Academic works almost always advance arguments. "X is correct because we can see A, B, and people would have understood that in light of C. Critics will point out Y, which is addressed by D, E, and F".

There's no firm line between scholarly and pop history other than the reputation and credibility of the work, which often isn't obvious to lay readers.

> "Event A happened. Event B happened. Event C happened. In that order. Perhaps that means X"

That's both academic and pop-history, where a better representation would be "A gazillion different events happened but let's talk about events A, B, and C." It's impossible to talk about all the events that happened, so everyone needs to select the "important" ones. Of course when selecting what's "important" the bias is employed. It's not uncommon to reach different conclusions when looking at certain events (while disregarding others).