Books worth contemplating reading

Journals and letters

The collected letters of Joseph Conrad
Anje van Maanen, Diary (Oosterbeek, 17–25 September 1944)
Lina Bögli, Forward. Letters written on a trip around the world (1904)
Søren Kierkegaard

History

Christopher Clark, The Sleepwalkers: How Europe Went to War in 1914
Emily Gilbert, Rebuilding Post-War Britain: Latvian, Lithuanian and Estonian Refugees in Britain, 1946-51
Walter Lord, A Night to Remember
John Maxtone-Graham, The Only Way to Cross

Reportage

Bernard Newman, Baltic Roundabout
Jean-Paul Kauffmann, A Journey to Nowhere: Among the Lands and History of Courland
Max Egremont, The Glass Wall: Lives on the Baltic Frontier

Thought

John Lester, Conrad and Religion
Curtis L. Thompson, Kierkegaard Trumping Trump: Divinity Resurrecting Democracy

Biographies

Margaret Siriol Colley, More than a Grain of Truth
Maya Jasanoff, The Dawn Watch: Joseph Conrad in a Global World

Theology

Jaroslav Pelikan, From Luther to Kierkegaard: A Study in the History of Theology
Robert Kolb, Carl R. Trueman, Between Wittenberg and Geneva: Lutheran and Reformed Theology in Conversation

Politics

Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America
John Pomfret, From Warsaw with Love: Polish Spies, the CIA, and the Forging of an Unlikely Alliance
Timothy Snyder, The Road to Unfreedom

Novels

Bernard Newman, The Red Spider Web. The Story of Russian Spying in Canada

Stories

Karen Blixen, Babette's Feast
William J. Locke, Ladies in Lavender

Places

England

Roger Scruton, Our Church: A Personal History of the Church of England
Emily Gilbert, Rebuilding Post War Britain: Latvian, Lithuanian and Estonian Refugees in Britain, 1946-51
Alan Macfarlane, The Origins of English Individualism

The Baltic Sea

Michael North, The Baltic: A History

Central Eastern Europe

Timothy Snyder, The Red Prince: The Secret Lives of a Habsburg Archduke
Timothy Snyder, Bloodlands: Europe Between Hitler and Stalin
Shachar M. Pinsker, A Rich Brew: How Cafes Created Modern Jewish Culture

Byzantium

Steven Runciman, Byzantine Civilization

Israel

Theodor Herzl, The Jewish State

Canada

Pierre Berton, The Last Spike: The Great Railway, 1881-1885

Russia, The Soviet Union

Bogumił Jasinowski, Wschodnie chrześcijaństwo a Rosja
Marian Zdziechowski, Od Petersburga do Leningrada