BVBook Verdict

If you liked

Books like Charles Darwin's The Voyage of the Beagle:

Loved Charles Darwin's The Voyage of the Beagle: by Charles Darwin? Here are 10 books with a similar appeal — drawn mostly from history, ranked by how confidently we'd recommend them next.

10 books · ranked

  1. 1

    Sapiens

    Yuval Noah Harari · 2011 · History

    A sweeping history of humanity from the emergence of Homo sapiens in Africa to the present, arguing that what made humans uniquely powerful was the ability to create and believe in shared fictions — nations, religions, money — that allowed large-scale social cooperation impossible for other species. One of the bestselling non-fiction books of the 21st century.

  2. 2

    Guns, Germs, and Steel

    Jared Diamond · 1997 · History

    Why some societies came to dominate others, argued from geography rather than race; sweeping and influential.

  3. 3

    The Warmth of Other Suns

    Isabel Wilkerson · 2010 · History

    The Great Migration of Black Americans told through three unforgettable lives; monumental narrative history.

  4. 4

    Aesop's Fables

    Aesop · 1848 · History

    Aesop fables are a collection of fables credited to Aesop, a slave and story-teller believed to have lived in ancient Greece between 620 and 560 BCE.

  5. 5

    The great controversy

    Ellen Gould Harmon White · 1858 · History

    Short description of the plan of salvation and the final apocalyptic events of earth's history.

  6. 6

    Lysistrata

    Aristophanes · 1872 · History

    In Aristophanes' most popular play, sex is a powerful agent of reconciliation. As war ravages ancient Greece, a band of women, led by Lysistrata, promise to deny their husbands all sex until they stop

  7. 7

    The Innocents Abroad

    Mark Twain · 1800 · History

    Twain's letters about his steamship voyage of 1867.

  8. 8

    In Freedom's Cause

    G. A. Henty · 1884 · History

    At the turn of the fourteenth century in Scotland, young Archie Forbes becomes involved with both William Wallace and Robert the Bruce in the struggle for Scottish independence from English rule.

  9. 9

    Five Little Peppers Midway

    Margaret Sidney · 1890 · History

    Pepper children, especially Phonsie, win over their hoity-toity cousin while taking joy in their mother's wedding.

  10. 10

    Frogs

    Aristophanes · 1785 · History

    Among extant Greek comedies, the Frogs is unique for the light it throws on classical Greek attitudes to tragedy and to literature in general. It merits a much more extensive commentary than it has so

Browse wider