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What to read about America’s culture wars

Four books on controversies that helped to shape the presidential election

A person carries a 'Stay Woke' sign during the 'Teach No Lies' march to the School Board of Miami-Dade County to protest Florida's new standards for teaching Black history, which have come under intense criticism for what they say about slavery, USA.
Photograph: AP

Editor’s note (November 6th 2024): This article has been updated.

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Young mother is reading a book to her two sons for a good night sleep. Night time with reading lamp.

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Hillary Rodham Clinton, wife of Democratic presidential candidate Bill Clinton, the Governor of Arkansas, is surrounded by supporters of her husband at a Washington campaign rally in 1992.

Books that imagine that history took a different course

What if Hitler had won and Hillary Rodham had broken up with Bill Clinton?


A disconnected phone sits inside Kaze-no-Denwa (the phone of the wind), a phone booth set up for people to call their deceased loved ones at Bell Gardia Kujira-yama in Otsuchi town, Iwate Prefecture, northern Japan.

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Six books about feelings that are both universal and unique to the person experiencing them


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Seven books on Israeli intelligence agencies, which are spearheading the offensive against Hizbullah in Lebanon

An introduction to Lebanon, perhaps the next front in a wider war

Four books and a film on a pivotal Middle Eastern country

What to read about modern feminism

An introduction to a large, evolving and controversial subject