The Tea Party: A Brief History by Ronald P. Formisano

The nutshell: University of Kentucky historian Formisano’s account of the rise of the Tea Party explores whether its roots are truly populist, how much it has influenced the Republican party, and if it has staying power.

Literary lovechild of: Jill Lepore’s The Whites of Their Eyes: The Tea Party’s Revolution and the Battle over American History and Sidney M. Milkis’s Theodore Roosevelt, the Progressive Party, and the Transformation of American Democracy.

You’ll find it on your bookshelf if: You were out of the country, or the earth’s atmosphere, for the 2010 midterm election.

Cocktail party fodder: About 10 percent of all voters consider themselves Tea Party members first-and Republicans second.

For optimal benefit: Read before starting your own grassroots political campaign to revive the Whigs.

Snap judgment: Although Formisano is skeptical of what he calls “libertarianism with benefits,” this is an evenhanded history that stays away from sweeping generalizations.

The Wrong Complexion for Protection: How the Government Response to Disaster Endangers African American Communities by Robert D. Bullard and Beverly Wright

The nutshell: Looking at natural and unnatural disasters in the American South, sociologists and environmental justice advocates Robert D. Bullard and Beverly Wright argue not only that African Americans are hit disproportionately hard by events like hurricanes and oil spills but also that government agencies could do much more to prevent and mitigate the damage from these tragedies.

Literary lovechild of: Michael Eric Dyson’s Come Hell or High Water: Hurricane Katrina and the Color of Disaster and Dianne Glave and Mark Stoll’s To Love the Wind and Rain: African Americans and Environmental Protection.

You’ll find it on your bookshelf if: A hurricane blew away your previous book collection.

Cocktail party fodder: In 2001, FEMA ranked the top three catastrophic disasters most likely to occur in America: a hurricane in New Orleans, a terrorist attack in New York City, and an earthquake in San Francisco.

For optimal benefit: Read, then check out Dave Anderson’s photos of the Lower Ninth Ward in the five years after Katrina.

Snap judgment: Bullard and Wright offer ample evidence and are solution-oriented, yet their thesis feels like a foregone conclusion before they started on page one.

My First Coup D’Etat: And Other True Stories From the Lost Decades of Africa by John Dramani Mahama

The nutshell: Mahama, who was just sworn in as Ghana’s president, recalls growing up in Ghana after a 1966 military coup d’etat unseated the government of Kwame Nkrumah-sending Mahama’s father, a Parliament member, to prison.

Literary lovechild of: Ellen Johnson Sirleaf’s This Child Will Be Great: Memoir of a Remarkable Life by Africa’s First Woman President and Wangari Maathai’s Unbowed: A Memoir.

You’ll find it on your bookshelf if: You’ve ever worn a dashiki.

Cocktail party fodder: In Ghana, newborns are considered strangers or visitors.

For optimal benefit: Read while listening to your favorite Kofi Annan smooth jazz.

Snap judgment: A politician who writes like a novelist? Mahama may have entered the wrong profession, at least if we judge by the lovely vignettes that entwine his stories and a nation’s turbulent history.

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