This handy collection of essays provides a nice introduction to various aspects of the Gilded Age. Written by scholars, the essays are authoritative, but they're written for students—not other academics—and provide the necessary narrative coverage as well as analysis.

This book is aimed at a general audience but the scholarship is sound, and while there are no footnotes, there is a useful bibliography. Readers interested in an intelligent overview of the period with a strong narrative should start with this book.

This fascinating book explores the multifaceted critique of American culture constructed in the closing decades of the 19th century and the various ways in which Americans sought to restore more intense and "authentic" experience to their "weightless" lives.

This award-winning book offers a fresh take on the farmers' movement of the late-19th century. Differing from other studies that have tended to treat Populists as either unrealistically utopian or hopelessly nostalgic, Postel's book suggests that the Populists offered a realistic and modern approach to politics and government.

Plunkitt's blunt discussion of his political philosophy is simultaneously funny, infuriating, and provocative. His views on public service, his advice to would-be politicians, and his description of his own political rise and methods provide a fascinating and shockingly honest contrast to conventional political autobiographies.