I just lost a longish post to you - will get back to you later. Happy to see more posts re books.

I most enjoy good, contemporary fiction as long as it's based on fact. Current favourites: "The Surgeon of Crowthorne" - renamed for US market, google it for US title. Based on an assistan surgeon on the Civil War US battlefields. Began there but ended in England with the compilation of first edition Concise Oxford Dictionary - the fellow was eventually re-patriated home to USA, (from a lunatic asylum) to neglected grave in NY, I think. Forget author, been a couple of years since I read it. Another "Longitude" re Englishman who devised how to establish longitude thereby making shipping safer and better maps. Last, "Sun, Sand and Stars" by Antoine de Saint Expury - a pilot/philospher who was one of a small band to first fly over the Alps in France, delivering mail, (in cloth and timber frame bi-planes). My first serious reading as a kid was two: Deeslayer, and The Last of the Mohicans.