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See Part I here, and read the full post here. —TPP

I’m back with Part II of The Portly Politico Summer Reading List 2026, with a focus on non-fiction. As a history teacher and a writer primarily focused on non-fiction, I possess a particular interest in non-fiction writing of every stripe. While I do love reading history, I enjoy reading broadly, so today’s list will have works of non-fiction from multiple genres.

Typically I leave the full list behind the paywall for paid subscribers; however, as several of these authors are indie/self-published and/or newer authors, I would like to boost their works more broadly (and, naturally, gain access to those sweet, sweet affiliate clicks). So, here are four books I’ve read and/or am currently reading that I highly recommend you order:

• Nicholas R. Ochs, Age of Rot: A Right Wing Dissident’s Prison Dispatches from a Torn America – Nicholas Ochs was arrested following the Epiphany Protests for covering the events as an independent journalist. His association with the Proud Boys made him an easy target for Biden’s Justice Department, and he ended up with a four-year sentence (!) in a maximum security prison in Butler, North Carolina, where he faced a number of abuses (including an arbitrary stint in solitary confinement in winter without a mattress or blanket for his cot; he burned so many calories trying to stay warm that he became dangerously emaciated). This book is his collected prison writings, and it is a stark window into the political persecution and prosecutions that faced so many patriots in 2021.
• Landis Brown, Life Under the Shadow of the Almighty: A Journey Through Psalm 91 – My pastor while I was living down in Lamar wrote this book. Pastor Dana, as we call him (his middle name is “Dana”), had an issue while preparing his manuscript: his editor backed out of the project. Pastor Dana contacted me and asked if I could edit the last four chapters, which I did last spring. I finally ordered a physical copy earlier this week, so I am excited to read the first two chapters (and re-read the four I edited). It’s an interesting blend of scholarly work and devotional.
• H.H. Scullard and A.A.M. van der Heyden, Shorter Atlas of the Classical World – I picked up this delightful little survey of the classical world, which focuses on ancient Greece and Rome, when I was a teenager. I devoured it, cover-to-cover, and I love all the maps and the lithographic plates.
• Walter Martin, The Kingdom of the Cults: An Analysis of the Major Cult Systems in the Present Christian Era – I borrowed—and never returned, gulp!—a copy of this book from my Aunt Cheryl some years ago. It is the “textbook” on the various cults of the twentieth century from the perspective of an Evangelical Protestant Christian theologian and historian. Martin gives detailed historical information about the foundation of a number of cults, including the Nation of Islam and Mormonism, and offers Christians useful theological and historical grounds for arguing against these movements. My (well, my aunt’s) edition is from the twenty-fourth printing in 1977, and it certainly reflects the cultic activity of the time (some of the movements are now just footnotes in religious history, while others are still thriving).

More below the punch. That said, each of these books if quite affordable on Amazon, and you can scoop them all up for under $70.71 at the time of writing.

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