Non-fiction books for fiction readers

I humbly apologize for inserting a non-fiction book in the thread about best 2009 fiction. I read so little non-fiction I lost my head in listing Mountains Beyond Mountains as one of my favorites. Anyway, I thought it might be nice to hear from our members who read non-fiction and can recommend books for those of us who may find non-fiction less appealing than fiction.
Please share with us those non-fiction books that we absolutely should take a break from our fiction for a little taste of reality.
For example - another one of my favorites is Krakatoa : the day the world exploded, August 27, 1883. This book became even more dramatic for me after the Indian Ocean tsunami that killed so many people. Sci-fi fans would particularly appreciate the rudimentary science used in estimating the magnitude of the explosion.

ETA - OK, so I should have read on further down the list for the Favorite Non-fiction of 2009 thread. Anyway, I have to challenge myself to read non-fiction and would love to hear what recommendations people have for me and others like me.

Simon Winchester writes fascinating books. The Professor and the Madman is about James Murray, editor of the Oxford English Dictionary, and one of his contributors, Dr. W. C. Minor. A Crack in the Edge of the World is about the San Francisco earthquake of 1908 and well worth reading.

I'm sorry if I made you feel bad, I was just confused. I'm one of those people who could use this kind of advice, because I read so little non-fiction these days.

I felt The Worst Hard Time about the dust bowl in the US of A and Bad Land are both books fiction readers might enjoy as they are history books with the emphasis on ordinary people's experiences. I also find that biographies and autobiographies are frequently appealing to readers of fiction who wish to touch bases with real life, albeit sometimes these books are very romanticized and not so much in touch with real life.

I've already raved about The Worst Hard Time in several other posts, so you know I'm going to agree with maggie.,

For other readers of mainly fiction I would definitely recommend Galileo's Daughter by Dava Sobel. It's a very interesting story about that period of history.

In Cold Blood may appeal to crime fiction readers. It is often described as 'the first non-fiction novel'. If you do read it, please give credit to Harper Lee, who did most of the research for no more reward than a shared dedication.

I think The dark heart of Italy and This is Serbia Calling are two good reads, for anyone interested in Italian history (NOT Roman - ITALIAN) and the Balkan War respectively.

For people like me, who work in the IT/internet biz, Hackers, Where the wizards stay up late, Accidental Empires and Insanely Great are fast and fun reads.

And anyone who is into Trek should find Future perfect and Is data Human? fun reads.

All but the last reads almost as novels.

Since you own a few graphic novels, how about some non-fiction poured into that format?

Bryan Talbot's Alice in Sunderland for example. (I do warn you to read it in small chunks if you decide to check it out.) (Alternatively, you have the (auto)biographies Maus and Persepolis and a whole slew of "Manga Guide to" series, such as Manga Guide to Databases, but I haven't read those.)

One non-fiction book that I've really enjoyed what I've read of is Reel Music, but, as you can probably guess, you need to be a music lover for that. It's about the history of film music. Fascinating and incredibly accessible, even if you know nothing of the technical terms.

I've also really enjoyed When Dreams Came True by Jack Zipes, which is about the history behind fairytales and the lives of their authors.

I really like this recommendation thread-idea, Mamzel. I'm not a big non-fiction reader either. Mostly it's because the non-fiction books I do read tend to be (very dry) academic ones that make my feel woozy and that puts me off on the whole.