Here are 100 books that Repeal the Second Amendment fans have personally recommended if you like Repeal the Second Amendment. Shepherd is a community of 12,000+ authors and super readers sharing their favorite books with the world.

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Book cover of Making a Killing: The Business of Guns in America

Thomas Gabor Author Of American Carnage: Shattering the Myths That Fuel Gun Violence

From my list on gun violence and the gun industry.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’m a former Professor of Criminology who has published over 200 works. While I have written about gun policy for 30 years, my first book on the topic was stimulated by the murder of an unarmed Trayvon Martin in Florida by an armed neighborhood vigilante who pursued Trayvon for no reason other than that he was a tall black male wearing a hoodie. I was outraged by the shooter’s contention that he was acting in self-defense. This case prompted me to write my book Confronting Gun Violence in America which included two chapters on the issue of defensive gun use. 

Thomas' book list on gun violence and the gun industry

Thomas Gabor Why Thomas loves this book

Making a Killing is a powerful exposé of the highly opaque and unregulated gun industry.

Former NRA member Tom Diaz uses the gun industry’s own words to illustrate how manufacturers are making guns more lethal and appealing to those who will misuse them. Diaz shows that the industry does not represent certain American values but is simply a business, maximizing profit regardless of the cost to the country.

By Tom Diaz ,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Making a Killing as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

The gun industry is the last unregulated manufacturer of a consumer product in America, with a level of secrecy that makes the tobacco industry look like a model of transparency. This text blows away the smoke and offers a provocative analysis of gun violence in American society. Tom Diaz argues that despite endless rhetoric about the right to bear arms, the real story behind the epidemic of gun violence in America is the systematic increase in lethality by manufacturers. Diaz shows how during the 1980s and 90s the gun industry has sought to reverse declining profits by dramatically increasing the…


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Book cover of The High House

The High House by James Stoddard,

The Victorian mansion, Evenmere, is the mechanism that runs the universe.

The lamps must be lit, or the stars die. The clocks must be wound, or Time ceases. The Balance between Order and Chaos must be preserved, or Existence crumbles.

Appointed the Steward of Evenmere, Carter Anderson must learn the…

Book cover of Private Guns, Public Health

Thomas Gabor Author Of American Carnage: Shattering the Myths That Fuel Gun Violence

From my list on gun violence and the gun industry.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’m a former Professor of Criminology who has published over 200 works. While I have written about gun policy for 30 years, my first book on the topic was stimulated by the murder of an unarmed Trayvon Martin in Florida by an armed neighborhood vigilante who pursued Trayvon for no reason other than that he was a tall black male wearing a hoodie. I was outraged by the shooter’s contention that he was acting in self-defense. This case prompted me to write my book Confronting Gun Violence in America which included two chapters on the issue of defensive gun use. 

Thomas' book list on gun violence and the gun industry

Thomas Gabor Why Thomas loves this book

Private Guns, Public Health is a comprehensive, evidence-based review of research on the link between gun availability and mortality.

The book explains why policies are urgently needed to address America’s gun violence problem. Hemenway makes the case for a public health approach to gun violence prevention, as opposed to a reactive punitive approach anchored in the criminal justice system. It is not about banning guns but preventing violence in the same way that research-based practices led to dramatic reductions in fatalities arising from car accidents.

Measures supported by Hemenway include safe storage practices, addressing the mental health of the public, encouraging Hollywood to promote responsible gun ownership, preventing gun theft through safe shipping practices, regulating guns as a consumer product, and ensuring that all gun sales proceed through licensed dealers.

By David Hemenway ,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Private Guns, Public Health as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

On an average day in the United States, guns are used to kill almost eighty people and wound nearly three hundred more; yet such facts are accepted as a natural consequence of supposedly high American rates of violence. Private Guns, Public Health reveals the advantages of treating gun violence as a consumer safety and public health problem-an approach that emphasizes prevention over punishment and that has successfully reduced the rates of injury and death from infectious disease, car accidents, and tobacco consumption.

Hemenway fair-mindedly and authoritatively outlines a policy course that would significantly reduce gun-related injury and death, pointing us…


Book cover of Rampage Nation: Securing America from Mass Shootings

Thomas Gabor Author Of American Carnage: Shattering the Myths That Fuel Gun Violence

From my list on gun violence and the gun industry.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’m a former Professor of Criminology who has published over 200 works. While I have written about gun policy for 30 years, my first book on the topic was stimulated by the murder of an unarmed Trayvon Martin in Florida by an armed neighborhood vigilante who pursued Trayvon for no reason other than that he was a tall black male wearing a hoodie. I was outraged by the shooter’s contention that he was acting in self-defense. This case prompted me to write my book Confronting Gun Violence in America which included two chapters on the issue of defensive gun use. 

Thomas' book list on gun violence and the gun industry

Thomas Gabor Why Thomas loves this book

Rampage Nation combines sober analysis with case material to produce an original and engaging book on mass shootings.

Klarevas has a unique focus—gun massacres or high-fatality shootings in which six or more victims die. You should read this book if you would like to know the impact of gun-free zones and armed civilians on mass shootings. This book makes it clear that successful prevention of mass shootings involves targeting both the perpetrator and the weapons that enable gun massacres.

It is simply the best book on mass shootings.

By Louis Klarevas ,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Rampage Nation as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

In the past decade, no individual act of violence has killed more people in the United States than the mass shooting. This well-researched, forcefully argued book answers some of the most pressing questions facing our society: Why do people go on killing sprees? Are gun-free zones magnets for deadly rampages? What can we do to curb the carnage of this disturbing form of firearm violence?

Contrary to conventional wisdom, the author shows that gun possession often prods aggrieved, mentally unstable individuals to go on shooting sprees; these attacks largely occur in places where guns are not prohibited by law; and…


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Book cover of December on 5C4

December on 5C4 by Adam Strassberg,

Magical realism meets the magic of Christmas in this mix of Jewish, New Testament, and Santa stories–all reenacted in an urban psychiatric hospital!

On locked ward 5C4, Josh, a patient with many similarities to Jesus, is hospitalized concurrently with Nick, a patient with many similarities to Santa. The two argue…

Book cover of Lethal Logic: Exploding the Myths That Paralyze American Gun Policy

Thomas Gabor Author Of American Carnage: Shattering the Myths That Fuel Gun Violence

From my list on gun violence and the gun industry.

Why am I passionate about this?

I’m a former Professor of Criminology who has published over 200 works. While I have written about gun policy for 30 years, my first book on the topic was stimulated by the murder of an unarmed Trayvon Martin in Florida by an armed neighborhood vigilante who pursued Trayvon for no reason other than that he was a tall black male wearing a hoodie. I was outraged by the shooter’s contention that he was acting in self-defense. This case prompted me to write my book Confronting Gun Violence in America which included two chapters on the issue of defensive gun use. 

Thomas' book list on gun violence and the gun industry

Thomas Gabor Why Thomas loves this book

Henigan makes the first comprehensive attempt to debunk the slogans so effectively used by the gun lobby to impede gun law reform.

Lethal Logic provides insights into the tactics used by the National Rifle Association to block the most basic measures that can combat gun violence. The book uses a combination of storytelling and statistical analysis to eviscerate the myths propagated by the gun lobby.

By Dennis A. Henigan ,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Lethal Logic as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

"Guns don't kill people; people kill people."

"When guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have guns."

"An armed society is a polite society."

Who hasn't heard these engaging assertions, time and time again? Burned into the national consciousness by years of targeted, disciplined messaging by the National Rifle Association and others, they are just a few of the bumper-sticker slogans that have defined the gun control debate in America. Long ridiculed by gun control advocates, they are the first words that come to mind for most Americans when the gun issue is discussed.

This is the first book both to…


Book cover of Gunfight: The Battle Over the Right to Bear Arms in America

Pamela Haag Author Of The Gunning of America: Business and the Making of American Gun Culture

From my list on new or surprising on American guns and gun culture.

Why am I passionate about this?

I got interested in American guns and gun culture through the backdoor. I’d never owned a gun, participated in gun control politics, or thought too much about guns at all. Guns might not have interested me—but ghosts did. I was beguiled by the haunting legend of the Winchester rifle heiress Sarah Winchester, who believed in the late 1800s that she was being tormented by the ghosts of all those killed by Winchester rifles. As I scoured the archives for rare glimpses of Sarah, however, it dawned on me that I was surrounded by boxes and boxes of largely unexplored sources about a much larger story, and secretive mystery: that of the gun industry itself.

Pamela's book list on new or surprising on American guns and gun culture

Pamela Haag Why Pamela loves this book

I admire this book for its measured erudition on a topic (guns) that the author feels is the most formative cultural chasm in the US. Winkler, a renowned legal scholar, uses the 2008 Supreme Court Heller decision that enshrined the second amendment as an individual right to bear arms as the touchstone for a riveting and more wide-ranging investigation of the history of gun rights as well as gun control laws. Winkler finds historical precedents for the concept of an individual right (if not a mandate, in some cases) to bear arms.

However, what I found most surprising is Winkler’s account of the equally sturdy and deeply-rooted history of gun control and regulation. This revises the popular wisdom that gun control, essentially, has no history—that the US was a land of unfettered gun-toting and gun-owning that was only later thwarted by modern, liberal gun restrictions. On the contrary, by the…

By Adam Winkler ,

Why should I read it?

2 authors picked Gunfight as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Gunfight is a timely work examining America's four-centuries-long political battle over gun control and the right to bear arms. In this definitive and provocative history, Adam Winkler reveals how guns-not abortion, race, or religion-are at the heart of America's cultural divide. Using the landmark 2008 case District of Columbia v. Heller-which invalidated a law banning handguns in the nation's capital-as a springboard, Winkler brilliantly weaves together the dramatic stories of gun-rights advocates and gun-control lobbyists, providing often unexpected insights into the venomous debate that now cleaves our nation.


Book cover of Gun Baby Gun: A Bloody Journey into the World of the Gun

Norman Baker Author Of ...And What Do You Do?: What the Royal Family Don't Want You to Know

From my list on how the world works.

Why am I passionate about this?

We all need to understand more about how the world ticks, who is in control, and why they act as they do. And we need to salute those of courage who refuse to go along with the flow in a craven or unthinking way. I was an MP for 18 years and a government minister at the Department for Transport with a portfolio that included rail, bus, active travel, and then at the Home Office as Crime Prevention minister. After leaving Parliament, I became managing director of The Big Lemon, an environmentally friendly bus and coach company in Brighton. I now act as an advisor to the Campaign for Better Transport, am a regular columnist and broadcaster, and undertake consultancy and lecturing work.

Norman's book list on how the world works

Norman Baker Why Norman loves this book

An astonishing well-researched and detailed analysis of the arms trade and the omnipresence of guns in the world today. Full of startling and worrying statistics, for example, that there are 12 billion bullets produced every year which kill at least 500,000 people. The book reveals how in some places it is easier to get a gun than to get a glass of water. Solo killers, the military, the hunters, the paranoid suburban Americans, they are all here, and it is not a pretty picture.

By Iain Overton ,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Gun Baby Gun as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

SHORTLISTED FOR THE CWA NON FICTION DAGGER

'A brilliantly researched journey, capturing the gun's strangely accepted place in human life and, far too often, death' JON SNOW

EVERY MINUTE, OF EVERY DAY, SOMEONE SOMEWHERE IS SHOT

There are almost one billion guns across the globe today - more than ever before. There are 12 billion bullets produced every year - almost two bullets for every person on this earth. And as many as 500,000 people are killed by them every year worldwide. The gun's impact is long-reaching and often hidden. And it doesn't just involve the dead, the wounded, the…


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Book cover of Trusting Her Duke

Trusting Her Duke by Arietta Richmond,

A Duke with rigid opinions, a Lady whose beliefs conflict with his, a long disputed parcel of land, a conniving neighbour, a desperate collaboration, a failure of trust, a love found despite it all.

Alexander Cavendish, Duke of Ravensworth, returned from war to find that his father and brother had…

Book cover of Loaded: A Disarming History of the Second Amendment

Pamela Haag Author Of The Gunning of America: Business and the Making of American Gun Culture

From my list on new or surprising on American guns and gun culture.

Why am I passionate about this?

I got interested in American guns and gun culture through the backdoor. I’d never owned a gun, participated in gun control politics, or thought too much about guns at all. Guns might not have interested me—but ghosts did. I was beguiled by the haunting legend of the Winchester rifle heiress Sarah Winchester, who believed in the late 1800s that she was being tormented by the ghosts of all those killed by Winchester rifles. As I scoured the archives for rare glimpses of Sarah, however, it dawned on me that I was surrounded by boxes and boxes of largely unexplored sources about a much larger story, and secretive mystery: that of the gun industry itself.

Pamela's book list on new or surprising on American guns and gun culture

Pamela Haag Why Pamela loves this book

Rather than reprising hackneyed debates between the usual political actors—for example, gun control liberals versus gun rights libertarians—this book argues that American ‘gun culture’ was never really about hunting, freedom fighters, the militia, or constitutional liberty in the first place. From the country’s inception, Dunbar-Ortiz describes, guns were about racial subjugation, the genocide of Native Americans, the enforcement of enslavement, and the privileges and wealth that flowed from this subordination to the dominating class.

For Dunbar-Ortiz, the use of guns for subjugation and the expropriation of labor, land, and wealth from non-white populations wasn’t lamentably incidental to the American gun culture but at its very heart. I especially appreciate how the author shifts the terrain of the gun discussion: This book left me wondering if we spend too much time thinking about what guns have meant in the abstract and too little about what guns have done in the specific—the…

By Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz ,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Loaded as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

"Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz's Loaded is like a blast of fresh air. She is no fan of guns or of our absurdly permissive laws surrounding them. But she does not merely take the liberal side of the familiar debate."--Adam Hochschild, The New York Review of Books

"If . . . anyone at all really wants to 'get to the root causes of gun violence in America,' they will need to start by coming to terms with even a fraction of what Loaded proposes."-Los Angeles Review of Books

"Her analysis, erudite and unrelenting, exposes blind spots not just among conservatives, but, crucially, among…


Book cover of Lafcadio, The Lion Who Shot Back

Stuart Gibbs Author Of Once Upon a Tim

From my list on so funny they’ll make you laugh out loud.

Why am I passionate about this?

I'm the New York Times bestselling author of five middle grade book series: Spy School, FunJungle, Charlie Thorne, Moon Base Alpha, and Once Upon a Tim. Together, my books have sold over six million copies. Although my books are mysteries and adventures at heart, there is a great deal of humor in them, which is probably the secret to their success. I hear from a surprising number of readers (or the parents of my readers) that someone has laughed so hard at my book that they have fallen off a couch. My sense of humor has come from careful reading of the books listed here, over and over again, throughout my life.

Stuart's book list on so funny they’ll make you laugh out loud

Stuart Gibbs Why Stuart loves this book

While Silverstein is most known for his wonderful compendium of poetry, Where The Sidewalk Ends, this was one of my favorite books as a child (and my sister’s too). Yes, it’s written for kids, but it’s still a great read as an adult, laugh-out-loud funny – and ultimately, very affecting. As you may have deduced from the title, it’s about a lion who figures out how to shoot back to defend himself and his pride against hunters – which then sparks an extremely inventive and surprising journey. Plus, it is deftly illustrated by Silverstein as well.

By Shel Silverstein ,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked Lafcadio, The Lion Who Shot Back as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Shel Silverstein's first children's book, Lafcadio, the Lion Who Shot Back—a whimsical tale of self-discovery and marshmallows—is turning fifty with a return to the vintage full-color cover.

Is a famous, successful, and admired lion a happy lion? Or is he a lion at all? Written and drawn with wit and gusto, Shel Silverstein's modern fable speaks not only to children but to us all!

First published in 1963, this book had rave reviews from the New York Times, Time magazine, and Publishers Weekly, as well as a starred review from Kirkus. Now celebrating its fiftieth anniversary, Lafcadio is being reissued…


Book cover of The Psychology of Police Deadly Force Encounters: Science, Practice, and Policy

Matthew J. Sharps Author Of Processing Under Pressure: Stress, Memory, and Decision-Making in Law Enforcement

From my list on cognitive science and the criminal justice system.

Why am I passionate about this?

I'm a professor of cognitive and forensic cognitive science. I have consulted on hundreds of criminal cases, most involving violent crime, and have published a body of research on the cognitive dynamics involved in eyewitness memory, officer-involved shootings, and training for IED detection in counterterrorism environments. The dynamics I've studied in the law-enforcement/forensic realm have proven to be important in the realm of firefighting and other first-response emergency services, as I also discuss in my book Thinking Under Pressure. This is an important field of study across the emergency and first response services, and will probably become more important in the future.

Matthew's book list on cognitive science and the criminal justice system

Matthew J. Sharps Why Matthew loves this book

This is an excellent work in which Dr. Miller smoothly blends the principles of modern psychology with the street realities of modern law enforcement situations. 

It is an excellent companion to my own work which focuses on cognitive factors in the criminal justice system, and also on my book, which deals with these factors in the realm of fire service and other first responder emergency operations. 

Dr. Miller gives a realistic view of psychology in the dangerous realm of law enforcement.

By Laurence Miller ,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Psychology of Police Deadly Force Encounters as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

Recent events have highlighted both professional and public interest in the use of force by police, especially those involving officerinvolved shootings. The Psychology of Police Deadly Force Encounters: Science, Practice, Policy is the first book to comprehensively review the scientific literature in neuropsychology, cognition, personality, and criminology as they relate to the mindset of an officer before, during, and after a deadly force incident. Chapter topics also illustrate practical applications of deadly force psychology to agency policy, training curricula, internal and legal investigation of cases, administrative and disciplinary measures, criminal prosecution, civil litigation, legal strategy, clinical services for officers and…


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Book cover of Aggressor

Aggressor by FX Holden,

It is April 1st, 2038. Day 60 of China's blockade of the rebel island of Taiwan.

The US government has agreed to provide Taiwan with a weapons system so advanced that it can disrupt the balance of power in the region. But what pilot would be crazy enough to run…

Book cover of The Death of Common Sense

Jim E. Riviere Author Of Zero – Much to Do About Nothing?

From my list on how numbers such as zero have affected society’s evolution and its concept of risk.

Why am I passionate about this?

My professional life has been focused on teaching and research on chemical food safety as well as scientific applications of mathematics to animal and human health. The books on this list were riveting and eye-opening examples of how complex mathematical concepts, including zero and nothing, often get misused when applied to practical problems such as food safety and cancer. This misapplication is often a result of the unique properties and history of numbers like zero, which are hard to translate into practical endpoints. These books have given me a better understanding of this issue, as well as plunging me into the fascinating history of numbers through Eastern and Western civilizations.

Jim's book list on how numbers such as zero have affected society’s evolution and its concept of risk

Jim E. Riviere Why Jim loves this book

This book is the best I have read on how simple and sound properties in science can be so misapplied in the legal system.

Thresholds and tolerances defined by specific scientific principles and studies, once incorporated into laws, can have unattended consequences when applied to scenarios never anticipated by the original studies.

The book gives numerous examples of well-intentioned laws creating havoc and causing harm when misapplied to new scenarios. It is a book that often comes to mind when I read the basis of a new regulation based on data that we never generated for that purpose.

By Philip K. Howard ,

Why should I read it?

1 author picked The Death of Common Sense as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.

What is this book about?

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

“We need a new idea of how to govern. The current system is broken. Law is supposed to be a framework for humans to make choices, not the replacement for free choice.” So notes Philip K. Howard in the new Afterword to his explosive manifesto The Death of Common Sense. Here Howard offers nothing less than a fresh, lucid, practical operating system for modern democracy. America is drowning—in law, lawsuits, and nearly endless red tape. Before acting or making a decision, we often abandon our best instincts. We pause, we worry, we equivocate, and then we…


Book cover of Making a Killing: The Business of Guns in America
Book cover of Private Guns, Public Health
Book cover of Rampage Nation: Securing America from Mass Shootings

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