ALBION'S SEED by David Hackett Fischer (non-fic)

Having read Fischer's book on Champlain, I decided to tackle "Albion's Seed (Four British Folkways in America."  Like "Champlain's Dream," this book is well researched with many illustrations and maps.  At 948 pages, it took me most of the month to read it.  The book was written in 1988, and has received mixed reviews by historians, but generally favorable.  Despite the 24 years since it has been written, I found it fresh and interesting.  It really is a well written text and source book, and I chose to read it that way in chunks.  It is well set up for the reader who is interested in the colonial social history of the United States.
Fischer's premise is that colonial America was settled largely by immigrants from four areas of Great Britain, each area heavily influencing the values, customs and beliefs of the land where they settled, in some cases, even into modern times. 
 New England was heavily settled by Puritans from East Anglia escaping hard economic times and desiring the freedom to practice their religion away from Stewart England.
The land that made up the Southern States was settled by aristocratic cavaliers fleeing from the Cromwell's roundheads.  These aristocrats, from the southern counties of England, were proud of their ancestry and perpetrated a more defined class system than in other areas of early settlement.
A third area in the Pennsylvania and the Delaware Valley was largely settled by Quakers also seeking freedom of worship.  Under the leadership of William Penn, they brought advanced ideas of democracy, diversity and equality to their settlements.
Finally the last to arrive were the immigrants from the north of England along the Scottish border lands and Northern Ireland.  The Scots/Irish that came to America were a tough, truculent lot.  They had been involved in fierce fighting in border wars that went on for hundreds of years between the Scots and English.  Most were fleeing a hardscrabble life and settled in the mountainous regions we know as Appalachia.
Fischer is thorough in investigating all aspects of the settlers lives. Whether you agree with his thesis or not, you are sure to find this a fascinating book worth the read, especially if you love history.