You Say You Want a Revolution...

'Boxers' & 'Saints', by Gene Luen Yang

These companion graphic novels tell the story of the Boxer Rebellion in two volumes. This innovative format presents two parallel tales about young people caught up on opposite sides of a violent rift. Saints tells Vibiana's story, and the companion volume, Boxers, tells the story of Little Bao, a young man who joins the Boxer Rebellion. Gene Luen Chang, an American-born Chinese author, brings his clear-eyed storytelling and trademark magical realism to the complexities of the Boxer Rebellion and lays bare the foundations of extremism, rebellion, and faith.

'Midnight's Children,' by Salman Rushdie

Saleem Sinai is born at the stroke of midnight on August 15, 1947, the very moment of India’s independence. Greeted by fireworks displays, cheering crowds, and Prime Minister Nehru himself, Saleem grows up to learn the ominous consequences of this coincidence. His every act is mirrored and magnified in events that sway the course of national affairs; his health and well-being are inextricably bound to those of his nation; his life is inseparable, at times indistinguishable, from the history of his country. Perhaps most remarkable are the telepathic powers linking him with India’s 1,000 other “midnight’s children,” all born in that initial hour and endowed with magical gifts.

This 1981 book has withstood the test of time, winning both the Booker Prize in 1981 as well as the "Booker of Bookers" in both 1993 and 2008. 

'Long Walk to Freedom: The Autobiography of Nelson Mandela'

Nelson Mandela was one of the great moral and political leaders of his time: an international hero whose lifelong dedication to the fight against racial oppression in South Africa won him the Nobel Peace Prize and the presidency of his country. After his triumphant release in 1990 from more than a quarter-century of imprisonment, Mandela was at the center of the most compelling and inspiring political drama in the world. 

Long Walk to Freedom is his moving and exhilarating autobiography, destined to take its place among the finest memoirs of history's greatest figures. Here for the first time, Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela told the extraordinary story of his life -- an epic of struggle, setback, renewed hope, and ultimate triumph.

'1776,' by David G. McCullough

In this masterful book, David McCullough tells the intensely human story of those who marched with General George Washington in the year of the Declaration of Independence--when the whole American cause was riding on their success, without which all hope for independence would have been dashed and the noble ideals of the Declaration would have amounted to little more than words on paper.

Based on extensive research in both American and British archives, 1776 is a powerful drama written with extraordinary narrative vitality. It is the story of Americans in the ranks, men of every shape, size, and color, farmers, schoolteachers, shoemakers, no-accounts, and mere boys turned soldiers. And it is the story of the King's men, the British commander, William Howe, and his highly disciplined redcoats who looked on their rebel foes with contempt and fought with a valor too little known.

'When We Rise: My Life in the Movement,' by Cleve Jones

A book about a revolution of a different kind.

Cleve Jones lived through many turning points in queer history, from his entire existence being criminalized to losing so many of his friends to being able to live out loud with his community. Jones’s memoir provides a look into the queer history of the 1970s in San Francisco and traces the beautiful task of the AIDS Memorial Quilt. He launched many initiatives and programs to help ease his friends’ suffering, and consistently focused on justice for queer people. However, this isn’t just a tragic history. Jones had a joyful, exciting life and refused to be stomped down in a world that didn’t want to listen to him.

'1917,' by Arthur Herman

In April 1917, Woodrow Wilson--champion of American democracy but also of segregation, advocate for free trade and a new world order based on freedom and justice--thrust the United States into the First World War in order to make the "world safe for democracy"--only to see his dreams for a liberal international system dissolve into chaos, bloodshed, and betrayal.

That October, Vladimir Lenin--communist revolutionary and advocate for class war and "dictatorship of the proletariat"--would overthrow Russia's earlier democratic revolution that had toppled the powerful czar, all in the name of liberating humanity--and instead would set up the most repressive totalitarian regime in history, the Soviet Union. 

In this incisive, fast-paced history, the New York Times bestselling author Arthur Herman brilliantly reveals how Lenin and Wilson rewrote the rules of modern geopolitics. Prior to and through the end of World War I, countries marched into war only to advance or protect their national interests. After World War I, countries began going to war over ideas. Together Lenin and Wilson unleashed the disruptive ideologies that would sweep the world, from nationalism and globalism to Communism and terrorism, and that continue to shape our world today.

'The Death of Artemio Cruz,' by Carlos Fuentes

As the novel opens, Artemio Cruz, the all-powerful newspaper magnate and land baron, lies confined to his bed and, in dreamlike flashes, recalls the pivotal episodes of his life. Carlos Fuentes manipulates the ensuing kaleidoscope of images with dazzling inventiveness, layering memory upon memory, from Cruz’s heroic campaigns during the Mexican Revolution, through his relentless climb from poverty to wealth, to his uneasy death. Perhaps Fuentes’ masterpiece, The Death of Artemio Cruz is a haunting voyage into the soul of modern Mexico.