Los Angeles Times Book Prize for History

The Los Angeles Times Book Prize for History, established in 1980, is a category of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize. Works are eligible during the year of their first US publication in English, though they may be written originally in languages other than English.

Recipients YearAuthorTitleResultRef.1980Walter Lippmann and the American CenturyWinner1981Land of Savagery, Land of Promise: The European Image of the American Frontier in the Nineteenth CenturyWinner1982The Gate of Heavenly Peace: The Chinese and Their Revolution, 1895–1980Winner1983The Wheels of CommerceWinner1984The Great Cat Massacre and Other Episodes in French Cultural HistoryWinner1985Son of the Morning Star: Custer and the Little BighornWinner1986The First Socialist Society: A History of the Soviet Union from WithinWinner1987The Nazi Doctors: Medical Killing and the Psychology of GenocideWinner1988Reconstruction: America's Unfinished Revolution, 1863–1877Winner1989An Empire of Their Own: How the Jews Invented HollywoodWinner1990The Quest for El CidWinnerA Peace to End All Peace: The Fall of the Ottoman Empire and the Creation of the Modern Middle EastFinalistAwash in a Sea of Faith: Christianizing the American PeopleItaly and its MonarchyThe Search for Modern China1991The Promised Land: The Great Black Migration and How It Changed AmericaWinnerBehind the Mask of Innocence: Sex, Violence, Prejudice, Crime: Films of Social Conscience in the Silent EraFinalistSoulstealers: The Chinese Sorcery Scare of 1768Stalin in Power: The Revolution from Above, 1928-1941The Prize: The Epic Quest for Oil, Money, and Power1992Benevolence and Betrayal: Five Italian Jewish Families under FascismWinnerFrontiers: The Epic of South Africa’s Creation and the Tragedy of the Xhosa PeopleFinalistOwen Lattimore and the “Loss” of ChinaThe Campaign of the Century: Upton Sinclair’s Race for Governor of California and the Birth of Media PoliticsTriumphs and Tragedy: A History of the Mexican People1993New Worlds, Ancient Texts: The Power of Tradition and the Shock of DiscoveryWinnerRising in the West: The True Story of an “Okie” family in Search of the American DreamFinalist and Jon RothschildThe Immobile EmpireThe Most Southern Place on Earth: The Mississippi Delta and the Roots of Regional IdentityTragic Mountains: The Hmong, the Americans, and the Secret Wars for Laos, 1942-19921994Gay New York: Gender, Urban Culture, and the Making of the Gay Male World, 1890–1940WinnerAnti-Semitism in AmericaFinalistBecoming Mexican American: Ethnicity, Culture and Identity in Chicano Los Angeles, 1900-1945Marriage of Likeness: Same-sex Unions in Pre-modern EuropeWomen’s Work: The First 20,000 Years: Women, Cloth, and Society in Early Times1995Fables of Abundance: A Cultural History of Advertising in AmericaWinnerMarketing Modernism in Fin-de-Siècle EuropeFinalistRewriting the Soul: Multiple Personality and the Sciences of MemorySpeak Now Against the Day: The Generation Before the Civil Rights Movement in the SouthStalin and the Bomb: The Soviet Union and Atomic Energy, 1939-19561996Black SeaWinnerAshes to Ashes: America’s Hundred-Year Cigarette War, the Public Health, and the Unabashed Triumph of Philip MorrisFinalistEndangered Dreams: The Great Depression in CaliforniaEurope: A HistoryWar Before Civilization: The Myth of the Peaceful SavageWilliam Cooper’s Town: Power and Persuasion on the Frontier of the Early American Republic1997A People's Tragedy: A History of the Russian RevolutionWinnerEchoes of a Native Land: Two Centuries of a Russian VillageFinalistFat History: Bodies and Beauty in the Modern WestNazi Germany and the Jews: Volume 1. The Years of Persecution, 1933-1939Sun Dancing: Life in a Medieval Irish Monastery and How Celtic Spirituality Influenced the World1998The Greatest Benefit to Mankind: A Medical History of HumanityWinnerHope in a Jar: The Making of America’s Beauty CultureFinalistMany Thousands Gone: The First Two Centuries of Slavery in North AmericaSlave Counterpoint: Black Culture in the Eighteenth-Century Chesapeake and LowcountryThe Gospel of Germs: Men, Women, and the Microbe in American Life1999Embracing Defeat: Japan in the Wake of World War IIWinnerEmpire Express: Building the 1st Transcontinental RailroadFinalistFreedom from Fear: The American People in Depression and War, 1929-1945The First World WarThe Holocaust in American Life2000The Collaborator: The Trial and Execution of Robert BrasillachWinnerIn the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship EssexFinalistKosovo: War and RevengeResisting Hitler: Mildred Harnack and the Red OrchestraThe Right to Vote: The Contested History of Democracy in the United States2001Before the Storm: Barry Goldwater and the Unmaking of the American ConsensusWinnerFrance: The Dark Years, 1940-1944FinalistThe Metaphysical Club: A Story of Ideas in AmericaThe Stranger from Paradise: A Biography of William BlakeVenice: Lion City2002Six Days of War: June 1967 and the Making of the Modern Middle EastWinnerAt the Hands of Persons Unknown: The Lynching of Black AmericaFinalistBrotherhood of the Bomb: The Tangled Lives and Loyalties of Robert Oppenheimer, Ernest Lawrence and Edward TellerIn the Devil’s Snare: The Salem Witchcraft Crisis of 1692The Diligent: A Voyage Through the Worlds of the Slave Trade2003An Imperfect God: George Washington, His Slaves, and the Creation of AmericaWinnerGulag: A HistoryFinalistHomosexuality and CivilizationThey Marched Into Sunlight: War and Peace, Vietnam and America, October 1967When the King Took Flight2004Perilous Times: Free Speech in Wartime from the Sedition Act of 1798 to the War on TerrorismWinnerBeasts of the Field: A Narrative History of California Farm Workers, 1769-1913FinalistHigh Noon in the Cold War: Kennedy, Khrushchev, and the Cuban Missile CrisisMasquerade: The Life and Times of Deborah Sampson, Continental SoldierThe Coming of the Third Reich: Volume 1 of The Third Reich Series2005Bury the Chains: Prophets and Rebels in the Fight to Free an Empire's SlavesWinner and Tim HarperForgotten Armies: The Fall of British Asia, 1941-1945FinalistPostwar: A History of Europe Since 1945The Rise of American Democracy: Jefferson to LincolnThe Third Reich in Power: Volume 2 of The Third Reich Series2006The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11WinnerAt Canaan’s Edge: Volume 3 of America in the King Years, 1965-68FinalistMayflower: A Story of Courage, Community, and WarJohn TaymanThe Colony: The Harrowing True Story of the Exiles of MolokaiThe War of the World: Twentieth-Century Conflict and the Descent of the West2007Legacy of Ashes: The History of the CIAWinnerNixon and Mao: The Week that Changed the WorldFinalistThe First Total War: Napoleon’s Europe and the Birth of Warfare as We Know ItThe Greatest Battle: Stalin, Hitler, and the Desperate Struggle for Moscow that Changed the Course of World War IITroublesome Young Men: The Rebels Who Brought Churchill to Power and Helped Save England2008Hitler's Empire: How the Nazis Ruled EuropeWinnerObscene in the Extreme: The Burning and Banning of John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of WrathFinalistOne Minute to Midnight: Kennedy, Khrushchev, and Castro on the Brink of Nuclear WarSweet Land of Liberty: The Forgotten Struggle for Civil Rights in the NorthThis Republic of Suffering: Death and the American Civil War2009Golden Dreams: California in an Age of Abundance 1950–1963WinnerEmpire of Liberty: A History of the Early Republic, 1789–1815FinalistLynching and Spectacle: Witnessing Racial Violence in America, 1890-1940Passing Strange: A Gilded Age Tale of Love and Deception Across the Color LineThe Age of Wonder: How the Romantic Generation Discovered the Beauty and Terror of Science2010The Killing of Crazy HorseWinnerCultures of War: Pearl Harbor/Hiroshima/9-11/IraqRoosevelt’s Purge: How FDR Fought to Change the Democratic PartyWashington: A LifeWater: The Epic Struggle for Wealth, Power, and Civilization2011Railroaded: The Transcontinentals and the Making of Modern AmericaWinner1861: The Civil War AwakeningFinalistMolotov’s Magic Lantern: Travels in Russian History with Anne McLean (trans.)The Anatomy of a Moment: Thirty-Five Minutes in History and ImaginationTo End All Wars: A Story of Loyalty and Rebellion, 1914-19182012America's Great Debate: Henry Clay, Stephen A. Douglas, and the Compromise That Preserved the UnionWinnerA Wicked War: Polk, Clay, Lincoln, and the 1846 U.S. Invasion of MexicoFinalistEmpire of Shadows: The Epic Story of YellowstoneRoger Williams and the Creation of the American Soul: Church, State, and the Birth of LibertyRule and Ruin: The Downfall of Moderation and the Destruction of the Republican Party, From Eisenhower to the Tea Party2013The Sleepwalkers: How Europe Went to War in 1914Winner and Allan J. LichtmanFDR and the JewsFinalistThe Bully Pulpit: Theodore Roosevelt, William Howard Taft, and the Golden Age of JournalismThe Internal Enemy: Slavery and War in Virginia, 1772-1832The Searchers: The Making of an American Legend2014The Deluge: The Great War, America and the Remaking of the Global Order, 1916–1931WinnerFive Came Back: A Story of Hollywood and the Second World WarFinalistThe Innovators: How a Group of Hackers, Geniuses, and Geeks Created the Digital RevolutionThe Victorian City: Everyday Life in Dickens’ LondonThirteen Days in September: Carter, Begin, and Sadat at Camp David2015Killing a King: The Assassination of Yitzhak Rabin and the Remaking of IsraelWinnerDark Places of the Earth: The Voyage of the Slave Ship AntelopeFinalistOnce in a Great City: A Detroit StorySPQR: A History of Ancient RomeThis Gulf of Fire: The Destruction of Lisbon, or Apocalypse in the Age of Science and Reason2016An American Genocide: The United States and the California Indian Catastrophe, 1846–1873WinnerBlood in the Water: The Attica Prison Uprising of 1971 and Its LegacyFinalistSpain in Our Hearts: Americans in the Spanish Civil War, 1936–1939Where the Jews Aren’t: The Sad and Absurd Story of Birobidzhan, Russia’s Jewish Autonomous RegionWhite Trash: The 400-Year Untold History of Class in America2017The Death and Life of the Great LakesWinnerThe Color of Law: A Forgotten History of How Our Government Segregated AmericaFinalistThe Evangelicals: The Struggle to Shape AmericaHue 1968: A Turning Point of the American War in VietnamLondon’s Triumph: Merchants, Adventurers, and Money in Shakespeare’s City2018Travelers in the Third Reich: The Rise of Fascism: 1919–1945Winner2019They Were Her Property: White Women as Slave Owners in the American SouthWinner2020Vanguard: How Black Women Broke Barriers, Won the Vote, and Insisted on Equality for AllWinnerSouth to Freedom: Runaway Slaves to Mexico and the Road to the Civil WarFinalistThe Deportation Machine: America’s Long History of Expelling ImmigrantsThe Broken Heart of America: St. Louis and the Violent History of the United StatesThe United States of War: A Global History of America’s Endless Conflicts, From Columbus to the Islamic State2021Cuba: An American HistoryWinnerTraveling Black: A Story of Race and ResistanceFinalistThe Chinese Question: The Gold Rushes and Global PoliticsAfrican Europeans: An Untold HistoryI've Been Here All the While: Black Freedom on Native Land2022By Hands Now Known: Jim Crow’s Legal ExecutionersWinnerHugh EakinPicasso’s War: How Modern Art Came to AmericaFinalist Kerri K. GreenidgeThe Grimkes: The Legacy of Slavery in an American FamilyAndrew M. WehrmanThe Contagion of Liberty: The Politics of Smallpox in the American RevolutionDonald YacovoneTeaching White Supremacy: America’s Democratic Ordeal and the Forging of our National Identity2023Shadows at Noon: The South Asian Twentieth CenturyWinnerNed BlackhawkThe Rediscovery of America: Native Peoples and the Unmaking of U.S. HistoryFinalist Malcolm HarrisPalo Alto: A History of California, Capitalism, and the WorldBlair L.M. KelleyBlack Folk: The Roots of the Black Working ClassNikki M. TaylorBrooding Over Bloody Revenge: Enslaved Women’s Lethal Resistance