Kenya: A Country in the Making, 1880-1940 (W.W. Norton)

Black-and-white photography is a uniquely suitable window to the past, capturing the outlines of reality as it once existed and stripping it of color, leaving much to the imagination. Kenya: A Country in the Making is a treat for the imagination even if you normally have little interest in Britain's East African colonies of long ago. Collected and restored after years of scrounging through attics and photo albums, Kenyan photographer Nigel Pavitt has assembled a remarkable collection that includes gorgeous landscapes and incredible wildlife shots, photos of the native Africans, the immigrant Indians and the British colonists who inhabited the country in the decades before World War II. Some of the little towns have a frontier feel not unlike the American West or the Australian Outback. A few of the photographs could be considered artful, and all are fascinating records of a lost time. (David Luhrssen)