THE INTERESTING BITS is a veritable treasure trove of those surprising, eccentric, chaotic, baffling asides that don't fit neatly into history's official narrative. Find out how exactly Henry II of France came to have a two-foot splinter in his head; why Alexandra of Bavaria believed she had swallowed a piano; whether there really was a female Pope. These are all the gems that generations of teachers have excised from lessons on the grounds that they might make history too much like fun. Fact-filled yet funny, this is a great cross-generational gift.