While preparing for European history, or any subject as such, is it ok to use only one book for making notes ? Someone using European history by Mahajan will understand better because it is a comprehensive book otherwise.
Kindly help me with this seniors and specially those who have passed the written exam.

Thanku!

European History by V.D.Mahajan is a good book but i am afraid that it is little outdated now a days. For last two years the pattern of questions has changed.To solve these questions indepth knowledge is required and mere superficial knowledge will not suffice. Now i don't know how well versed are you in the subject of European History but please prepare it thoroughly if you want to get thorugh with good marks.

For detail Study i'll recommend

1. Europe since Napoleon by David Thomson
2. Aspects of European History Stephen J.Lee

you can augment these with V.D.Mahajan, which you already possess. Sometimes just the phraseology is changed but the question asked is the same. For i,e

1. What was the symbolism of French Revolution? ( css-2007 )
now the question may seem odd for some but the real thing asked is almost the Causes of French Revolution?? you just have to adjust a bit.


One book is sufficient most of the times, but if one consults more than one book then obviously it helps because in each book one finds atleast 2-3 ideas which are different or were missing in the previous. This way one's answer can be different and comprehensive.

__________________
M-M-M

Hey thanx for the detailed reply.

Also, if you had to pick any one book from the ones you've mentioned i.e
David Thompson or Stephen Lee, which one would you recommend?

well Europe since Napoleon by David Thomson is a detailed book and Aspects of European History by Stephen J lee is more of a reference book.
But some of topics are extensively covered by stepehen J.Lee as for example

1. Down Fall of Napoleon
2. Rise of Hitler
3. Rise of Mussolini
4. Uno
5. European economic community
etc

Trust me if you go through these topics it wont take long, but if you want one than David Thomson would also suffice.

Regards

__________________
M-M-M

I agree with you, Mr. Maneka.In my view, one book reading is not sufficient for any history subject.I think that topic wise study from the books of Mahajan, Hazen,Fisher,Peacock,Stephen J. Lee and Thompson can yield a great output.Why you opted for Indo-Pak history?You hold Master`s degree in history and surely you would have a background in European, British and American histories.Then why Indian history?

[QUOTE]Agreed. I have gone through almost all of the aforementioned books. But i was reluctant to discuss their names here because our respected member is already reluctant to study two books .(No offense Aphrodite)
Well it is a long story. I had initially planned an exam preparation regime of two months that is from January 2008-March 2008 as i was busy in Elections in my Native town.Therefore i tried to select those subjects which would overlap each other and hence save me precious time. Indo-Pak lessened the burden of preparing one additional subject, Pakistan Affairs.American History is of 100 marks and i did not opt for it because i wanted to opt for a 200 marks History paper.Indo-Pak was a direct result of this plan, although i wanted to opt for European History but as it could not be fully prepared in such a short time i dropped it. But as fate would have it BB was martyred and the elections were scheduled for 18th of Feb and here i am. But i am not complaining or something i am happy with what i have achieved, Allah has blessed me beyond my imagination.

__________________
M-M-M

yes,it is a great achievement for the candidates falling in age group (21-24) n getting through it in first attempt.but i personally think that you could have scored around 750 if you had 2 or 3 more months for it.

Thanx for picking out one book for me. I would also mention here that I am not 'reluctant' to go through many books infact I have had a heavy reading habit all my life apart from academic text. However unfortunately due to time constraints I'm currently going through , I feel I may not be able to handle an information overload either- thus perhaps a book or two that cover the whole syllabus sufficiently.

Do let me know of anything else that might help in passing the exam, from time to time. You know good advice certainly helps.