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9/11: Reflecting on our darkest hour

Feature by Martin Brady

The 10th anniversary of 9/11 is a solemn occasion that will be noted by all Americans. Several recent books recall the events of that day, with emphasis on heroism, courage under fire, sacrifice and loss.

WITNESSES TO TRAGEDY

In tandem with Columbia University’s Oral History Research Office, a team of editors has compiled After the Fall: New Yorkers Remember September 2001 and the Years That Followed. This compelling collection of reminiscences by survivors of, and witnesses to, 9/11 has particular resonance because the subjects were interviewed first after the attack, and then several years later, as a means of monitoring their post-trauma reactions and behavior. The project’s Q&A approach offers readable access into the feelings—both personal and political—of the respondents, including firefighters and police, surviving family members of victims and residents of Lower Manhattan.

Another volume comes from Tuesday’s Children, a nonprofit founded by the relatives and friends of 9/11 victims, which has put together The Legacy Letters, gathering missives written to the deceased victims by their loved ones. With the tragedy now 10 years in the past, these plaintive letters from wives, children, siblings and parents are nonetheless palpably moving, and the poignant expressions of love, hope, regret, sadness and longing serve as stark reminders of the human toll exacted by the brutal attacks.

In a similar vein, but with broader scope, is 9/11: The World Speaks. Compiled by the Tribute WTC Visitor Center and a project of the September 11th Families’ Association, this book compiles the thoughts, prayers and heartfelt ruminations of worldwide visitors to Ground Zero, reproducing the actual note cards and original drawings contributed by the respondents. A paperback with a somewhat ephemeral feel to it, this item is nevertheless a worthy addition to the 10-year commemoration, with a foreword by former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani and a preface by Tom Brokaw.

STORIES OF HOPE

There are, of course, many noteworthy stories of survival from 9/11, but perhaps none are as stirring as the one related in Angel in the Rubble: The Miraculous Rescue of 9/11’s Last Survivor. Genelle Guzman-McMillan was employed by the New York Port Authority and was working on the North Tower’s 64th floor on September 11, 2001. Her escape from the building following the crash of American Airlines Flight 11 begins almost as a comedy of errors involving misdirection and official confusion. Alas, what should have been a fairly straightforward evacuation turned into a nightmare, and her survival was truly miraculous. She and her colleagues in fact never really escaped from the tower. The building collapsed just as they were nearing the exits, and only Guzman-McMillan survived, discovered alive amid the rubble by rescue workers more than 24 hours later. Guzman-McMillan, along with co-author William -Croyle, crafts a readable account of that ill-fated sequence of events, effectively framing the 9/11 story within the context of her own confused personal life, including her illegal status with the INS. Her story has a happy ending on many fronts and serves to remind us that hope can spring from despair.

Michael Hingson’s 9/11 survival story is unique, to say the least. A salesman beginning a normal workday at the World Trade Center that morning, Hingson happens to be blind, his guide dog, Roselle, ever at his side. In Thunder Dog, Hingson, with a deft assist from co-author Susy Flory, intersperses a solid overview of his life—blind almost from birth—with the tale of his escape from the 78th floor of Tower One. Hingson describes feeling the impact of the plane that morning, the sway of the building, the smell of airplane fuel and his subsequent evacuation with a colleague, traversing some 1,400 stairs to the tenuous safety of the chaotic New York streets below, Roselle determinedly and faithfully leading the way. 

Hingson’s well-written story does more than provide a slice of 9/11 history. Readers will learn enlightening information about the blind experience in general and take away some good advice for how the sighted can better interact with their blind brethren.

MAKING HISTORY

Finally, the 9/11 anniversary has induced two publishers to re–release valuable books on the event. In 102 Minutes: The Unforgettable Story of the Fight to Survive Inside the Twin Towers, authors Jim Dwyer and Kevin Flynn provide a chronological narrative of the dramatic developments at Ground Zero, with focus on the stories of individuals in both towers caught up in the horror and confusion. Originally published in 2005, the latest edition features a new postscript with updates on the lives of some of the people involved in the events.

First published in 2002, when it was rushed into print as a timely summary of 9/11, the reissued What We Saw: The Events of September 11, 2001, In Words, Pictures, and Video includes the DVD from the original publication plus a new reflective essay by Joe Klein. This package cogently gathers contemporaneous news stories from the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post and other major print sources; the authors represented include Anna Quindlen, Maureen Dowd, Howard Kurtz and Pete Hamill, among others. There are also transcripts of CBS News radio and television coverage, and the video disc—narrated by Dan Rather—offers an informative visual look back at the terror and its aftermath.

 

The 10th anniversary of 9/11 is a solemn occasion that will be noted by all Americans. Several recent books recall the events of that day, with emphasis on heroism, courage under fire, sacrifice and loss.

WITNESSES TO TRAGEDY

In tandem with Columbia University’s Oral…

NonfictionMilitary HistoryBlack HistoryAmerican History

Humanity at its most inventive and savage

Feature by Edward Morris

It is an open question whether history as it comes down to us, with all its political and psychological overlays, has something useful to teach us about our own affairs. What is not in dispute about history, though, is its power to entertain and inspire us with its myths and stories. In this regard, the four annals considered here are all enormously satisfying and thought-provoking—maybe even instructive.

MAKING HISTORY BY HAND
As director of the British Museum, Neil MacGregor had only to look around him to find the exemplary artifacts he discusses in A History of the World in 100 Objects. The oldest is a stone chopping tool discovered in the Olduvai Gorge in Tanzania and estimated to be between 1.8 and 2 million years old, while the newest is a solar-powered light and charger made in China in 2010. Each object is illustrated in color and explained by MacGregor in essays that manage to be both scholarly and conversational in tone. Embedded within certain of these essays are additional wise commentaries from the likes of David Attenborough, Martin Amis, Yo Yo Ma, Karen Armstrong and Seamus Heaney.

Not surprisingly, most of the objects cited are from the large civilization centers of Europe, Africa and Asia. But there are also ones from less bustling locations: a Clovis spear point from Arizona, a pestle from New Guinea, a textile fragment from Peru, a bark shield from Australia. The choices here will no doubt spur arguments about significance (was the Hawaiian feather helmet really symbolic of human development?), omissions (where is the can of Spam? the Swiss pocket knife?) and political correctness (is the Suffragette-defaced penny anything more than an oddity?). But, then, isn’t raising issues the best part of reading histories?

WHEN IN ROME
The congenitally combative art critic Robert Hughes began his long love affair with Rome on his first visit there in 1959. In Rome: A Cultural, Visual, and Personal History, he undertakes the gargantuan task of chronicling more than 3,000 years of myths, battles, political intrigues, religious upheavals and, most dear to him, art in its infinite manifestations. He begins his account in the mists of prehistory and carries it forward to what he sees as Rome’s present condition—a pestilential tourist beehive in which art is viewed and checked off one’s list rather than savored.

No figure is too transient, no artifact too trivial and no political movement too bizarre to merit Hughes’ attention as he strides those city streets through the ages. His descriptions are sharp and vivid. Of the battle at Cannae between the Carthaginian Hannibal’s troops and Roman soldiers, he writes, “Roman losses in a single day at Cannae were almost as great as American combat losses (58,000) in the Vietnam War. And it all happened within about nine hours on a late-spring or early-summer day, blindingly hot, fogged with the clouds of dust kicked up by thousands of men in their relentless, terminal struggle.”

Although his prose often has a working man’s swagger to it, Hughes can become lyrical given the right stimulus. Recalling the Church of Santa Maria della Consolazione in nearby Umbria, he says, “There is no town around it; it simply emerges from the earth, flooded with light inside. No mosaics, no statuary, no gilt, no marble: only strong, ideal geometrical form. To have such an interior to oneself, in the light of a spring morning, is to grasp a fleeting sense of what Dante meant—‘luce, intellettual, piena d’amore’: the light of the mind, suffused with love.”

SEEING THE CIVIL WAR ANEW
Margaret E. Wagner’s The Library of Congress Illustrated Timeline of the Civil War is a real factual and pictorial treasure. Illustrated by more than 350 photographs, drawings, editorial cartoons, maps, handbills and manuscript reproductions (many in color), the book begins on February 4, 1861, when representatives from six secessionist states meet in Montgomery, Alabama, to form a Confederate government, and ends on May 29, 1865, when newly elevated President Andrew Johnson grants amnesties or pardons to most of those who rebelled against the Union.

All the entries are brief, so the accounts of skirmishes and battles are necessarily summaries. But the length is perfect for anecdotes that reveal the human side of the war, such as this one from October 15, 1863: “Inventor H. L. Hunley is among eight men who die when the Confederate submarine H. L. Hunley sinks (for the second time; see August 29, 1863) during a practice dive in Charleston Harbor.” Or take this missive for February 10, 1864: “When flames are spotted at the president’s stables near the White House, Abraham Lincoln dashes outside, leaping over an intervening boxwood hedge ‘like a deer’ . . . and ‘with his own hands burst open the stable door.’ ” Lincoln was restrained from entering the building, and the fire killed six horses, including one that had belonged to his deceased son.

The book’s illustrations are large, fully captioned and powerfully narrative in their own right. Among the curiosities depicted are a drawing from a surgery manual showing how to amputate a leg; a printed envelope bearing the likeness of Lincoln’s reluctant general, George B. McClellan, and identifying him as “The Bag of Wind”; and a letter written by Jefferson Davis’ secretary with lines running both across and up and down the page to save precious paper. It is hard to imagine a more accessible survey of the Civil War than this one.

500 YEARS OF BLACK HISTORY
Strange as it may seem now, as recently as 50 years ago, textbooks on American history barely touched on the contributions of African Americans. Henry Louis Gates Jr.’s stirring collection, Life Upon These Shores, is a chronicle of important figures and events that were long overlooked, forgotten or ignored. He begins in 1513, when Vasco Núñez de Balboa first sighted the Pacific Ocean at the Isthmus of Panama, with 30 Africans among his party. Just over 100 years later, in 1619, the first shipment of slaves to America arrived in Jamestown, Virginia. The terminus of Gates’ survey, naturally enough, is the election of America’s first black president.

Illustrated with more than 750 drawings, paintings and photographs, the book offers little historical vignettes much like those in an encyclopedia, except that these entries are in chronological rather than alphabetical order. The recurring themes—as Gates presents them in his measured, conversational tone—are resistance, persistence, imagination, self-help and thwarted attempts at assimilation.

Perhaps because it has been so minutely anatomized elsewhere, Gates devotes only a few pages to the Civil War proper, concentrating instead on events leading up to the war and the devastating Reconstruction period that followed. In the modern era, he pays much attention to the influence of African Americans on the arts and popular culture—from Duke Ellington and Richard Wright to Muhammad Ali, Spike Lee and Oprah Winfrey. He also illuminates political conflicts within the African-American community via snapshots of such volatile figures as Marcus Garvey, Martin Luther King Jr., Louis Farrakhan and Clarence Thomas, and summarizes the achievements of African Americans in municipal, state and national politics. One may quibble with his omissions, but Gates’ task here is truly Herculean, and he has handled it superbly.

It is an open question whether history as it comes down to us, with all its political and psychological overlays, has something useful to teach us about our own affairs. What is not in dispute about history, though, is its power to entertain and inspire…

NonfictionPop CultureArtAmerican History

Great gifts that run the gamut

Feature by Alice Cary

Are you trying to tackle a towering gift list? Never fear! No matter who you’re shopping for, the right book is waiting.

WHITE HOUSE HISTORY
As an elementary school student, I had the good fortune to be part of a private White House Christmas tour led by my classmate’s aunt, who was First Lady Pat Nixon’s press secretary. Decades later, I continue to be fascinated by the White House, and The White House: The President’s Home in Photographs and History is indeed a mesmerizing tour, boasting 278 photographs along with a highly readable, informative text by photography critic Vicki Goldberg.

Here’s a sampling of the intriguing photos within these pages: a biplane about to land on the White House lawn in 1911, flown by a student of the Wright brothers; smoke billowing out of the White House during a 1929 Christmas Eve fire that erupted as President Hoover and his wife hosted a party for the children of their staff; a press secretary in 1957 using office equipment that was crammed inside a bathroom; Betty Ford dancing barefoot on top of the Cabinet Room table; Caroline Kennedy visiting President Obama in the Oval Office as they inspect the desk that her father once used.

There’s something interesting on every page of this comprehensive photographic journey.

PILGRIMAGE TO SAN DIEGO
Perhaps, like me, you’ve heard about Comic-Con for years and wondered what it’s all about. Here’s an insider’s look at the “world’s largest pop-culture event,” in the form of both a new documentary and this companion book by Oscar-nominated director Morgan Spurlock, Comic-Con Episode IV: A Fan’s Hope.

Think of this convention as Halloween on steroids, as adults, families, geeks, comic creators and fans dress up as their favorite super­heroes and comic characters and meet and mingle, all gloriously captured in living color by photographer Alba Tull. Also present are legends and pioneers of the business, such as Stan Lee (the comic book creator of Spider-Man), Iron Man, Thor and other superheroes.

Leafing through this colorful portrait gallery is like wandering through the convention floor and having a quick chat with the fans. Why do they come? What do they love? What do they talk about? “Battlestar Galactica” actor Richard Hatch sums up Comic-Con like this: “People want to come and feel part of something—feel connected to the greater world and be part of this magical industry that has kind of been a savior, I think, for a lot of people’s lives.”

WORLD’S BEST AND WEIRDEST
The RecordSetter Book of World Records is the sort of book that my three teen and almost-teen children are bound to devour. Authors Corey Henderson and Dan Rollman founded their own website (RecordSetter.com) in 2008 after finding the submission process for the Guinness Book of World Records both limiting and overly daunting. Their website’s goal is to invent, beat and discuss world records, and the founders’ philosophy is that “everyone on earth can be the world’s best at something.”

The website itself is fun, creative and inclusive, as is this book, which features records, interviews and tips for setting and beating new records. There’s no end to the inventive feats celebrated, such as: fastest time to open a bag of Skittles and sort them by color (21.5 seconds); most KISS songs named in one minute (45); largest group to sit on balloons and pop them at once (117 people); and most text messages sent and received in a single month (200,052)—a record set by a 19-year-old who, not surprisingly, developed blisters on his thumbs.

Let’s just say that this book is the perfect party gift!

MINDING YOUR P’S AND Q’S
Move over, Ann Landers and Dear Abby. As Philip Galanes explains, his popular New York Times column is “Not Your Mummy’s Advice Column.” He’s collected many of the outrageous questions he’s received and answered in Social Q’s: How To Survive the Quirks, Quandaries and Quagmires of Today.

The book is arranged into chapters addressing dilemmas related to social situations, public transportation, work, romance, family and money matters, all with wonderful titles such as “Step Away from That Keyboard! E-mails, Texts, and the Three Commandments for E-Living.” With the holidays soon to be here, you’ll learn whether you have to keep shelling out gifts to teenaged relatives who never bother to thank you for them. “Move on,” Galanes advises. Is it okay to approach a fellow commuter on whom you have developed a crush? He tells this questioner, “It’s a free country, Brooke. So long as you keep your clothes on.” (He adds a few cautionary notes, however).

Galanes dishes out reasonable, well thought-out answers to these questions and more. This book is a fun romp through other people’s problems, regardless of whether you face them yourself.

PATRIOTIC PAINTINGS
On a more nostalgic note, here’s a lovely compendium for anyone who’s a fan of Norman Rockwell, American history, literature and music. Included in Norman Rockwell’s Spirit of America are 100 color and 50 black-and-white illustrations painted by Rockwell, as well as eight color plates that are separate, ready-to-frame prints. The inspiring paintings are accompanied by excerpts from songs, stories, speeches and more from our nation’s history.

These glimpses into our country’s past are great fun to peruse, and an excellent education for younger readers, who can take a look at an old-fashioned voting booth, a drugstore soda counter, a stern schoolmaster and a crooning barbershop quartet. The literary excerpts feature plenty of well-known names, such as Mark Twain, Emily Dickinson, Martin Luther King Jr., Laura Ingalls Wilder and O. Henry. Cuddle up with this collection on a cold winter’s night, and you’re bound to stumble upon some hidden gems, such as Ogden Nash’s ode to being a father, which includes lines like these: “But all children matures / Maybe even yours. // You improve them mentally / And straighten them dentally.”

The rest of the poem is equally delightful, and just one of the many treasures found in this literary and artistic collection.

Are you trying to tackle a towering gift list? Never fear! No matter who you’re shopping for, the right book is waiting.

WHITE HOUSE HISTORY
As an elementary school student, I had the good fortune to be part of a private White House Christmas tour led…

NonfictionMilitary HistoryBlack HistoryAmerican History

The march toward freedom

Feature by John T. Slania

Although they examine three separate, significant times in the span of African-American history, these books share common themes: the struggle for freedom, the quest for equality and the achievement of these goals with the help of a great leader. Spanning more than a century, from the Civil War to the Civil Rights movement, these new volumes provide important perspective as we celebrate Black History Month.

THE GREAT EMANCIPATOR

Much has been written about Abraham Lincoln’s evolution from a president who simply sought to preserve the union to one who ultimately realized he must free the slaves. But James Oakes makes the case in Freedom National that even before the Civil War, Lincoln held a firm anti-slavery view and pursued that goal until his death. While January 1, 2013, marked the 150th anniversary of the Emancipation Proclamation, Oakes writes that long before that historic order was issued, Lincoln and the Republican Party were orchestrating political and military maneuvers to free the slaves.

Oakes, a noted professor of history, provocatively sets the starting date of the emancipation at less than four months after the first cannon shot of the Civil War. It was on August 6, 1861, that Lincoln signed the First Confiscation Act, instructing the Union Army to seize any property and free any slaves owned by Southerners disloyal to the union. “[F]irmly convinced that slavery was the source of the rebellion, Republicans began attacking it almost as soon as the war began,” Oakes writes.

While experiencing some success with military action, Lincoln realized he needed a broader decree—the Emancipation Proclamation—to achieve full freedom for slaves. Thus, Oakes writes, the Emancipation Proclamation wasn’t the beginning or end of Lincoln’s mission, but a more aggressive phase of his anti-slavery campaign. The final steps were victory over the South in the war, and then passage of the Thirteenth Amendment outlawing slavery, which Lincoln shepherded through Congress. He was assassinated before the amendment was ratified by the states.

Freedom National is a refreshing new look at Lincoln because it refutes a growing body of work arguing that it was only after exhausting every other political and military tactic that he adopted an anti-slavery stance. Oakes’ conclusion: “[Lincoln] was neither the Great Emancipator who bestrode his times and brought his people out of the darkness, nor was he in any way a reluctant emancipator held back by some visceral commitment to white supremacy.”

GIVE 'EM HELL

It is altogether fitting that this Black History Month trilogy moves from one great military conflict—the Civil War—to another: World War II. In fact, the theme of Rawn James Jr.’s The Double V is how the nation’s military conflicts, and their use of African-American soldiers, reflect our attitudes toward racism and equality. “From exclusion and segregation, to integration and diversity, the armed forces, for better or worse, have always reflected our country at large,” James writes.

The Double V refers to the attempt by black soldiers to achieve two victories in World War II: on the battlefield and at home, where they sought to be treated as equals. James, an accomplished historian, writes that the Double V campaign was best described by prominent civil rights activist Roy Wilkins, who said that blacks should “fight on for the full freedom of 100 percent democracy at home while we are fighting a war for democracy abroad.” Providing critical historical context, James details how African Americans were mustered into the U.S. military beginning in the late stages of the Civil War. Yet it wasn’t true integration, he writes, since black soldiers often performed menial tasks in segregated units.

Two factors led to the complete integration of the military, according to James: the loyalty and heroics displayed by black soldiers in World War II, and the presidency of Harry S. Truman. As a U.S. senator, Truman headed a committee to investigate misappropriation of military defense contracts. Inspecting dozens of military bases and field operations, Truman grew to understand not only the nation’s vast military apparatus, but also its soldiers, including the bravery of its black soldiers. Once the war was over and the foreign enemies dispatched, Truman turned to combating the internal enemy of segregation.

On July 26, 1948, African Americans finally enjoyed the “Double V” when Truman issued Executive Order 9981, desegregating the armed forces. Of course, the order did not end racism in the military, James points out. But this bold decision by a conservative, white Missourian did establish a doctrine to bring equality to the military. While the struggle for equality continues, James concludes that evidence of progress can be seen six decades later with the election of Barack Obama, who, as president, is commander in chief of the armed forces.

TRIUMPH AND TRAGEDY

Not all wars involve the military. This is a lesson from Taylor Branch’s The King Years, which chronicles Martin Luther King Jr.’s fight for equality during the Civil Rights era. Here, the clash is between white supremacists—who refuse to allow blacks to eat at the same lunch counters, drink from the same water fountains or use the same bathrooms—and African Americans asking for the rights granted to all citizens by the U.S. Constitution. The offensive is conducted in a peaceful fashion by King, but frequently met with bloody violence.

The King Years is a distillation of Branch’s acclaimed trilogy, America in the King Years. The series totaled more than 2,000 pages, offering a comprehensive and exhaustively researched exploration of the Civil Rights movement. Branch was awarded a Pulitzer Prize for History for the first installment, Parting the Waters, and received praise for two subsequent volumes, Pillar of Fire and At Canaan’s Edge. Here, Branch selects 18 passages from the trilogy in an attempt to capture the essential moments of the Civil Rights era. Branch’s hope in publishing a condensed edition is to make history accessible to a new generation of readers. “Our goal in this edition,” Branch writes, “is to convey both the spirit and sweep of an extraordinary movement.”

Moving chronologically, The King Years begins with the Montgomery Bus Boycott in 1955, moves through the Selma March in 1965, and finishes with King’s assassination in Memphis in 1968. These condensed passages allow readers to grasp the significance of these and other key moments in King’s life and offer an invitation to Branch’s more complete writings.

In an interview with his publisher, Branch revealed the inspiration for publishing The King Years: “For all readers, I believe, lessons from the Civil Rights Era apply not to bygone forms of racial segregation but most urgently to a troubled future. . . . They show how ordinary people can work miracles against intractable burdens to advance both freedom and the common good.”

The war against racism is not over. But The King Years shows how King and others advanced the cause of equality in the same noble fashion as the great leaders who preceded them. It is Branch’s hope that a new generation who learn about King’s crusade for civil rights may be inspired to continue the fight.

Although they examine three separate, significant times in the span of African-American history, these books share common themes: the struggle for freedom, the quest for equality and the achievement of these goals with the help of a great leader. Spanning more than a century, from…

NonfictionMusicBlack HistoryBiographyAmerican History

Turning points on the road to equality

Feature by John T. Slania

African Americans have been struggling for independence, equality and respect from the moment they were brought to the New World in chains. As that struggle continues today, it’s instructive to look back on our turbulent history to learn from the past and hopefully improve on the future. The five books featured here can help us to do just that, examining historical themes that serve as milestones on the journey of progress.

DESPERATION & DECEPTION

It’s ironic that Captain Amasa Delano was on the high seas in pursuit of seals when he came upon what appeared to be a slave ship. Hunting for seals and slaves were equally predatory professions. And while seal hunting was a lucrative industry, the slave trade would prove to be even more profitable. Not that Delano would grasp the irony; he was an idealistic, anti-slavery New Englander. And when he boarded the battered vessel, his idealism would leave him vulnerable to a deception that had deadly consequences.

This page-turning history lesson is found in The Empire of Necessity by Greg Grandin, author of the acclaimed Fordlandia. Delano’s ship happened upon a distressed Spanish vessel one day in 1805. It appeared to be merely a lost slave ship. In reality, the 70 West Africans on board, seeking their freedom from slavery, had commandeered the ship. The clever slaves forced the Spanish captain to go along with the ruse. Delano believed the charade for nine hours, but when he discovered he’d been tricked, he ordered his men to attack the West Africans.

While Grandin’s narrative is a gripping read on its own, the underlying theme is profound: The deception in this incident is symbolic of America’s willingness to ignore the hypocisy of slavery in a supposedly free society. Unfortunately, it would take the United States another 60 years before it would acknowledge the falsehood.

FAILED EXPERIMENT

When the Civil War ended slavery in 1865, the U.S. embarked on an effort to provide reparations to Southern landowners and expanded rights to newly freed slaves, including suffrage and education. That policy, called Reconstruction, was a noble idea that failed.

In The Wars of Reconstruction, Le Moyne College history professor Douglas R. Egerton details the myriad factors that led to the collapse of Reconstruction: the replacement of Abraham Lincoln with an inept Andrew Johnson; Southern resistance to the granting of equal rights to blacks; and the premature withdrawal of federal troops. But Egerton contends that an ongoing pattern of violence in the South doomed Reconstruction from the beginning. “Reconstruction . . . was violently overthrown by men who had fought slavery during the Civil War and continued that battle as guerrilla partisans,” Egerton writes.

The Wars of Reconstruction offers a fresh perspective on why the grand experiment of Reconstruction failed and how it took nearly a century afterward for African Americans to gain any semblance of equal rights in the South.

SIREN SONG

In the early 1900s, many African Americans—shackled by an inability to earn a living or cast a vote—began a Great Migration from the rural South to the industrialized cities of the North. Jobs in the car factories of Detroit and steel mills of Chicago beckoned, while also fostering a black middle class. For the first time, African Americans earned enough money to own homes, buy cars and spend money on entertainment. One of the people they went to see was trumpeter Louis Armstrong.

In Louis Armstrong: Master of Modernism, Duke University music professor Thomas Brothers chronicles Armstrong’s own Great Migration. After gaining notoriety as a musician in New Orleans, Armstrong heard a siren song in 1922 calling him north to Chicago, where there was a thriving black nightclub scene on the city’s South Side. There, Armstrong honed his crafts playing alongside jazz greats such as King Oliver, Earl “Fatha” Hines and Cab Calloway.

While this biography highlights the maturation of a great entertainer during the Jazz Age, it parallels the evolution of many African Americans in the early 20th century as they earned respectable livelihoods and carved out their own cultural enclaves in the North.

BARRIER TO PROGRESS

Unfortunately, the prosperity of the Jazz Age gave way to the Great Depression, and over the next several decades, many African Americans suffered from poverty and segregation in Northern cities. Some returned to the South, only to encounter further discrimination. The hatred experienced by a race was crystallized in the life of James Meredith, a trailblazer best known as the first African-American student to attend the University of Mississippi. Meredith is the central figure in Down to the Crossroads, an intriguing new book about the civil rights movement by historian Aram Goudsouzian.

Down to the Crossroads focuses on the so-called Meredith March, which the civil rights leader began on June 5, 1966, to register black voters in Mississippi. He started the march in Memphis with the goal of reaching Jackson, Mississippi, but he was soon wounded by a mysterious gunman. While Meredith recovered from his wounds, other black leaders, including Martin Luther King Jr. and Stokely Carmichael, traveled to Mississippi to continue the Meredith March.

Goudsouzian uses the march to capture the divergent leadership styles of the era’s civil rights leaders. There was the defiant Carmichael, who led marchers in “black power” chants, while King preached nonviolence. This single march, captured in detail in Down to the Crossroads, gives readers a clearer understanding of the tensions that often dominated the civil rights movement. 

CONTINUING THE DREAM

When King was assassinated in Memphis on April 4, 1968, some thought it was the end of the dream of equality for African Americans. In his new book, Waking from the Dream, David L. Chappell turns the spotlight onto those who stepped in to continue the cause in King’s wake, albeit in a less unified fashion.

Waking from the Dream describes the attempts by black leaders such as Ralph Abernathy and Jesse Jackson to further the movement, only to see the struggle slowed by politics and in-fighting. Despite the splintered movement, Chappell details how this new generation of leaders helped gain the passage of the Fair Housing Act and launched the presidential campaign of Jackson.

While it would take another 40 years before Americans would vote in their first black president, Waking from the Dream makes a strong case that Barack Obama would never have been elected were it not for the efforts of the leaders who followed in King’s wake.

African Americans have been struggling for independence, equality and respect from the moment they were brought to the New World in chains. As that struggle continues today, it’s instructive to look back on our turbulent history to learn from the past and hopefully improve on the future. The five books featured here can help us to do just that, examining historical themes that serve as milestones on the journey of progress.

NonfictionTrue CrimeBlack HistoryAmerican History

Obstacles on the path to equality

Feature by John T. Slania

The African-American struggle continues in every corner of the nation, from small towns like Ferguson, Missouri, to the boroughs of New York. Thus, Black History Month arrives at a critical time in America. The question is: Can we learn from history? These selections shed new light on the black experience and offer perspectives on the often painful evolution of race relations in America.

Journalist Jill Leovy’s Ghettoside: A True Story of Murder in America chillingly reflects the violence and racial tension that exists in many urban areas. It’s principally the story of Bryant Tennelle, a Los Angeles teenager who was shot and killed in 2007. At first blush, this might simply be viewed as another black-on-black murder, and something the Los Angeles Police Department would typically ignore. But Tennelle’s father was a police officer. An unlikely hero, police detective John Skaggs, emerges to doggedly work the case and solve the crime.

But Ghettoside is more than just the story of one murdered teen. Leovy broadens her focus to examine the cycle of violence among black men in America—a country in which nearly 40 percent of all murder victims are black. She also offers insight into how the killings can be stopped.

“[W]here the criminal justice system fails to respond vigorously to violent injury and death,” she writes, “homicide becomes endemic.” Leovy bolsters her argument with extensive research, which included embedding herself within an LAPD detective squad.

SPYING EYES
Sometimes the conflict between law enforcement and African Americans doesn’t play out through violence. F.B. Eyes: How J. Edgar Hoover’s Ghostreaders Framed African American Literature reveals the covert side of oppression. Scholar William J. Maxwell conducted an exhaustive records search to uncover files showing that the FBI under J. Edgar Hoover spied on African-American writers and silenced some of their work. Maxwell gained access to 51 files demonstrating that over five decades, Hoover was obsessed with black authors, fearing their work might inspire political unrest and violence. He assigned a team of FBI agents to carry out a series of assignments, some as benign as reading advance copies of books, others as serious as persuading publishers to halt the release of books. Targets included Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man and Lorraine Hansberry’s A Raisin in the Sun, as well as the work of Richard Wright, whose poem “The FB Eye Blues” inspired the book’s title.

Among the most stunning examples of the Bureau’s activity was a hate letter written to the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. in 1964. In it, a white FBI agent posing as a black man tells King he is a “complete fraud and a great liability to all us Negroes.” F.B. Eyes is a startling look at how racism has influenced the highest levels of authority.

THE FUGITIVE TRAIL
In Gateway to Freedom: The Hidden History of the Underground Railroad, noted historian Eric Foner gives a detailed and often stirring account of the antebellum network that transported escaped slaves from the South to Northern free states and Canada. Foner, a Pulitzer Prize-winning author who has written many fine books on the Civil War, slavery and Reconstruction, uncovers new evidence of just how extensive the secret path to freedom was for fugitive slaves.

His account centers on the Underground Railroad’s network in New York City, which had the North’s largest community of free blacks, as well as many ardent white abolitionists. Pre-eminent among them was newspaperman Sydney Howard Gay, who documented the activities of the Underground Railroad in a meticulous “Record of Fugitives,” which logged the arrival of fugitives in the city in 1855 and 1856 and related some of their horrifying personal stories. (In the book’s acknowledgements, Foner credits a former Columbia University student who found the document in the university archives.) Gay’s record details the step-by-step movements of escaped slaves through the city and the deeds of abolitionists who aided their flight. Among those recorded by Gay was Harriet Tubman, who reached New York in November 1856 with a group of runaway slaves from Maryland.

Gateway to Freedom is an important addition to the historical view of the Underground Railroad and a salute to the slaves who “faced daunting odds and demonstrated remarkable courage” in their journeys to freedom.

 

This article was originally published in the February 2015 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

The African-American struggle continues in every corner of the nation, from small towns like Ferguson, Missouri, to the boroughs of New York. Thus, Black History Month arrives at a critical time in America. The question is: Can we learn from history? These selections shed new light on the black experience and offer perspectives on the often painful evolution of race relations in America.
NonfictionMemoirBlack HistoryAmerican History

Perspectives on the road to equality

Feature by John T. Slania

Racism. Oppression. Violence. Faith. Hopefulness. These themes have defined the black experience in America from the moment slaves touched shore. As African Americans continue their struggle, three new books cast fresh light on the journey from slavery to freedom.

A LOST MEMOIR FINALLY FOUND
Austin Reed’s birth certificate states that he was born a free man in New York, unique for a person of color in the 1820s. But Reed’s struggles in the pre-Civil War era made him far from free. Never before published, his remarkable 150-year-old autobiography, The Life and the Adventures of a Haunted Convict, shows that even in the North, hatred and prejudice made life intolerable for African Americans.

Reed’s handwritten account chronicles years spent as an indentured servant and petty thief whose crimes led to turns in a juvenile reformatory and later, prison. Following the death of his father, Reed was made an indentured servant to pay off his family’s debts. When he burned down his master’s house, he was sent to a reformatory, where he was subjected to hard labor. But he also learned to read and write, allowing him to create this fascinating account of his experiences. As an adult, crimes of theft and larceny would return him to prison, where he was beaten and left in solitary confinement.

The Life and the Adventures of a Haunted Convict is believed to be the earliest account of prison life written by an African American. Authenticated by a team of scholars, it helps broaden the historical context of the black experience in America.

BAD SEEDS
Author Karen Branan is forced by two events to confront her prejudices: the present-day birth of her granddaughter and a century-old lynching in a small Southern town. The birth involves a baby girl born to Branan’s white son and his African-American girlfriend. Brenan’s first instinct is to recoil, a reaction that can, in part, be traced to her upbringing in Georgia. It is there, in the town of Hamilton, that four African Americans were lynched in 1912 for their suspected role in the murder of a white man. The sheriff at the time was Branan’s great-grandfather.

Branan, a veteran journalist, decides to confront her family’s past, and her own beliefs, by researching the lynching. It forms the basis for her cathartic memoir, The Family Tree. The book reveals some dark truths. First, the murdered white man, Brenan’s distant cousin, had a history of assaulting black women. He was found shot dead after pursuing a 14-year-old black girl. As the case unfolded, Branan’s great-grandfather, the sheriff, arrested a woman and three men, all black. Then he offered no resistance when a white mob dragged the four suspects from jail and hanged them from a tree. Even more startling is that Branan discovers she is related to one of the lynching victims.

The Family Tree is a fascinating account of a white author’s struggle to examine lynching, racism and the violent crimes of her own family. She strives for healing the only way she can: by uncovering the truth.

AN INFLUENTIAL VOICE
When African Americans began the Great Migration from the South to Northern cities, many found opportunities in Chicago: employment in factories, steel mills and stockyards, a chance to own a home and greater social acceptance. The city’s South Side became a black metropolis teeming with shops, restaurants, nightclubs and churches. Providing news to this emerging group was the newly created Chicago Defender, a black-owned newspaper.

Ethan Michaeli traces the growth of this groundbreaking newspaper in The Defender, showing how the Chicago Defender grew to become a cultural and economic force in not only Chicago, but also the nation. Smuggled copies made their way to the Jim Crow South, providing blacks with much-needed news of the civil rights movement. A team of national correspondents from the Chicago Defender was there to cover the lynching of Emmett Till, the violence against the Freedom Riders and King’s crossing of the Edmund Pettus Bridge. And the newspaper played an important role in supporting and promoting the emerging black middle class.

The Defender is a thorough and well-researched account of an important voice in black history.

 

This article was originally published in the February 2016 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Racism. Oppression. Violence. Faith. Hopefulness. These themes have defined the black experience in America from the moment slaves touched shore. As African Americans continue their struggle, three new books cast fresh light on the journey from slavery to freedom.
NonfictionAmerican History

Captivating perspectives on the past

Feature by Keith Herrell

Gift-buying trends come and go, but for some readers, history books are a sure source of enlightenment and pleasure. Here are five of our favorites this season, sure to brighten the holidays for any history buff.

SHAPING NEW YORK
Looking for the perfect gift for someone who loves all things New York? You can’t go wrong with The Gilded Age in New York, 1870-1910, which covers the 40-year period known for rampant capitalism and audacious displays of wealth. With its handsome cover featuring the Flatiron Building and a full-page photo of the  Cornelius Vanderbilt mansion facing the introduction, this is a book that cheerfully joins in the celebration. But don’t be fooled—author Esther Crain has produced a comprehensive look at the Gilded Age, peeling back the veneer to examine the multiple flaws that led to progressive reforms. So yes, there are plenty of photos and reproductions of mansions, costume balls and luxury hotels, but Crain also carefully depicts all aspects of life in the Big Apple, with chapters focusing on the poor, crime (and sin!) and the rise of the “New Woman.” Treat this like a coffee table book, merely flipping through pages to gaze at the pictures, at your peril. With numerous breakout sections on such topics as crusading reporter Nellie Bly, “The Opera House War” and an all-female stolen-goods ring, it’s a fascinating history lesson as well. 

BLACK PANTHER LEGACY
The founders of the Black Panther Party probably didn’t expect a coffee table book about the group’s creation when they got together 50 years ago, but this year’s anniversary commemorations include Power to the People: The World of the Black Panthers. Authored by Stephen Shames and party co-founder Bobby Seale, the book uses photographs from the early days (almost all of them black and white) and oral recollections to tell the story of the revolutionary social organization created as a response to racism and social inequality. Most controversially, the Black Panthers advocated armed self-defense to counter police brutality. (One of the most striking images shows Seale and other party members armed during a protest at the California State Legislature.) Seale’s voice dominates the text, but many figures important to the movement, including Angela Davis and Eldridge Cleaver, are also heard from. The photographs are by Shames, who acknowledges in the introduction that the Panthers have made errors but emphasizes a legacy of positive social programs, including free breakfasts and health care. His photographs capture it all, including recent images that make it plain that the struggle continues.

MARVELS OF INVENTION
Just as you can’t eat only one potato chip, it would be impossible to stop with one selection from America the Ingenious: How a Nation of Dreamers, Immigrants, and Tinkerers Changed the World. Written by novelist and journalist Kevin Baker (Paradise Alley), it’s a celebration of more than 75 inventions and innovations—some of which we take for granted, some of which we’ve almost forgotten (cotton gin, anyone?) and some of which we still marvel at. Each entry checks in at about three pages, including illustrations, which makes this the book to pick up any time you’re looking for that perfect factoid or cocktail party anecdote. Did you know that the death of legendary football coach Knute Rockne hastened the development of the transcontinental airplane? Or that 3-D printing has been around in some form since the 19th century? Thanks to Baker’s efficient and witty commentary, the learning goes down easily and leaves the reader wanting more. His selections are eclectic—don’t go looking for a recounting of how Bell invented the telephone—and he casts a wide net, somehow managing to work in such disparate subjects as the safety pin and the Tennessee Valley Authority.

SURPRISE ATTACK
The weekly Life magazine that baby boomers grew up with may be gone, but its editors still maintain an online presence and publish books on a broad range of subjects. The latest is Pearl Harbor: 75 Years Later, which carries on the Life tradition of iconic photographs, with additional features. The photographs—most of them black and white—are striking, of course, and include images from a Japanese aircraft carrier bound for Pearl Harbor in December 1941. As for the attack itself, destruction on the ground and at sea is depicted in page after page of photos, with black smoke filling the sky. But don’t overlook the accompanying words, including a thoughtful explanation of the run-up to the war and a valuable timeline for Dec. 7, 1941. Additional features include maps, breakouts such as “Did Roosevelt Know?” and a look at another surprise attack on American soil: Sept. 11, 2001. And in a nod to tradition, archival pages from Life coverage of the attack on Pearl Harbor are replicated at the end of the book. One indication of how things have changed: No photos from the actual attack appeared until the Dec. 29 issue.

GOING BIG
If you like your gift books with a little ambition, look no further than Big History: Examines Our Past, Explains Our Present, Imagines Our Future. As the subtitle indicates, all it seeks to do is “ponder some of the most exciting and enduring questions about life, the universe, and what the future holds for humans.” A project of the Big History Institute at Macquarie University in Sydney, Australia, this is a fascinating book with vivid illustrations and—despite its high-flying ambitions—easy-to-understand, forthright text. Divided into eight sections, from “The Big Bang” to “Industry Rises,” it presents an array of maps, graphics and text to educate the reader on what it terms a “grand evolutionary epic.” Particularly useful are the “Goldilocks Conditions” charts that open each section, laying out how the right conditions occurred at just the right time to trigger fundamental change—including the emergence of life. Also useful: back-of-the-book timelines of world history, with breakouts on such topics as culture, inventions and great buildings. Even at more than 400 pages, it’s a book you don’t want to see end.

 

This article was originally published in the December 2016 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Gift-buying trends come and go, but for some readers, history books are a sure source of enlightenment and pleasure. Here are five of our favorites this season, sure to brighten the holidays for any history buff.
NonfictionMilitary HistoryMemoirAmerican History

Clueless about Dad’s gift? There’s hope

Feature by Keith Herrell

With Father’s Day approaching, it’s time to wrap that present you’ve had hidden away for months. Wait, you have nothing hidden away and no idea what to buy Dad? Here are five books that will be even more welcome than a box of golf balls.

What Father’s Day list is complete without an unabashedly sentimental—yet realistic—look at the father-son relationship from first-person experience? Two and Two: McSorley’s, My Dad, and Me, by Rafe Bartholomew, fills that bill admirably. It also serves as a history of McSorley’s Old Ale House, a 163-year-old institution in New York’s East Village, as well as a compendium of anecdotes about things that can only happen at a beloved neighborhood bar (nowadays, alas, also a frequent tourist stop). Bartholomew, a sports writer and editor, writes lovingly of his father, known as “Bart” over the course of his 45-year bartending career, and also gives us some of his own coming-of-age glimpses along the way. If you can survive St. Patrick’s Day at McSorley’s, we learn, you can survive just about anything. But just when you think this is strictly a fathers-and-sons book, some of the best writing appears in the chapter dealing with the author’s mother, Patricia, who conquered alcoholism only to find life had an even bigger punch in store for her.

BROTHERS IN ARMS 
Fatherhood takes a back seat to brotherhood in The Jersey Brothers: A Missing Naval Officer in the Pacific and His Family’s Quest to Bring Him Home, but the family ties are just as strong. They extend to the author, Sally Mott Freeman, a former speechwriter and public relations executive who is the daughter of one of the brothers. Her curiosity piqued by a family argument, she sought to unravel the story of her uncle Barton’s life as an MIA naval ensign during World War II (it’s no spoiler to note that he was actually a prisoner of war) and the efforts of his two brothers—also Navy men—to find and rescue him even as they fight their own battles. Meanwhile, the home fires are tended by a tenacious mother who never hesitates to pick up her pen and give the powers that be—all the way up to President Roosevelt—a piece of her mind. Tenacious in her own way, Freeman uses archives, interviews and diaries to uncover Barton’s tragic story along with those of his brothers and fellow prisoners, who endured unspeakable horrors in Japanese prison camps as war raged in the Pacific.

TEAMS AT THE TOP
Want to see Dad exercise his long-dormant debating skills? Just give him a copy of The Captain Class: The Hidden Force That Creates the World’s Greatest Teams and watch him search for his favorite team in author Sam Walker’s Tier One ranking. He’ll hunt in vain for baseball’s Big Red Machine Cincinnati Reds of the 1970s, or the Michael Jordan-led Chicago Bulls. (Hint: He’ll find Jordan in the chapter titled “False Idols.”) Rest assured, the New York Yankees (1949-53 edition) did make the cut, along with the Collingwood Magpies of Aussie Rules football and 14 other teams. If your team isn’t on the list, Walker is ready with the reasoning for the snub (for example, the lack of a “true championship,” i.e., Super Bowl, for part of their existence kept the 1960s Green Bay Packers from Valhalla). And perhaps not surprisingly, given Walker’s background at The Wall Street Journal (he founded its daily sports report), the book doubles as a guide to success in business, with pointed commentary on what makes leaders effective or ineffective (go easy on the vitriol directed at teammates, Mr. Jordan).

WHAT A CATCH
Dad can get in touch with his inner Walter Mitty with Shark Drunk: The Art of Catching a Large Shark from a Tiny Rubber Dinghy in a Big Ocean. The seemingly sane author, Morten Strøksnes, and an eccentric artist friend decide they want to haul up a Greenland shark—bigger than the great white, and thus the world’s largest flesh-eating shark—from the oceanic depths off the coast of Norway. Think ­Moby-Dick, but shorter and funnier with enough random factoids to fill a whale’s belly. Waiting for a shark to bite (the line, that is) gives ­Strøksnes plenty of time to muse on such topics as Norwegian history and mythology, seafaring tales, space exploration and even the shark itself. (The “drunkenness” referred to in the title comes from eating the flesh of the Greenland shark, which contains compounds used in the nerve gas trimethylamine oxide.) Ranging over a full year, the quest for more than a nibble yields satisfying insights into friendship, aspirations and the thrill of the chase. When the end comes, it’s almost anticlimactic.

CLIMBING HIGH
Warning: Reading The Push: A Climber’s Journey of Endurance, Risk, and Going Beyond Limits can be a queasy experience, for at least a couple of reasons. For starters, the author of this absorbing memoir, expert rock climber Tommy Caldwell, spends a fair amount of time thousands (yes, thousands) of feet above ground level, protected only by a web of ropes, attempting to conquer the Next Big Climb. His targets include El Capitan’s 3,000-foot Dawn Wall in Yosemite National Park, which he conquers in 2015 with climbing partner Kevin Jorgeson. But Caldwell’s relationship with his gung-ho, adventure-guide father is also cringe-inducing and provides insight into his motivations and doubts, along with at least one failed relationship. If Caldwell’s name rings a bell, it’s possibly because one of his international expeditions ended with him and his companions—including the woman who would become his first wife—being held hostage by militants in Kyrgyzstan in 2000, escaping only when Caldwell pushed a captor off a nearly sheer dropoff. Somehow the captor survived, but it’s clear the incident still haunts Caldwell. Between the thrills, this book will haunt the reader, too.

 

This article was originally published in the June 2017 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

With Father’s Day approaching, it’s time to wrap that present you’ve had hidden away for months. Wait, you have nothing hidden away and no idea what to buy Dad? Here are five books that will be even more welcome than a box of golf balls.

NonfictionPoliticsBiographyAmerican History

America’s fascinating past and present

Feature by Keith Herrell

How has the United States changed over the past 250 years, and how has it remained the same? Here are five gift ideas for readers with a serious interest in where we’ve come from, how we got this far and just how far we have left to go.

The word “frenemies” wasn’t around during the founding of the United States, but it could certainly be applied to the relationship between John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, which is detailed by Gordon S. Wood in Friends Divided: John Adams and Thomas Jefferson. The acerbic Adams and the idealistic Jefferson were divided by geography and social standing in addition to temperament. Yet they forged a friendship in the early days of the nation before later falling out over issues large and small as the years rolled by and both served presidential terms. The rift was healed with the help of a mutual friend in their later years, providing a heartwarming ending to the intertwined biographies of two men who famously both died on the Fourth of July, 1826. Their differences remained to the end, but as Wood shows—with the help of the numerous letters between the pair that survive—the combatants’ jousting took on a mutually respectful tone. A 1993 Pulitzer Prize winner for The Radicalism of the American Revolution, Wood is a skillful guide to Revolutionary-era principles, both profound and personal.

EMPIRE STATE OF MIND
Historian Mike Wallace is a Pulitzer Prize winner for his co-authorship of Gotham: A History of New York City to 1898, and he has now produced the second volume in the series, Greater Gotham: A History of New York City from 1898 to 1919, and it’s a worthy sequel packed with insight and information. Organized by topic, it can be read straight through (just not all in one sitting) or approached as an encyclopedia, jumping from section to section while savoring the photos and illustrations. If you want to start with dessert, flip to the Cultures section, with its histories of Broadway, the Bronx Zoo, Coney Island and more. But don’t overlook the more serious fare, most notably the excellent explanations of the rise of Manhattan’s skyscrapers and the history of the island’s famous tunnels and bridges. Through it all, Wallace holds to a historian’s tone that maintains an easy appeal with the casual reader.

WE HAVE HIT BOTTOM
If anyone ever appeared to be eminently qualified to be president of the United States, it was Herbert Hoover. A self-made millionaire largely untainted by politics, Hoover had a long history of rolling up his sleeves and getting important work done when he was elected to the job in 1928. So how did things go off the rails, ending with his defeat by Franklin Delano Roosevelt four years later? Kenneth Whyte tackles that question and more in Hoover: An Extraordinary Life in Extraordinary Times. While no apologist for the man who became synonymous with the Great Depression, Whyte details how Hoover was up against worldwide economic forces that he had no way of controlling and points out that the hard times continued long into Roosevelt’s presidency. Just as interesting, however, are Whyte’s accounts of Hoover’s early life, from his rise from orphanhood to world-traveling problem solver, and his post-presidency attempt to restore his image and regain his place among the 20th century’s most admired people.

A KEN BURNS COMPANION
Another Ken Burns PBS series? Delightful! And with the series comes the companion book, The Vietnam War: An Intimate History, by Burns and historian Geoffrey C. Ward. Burns’ style has proven irresistible over the years: It’s straight history inter­spersed with personal vignettes and peppered with photographs. The iconic images from the war are here, of course, but look for the lesser-known shots, such as President Lyndon B. Johnson watching television coverage of the war in bed with his wife, Lady Bird, or an overhead shot of the famed Ho Chi Minh Trail, which continued to be used despite multiple American airstrikes. Still, the personal stories—from all sides—will grab the reader most tightly, as individual soldiers are followed from enlistment to, in one case, the day an obituary appears in a hometown newspaper.

RACE AND DEMOCRACY
The winner of the 2015 National Book Award for Between the World and Me, Ta-Nehisi Coates has produced a new book of essays—some new, some previously published in The Atlantic—titled We Were Eight Years in Power: An American Tragedy, which refers to a quote from a Reconstruction-era congressman but also, of course, to President Barack Obama’s two terms as president. Coates, a black man, was astonished by Obama’s election, and in a scathing epilogue, sees his successor, Donald Trump, as a return to the natural order of things. Indeed, Coates views him as the nation’s “first white president,” because “his entire political existence hinges on the fact of a black president.” But it’s not all presidential politics with Coates—two of the most thought-provoking essays included in the book are “The Case for Reparations” and “The Black Family in the Age of Mass Incarceration.”

 

This article was originally published in the December 2017 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

How has the United States changed over the past 250 years, and how has it remained the same? Here are five gift ideas for readers with a serious interest in where we’ve come from, how we got this far and just how far we have left to go.

NonfictionFamily & RelationshipsAmerican History

What’s love got to do with it?

Feature by the editors of BookPage

The month of Valentine’s Day has arrived, and whether you’re in a committed relationship, looking for love or happily single, we’ve got a few books you may want to have on your nightstand.

HORMONAL
By Martie Haselton

The perfect Valentine’s Day read for: Heterosexual women interested in understanding how their hormones help them choose potential dates—or any woman who’s ever been pissed off by a guy calling her “hormonal.”

Between the covers: The world’s leading researcher of ovulatory cycles offers insight into the hidden intelligence of women’s hormones. It’s heavy on the science, so it can be dry, but knowledge is powerful.

Best advice for the lovelorn: Sexually active Soay sheep in Scotland are often sick and succumb to the elements, while those less driven to reproduce remain healthy. Sex is dangerous, Haselton writes, so stay home with your Wi-Fi.

Strangest tidbit: Only primates, bats and elephant shrews have menstrual periods.

Choice quote: “[W]e are not under strict hormonal control, locked in the sway of ‘heat,’ weakened by the loss of blood, or depleted as our fertility fades. Still, when we do feel these ancient forces stirring in rhythm with our hormonal cycles, we can tap into a uniquely feminine power.”

HOTTEST HEADS OF STATE
By J.D. Dobson and Kate Dobson

The perfect Valentine’s Day read for: Those who have reached a point—whether single, taken or navigating online dating territory—where all you can do is laugh.

Between the covers: Combining biting satire with gleeful absurdity, this is a relentlessly funny, bipartisan exploration of America’s presidents that judges each as a potential partner. Check out a fearless exposé of John Tyler (who was obviously a swamp monster) and a timeline of struggles with our greatest foe—Canada.

Best advice for the lovelorn: You can have a meet cute with Richard Nixon by doing the following: “Identify the sketchiest nearby location. . . . Go there, take out your wallet, and start visibly counting your money. When someone hits you on the back of the head with a sap, that’s Richard Nixon!”

Strangest tidbit: If you want to get into taxidermy in order to impress Teddy Roosevelt, you have to first murder an animal and then be cleared by a jury of its peers. Only then you may proceed with the taxidermy.

Choice quote: “Did you know that over time, people grow to look more and more like their favorite pastime? That is why the very handsome young Dwight D. Eisenhower gradually grew to resemble a golf ball.”

THE ROUGH PATCH
By Daphne de Marneffe

The perfect Valentine’s Day read for: Married couples and middle-aged singles who are struggling with parenting, finances, aging, loss of libido or drug and alcohol abuse, and are looking for practical, experience-based advice from a professional psychotherapist.

Between the covers: Daphne de Marneffe tackles the cliche of the midlife crisis in its many forms. Using examples from her practice, she illustrates how to cope with feelings of isolation, desire, longing and distress, offering a necessary guide for those who wish to heal and grow in their relationships.

Best advice for the lovelorn: If you’re feeling left out of the fun that young people supposedly are having—the excitement of falling in love, the freedom from caring for children and elders—perhaps it’s time to start an affair with understanding (and loving) your flawed self.

Strangest tidbit: A discussion of the differences between terms like “polyamory,” “swinging” and something called “sexual anarchy” might leave you wanting—and maybe or maybe not daring—to research their meanings further.

Choice quote: “Occupying the panoptic position of a therapist who sees people at all phases of life, I sometimes have the Ghost of Marriage Future impulse to tell women in their thirties, who currently feel hounded by their partner’s sexual demands, that in a decade or two they might be hankering for more attention, not less.”

THE LOVE GAP
By Jenna Birch

The perfect Valentine’s Day read for: Heterosexual millennial women who are well educated, successful, confident, independent—and really frustrated that they can’t get a guy to commit.

Between the covers: Health and lifestyle journalist Jenna Birch gets to the bottom of this major modern dating problem with her theory of the Love Gap, which she defines as “the reason men don’t always pursue the women they claim to want; frequently, women like you.”

Best advice for the lovelorn: “The exact love that you want is out there. But it takes patience, growth, tenacity, investment, discernment, a dash of timing, and just the right chemistry.”

Strangest tidbit: “I’m also here to tell you that men have pertinent needs that may overwrite the qualities they desire in a partner.” Sometimes logic really does go out the window.

Choice quote: “A relationship with the ‘right’ person should excite you with its potential for growth. A ‘right’ commitment should feel like it expands your possibilities in life, instead of shrinks them.”

THE KISS
Edited by Brian Turner

The perfect Valentine’s Day read for: The literature-loving romantic in your life.

Between the covers: Across cultures and time, the kiss has always been there. In this collection, a diverse assemblage of writers contribute their own unique takes on that singular act and all that it can mean.

Best advice for the lovelorn: There are billions of humans out there, and anything you’re feeling has been felt before, many times over. You’re not alone out there—even if you’re single. We’re all connected by something as simple as a kiss.

Strangest tidbit: Who knew a kiss could mean so many different things? It can be loving, sad, a goodbye or a hello—or even ambiguous. The full spectrum of human emotions can be pinned on a kiss.

Choice quote: “She will reach out, bridging the abyss between any two humans, and offer this kiss, this true gift, this brief meeting of spheres, and you’ll feel like a balloon being inflated, and believe quite suddenly in the possibility of grace.”(Excerpt from Steven Church’s “Kiss, Bounce, Grace.”)

 

This article was originally published in the February 2018 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

The month of Valentine’s Day has arrived, and whether you’re in a committed relationship, looking for love or happily single, we’ve got a few books you may want to have on your nightstand.

NonfictionSocial ScienceMemoirBlack HistoryAmerican History

The many forms of a freedom fighter

Feature by Vanessa Willoughby

America may have abolished Jim Crow laws, but prejudice is a clever shape-shifter. Certainly, the black experience is not solely defined by injustices inflicted by white America. Regardless, the black experience in this country cannot be discussed without the ever-looming menace of racism and the complementary institution of white supremacy. These four recent releases offer a nuanced spectrum of views on what it means to be black in America.

For many Americans who believed in the concept of “colorblindness,” the election of Donald Trump abruptly shattered the myth of a post-racial America. Yet for many minorities, the unapologetic racism and bigotry that helped elect Trump served as a reminder that the institution of white supremacy is alive and thriving. At a young age, Patrisse Khan-Cullors learned that blackness functioned as a target and watched as racism chipped away at the humanity of her loved ones. Yet Khan-Cullors, who co-founded the Black Lives Matter movement with Alicia Garza and Opal Tometi, found strength within the unconditional love she held for her family, which provided a refuge from the dehumanization tactics of white supremacy. The title of her memoir, When They Call You a Terrorist, co-authored with asha bandele, references the labeling of Black Lives Matter as a terrorist movement by conservative media outlets, politicians and government officials. According to a report leaked by Foreign Policy, the FBI’s counterterrorism division determined that “black identity extremists” were a violent group of domestic terrorists. Activists such as Khan-Cullors cite this assessment as an example of dog-whistle politics. For those under the banner of white supremacy, it’s deemed radical to say that black lives matter—because black people are rarely seen as human.

HARD TO SAY
Talking about race in America can feel like chatting with a mouth full of thorns. Even for the white Americans who vow to be allies, talking about race is taboo: If you’re not racist, then why are you noticing skin color in the first place? Equal parts an excavation of personal history and a piece of sharp political commentary, author Ijeoma Oluo inhabits a narrative tone that is neither condescending nor coddling in So You Want to Talk About Race. Racism in America can take the form of so much more than the “N” word, and here Oluo astutely dismantles issues such as police brutality, cultural appropriation and microaggressions, and the pervasive, poisonous power of racism and white supremacy. Balancing the intimacy of a memoirist with the dedication of an investigative journalist, Oluo recognizes that her offerings are a starting point. The work required to effectively battle racism can begin with conversation, but if these principles are not put into consistent practice, then lasting change has little chance. Systemic racism benefits from silence just as much as it thrives under white liberals who refuse to check their privilege—those who assume that proximity to their black friend, love interest or neighbor proves that they are not complicit. So You Want to Talk About Race argues that with the right tools, discussions about race in America can serve as bridges rather than battlefields.

FINAL WORDS
In 2014, the killing of 43-year-old Eric Garner, a black Staten Island resident and neighborhood fixture, was caught on video. The footage shows white New York City police officer Daniel Pantaleo wrestling Garner to the ground and using what appears to be an illegal chokehold. Garner struggles, uttering those infamous last words, “I can’t breathe.” The medical examiner ruled Garner’s death a homicide. Regardless, a grand jury chose not to indict Pantaleo on a charge of murder. In I Can’t Breathe: A Killing on Bay Street, a carefully constructed and researched portrait of Garner, Rolling Stone staff writer and author Matt Taibbi utilizes the tragedy to hold a mirror to the degrading, demoralizing and crippling manifestations of American racism. I Can’t Breathe not only examines the wide-reaching effects of racism but also specifically breaks down how the ideas of “law and order” contribute to a system of racist, predatory policing. Although Taibbi recognizes that Garner had his flaws, he pushes beyond them to compile a rich, nuanced depiction of a devoted family man who became yet another victim of bad luck, unforgiving environmental circumstances and the racially fueled injustices of the country’s police forces. I Can’t Breathe demands readers ask: Who are the police really intended to protect?

AMERICAN GLORY
When we think of the black renaissance, we typically conjure images of bustling Harlem streets and flashy zoot suits alongside the black excellence of Langston Hughes and Zora Neale Hurston. We may even think of Chicago and its cultural icons such as author Richard Wright and playwright Lorraine Hansberry. Memoirist and reporter Mark Whitaker’s Smoketown: The Untold Story of the Other Great Black Renaissance is a thoroughly researched celebration of the black community and culture in Pittsburgh from the 1920s through the 1950s. Pittsburgh’s black residents, Whitaker argues, offered cultural contributions that significantly shaped black history—and the nation. With the diligence of a seasoned anthropologist, Whitaker spotlights the city’s stunning feats of black achievement and resilience through the lens of his extensive cast of influencers and icons. While some of the names may be unfamiliar, each subject’s narrative is a nuanced portrayal meant to challenge our country’s often narrow, dismissive version of black history. Cultural heavyweights such as boxer Joe Louis are treated as historical catalysts rather than extraordinary oddities. Black history, as evident in the cultural renaissance of Pittsburgh, is not defined by oppression. Despite the setbacks of systemic racism and discrimination, black excellence flourishes regardless of the white gaze.

 

This article was originally published in the February 2018 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

America may have abolished Jim Crow laws, but prejudice is a clever shape-shifter. Certainly, the black experience is not solely defined by injustices inflicted by white America. Regardless, the black experience in this country cannot be discussed without the ever-looming menace of racism and the complementary institution of white supremacy. These four recent releases offer a nuanced spectrum of views on what it means to be black in America.

NonfictionWomen's HistoryAmerican History

We are the leaders we’ve been waiting for

Feature by Julie Hale

Women speak up louder and stronger with every passing day, even though it can be hard to make the world listen. Women’s History Month is a time for recognizing the milestones reached on the road to equality and the pioneering women who have made progress possible. Five outstanding new titles focus on the female experience from a variety of viewpoints.

An inspiring tribute to 100 sensational women, Julia Pierpont’s The Little Book of Feminist Saints celebrates trailblazing figures from the past and present. This who’s who of winning women spotlights educators and athletes, artists and activists. Luminaries include Maya Angelou, Frida Kahlo, Gloria Steinem, Sandra Day O’Connor, Billie Jean King and Oprah Winfrey. Small but jam-packed, the volume contains facts and anecdotes about each woman, along with memorable quotes and plenty of feminist trivia. Taking her cue from Catholic saint-of-the-day books, Pierpont gives each woman in her book “matron saint” status and a special feast day. (Nina Simone, for instance, is the “Matron Saint of Soul.”) In luminous, full-color portraits, artist Manjit Thapp captures the essence and individuality of her subjects. Small enough to tuck into a bag, this delightful book offers instant inspiration.

PROGRESS AT THE POLLS
On August 18, 1920, Tennessee ratified the 19th Amendment—a history-making move by the state legislature that enabled women to vote in elections across the nation. In her absorbing new book, The Woman’s Hour: The Great Fight to Win the Vote, bestselling author Elaine Weiss retraces the road to victory traveled by female reformers such as Carrie Chapman Catt and Alice Paul. Weiss does a wonderful job of laying out the background of the American women’s suffrage movement, which began to take shape in the 1840s, providing a setup for the tension-filled debates and protests in Nashville that culminated in the August vote. Weiss brings the struggle for women’s suffrage to life through vivid portrayals of the suffragists and the “Antis” who challenged them, including Tennessee native Josephine Pearson. A lively slice of history filled with political drama, Weiss’ book captures a watershed moment for American women.

JOIN THE SISTERHOOD
The internet may make connecting with others easier than ever before, but there’s no substitute for old-fashioned, face-to-face friendship. In I Know How You Feel: The Joy and Heartbreak of Friendship in Women’s Lives, F. Diane Barth, a prominent psychotherapist, explores the particular challenges and rewards women face when forging friendships. Barth interviewed a wide range of women on the topic of friendship, and she includes their heartfelt testimonies in the book. She also provides advice on negotiating the thorny territory that often comes with connection, offering suggestions on what to do when a friend drops you, as well as guidance on relationships with women who are competitive or controlling. Each chapter concludes with a “What You Can Do” segment that has proactive steps on how to combat loneliness, reach out to others and find the unique fulfillment that comes with friendship. A compelling look at the ways in which women bond, Barth’s book is eye-opening and essential reading for anyone trying to build—or maintain—a strong social circle.

POWER TOGETHER
Beverly Bond established the organization BLACK GIRLS ROCK! in 2006 in order to support and promote the accomplishments of black women. Over the years, the organization has evolved into a movement, with an annual awards show, youth enrichment activities and now a book edited by Bond, Black Girls Rock!: Owning Our Magic. Rocking Our Truth., an inspiring salute to outstanding black women who are leading the way in politics, education and entertainment. This coffee table-worthy book spotlights fierce figures like Misty Copeland, Maxine Waters, Joy Reid, Lupita Amondi Nyong’o, Erykah Badu and Serena Williams, each of whom contribute thoughtful essays on their experiences as black women. Divided into nine sections that highlight a particular facet of “Black Girl Magic,” the volume is filled with gorgeous new and archival photographs. “The women in this book showcase the beautiful complexity, depth of diversity, rich cultural traditions, and bountiful contributions of Black women,” Bond writes. “They remind us of our collective magic.” Rock on!

EQUALITY IN THE WORKPLACE
Former USA Today editor-in-chief Joanne Lipman delivers a fascinating overview of today’s working environment in That’s What She Said: What Men Need to Know (and Women Need to Tell Them) About Working Together. In this important, accessible book, Lipman examines on-the-job dynamics between genders, addressing topics such as unconscious bias, communication and salary disparity. She also shares stories about her own professional evolution and investigates efforts by companies such as Google to create an equitable workplace. Women, Lipman says, “are attempting to fit into a professional world that was created in the image of men.” Drawing upon statistics from studies about women in the workplace, she explores the unique obstacles that female professionals face. (Case in point: According to one survey, women are 15 percent less likely to get promoted than men.) Perhaps most importantly, Lipman looks at the ways in which small businesses and large corporations alike can bridge the gender gap. Her book is a must-read for the career-minded reader—male or female.

 

This article was originally published in the March 2018 issue of BookPage. Download the entire issue for the Kindle or Nook.

Women speak up louder and stronger with every passing day, even though it can be hard to make the world listen. Women’s History Month is a time for recognizing the milestones reached on the road to equality and the pioneering women who have made progress possible. Five outstanding new titles focus on the female experience from a variety of viewpoints.

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