Europe

Europe, no not that Europe, this Europe, and there is quite the difference too I can. One an eighties throw back while the other is the heaviest book (not in the metaphorical sense) I've read since Denzien and Lincoln and there  love of all things question related. There are times I wonder why history as a subject never progressed for me beyond third year (I think formal education stopped somewhere between the Romans and The Easter Rising) but  on other more lucid occasions I realise that an inability of mine to remember dates would have been a hindrance  in the pursuit of gainful employment in the field of history (or else I could have just purchased this software). Of course that piece of software assumes by definition that time is linear but I think someone famous and kinda clever disproved that. 

Anyways I digress, back to the enormous tome in which a man (Norman Davies) who seems to know everything about everything (seriously the breadth of material is insane from Punk Rock to the War of Independance(British Pathé what a site)) charts a fasinating journey through European history with enough crammed in a single paragraph to keep you going for an age. In honour of all things historical and even though the lyrics are a bit on the mad side here is The Low Anthem and Charlie Darwin.