I feel like kinduva dumbass for suggesting it, but I recently (finally) read McCullough's 'Johnstown Flood' and it made me nervous, excited, and ultimately angry. I loved it.

Also read recently
-The Warmth of Other Suns, a history of the Great Migration - http://isabelwilkerson.com/ - also enjoyable.

-Two of Elijah Wald's fascinating books on music history
1. Josh White: Society Blues - explores White's evolution as a major entertainer from the '30s through the '60s, and its impact and implications on society as well as popular and folk musics
2. Escaping the Delta - nominally a biography of Robert Johnson, the bio details are an excuse for Wald to explore & evaluate the mythology of the blues and the origins of that mythology. Makes a great companion piece to Society Blues.

And since I know you like the four color funnies, if you haven't read 'Ten Cent Plague,' you really really should. It's terrific. http://www.davidhajdu.com/books/TenCentPlague.html

-------
so I'm in a band now:
album ---> http://greenwoodburns.bandcamp.com/releases
Soundcloud ---> http://soundcloud.com/greenwood-burns

my own stuff -->http://soundcloud.com/lonesomedstringband

avy by buckshot_defunct