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- Damn History #96 / November 2025
Psst…don’t make stuff up!
A puzzling confession lies buried in the Author’s Notes at the end of Brad Ricca’s new popular-history book Lincoln’s Ghost: Houdini’s War on Spiritualism and the Dark Conspiracy Against the American Presidency:
“In certain spots I have characterized certain scenes and even, in a few spots, dialogue that I have taken from other sources of the same speaker or imagined around facts.”
The syntax is strange, even nonsensical, but I believe Ricca is saying that his book includes composite dialogue and fictionalized details. Is that how you would interpret it? What do you think of someone using those techniques in a nonfiction book?
In Damn History you'll find, as usual, recommendations on good and popularly accessible historical reading, with tips on writing and updates on my own work.
Follow me on X at @Jack_ElHai, on Bluesky at @jackelhai.bsky.social, and on Threads at @jackelhai1.
Contact me by email at [email protected]
Personal Notes
The movie Nuremberg, adapted from my book The Nazi and the Psychiatrist, opens in 1,200 theaters in the U.S. on November 7. The film will screen in 42 other countries starting this month.
“They weren’t buddies – but they formed a connection.” The BBC explains the relationship between Nazi leader Hermann Göring and American military psychiatrist Douglas M. Kelley, as told in Nuremberg and my book.
And an opinion piece discusses the movie/book, the Nuremberg Trials and the need for a return to American leadership in human rights advocacy.
For my recommendations of popular-history books, search X, Bluesky, or Threads for #popularhistory.
Recent Popular History from All Over
You may find some of these articles behind a paywall if you’ve exceeded the publisher’s allowance of free views.
The invention of refrigeration changed how food actually tastes.
In the 1880s, Henrietta Wiley endured the guardianship of her husband and a stay in an insane asylum.
What was author Arthur C. Clarke doing on the bottom of the ocean?
This hitman wanted nothing more than to become a pop star.
The anti-vaccine movement has a strange history.
Why did the poet W.H. Auden develop a close friendship with a sex worker who stole from him?
Some failed Constitutional amendments, if adopted, could have changed everything.
Mars and Hershey’s made a sweet fortune during World War II.
The Russian government recently handed over to the United States its 386-page dossier on the assassination of JFK.
In 1975, a rat on the loose changed the way baseball was broadcast.
One of the greatest American composers you’ve not heard of is at last getting a hearing.
Resources
Those food stains on the pages of old cookbooks contain valuable historical information.
Three states account for 80 percent of recent school book bans.
AI has helped identify a German soldier shown in a notorious Holocaust photo.
Learn how the nonfiction book The Orchid Thief by Susan Orlean became the movie Adaptation.
“Scenes are essential for any great narrative.”
To truly think historically demands a new perspective.
A historian of the antifa movement has received death threats.
“If it sounds like writing, I rewrite it.” – Elmore Leonard, born 100 years ago last month
Housekeeping
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More next month, and thanks for looking. And you are welcome to forward Damn History in its entirety to anyone.
About me: I'm a history and science writer. I've contributed hundreds of articles to such publications as Smithsonian, The Atlantic, The Washington Post Magazine, Wired, Scientific American, Discover, GQ, Longreads and many others. My books include The Lost Brothers: A Family’s Decades-Long Search, The Lobotomist: A Maverick Medical Genius and His Tragic Quest to Rid the World of Mental Illness, Non-Stop: A Turbulent History of Northwest Airlines, and The Nazi and the Psychiatrist: Hermann Goering, Dr. Douglas M. Kelley, and a Fatal Meeting of Minds at the End of WW2.
I frequently give talks and lead workshops on the topics of my books as well as on the craft of nonfiction writing. To book me for your event, please contact Jayme Boucher, Hachette Speakers Bureau, at [email protected].
Please feel free to get in touch.