I'm an avid reader of history books (antiquity, middle ages), and I'd say I'm very picky, trawling through reviews and recommendations from trusted sources before deciding on a book.

I have already come across books that were a slog to read because of the author's simplistic worldview or obvious contrarian agenda (so I can definitely relate), but I've also read some masterpieces (for example, Kaldellis I believe is solid).

Unfortunately I don't count any historians among my friends, so I'd welcome any recs from you for authors that are the least bad, or a teardown of main antiquity/middle ages historians.