Undoubtably. Do you know of an alternative that provides more depth? I like Jared's tone, but it doesn't matter too much as long as the content is factual to the smallest points.
Nope! I don't normally even read anthropology books or anything, I only read it on the recommendation of a gay heathen irishman, whose suggestions always yielded entertaining reads. I'd probably just look into Portugal since they were the first Empire to hold distant territory across the world without any connection beyond the sea. History of Portugal, developments in Portugal, what obstacles Portugal faced and what the Portuguese wanted and ended up with (for example, a great many STDs). It is very amusing to see how hard Venice fought Portugal's attempts to build their trade Empire. The greatest enemy of one ascendant European Empire was usually another European Empire yet to rise. And to be honest I wouldn't even be able to find a good history book in the sea of history books.
I think the best, holistic way would be to look at how geography shapes a nation and its people, how technology was spread (contrast the Islamic world spreading paper through captured Chinese or Ancient Greek-Indian exchanges with the great Eurasian Steppes that brought gunpowder to Europe), the cycle of civilizations (nomads conquer, become builders, builders get conquered by nomads who then become builders e.t.c.) and well... Shit the list goes on. Religion, nationalism, historical rivalries, one of the things I forgot about was the European schooling systems and the creation of Universities - no point having a nation of geniuses if they're not being used, and there's a reason Universities like Oxford and Cambridge are still in the top 5 Universities in the world and notable inventors/generals/scientists weren't all exactly self-taught.
Tl;dr it's easy to say something's wrong but it's considerably harder to pin down one good cause. I wouldn't say there's an alternative to Guns Germs and Steel so much as you need many, many, many more informations. At least 20 informations.