and the American backed dictator, General Stroessner. In a muddle up Charlie Fortnam gets kidnapped by Paraguayan rebels hoping for an exchange of prisoners; the American Ambassador was the real target. The British government isn’t eager to get involved, Charlie is a sixty-year-old ‘honorary’ consul and alcoholic. Worse still he has recently married Clara, a young prostitute – not a becoming image at all.
When the alcoholic British 'Honorary Consul' in an Argentinian town is kidnapped by a band of revolutionaries, a local doctor negotiates with his captors and with the authorities for the man's release, but the corruption of both soon comes to the fore. From the author of OUR MAN IN HAVANA and THE HUMAN FACTOR.
I can’t remember a time when I wasn’t interested in Napoleon, although in what ways have shifted back and forth over time. His reforms shaped the Europe we live in today, as few other rulers have managed. To go to law, to buy and sell, to marry, be born, or divorce, all these actions belong to his Civil Code. That is why I took up the study of his regime and its work as a professional historian. His myth, his exploits, gripped me as a boy, and still do. So spectacular a rise and fall do not happen by chance. There was no one like him.
‘Game changer’ is a much-overused term for new academic books, but not in this case. Wolfram Siemann’s seminal biography of Metternich sheds a blinding array of new light on one of the most important figures of the age, and recasts forever our understanding of the politics and diplomacy of the Napoleonic period. At last, a great scholar has systematically exploited the private archives of the Metternich family, bringing new facts to bear on the key moments of the Napoleonic wars. It is simply indispensable, and HUP are to be saluted for making it available in English.
A compelling new biography that recasts the most important European statesman of the first half of the nineteenth century, famous for his alleged archconservatism, as a friend of realpolitik and reform, pursuing international peace.
Metternich has a reputation as the epitome of reactionary conservatism. Historians treat him as the archenemy of progress, a ruthless aristocrat who used his power as the dominant European statesman of the first half of the nineteenth century to stifle liberalism, suppress national independence, and oppose the dreams of social change that inspired the revolutionaries of 1848. Wolfram Siemann paints a fundamentally new image of the…
I’ve been a journalist for much of my life and have been passionate about history since I was a child. Ever since I visited a castle at age five, I’ve loved imagining the past and naturally ended up doing a History degree at Oxford. I love fact-based stories and am always meticulous in my research so that I can bring my readers with me on a journey of discovery. But what always brings history to life for me is focusing on the characters, real or imagined, who’ve made history themselves.
I liked the different perspective of this novel. The main character is an Irish priest in Rome who refuses to bow to pressure and toe the Nazi line by running an escape line for Allied prisoners of war.
It’s a story of courage and determination and is beautifully written, too. The characterisation is a masterclass in how to bring people to life.
Based on a true story, yet written with great skill and imagination, I
found it totally immersive. This was the first book I've read by this
author, but it won't be the last.
From the acclaimed, bestselling author of Star of the Sea and winner of the 2021 Irish Book Awards Book of the Year for Shadowplay, comes a gripping and atmospheric new novel set in occupied Rome.
September 1943: German forces have Rome under their control. Gestapo boss Paul Hauptmann rules over the Eternal City with vicious efficiency. Hunger is widespread. Rumors fester. The war’s outcome is far from certain. Diplomats, refugees, Jews, and escaped Allied prisoners flee for protection into Vatican City, the world’s smallest state, a neutral, independent country nestled within the city of Rome. A small band of unlikely…
I’ve always been drawn to stories that feature mysterious locales and secret objects and strange or magical occurrences, so books with these elements—particularly when the main characters in the books are young people learning about themselves and the world around them—are often very satisfying to me. There’s something naturally engaging, I believe, in tales where someone is thrust into a disorienting situation and has to make sense of the uncertainty he or she faces. The books I’ve written for young readers all tend in this direction, and so I’m always on the hunt for stories along these same lines.
This humorous, intelligent tale—about a diplomat’s son who befriends a troupe of young pickpockets in early-‘60s Marseilles—is a brisk read by a writer who cares as much about the rhythm of his sentences as he does the arc of his story. Before our hero knows it, he’s caught up in a life of excitement that begins to make sense to him—until it doesn’t. Full of surprises, including one that walloped this reader as much as it does the main character, this novel navigates a shadowy and unexpected world where young teens talk like seasoned criminals, and friendship itself is a risky proposition.
From the creators of the New York Times bestselling Wildwood Chronicles comes an original, humorous, and fast-paced middle grade novel about a band of child pickpockets—imagine The Invention of Hugo Cabret meets Oliver Twist.
It is an ordinary Tuesday morning in April when bored, lonely Charlie Fisher witnesses something incredible. Right before his eyes, in a busy square in Marseille, a group of pickpockets pulls off an amazing robbery. As the young bandits appear to melt into the crowd, Charlie realizes with a start that he himself was one of their marks.
My book recommendations reflect my experience as a former US government physician-diplomat, based overseas in Russia, Mexico, Europe, and South Asia, where I was involved in working closely with law enforcement and diplomatic negotiators in several highly sensitive, delicate, and dangerous hostage situations, both as a consultant and in providing medical support/care coordination to released hostages. I always found this work to be exhilarating and demanding, and it left me with the highest respect for law enforcement, diplomatic, and mental health professionals who work in this space. As a result, I’ve had additional formal training in hostage negotiation, negotiation psychology, and medical/psychological support to victims.
Picco’s book is a striking tale of his role as a UN diplomat in the 1980s and 1990s, where he worked tirelessly behind the scenes to negotiate and free numerous hostages held by Islamic terrorist groups in Lebanon.
He describes his meetings with key Israeli, Syrian, American, and Iranian interlocutors in extremely risky, high-stakes hostage negotiations; he was thought to have been one of the few Westerners to have ever met the late Imad Mugnihyah, leader of Islamic Jihad—and lived to tell the tale.
Picco is a true hero, and the released Lebanon hostages owed their lives to his compassion, courage, unbelievable endurance, and remarkable diplomatic gifts.
Can an unarmed man triumph in a land of terror and violence?
Man Without a Gun is the true story of a single UN diplomat's astonishing high-wire struggle for peace in the Middle East. UN secretary-general Javier Pérez de Cuéllar called the author "more of a soldier than a diplomat." And, indeed, his life is the stuff of John le Carré thrillers. But Man Without a Gun is more than a thriller: It is a real-life voyage through the maze of the secretive Middle East, the inside account of the political maneuverings that continue to dominate today's headlines, and the…
