I find fiction set in a period is useless, but actual contemporary fiction can be brilliant for the kind of things historians don't bother with. However, while I'm deeply overstocked on UK and Canada of this period, I have no US recommendations earlier than '63. Try old romance novels and detective stories in the library.
On non-fiction I can recommend Manchester's bio of MacArthur, which cuts right through it, and Jan Morris's _Manhattan '45_ though that's the wrong coast, And it's worth looking at the last volume of Orwell's essays, because he was writing for a left wing US magazine and there's feedback, as well as his perspective on that was happening there.
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Date: 2014-05-17 11:19 am (UTC)On non-fiction I can recommend Manchester's bio of MacArthur, which cuts right through it, and Jan Morris's _Manhattan '45_ though that's the wrong coast, And it's worth looking at the last volume of Orwell's essays, because he was writing for a left wing US magazine and there's feedback, as well as his perspective on that was happening there.