Book Description
In this, his first major book, Mark Steyn--probably the most widely read, and wittiest, columnist in the English-speaking world--takes on the great poison of the twenty-first century: the anti-Americanism that fuels both Old Europe and radical Islam. America, Steyn argues, will have to stand alone. The world will be divided between America and the rest; and for our sake America had better win.
Customer Reviews:
A Must-Read!.......2007-10-10
This book was every bit as good as I had heard. I've always enjoyed Mark Steyn, but hadn't gotten a chance to read this yet because I had a stack of books in front of it. That's my loss, because this was one of the most profound and eye-opening books I've ever read. To be honest, I pay pretty close attention to this conflict we find ourselves in, so most of the individual facts in this book weren't exactly foreign to me. But Steyn pulls all this together and presents it in such a concise, clear and entertaining way that I was able to put the pieces together in a way I hadn't even imagined. His demographic data alone is shocking, and should make every person in Europe and Canada sit up and take serious note - I'll be paying very close attention to what happens over the next few years "across the pond", as they say, for how goes Europe, so will eventually go America. I plan to buy several more copies of this book and hand them out to friends and family. I highly suggest it.
Excelent book. Really crunches the numbers like no other book........2007-10-05
This book really lays out the problems with hard numbers and facts in a way I have never seen and is easy to understand. I recomend this book to anyone who is worried about the muslim issue. People in Europe better read it asap!
America Alone is Excellent.......2007-10-04
This book gives a lot of attention to fertility rates in Europe, Scandanavia and the United States. Many other good observations and opinions are included as well. It will give you some insights into what may occur in various countries in the future vis-a-vis the Muslims and non Muslims.
What a sad worldview.......2007-10-01
I can't even begin to describe the serious flaws in this book...
But I gave it one star instead of zero because, if you want to study logic and how to detect subtly and not so subtly flawed arguments, buy this book.
What's sad is he's done actual research (but distorts everything to fit his way of thinking), and some muslims, like some christians, some jews, some whatever, really are dangerous and want to hurt America, but he makes his side of the controversy look like a bunch of, what's a nice word... 'baffoons'.
I think he seriously believes the things he writes in his book, which means he's stressing himselfand others out for nothing, and ultimately, pushing away the moderates that might listen to a more logical argument against religious extremism
Excellent.......2007-09-21
With the many positive reviews already posted, there isn't much more for me to say, so I will just say, "Read a few of the reviews, then, most definitely, read this book."
Book Description
By the early l940s, when Ukrainian-born Irène Némirovsky began working on what would become Suite Française—the first two parts of a planned five-part novel—she was already a highly successful writer living in Paris. But she was also a Jew, and in 1942 she was arrested and deported to Auschwitz: a month later she was dead at the age of thirty-nine. Two years earlier, living in a small village in central France—where she, her husband, and their two small daughters had fled in a vain attempt to elude the Nazis
—she’d begun her novel, a luminous portrayal of a human drama in which she herself would become a victim. When she was arrested, she had completed two parts of the epic, the handwritten manuscripts of which were hidden in a suitcase that her daughters would take with them into hiding and eventually into freedom. Sixty-four years later, at long last, we can read Némirovsky’s literary masterpiece
The first part, “A Storm in June,” opens in the chaos of the massive 1940 exodus from Paris on the eve of the Nazi invasion during which several families and individuals are thrown together under circumstances beyond their control. They share nothing but the harsh demands of survival—some trying to maintain lives of privilege, others struggling simply to preserve their lives—but soon, all together, they will be forced to face the awful exigencies of physical and emotional displacement, and the annihilation of the world they know. In the second part, “Dolce,” we enter the increasingly complex life of a German-occupied provincial village. Coexisting uneasily with the soldiers billeted among them, the villagers—from aristocrats to shopkeepers to peasants—cope as best they can. Some choose resistance, others collaboration, and as their community is transformed by these acts, the lives of these these men and women reveal nothing less than the very essence of humanity.
Suite Française is a singularly piercing evocation—at once subtle and severe, deeply compassionate and fiercely ironic—of life and death in occupied France, and a brilliant, profoundly moving work of art.
Download Description
Irène Némirovsky was born in Kiev in 1903 into a wealthy banking family and emigrated to France during the Russian Revolution. After attending the Sorbonne, she began to write and swiftly achieved success with her first novel, David Golder, which was followed by The Ball, The Flies of Autumn, Dogs and Wolves and The Courilof Affair. She died in 1942.
From the Hardcover edition.
Customer Reviews:
Not Up to the Hype.......2007-10-06
I really wanted to like this book. I read it after reading Vasily Grossman's LIFE AND FATE, a masterpiece of WW2 literature if there ever was one. And maybe it was the juxtaposition of that book with this that caused my disappointment. Where Grossman's book at 800 pages is taut and serious throughout, Nemirovsky's seems trivial by comparision. Had it been published soon after it was written, it would have been considered an interesting popular novel containing interesting observations of occupied France but ultimately lightweight in its' often pedestrian storyline and execution. It often reads like a mass paperback romance set within the larger context of the war, and too often devolves into hackneyed popular novel tropes - the cowardess and duplicities of the moneyed classes set against the native nobility of the poor, love amidst the ruins of war etc.
Interesting light reading, but a "classic?" Sorry.
Enjoyable and Interesting.......2007-10-05
A really enjoyable read and extremely interesting. It was such a good book! Highly recommend. The ending leaves you trailing though...
A magnificent, tragic fragment........2007-09-29
Irene Nemirovsky's "Suite Francaise" will stand with "The Diary of Anne Frank" as one of the most poignant literary monuments of World War II and the insanity of the Holocaust. But whereas Anne Frank was a young girl whose hopes and dreams ended forever at Belsen, Irene Nemirovsky was a novelist of enormous talent who would have been recognized as one of the greatest European writers of the 20th century had her life not been extinguished at Auschwitz. Considering all she suffered during the war, and how she was murdered in the very middle of it, it is amazing that Nemrovsky completed as much of it as she did, and that what she completed is of such a high order. "Suite Francaise" consists of the first two parts of a projected five-part novel depicting the fall of France to the Nazis, the panicked flight of Parisians and the return to something vaguely resembling normalcy under German military rule. The first section, "Storm in June," gives readers a panoramic view of several groups of fleeing Parisians, representing every class of society and every conceivable moral and mental attitude; the second, "Dolce," depicts life in a French village under the Germans, bringing back some of the characters from the first book and making it plain that Nemirovsky planned to reintroduce more of them in the following three books. Superbly translated by Sandra Smith, "Suite Francaise" is a swift and graceful read, depicting the characters and action with breathtaking clarity and excitement. Many of the characters are presented only in a few sentences, yet all live and breathe with total realism. What is really astonishing about "Suite Francaise," however, is Nemirovsky's authorial impartiality and clear-eyed sympathy for all her characters. There are no saints and no monsters in Nemirovsky's universe, just people--some more likable than others, but even the most despicable among them are given sharp moments of deep and moving humanity. Even the Germans are human--they have their faults, but also their virtues. To be able to write such panoramic fiction in the midst of war, with such a detached and pragmatic yet sympathetic eye, is truly amazing, even more so from an author who rightly feared she would be arrested and deported to the death camps at any moment. A Russian-Jewish emigree to France who moved in the highest literary and societal circles, Nemirovsky was an exceptionally keen observer of the French class system and how it warps individuals, in that sense (and in others) the equal of Balzac, Flaubert and Proust. The argument in Chapter 16 of "Dolce" between the snobbish, sickly-sentimental Vicomtesse de Montmort and the brutish peasant Benoit Sabarie stands out: both are sympathetic, as people and as representatives of their social classes, and both are utterly despicable. Nemirovsky sums up their fight neatly: "What separates or unites people is not their language, their laws, their customs, their principles, but the way they hold a salad fork." This argument has repercussions that promise to ripple across the rest of the story, except that Nemirovsky, alas, never had a chance to show us how. Appendices to the book include Nemirovsky's copious notes on how she planned to continue the story; correspondence to, from, and about her; and the preface to the French addition, included as an afterword here, which tells the poignant story of Nemirovsky's life and death, and of how Nemirovsky's daughter discovered the manuscript of "Suite Francaise" more than sixty years after her mother's death. "Suite Francaise" is a magnificent fragment and an eternal testimonial to the genius of its author. We can only mourn that the book, like her life, will remain unfinished.
A taste of things to come.......2007-09-26
It's a known fact that this work has gotten much attention due to the circumstances that surrounded Irene Nemirovsky's life. Left in a suitcase as she attempted flight, the author found her demise at the hands of the Nazis before this manuscript could be published.
Who knows what she might have added or excluded or expanded? And I could not help but think this as I read along.
There are two novellas under one umbrella here--depicting day in the life scenes of how things were in these troublesome times. I certainly found this to be gratifying reading, but it did not take me out of myself in that complete way I enjoy when I read truly remarkable fiction.
Will recommend, but for a story that brought me to that special place of compelling fiction, I recommend the lesser-known, SIM0N LAZARUS, a book more should know about.
Remember - Two Novellas.......2007-09-24
It must be remembered that this one book consists of two novellas. With the exception of minor mentions in the second book of a few characters from the first, there is nothing in common between the two. Thus, they really should be evaluated as two books.
The first was about Parisians fleeing Paris before the German occupation in June, 1940. Most are from the upper class and they are forced to "mix" with the lower classes. Almost all the characters are unlikeable and the characterizations almost seem to be caricatures of snooty Frenchmen and women. It is amazing that a French author would draw such scathing portraits.
Although the writing is good, I found the pacing extremely slow and tedious. There was a relentless litany of whining and complaining without corresponding renderings of real suffering. At one point I thought the tedium was by design, to show the relentless hardship. If that were the purpose, it did not work. The first book was simply over-written, slow and tedious. There really was no plot. It consisted of mere accounts of the plight of some atypical Parisian refugees.
The second book, "Dolce" was much much better. I wish I had not been jaded by the first novella. It was the account of the occupation by the Germans of a small rural town. It had tensions between farmers and town people, rich and poor (rich were still lambasted mercilessly), sympathizers and patriots and, best of all, the internal tension of a French woman forced to billet a German officer. This was the heart of Dolce. The woman's husband is a prisoner of war. Despite that, she realizes she is falling love with the German officer and he with her. The plot rotates around this tension and events that effect it.
In sum, I wish I had skipped the first novella but enjoyed the second. Thus, the average to 3 star rating.
Average customer rating:
- NIGHT
- Night
- Chilling and Incredible
- A powerful and compelling account of a horrific time
- This book is burned in my memory
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Night (Oprah's Book Club)
Elie Wiesel
Manufacturer: Hill and Wang
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Binding: Paperback
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Day: A Novel
ASIN: 0374500010
Release Date: 2006-01-16 |
Amazon.com
In Nobel laureate Elie Wiesel's memoir Night, a scholarly, pious teenager is wracked with guilt at having survived the horror of the Holocaust and the genocidal campaign that consumed his family. His memories of the nightmare world of the death camps present him with an intolerable question: how can the God he once so fervently believed in have allowed these monstrous events to occur? There are no easy answers in this harrowing book, which probes life's essential riddles with the lucid anguish only great literature achieves. It marks the crucial first step in Wiesel's lifelong project to bear witness for those who died.
Book Description
A New Translation From The French By Marion Wiesel
Night is Elie Wiesel’s masterpiece, a candid, horrific, and deeply poignant autobiographical account of his survival as a teenager in the Nazi death camps. This new translation by Marion Wiesel, Elie’s wife and frequent translator, presents this seminal memoir in the language and spirit truest to the author’s original intent. And in a substantive new preface, Elie reflects on the enduring importance of Night and his lifelong, passionate dedication to ensuring that the world never forgets man’s capacity for inhumanity to man.
Night offers much more than a litany of the daily terrors, everyday perversions, and rampant sadism at Auschwitz and Buchenwald; it also eloquently addresses many of the philosophical as well as personal questions implicit in any serious consideration of what the Holocaust was, what it meant, and what its legacy is and will be.
Customer Reviews:
NIGHT.......2007-10-03
This new translation of NIGHT is not just a book, it's a gift. A gift of Elie Wiesel's memory, memory of such horrific atrocities committed against him, his family, and others. We can use this gift as a tool to evolve as a human race - or not.
Night.......2007-10-02
This book was both wonderful and disturbing. The translation was smooth and easy to read. The body of the book gives a further glimpse into the terrors of that war, and the suffering people had to endure; especially children. I finished this book in less than a day, and when I was done, I was able to appreciate my life even more, and be grateful for everthing I have.
Chilling and Incredible.......2007-10-01
This book is very scary filled with all of Mr. Wiesel's experiences in the concentration camps during the Holocaust. The book covers from when the man, Moishe, warning them about the coming German soldiers to the undefinable ending.
What Mr. Wiesel saw during this time was what most people don't even dream of seeing. He even saw a father getting killed by his own son for a small crust of bread. What he went through is horrific.
This book may be one of the most touching books you may ever read. It is amazing how this man went through all this without freaking out. This book will deepen your sadness for the Jewish people and it will increase your hate for the man named Hitler.
A powerful and compelling account of a horrific time.......2007-09-29
First of all, let me say that this is the very first book about the Holocaust I've ever read. I've seen documentaries about the holocaust, images, and newspaper articles, but I've never read a first-hand account until now. This book completely blew me away. I read it continuously over 2 days and learned about determination, love, loss, cruelty, compassion, and of the lucky few who survived. Like many, I had some idea that the holocaust was about gas chambers and furnaces used to kill and cremate human beings. I had no idea, however, of the many other hardships imposed on the Jews during the Holocaust, both before, leading up to, and - for the lucky few - after the mass killings. I'd recommend this book without reservation to anyone interested in learning about this horrific, brutal period of human history, as told with great honesty by someone who lived through it. As Elie Wiesel writes, "we must never forget". -5/5
This book is burned in my memory.......2007-09-29
This book is a must read, especially for young people, as we move further away in time from the Holocaust. It is very well written; you almost feel like you are right there beside the author enduring all the emotional and physical pain that he felt. This book chronicles the author's life from a young child until the day he was released from a concentration camp. He describes his living conditions in the camp, the behavior and attitude of the prison camp guards, and his relationship with other prisoners around him. He also recalls how his father died right before his eyes. This book brought tears to my eyes more than once.
Book Description
“The end was near.” —Voices from the Zombie War
The Zombie War came unthinkably close to eradicating humanity. Max Brooks, driven by the urgency of preserving the acid-etched first-hand experiences of the survivors from those apocalyptic years, traveled across the United States of America and throughout the world, from decimated cities that once teemed with upwards of thirty million souls to the most remote and inhospitable areas of the planet. He recorded the testimony of men, women, and sometimes children who came face-to-face with the living, or at least the undead, hell of that dreadful time. World War Z is the result. Never before have we had access to a document that so powerfully conveys the depth of fear and horror, and also the ineradicable spirit of resistance, that gripped human society through the plague years.
Ranging from the now infamous village of New Dachang in the United Federation of China, where the epidemiological trail began with the twelve-year-old Patient Zero, to the unnamed northern forests where untold numbers sought a terrible and temporary refuge in the cold, to the United States of Southern Africa, where the Redeker Plan provided hope for humanity at an unspeakable price, to the west-of-the-Rockies redoubt where the North American tide finally started to turn, this invaluable chronicle reflects the full scope and duration of the Zombie War.
Most of all, the book captures with haunting immediacy the human dimension of this epochal event. Facing the often raw and vivid nature of these personal accounts requires a degree of courage on the part of the reader, but the effort is invaluable because, as Mr. Brooks says in his introduction, “By excluding the human factor, aren’t we risking the kind of personal detachment from history that may, heaven forbid, lead us one day to repeat it? And in the end, isn’t the human factor the only true difference between us and the enemy we now refer to as ‘the living dead’?”
Note: Some of the numerical and factual material contained in this edition was previously published under the auspices of the United Nations Postwar Commission.
Eyewitness reports from the first truly global war
“I found ‘Patient Zero’ behind the locked door of an abandoned apartment across town. . . . His wrists and feet were bound with plastic packing twine. Although he’d rubbed off the skin around his bonds, there was no blood. There was also no blood on his other wounds. . . . He was writhing like an animal; a gag muffled his growls. At first the villagers tried to hold me back. They warned me not to touch him, that he was ‘cursed.’ I shrugged them off and reached for my mask and gloves. The boy’s skin was . . . cold and gray . . . I could find neither his heartbeat nor his pulse.” —Dr. Kwang Jingshu, Greater Chongqing, United Federation of China
“‘Shock and Awe’? Perfect name. . . . But what if the enemy can’t be shocked and awed? Not just won’t, but biologically can’t! That’s what happened that day outside New York City, that’s the failure that almost lost us the whole damn war. The fact that we couldn’t shock and awe Zack boomeranged right back in our faces and actually allowed Zack to shock and awe us! They’re not afraid! No matter what we do, no matter how many we kill, they will never, ever be afraid!” —Todd Wainio, former U.S. Army infantryman and veteran of the Battle of Yonkers
“Two hundred million zombies. Who can even visualize that type of number, let alone combat it? . . . For the first time in history, we faced an enemy that was actively waging total war. They had no limits of endurance. They would never negotiate, never surrender. They would fight until the very end because, unlike us, every single one of them, every second of every day, was devoted to consuming all life on Earth.” —General Travis D’Ambrosia, Supreme Allied Commander, Europe
Customer Reviews:
Great guy gift........2007-10-09
I bought this book for my boyfriend, (a zombie lover) and he says it's a great book for guys like him. It's written very well a very interesting read, unlike any other book you'll buy.
the way the world was eaten.......2007-10-02
Brad Pitt's production company has bought the rights to this book but how he plans on doing the individual stories justice I don't know. This book impressed the hell outta me. It was so well done in the mock-u-mentary style that it had me planning on boarding up the windows if I ever saw someone even slightly limping thru my yard! It had great ideas if you have your zombie survival kit ready and at hand just waiting for the zed's to rise.
Incredible Alternate History Story! .......2007-10-01
I must begin this review by saying, I had no idea what to expect when I picked this book up!! It was recommeded to me by a friend, that knew I'm a sucker for a good zombie story! The subtitle of this book is "An Oral History of the Zombie War". And that's exactly the way it's written. A few years after the Zombie World War, a UN postwar Commission Report was written. The author (unnamed) was upset because the report he submitted was not the report that was presented. All the "human" element was removed. This book is a compilation of that human factor. Divided into sections detailing different aspects of the war, the author gives us a look at what happened through interviews with survivors. We learn a little about the initial outbreak of the Zombie epidemic that started in China and spread rapidly worldwide. We hear horror stories from survivors of the "great panic", and what each had to do in order to be telling the tale today. We learn about different countries and how they chose to turn the tide of the war. And we learn about heroes worldwide and how they stepped up to help their fellow man survive an attack like the world has never seen.
It's hard to review this book, because there are no central characters, no plot lines, no big finishes. It is written as if it is a documentary, detailing events and people all the way down to little footnotes of "historical" fact. And it is indeed chilling. Early on, I had expected this to be a funny book, taking a stab at the paranormal genre. What else would you expect from the son of Mel Brooks, but something of a parody?? World War Z isn't like that at all. It is a well-thought-out and carefully plotted book, that goes into such detail, it's hard to believe World War Z is just fiction!! Each little "interview" tells it's own little story, and Brooks ties them up nicely in his presentation. Not too much drama, but just the facts. Brooks also throws in a lot of political references in how he perceives the world would change if such a catastrophe occurred. Can you imagine a world in which Cuba is the new commerce capital? And yet, he does it so smoothly and believably, it's really hard to see it as fiction! Kudos to Brooks for such a unique and down-right fascinating book!! If there ever IS a Zombie epidemic, I know who's doorstep I'm going to show up on!! Max Brooks can lead us to Victory!!
Great Book - Serious Topic.......2007-09-27
For those of you thinking this will be a tongue in cheek ironic laugh of a book, let me tell you that this is not the case. It is writen in a serious, insightful and journalistic style, perfect for the topic. He has great ideas about how all this might take place, and there are some truly moving parts of this book, as well as the horrible and violent. Do you like end of the world scenarios? Grab this book!
"World War Z".......2007-09-27
The road to zombies is, evidently, a more slippery slope than I'd realized. Recently, I was in a Hamilton-Gibson ten-minute piece in which I played a dead person. The character opposite me was a bloody dead guy. At the opening night party, several of us got to laughing about how there just aren't enough plays where an actor gets to be a bloody dead guy. How we need some quality theater written about zombies. Imagine the witty dialogue-- Zombie #1: Mmmnnnggghhh! Zombie #2: Gnnrrrrrrr! There's some quality literature! Ha ha ha ha ha ....
Who knew how soon I would have to eat those sarcastic words (better than eating flesh, giggle-snort). On September 6, Max Brooks published his novel World War Z. "Z" in this case, is short for "Zombie". I started reading it soon after, thinking it'd be funny. I mean, zombie movies are mostly pretty cheesy, right?
I've never seen Romero's "Night of the Living Dead", or any of the films that followed. Certainly, I've read my share of Stephen King, and watched my share of slasher flicks. As a teen, I have to being somewhat scared by Freddie Kruger. But I was never a Goth girl, never into Anne Rice, and only watched "Resident Evil" because my boyfriend at the time had played the video game and wanted to see the film.
I picked up this novel because I thought it ironic to have just been joking about "zombie literature", and because I like survival stories. There are two post-apocalyptic, society-is-utterly-changed-by-sudden-catastrophe books that moved me and stayed with me over time. One is Stephen King's novel, The Stand (and for goodness' sake, read the book; don't see the mediocre movie!). The other was Whitley Strieber and James Kunetka's War Day. Both amazing stories came from sources I'd not expected. Third time's a charm, I guess.
World War Z surprised me. The writing grabbed me, and not the cheesy way a ghoulish hand from under the bed grabs the stupid heroine in a horror movie. I found the structure of the novel intriguing: Brooks shares the story of World War Z by "interviewing" the survivors ten years after "the Crisis" has passed. The interviewees are people who were, at the time, doctors, children, government officials, military grunts, cyberpunks, pilots, gardeners at fancy international resorts. They are Americans, Chinese, Russian, Mexican, Korean, British, French, Australian. While this style of storytelling is not completely original, it is compelling. I stopped chortling about reading about zombies (of all things! not serious literature, of course!), and started hearing what Max Brooks understands about humanity - as a whole, and as individuals.
I thought he had some profound insights about resilience and depravity, about the bald cruelty of survival tactics and the ridiculous amount of luxury we think of as necessity. Most of all, as someone who has fought my own version of life-or-death demons, I really agreed with what Brooks says about hope. Pick the book up yourself, and see if you don't find it hard to put down. Max Brooks may be a bit odd - he is the son of Mel Brooks, the director of many tongue-in-cheek films - but the writing here hits many issues right on the head. That's the only way to kill the undead, or the critics, if you can tell them apart.
Author of "Hobo Finds A Home" and Editor of "Of A Predatory Heart"
Book Description
An unprecedented account of life in Baghdad’s Green Zone, a walled-off enclave of towering plants, posh villas, and sparkling swimming pools that was the headquarters for the American occupation of Iraq.
The Washington Post’s former Baghdad bureau chief Rajiv Chandrasekaran takes us with him into the Zone: into a bubble, cut off from wartime realities, where the task of reconstructing a devastated nation competed with the distractions of a Little America—a half-dozen bars stocked with cold beer, a disco where women showed up in hot pants, a movie theater that screened shoot-’em-up films, an all-you-could-eat buffet piled high with pork, a shopping mall that sold pornographic movies, a parking lot filled with shiny new SUVs, and a snappy dry-cleaning service—much of it run by Halliburton. Most Iraqis were barred from entering the Emerald City for fear they would blow it up.
Drawing on hundreds of interviews and internal documents, Chandrasekaran tells the story of the people and ideas that inhabited the Green Zone during the occupation, from the imperial viceroy L. Paul Bremer III to the fleet of twentysomethings hired to implement the idea that Americans could build a Jeffersonian democracy in an embattled Middle Eastern country.
In the vacuum of postwar planning, Bremer ignores what Iraqis tell him they want or need and instead pursues irrelevant neoconservative solutions—a flat tax, a sell-off of Iraqi government assets, and an end to food rationing. His underlings spend their days drawing up pie-in-the-sky policies, among them a new traffic code and a law protecting microchip designs, instead of rebuilding looted buildings and restoring electricity production. His almost comic initiatives anger the locals and help fuel the insurgency.
Chandrasekaran details Bernard Kerik’s ludicrous attempt to train the Iraqi police and brings to light lesser known but typical travesties: the case of the twenty-four-year-old who had never worked in finance put in charge of reestablishing Baghdad’s stock exchange; a contractor with no previous experience paid millions to guard a closed airport; a State Department employee forced to bribe Americans to enlist their help in preventing Iraqi weapons scientists from defecting to Iran; Americans willing to serve in Iraq screened by White House officials for their views on Roe v. Wade; people with prior expertise in the Middle East excluded in favor of lesser-qualified Republican Party loyalists. Finally, he describes Bremer’s ignominious departure in 2004, fleeing secretly in a helicopter two days ahead of schedule.
This is a startling portrait of an Oz-like place where a vital aspect of our government’s folly in Iraq played out. It is a book certain to be talked about for years to come.
Customer Reviews:
Pretty close to the truth...sorry to say.......2007-10-09
I was working at the CPA during the time the author covers in his book. I think I may have been at some of the meetings he describes. He captures the sense of the CPA, a bunch of well-intentioned, hard-working people without much of a clue about how to run an occupation in an Arab country. These were heady times and we believed we were birthing a new democracy. Few of us were equipped to pull it off and the split between DoD and the rest of the US and coalition governments doomed us from the start.
I was there!.......2007-10-06
I did a tour at the American Embassy in 2006, after the events recorded in "Imperial Life." It was fun being able to read about details of the Republican Palace, then go to that particular feature and see it for myself. More importantly, I could put what I read into context, both in the Embassy and in Iraq itself. Even though the CPA no longer occupies the Green Zone, the isolation of the military and state department staff from events occurring around us was similar to what happened to the CPA in "Imperial Life." Most staff (military included) rarely leave the the Green Zone making the average non-Iraqi resident unaware of what goes on beyond the walls. If you want to understand what living in the Green Zone is like, and why progress is slow in Iraq read this book.
Timely information.......2007-09-23
"Imperial Life" is honest, first hand, information. The author has a good grasp of the subject, of the surroundings and above all, of reality. He is able to pick up the essentials and deal with them without exaggerating his importance or his role. He is a well informed man, as he should be. The book is very well put together, and a pleasure to read. It is above all, timely. This means, regretably, that its importance shall pass, as the events he decribe will give in time place to "new improved" versions. The importance for historians to come and to serious readers will not be diminished.
Worse than a civil war; because most civil wars include some ethics........2007-09-18
I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in learning about the reasons we are involved in Iraq. It is a personal account from a journalist who travels out of the green zone to get an inside look. The critical message I got from this book is that we shouldn't dictate how the people of Iraq should run their government. Rajiv Chandrasekaran with the Washington Post reports on the life of people involved with the CPA and their attempts to rebuild Iraq's infrastructure. His book outlines a critical perspective and helps to answer many questions. "Iraqi's needed help (good advice and ample resources) from a support of corps of well meaning foreigners, not a full scale occupation with imperial Americans cloistered in a palace of the tyrant, eating bacon and drinking beer, surrounded by Gurkhas and blast walls." Why should Americans be so concerned about Iraq being a democracy? Where the officials are debating over western ideas to propegate the policies of modernizing Iraq; In the shadow of a war torn country without the bare necessities for survival. The CPA who (couldn't produce anything) poisoned Iraq's politics and had big ideas of rebuilding Iraq, but couldn't provide essentials like: Safety for the Iraqi people, electricity, water, and adequate health care. You could argue both sides of this issue, but I think this book paints a very good portrait of life in the green zone.
POV from up close and personal on war.......2007-09-14
Chandrasekaran was Baghdad bureau chief for the Washington Post when the American troops invaded Iraq. Imperial Life in the Emerald City chronicles life in the Green Zone based on his experiences and what he gleaned from his countless interviews. The time period covered is roughly from the first days of the U.S. invasion to Bremer's departure in 2004.
It is a tale of cronyism, hubris, myopia, incompetence, and well-intentioned people not having the appropriate resources (training, information, human or material resources) to perform their duties. It is about inter-governmental in-fighting, and about how political loyalty trumped experience (often with disastrous results). It is a story of how disconnected those leading the rebuilding effort in Iraq were with the Iraqi people and how imposing their ideals in Iraq resulted in greater unrest. It is a paradigm example of how failing to plan resulted in planning to fail.
The book would have been hilarious, except that the stories - as incredible as they are - are true! Knowing that this work is non-fiction makes it sad. Rick (Fiasco), Stewart (The Prince of the Marshes), Packer (Assassin's Gate), Woodward (State of Denial) and others seem to concur that the U.S. government has grossly mishandled the efforts in Iraq. Unfortunately, the price has been lives (both American and Iraqi, both civilian and military) as well as Iraqi and U.S. national resources.
Chandrasekran writes in the first person, and his writing style is easy, straight forward and engaging. Interspersed between chapters are vignettes on life within the Emerald City (a.k.a. Green Zone, "Imperial Life" refers to life under Bremer's rule). Chandrasekaran does not pass judgment; he merely reports what he saw and learned from his interviews.
Examples of ignorance, ineptitude, and denial litter the pages that at times I could not bear to read any more. It was difficult for me not to get appalled and angry at the egregious decisions that were made. After reading this book, most readers would agree with the Iraqi leader Chandrasekran quotes as saying "The biggest mistake of the occupation was the occupation itself, pg. 290."
Armchair Interviews says: First-hand reporting well done in this book.
Book Description
The appearance, more than sixty years after the Spanish Civil War ended, of mass graves containing victims of Francisco Franco’s death squads finally broke what Spaniards call “the pact of forgetting”—the unwritten understanding that their recent, painful past was best left unexplored. At this charged moment, Giles Tremlett embarked on a journey around the country and through its history to discover why some of Europe’s most voluble people have kept silent so long.
Ghosts of Spain is the fascinating result of that journey. In elegant and passionate prose, Tremlett unveils the tinderbox of disagreements that mark the country today. Delving into such emotional questions as who caused the Civil War, why Basque terrorists kill, why Catalans hate Madrid, and whether the Islamist bombers who killed 190 people in 2004 dreamed of a return to Spain’s Moorish past, Tremlett finds the ghosts of the past everywhere. At the same time, he offers trenchant observations on more quotidian aspects of Spanish life today: the reasons, for example, Spaniards dislike authority figures, but are cowed by a doctor’s white coat, and how women have embraced feminism without men noticing.
Drawing on the author’s twenty years of experience living in Spain, Ghosts of Spain is a revelatory book about one of Europe’s most exciting countries.
Customer Reviews:
An outsider's insight.......2007-05-28
A British journalist who has lived 20 years in Spain, married and raising his 2 children in Madrid, the author investigates, reveals and muses upon Spanish culture, history and the forces of the "two Spains" as they come together, or rub against each other, in forming the modern Spanish world. A fascinating look at Spain, its subcultures from the Basques to the Catalans to flamenco to the Galicians, to drug culture to tourism and the very difficult and delicate process of choosing to forget the differences of the Spanish Civil War and Franco's regime in order to move forward in a country that was once the most powerful on earth.
I like Spain and its history. This is one of the very best insights into modern Spain. Highly recommended.
A Pale Secret.......2007-05-22
A liberal British newspaper reporter's hit and miss attempt at a book explaining Spain (his nearly adopted country) to us outsiders. Some hits (like how modern Spain handles the dark legacy of Franco) are offset by a number of misses.
Historical facts, or guesses as to historical facts, get thrown in as space fillers; events that catch Mr. Tremlett's fancy are highlighted, whether reflective of the whole Spanish society or not; the level of writing is often barely above that of a talented reporter on deadline. The final meandering chapter entitled "Moderns and Ruins", especially, cries out for editing.
Great book about a fascinating country.......2007-05-19
This is a great journalistic account of the social and political changes that have transformed Spain up to the present day. Tremlett discusses the country's past and present in fairly equal measure. He begins by looking at the legacies of the Spanish Civil War, discussing how only in the past decade has the full scale of the atrocities that took place come to light. He discusses how Spaniards whose relatives were killed by the Francoists have pushed in recent years for their relatives to be given decent burials. He also writes an interesting chapter on Franco's overall legacy, arguing that after his death and the country's transition to democracy he has been largely purged from public discourse. Despite this collective amnesia that he identifies, Tremlett points out that the same left-right cleavage that drove the war still lurks below the surface of Spanish society. The book also contains chapters on the Basque, Catalan, and Galician regions. Tremlett provides very insightful analysis of the origins of and main forces behind Basque and Catalan nationalism, while his chapter on Galicia details that region's emergence as a conduit for Columbian cocaine. One of my favorite chapters looked at gender relations in Spain, in which Tremlett provides some very amusing anecdotes that reveal contrasts between Spain and his native Britain. This chapter also discusses Tremlett's quest to understand the paradox of how a country can be so awash in brothels (which, he reports, 1/4 of Spanish men visited) yet relatively conservative in terms of the sexual mores of its people.
Other subjects covered here include Spain's emergence as a global tourism magnet (and the corruption that has often emerged alongside it) and the 2004 Madrid train bombing, which indirectly led to the defeat of the ruling party in the elections several days later. This was an interesting chapter, in which Tramlett looked at the ways in which the main parties tried to capitalize on this tragedy for political gain. Overall, I found Tremlett to be a very keen analyst of social and political relations, and there weren't really any weak chapters. For instance, I considered skipping a chapter on flamenco music, not being particularly interested in the musical form itself, but the chapter ended up including a fascinating discussion of the social history of Spain's gypsies.
Overall, I would heartily recommend this book to anybody interested in Spanish history, culture, and/or politics. I would NOT recommend it to those expecting more of a travel guide type of book; although Tremlett does visit and write evocatively about numerous regions, such descriptions are not the main substance of this book. If I had to make one minor criticism, it is that the chapters themselves were often not tightly organized. For example, the chapter on the Basques jumps from past to present and does not really follow any sort of structure. This wasn't really a problem for me, because Tremlett writes well and never bored me, but it might be a problem to some. Another minor complaint is that the book doesn't include a map, which might have been useful for readers like me who aren't intimately familiar with Spain's geography. Overall, though, I think that this is social and political journalism at its finest, and anybody wishing to learn more about this fascinating country could do worse than to start here!
Spain's a Fun Country to Visit.......2007-04-29
The first time tht I went to Spain the country was still under Franco. When getting off the plane, every arriving passenger was photographed. This set a tone that made you never forget where you were. Now going to Spain is like going to any other country. There is no problem going from one city to another. The people are friendly to Americans. The food, trains, hotels, highways are all good.
This book looks underneath these obvious outward trappings to the held over anguish from the Franco time. He also looks further backwards to the regional conflicts with Basque seperatists, and more recently to the Islamist bombers who killed 190 people using bomb attacks in 2004.
Spain remains a little bit different than the rest of Western Europe. Mr. Tremlett has lived in Spain for twenty years and has done an excellent job of bringing together the history and the current situation to explain the current country that is Spain.
The Real Spain.......2007-04-15
Giles Tremlett has written a highly readable, incisive portrait of Spain today--its problems and its pleasures. His presentation of the manner in which Spain has chosen to deal with the aftermath of Francisco Franco's death is particularly well written and revealing. He examines how the decades of dictatorship and brutal repression have been swept under the rug of collective consciousness by Spaniards choosing not to confront it or attempt to reconcile themselves with this difficult episode in their nation's history. The author's years of closely observing Spain, and reporting on its politics and culture for Britain's most respected newspaper, The Guardian, have given him a wonderful sense of both the large picture and the quotidian details, which do so much to bring this book to life.
Anyone wanting a sense of what today's Spain is all about will find it in these pages.
Book Description
"A gripping story." --Economist
An impressively accessible narrative depicting the three-day battle for the pass at Thermopylae (the Hot Gates)--a critical contest in Xerxes's massive invasion of Greece. The bloody stand made there by Leonidas and his small Spartan army in 480 B.C. has been hailed ever since as an outstanding example of patriotism, courage, and sacrifice.
Customer Reviews:
Very good read!.......2007-09-04
The book was very thorough and covered the subject very well. Each chapter was broken down into ten pages or less and each one took on a very specific subject, perfect for a light reading on the subject. It would have been nice to have some breakdown of the individuals in the beginning, because there are many and at times I had to back track to see who was who and what they had done. More maps, especially later when the details of where ships are sailing or troops are moving, maybe a map at the beginning of each chapter to help keep things moving without breaking the reading momentum.
Overall, a good read, and I enjoyed it very much.
Who you side with, says who you are.......2007-08-23
"it was the natural human tendency to elevate the battle at the hot Gates to an almost superhuman dimension and, having done so, to let the purpose of it be forgotten."
"Even the self-perpetuating bureaucracy of our modern Western, self-styled 'democratic', world would have seemed to the Spartans who died at Thermopylae an unacceptable thing."
There lies the moral of the whole story. It is not just a military history, it is a story of peoples choosing sides. Pushed to the brink were you have to choose what is really worth dying -and living- for. Here are the options that people (yesterday and today) consider before committing themselves to a country/party/policy/, etc. What would we fight for today? How much would you be willing to give up in the face of threats? Today we don't consider the real issues because wee don't see our lives threatened.
This book shows us what the people considered worth fighting for. Today things haven't changed, and that's what makes this book so relevant (besides well-written): we have today so much "noise" coming from the media and our elite classes (academia/bureaucratic establishment) that prevents us from listening to our own hearts when it comes to making sound and fundamental decisions.
Put yourself in the sandals of a Spartan or an Athenian in 5th century BC. and where would you stand? What would you live/die for?
The book covers Thermopylae, Salamis and Plataea.
East versus West.......2007-06-27
I found the author gave a very good background to the story of Thermopylae. It is hard to add much to an event that took place nearly 2500 years ago but his description of the world picture and the battle were able to transport you to another level. He delim=neates the real reason for the importance of the battle the domination of the East over the West or Asia over Europe. I found the work well worth my time.
An Impressive Account.......2007-05-04
I have read other books by the late Ernle Bradford and did not have to think twice about purchasing this one. I know Mr. Bradford to be an excellent and thoughtful writer; he may qualify as an historian by profession but he has a profound love of the ancient Greek world and as a sailor who has navigated the waters of the Aegean he has special practical knowledge. His book is a refreshing look at the battle of Thermopylae and the events of the Greco-Persian War.
Mr. Bradford's is a concise history of the Greco-Persian Wars but by no means is it lacking in substance or an abridgement. Certainly Peter Green's excellent volume is, arguably, the best and most thorough book on the war but Bradford's Thermopylae is highly readable and presents a good discussion of the people and events of the Greco-Persian War.
Mr. Bradford lays out his chapters nicely beginning with a discussion of Xerxes and his forbearers who created the Persian Empire; he is even-handed in his portrayal of the Great King discussing his weaknesses and noble traits. We are them given an overview of the Greek world concentrating on Athens and Sparta followed by how soldiers on both sides were armed and fought each other and their respective navies. He also provides a chapter on the invasion of Sicily by the Carthaginians and round out his book with a good discussion of Salamis and the final battle of Plataea.
I think the Mr. Bradford's words would speak better than any I could put together so here is an excerpt from chapter 18:
"Thermopylae, which has been wrongly compared in recent times to the evacuation of Dunkirk, can be counted a victory in moral terms. The right men had been there, in the right place and at the right time - but far too few of them. Had Sparta sent a thousand men instead of a king's bodyguard of three hundred, the Phocian force guarding the pass over Kallidromos could have been stiffened by a leaving of Spartan officers who would have made sure that it was, at the very least, hotly contested. In the end, in view of the size of the Persian army, there can be small doubt that the result would have been much the same...Quite unlike Dunkirk, which was a withdrawal, Thermopylae was a deliberate self-sacrifice by a handful of men who died so that the fleet at Artemisium might stay in being."
This is an engaging book (certainly better than some books that I have read on the same subject) that holds the reader's attention and I would not hesitate to recommend to someone who wants to about Thermopylae and the events surrounding the battle.
Superbly researched and written.......2007-03-16
Thermopylae: The Battle for the West by Ernle Bradford is truly a marvelous work dealing with a moment in history that forever changed everything that came after.
With Xerxes and the Persian army set to invade Greece, the Greeks had little time to plan a defense. The Spartan King Leonidas and a small contingent of Spartan hoplites along with about 7000 other Greeks rushed to the pass of Thermopylae to engage and delay the Persian invasion. The intent wasn't to defeat the invading army but to buy time....to fight a delaying action. Bradford does a terrific job at telling this classic story anew.
After Xerxes learns of a hidden path by which he could circle into the Greek's rear, the cause at Thermopylae was doomed. Leonidas, his Spartans, and a small group of Thespians stay behind to fight a delaying action allowing the other Greeks to flee to the south and live to fight another day. In the end Xerxes failed in his invasion plans. He did burn Athens but he lost the naval battle at Salamis which forced his withdrawl from Greece and Greek culture was saved.
So why all the attention on this battle fought so long ago? Just as the struggle forced by Xerxes upon the ancient Greeks saved western civilization in the end, many feel that we're locked in a similar struggle today. That discussion isn't for this space, but keep in mind current events as you read Thermopylae: The Battle for the West.
I strongly recommend this work.
Amazon.com
Esteemed historian David McCullough covers the military side of the momentous year of 1776 with characteristic insight and a gripping narrative, adding new scholarship and a fresh perspective to the beginning of the American Revolution. It was a turbulent and confusing time. As British and American politicians struggled to reach a compromise, events on the ground escalated until war was inevitable. McCullough writes vividly about the dismal conditions that troops on both sides had to endure, including an unusually harsh winter, and the role that luck and the whims of the weather played in helping the colonial forces hold off the world's greatest army. He also effectively explores the importance of motivation and troop morale--a tie was as good as a win to the Americans, while anything short of overwhelming victory was disheartening to the British, who expected a swift end to the war. The redcoat retreat from Boston, for example, was particularly humiliating for the British, while the minor American victory at Trenton was magnified despite its limited strategic importance.
Some of the strongest passages in 1776 are the revealing and well-rounded portraits of the Georges on both sides of the Atlantic. King George III, so often portrayed as a bumbling, arrogant fool, is given a more thoughtful treatment by McCullough, who shows that the king considered the colonists to be petulant subjects without legitimate grievances--an attitude that led him to underestimate the will and capabilities of the Americans. At times he seems shocked that war was even necessary. The great Washington lives up to his considerable reputation in these pages, and McCullough relies on private correspondence to balance the man and the myth, revealing how deeply concerned Washington was about the Americans' chances for victory, despite his public optimism. Perhaps more than any other man, he realized how fortunate they were to merely survive the year, and he willingly lays the responsibility for their good fortune in the hands of God rather than his own. Enthralling and superbly written, 1776 is the work of a master historian. --Shawn Carkonen
The Other 1776
With his riveting, enlightening accounts of subjects from Johnstown Flood to John Adams, David McCullough has become the historian that Americans look to most to tell us our own story. In his Amazon.com interview, McCullough explains why he turned in his new book from the political battles of the Revolution to the battles on the ground, and he marvels at some of his favorite young citizen soldiers who fought alongside the remarkable General Washington.
The Essential David McCullough
John Adams |
Truman |
Mornings on Horseback |
The Path Between the Seas |
The Great Bridge |
The Johnstown Flood |
More Reading on the Revolution
The Great Improvisation by Stacy Schiff |
Washington's Crossing by David Hackett Fischer |
His Excellency: George Washington by Joseph J. Ellis |
Washington's General by Terry Golway |
Iron Tears by Stanley Weintraub |
Victory at Yorktown by Richard M. Ketchum |
Book Description
In this stirring book, David McCullough tells the intensely human story of those who marched with General George Washington in the year of the Declaration of Independence -- when the whole American cause was riding on their success, without which all hope for independence would have been dashed and the noble ideals of the Declaration would have amounted to little more than words on paper.
Based on extensive research in both American and British archives, 1776 is a powerful drama written with extraordinary narrative vitality. It is the story of Americans in the ranks, men of every shape, size, and color, farmers, schoolteachers, shoemakers, no-accounts, and mere boys turned soldiers. And it is the story of the King's men, the British commander, William Howe, and his highly disciplined redcoats who looked on their rebel foes with contempt and fought with a valor too little known.
Here also is the Revolution as experienced by American Loyalists, Hessian mercenaries, politicians, preachers, traitors, spies, men and women of all kinds caught in the paths of war.
At the center of the drama, with Washington, are two young American patriots, who, at first, knew no more of war than what they had read in books -- Nathanael Greene, a Quaker who was made a general at thirty-three, and Henry Knox, a twenty-five-year-old bookseller who had the preposterous idea of hauling the guns of Fort Ticonderoga overland to Boston in the dead of winter.
But it is the American commander-in-chief who stands foremost -- Washington, who had never before led an army in battle.
The book begins in London on October 26, 1775, when His Majesty King George III went before Parliament to declare America in rebellion and to affirm his resolve to crush it. From there the story moves to the Siege of Boston and its astonishing outcome, then to New York, where British ships and British troops appear in numbers never imagined and the newly proclaimed Continental Army confronts the enemy for the first time. David McCullough's vivid rendering of the Battle of Brooklyn and the daring American escape that followed is a part of the book few readers will ever forget.
As the crucial weeks pass, defeat follows defeat, and in the long retreat across New Jersey, all hope seems gone, until Washington launches the "brilliant stroke" that will change history.
The darkest hours of that tumultuous year were as dark as any Americans have known. Especially in our own tumultuous time, 1776 is powerful testimony to how much is owed to a rare few in that brave founding epoch, and what a miracle it was that things turned out as they did.
Written as a companion work to his celebrated biography of John Adams, David McCullough's 1776 is another landmark in the literature of American history.
Download Description
"In this stirring book, David McCullough tells the intensely human story of those who marched with General George Washington in the year of the Declaration of Independence -- when the whole American cause was riding on their success, without which all hope for independence would have been dashed and the noble ideals of the Declaration would have amounted to little more than words on paper. Written as a companion work to his celebrated biography of John Adams, David McCullough's 1776 is another landmark in the literature of American history. "
Customer Reviews:
Success was not guaranteed.......2007-10-01
Looking back on the American revolution of 1776 we sometimes
make the mistake to think success was guaranteed.
In David McCulloughs splendid book 1776 we clearly see
that it was not.
Its the gripping tale of american patriots like Nathanael Green,
age thirty three, who knew nothing of war except what he had read in books, and twenty five year old bookseller Henry Knox - who joined the
cause with George Washington to fight the biggest army in the world.
A weird assembly - the cause of liberty being led by a slavemaster
(Washington had more than 100 slaves). Still, in the end he is the one
who overcomes all bad odds and makes independence real.
In december 1776 leading a down and out army of some 3.000 to surprise attack Christmas night on hessian forces in Trenton and later Princeton. Turning the tide.
Having narrowly escaped the british and certain defeat in Brooklyn,
where the american army eventually only escaped over the East river,
because of the curtain of night concealed them and later a heavy fog.
Had they been spotted by the british - defeat would have been certain.
At Kips Bay Washington finds his troops in panic. Turned cowards
in front of the enemy. When no one obeys and only runs in panic,
Washington throws his hat to the ground, exclaiming in disgust:
"Are these the men with which I am to defend America".
As he and his defeated men are chased through New Jersey
by the british, thousands of the good people in New Jersey
flock to the british camps to declare their loyalty.
Washingtons followers reduced to a pitiable collection of ragged,
dispirited mortals that ever pretended to the name of an army.
As the sick and elderly were being abused, raped and murdered by british and Hessian forces in the New Jersey countryside - Washington forces quit in large numbers and return home.
And still, Christmas night, Washingtons men attack Trenton and conquers
1.500 Hessians - and turned the tide.
In McCulloughs word- Washington was not a brilliant tactician,
not a gifted orator, not an intellectual. At several crucial moments
he had shown indecisiveness and mistakes in judgment. But he
never forgot what was at stake and he never gave up.
What a story 1776 is. It makes sense that one book can't follow
event all the way to Yorktown or from the beginning with the Boston teaparty.
Simply 1776 has so much drama - that it is more than enough
for one book. But I will look forward to sequels. 1775, 1777 etc.
The John Adams book was more complete in the sense that we got both the begining and the end to the story, so that got five stars. Here I missed something on what happened after 1776 - but then again, I am sure the author is busy working on sequels !
-Simon
It Can't Be Said Enough, Excellent, Superb, One of the Best.......2007-10-01
There has probably been enough written about this book to fill more pages than the book itself. Of all the military books I have read, this book more than any other brought the information alive. The way writing was beyond excellent and the information presented in an engaging manner. Obviously this book represents General Washington and the American cause in a positive manner. That's not to say that it glosses over any of Washington's mistakes. On the contrary the author is quick to point out the general's mistakes and weaknesses. But as history would prove, Washington did enough right to survive 1776 and all the events of that dramatic year to keep an army in the field. Keeping the Continental Army in the field was most likely the single most important achievement of George Washington's tenure as Commander and Chief, during the war years. The book gives you insight into the lives of both officers and enlisted while maintaining it's focus on the overall impact of the decisions made during each chapter. It's difficult to write a review for a book that has already won the Pulitzer Prize. All this reviewer can really say is that all the accolades this book has received were very much deserved
1776: A ROLLER-COASTER RIDE!.......2007-09-21
David McCullough's book "1776" chronicles the first major year of fighting in during America's war for independence. The strength of this book is how McCullough gives the reader a humanistic portrayal of all the key players of the American Revolution. His accounts of key battles and events are exciting and dramatic, rivaling the best of historic fiction. This book will keep you glued until the very end. I highly recommend it!
Grade: A
Wonderfully engaging and informative.......2007-09-20
This was the first book I've read by David McCullough. After reading this book I can see why it was a bestseller and why McCullough won all those awards. After finishing this book I immediately went out and bought another one of his books. He's a superb writer who really got the balance between being informative and being engaging.
If you think that history is boring (or if you associate it with memorizing lists of names and dates the night before your final), think again, because this book isn't like your average textbook. In fact, it's not a textbook at all, although I wish textbooks were written more like this.
This book talks about one of the most crucial times in our nations' history, 1776. This is something that every well-educated American should understand and be familiar with. Or, for that matter, any American who considers themselves a patriot or an informed person. The 4th of July isn't just a day for barbecues or a day to see fireworks, but it represents a very significant event in our country's history.
This book belongs on the shelf of every American. I firmly believe that this book will stand the test of time and go down as one of the great books of our time. It really makes the time period come alive; I often felt like I was there. This is a wonderful book and I unequivocally recommend it.
McCullough Does it Again.......2007-09-16
This was a Great Book written by a Great Author. My only regret was that it didn't go on and on. Like a great movie, it leaves you wanting more. When I purchased the book I thought it would be about the whole war but it is really just what the title says, about the year 1776. I now thirst for the "Rest of the Story" and will be diving in deep to find it. It is written as a Novel just like all of David McCullough's books and I highly recommend it. I am going to read this to my children as I know it will get them interested in history. Thanks again David.
Book Description
During and following WWII, a special multinational group of more than 350 men and women served behind enemy lines and joined frontline military units to ensure the preservation, protection, liberation and restitution of the world's greatest artistic and cultural treasures. This "band of unsung heroes," formally referred to as the Monuments, Fine Arts and Archives (MFAA) section, or commonly referred to as the "Monuments Men," worked tirelessly to track down, identify and catalogue millions of priceless works of art and irreplaceable cultural artifacts, including masterpieces by Da Vinci, Michelangelo, Rembrandt and Vermeer, that had been stolen by Hitler and the Nazis.
The story of the Monuments Men, including their heroics and exploits in rescuing and safeguarding many of the world's greatest artworks for the benefit of mankind, has never before been fully revealed until now, with the publication of
Rescuing Da Vinci, an exhaustively researched historical account written by Robert M. Edsel. Mr. Edsel can best be described as a successful athlete and business entrepreneur turned modern day "Indiana Jones." Mr. Edsel has dedicated the last five years of his life to painstaking and far-reaching research to unravel the secrets of the Monuments Men and, in so doing, to make the world aware of their unprecedented contributions, both during and after WWII, and to ensure that these unsung heroes receive appropriate recognition from the United States government, as well as the broad public.
The detailed documentation, inventories and photographs developed and catalogued by the Monuments Men during and following World War II, have made possible, and continue to make possible, the restitution of stolen artworks of to rightful owners and their descendents. Long after WWII, many Monuments Men went on to become renowned directors and curators of preeminent international cultural institutions, including the National Gallery of Art, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art, the Toledo Museum of Art and the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, among many others, as well as professors at esteemed universities such as Harvard, Yale, Princeton, New York University, Williams College and Columbia University. Others became founders, presidents, and members of associations such as the New York City Ballet, the American Museum Association, the American Association of Museum Directors, the Archaeological Institute of America, the Society of Architectural Historians, the American Society of Landscape Architects, the National Endowment for the Humanities and the National Endowment for the Arts, as well as respected architects, archivists, artists and musicians.
"Mr. Edsel's book is captivating in several respects, from the graphic, garish reminders of the faces of the great plunderers, to the singular beauty of the art they sought to steal. And it is a high and overdue memorial to the "Monuments Men," who did the herculean job of tracking down and repatriating the great art." -- William F. Buckley Jr.
Customer Reviews:
A wonderful book.......2007-10-09
This book shows and tells another side of war. It is the story told in picture of Hitler and his Nazi thugs pillaging Europe and stealing priceless art objects, painting, statures, books, even ancient scrolls then hiding them in caves and bunkers in Germany. What I loved about this book were the photos of US Army units rescuing those stolen art treasures then returned them to the towns, churches and cities. The author has done an exemplary job of finding photos and stories which has made this an important work. Photos I've never seen and story I have never heard about. I think this book needs to be in every high school library in the country. Students need to be shown how our American Army worked to recover all this lost art. His book made me proud to have serviced in the US army.
Thank you for writing this book
SPOILS OF WAR.......2007-09-21
This is one of the most fascinating books i have ever read. The period images are amazing, just the photo of italian masons bricking up Michaelangelo's iconic David is worth the purchase. After reading this book I was stunned that so few art treasures were destroyed. I had no idea that much of the treasures at the National Gallery of Art in D.C. was stored at Biltmore because of its remote setting. I was also blown away to see the images of workman removing winged victory from the Louvre, I just had no idea all of this went on leading up to the war and during the war. The German pillaging of the great European art treasures is disgusting of course, especially the art they looted from the weathy Jewry like the Rothchilds and others, some of which even to this day are trying to get back art work that is rightly theirs. I highly recommend this great book to anyone interested in art, history, art history, or frankly has an inquisive mind. I want to thank the authors for a job well done.
What were they thinking!!.......2007-08-10
This was a fascinating and disturbing account of the massive Nazi looting and subsequent recovery by the Allies. It is a story told mostly by pictures to the tune of about 20 pages of pictures for each page of print. It is promoted by the publisher as the biggest non-told story of WWII and he might be right; it diminished the German war effort and probably shortened the War. It was also about the massive and admirable effort by the so-called Allied `Monuments Men' to recover and redistribute the loot back to their rightful owners after the War.
Germany stole millions of art objects from occupied countries, and even from its own ally Italy, on the pretext of saving it from the `barbarian' invaders from the West. Monuments weighing tons, like the `Burghers of Calais' from France and the `Winged Lion' from atop the column in Florence's San Martin Square, were somehow lifted and hauled away. Also, 5000 church bells were stolen from Europe and 300 trolley cars were removed from Amsterdam. In short, they looted everything they could get their hands on, and they were good at it. There are good pictures of the bells and the trolley cars.
In Slavic countries such as Russia and Poland, the plundering was accompanied by an attempted systematic destruction of the culture itself; `inferior races' in Hitler's mind didn't deserve a history. The siege of Russia was particularly bad; 6000 hospitals were destroyed, and 86,000 elementary and secondary schools were destroyed. Decency had taken a long vacation in Germany.
Hitler was a master at destroying things. He destroyed a lot of Europe and Russia, and even extended his `scorched earth' policy to his own country when Germany was near defeat. Thankfully, that order was not faithfully carried out.
How could a country justify destroying the culture of another country? What were the people of Germany thinking when they elected this maniac as Chancellor in the 1930's? Why did they blindly follow him?
What were they thinking!!
I recommend this book.......2007-05-13
If you enjoy WWII history and art, this is a book that should be in your collection. It is full of wonderful photos that you will not find elsewhere. If you have ever wondered about what happened to the great masterpieces of art during WWII, this is the book to buy. Amazon also has a great price.
Great Book!.......2007-04-14
What a great story. Incredible photos too. Quality of the pages is very good. I'm actually surprised it's only $35 after getting it.
Amazon.com
Film Directing Shot by Shot offers a good introduction to the rudiments of film production. Steven D. Katz walks his readers through the various stages of moviemaking, advising them at every turn to visualize the films they wish to produce. Katz believes that one of the chief tasks of filmmaking is to negotiate between our three-dimensional reality and the two-dimensionality of the screen. He covers the number of technical options filmmakers can use to create a satisfying flow of shots, a continuity that will make sense to viewers and aptly tell the film's story. Katz provides in-depth coverage of production design, storyboarding, spatial connections, editing, scene staging, depth of frame, camera angles, point of view, and the various types of stable compositions and moving camera shots.
Book Description
A complete catalogue of motion picture techniques for filmmakers. It concentrates on the 'storytelling' school of filmmaking, utilizing the work of the great stylists who established the versatile vocabulary of technique that has dominated the movies
since 1915. This graphic approach includes comparisons of style by interpreting a 'model script', created for the book, in storyboard form.
Customer Reviews:
Chicken scratches vs. Detailed Storyboards.......2007-08-19
I have used this book numerous times for my teachings in which students go through the process of making a short film with certain limitations being imposed. It is part of a process that I call "fast filmmaking". I like the examples that Katz presents, specifically that it is not the quality of the drawing, but how the drawing communicates the director's vision to the rest of the crew. I will usually have a student "explain" their storyboard to the class, and it is amazing how a few chicken scratches can give as much details as a fully detailed storyboard. Kudos to Katz for explaining the creative aspect of directing, and Michael Weise Productions for publishing these types of books.
of moderate interest to readers of video magazines.......2007-08-13
as a long-time reader of videographer's magazines, I didn't find much of interest in this book. If I were new to the trade, I'd probably have found it more useful. For that reason, I gave it a rather high rating of 4 stars
Mind-opening, even if you aren't interested in directing.......2007-06-30
I've worked in the graphics design business for years, but more recently I've grown interested in working with video, primarily shorts and documentary work. I was looking for a book that could help teach me the "language" of motion and visual storytelling, and this book fit the bill. In fact, I found it to be incredibly inspiring as a student of art in general. It's extremely well-written, chock full of practical examples, and contains numerous time-worn techniques as well as cutting-edge experimentation. One funny thing: since it was written a few years before the desktop digital video revolution began, it talks about some of the difficult aspects of shooting which are now in many ways moot. But it's good to hear about the history of the craft.
If you have any interest in all in shooting, directing, or producing any kind of motion picture, show, or short, you'll definitely want to buy this book. However, be forewarned: you'll never be able to watch movies the same way again. You'll begin to pick up all the subtle nuances of filmmaking without even realizing it, so don't feel bad if you have to force yourself to re-engage with the actual story as you're watching!
Useful, pleasurable.......2007-05-07
I'm a college student, not at film school, who makes videos as a serious hobby. I thought this book was much better than other titles in the same market, because it's so specific. Instead of telling you what anyone with common sense knows, like "keep continuity" and "composition can affect the mood of a scene," this film lays it all out in detail. I recommend this for everyone who wants to improve. Even if you're not particularly interested in storyboarding, you'll learn how to think about your sequences in advance much better.
Learning the Rules Before You Break Them.......2007-01-13
Even though many of the great filmmakers may have not utilized storyboards, every one of them has pre-visualized their films.
Pre-visualization is the essence of what it means to be a director. A director can only be effective if he/she properly prepares for each scene. Even if one does not have every shot precisely planned out, they will still have an idea of the look and the flow of the process.
There are certainly many people who feel directing should be intuitive, that there should be no structure to the process or else creativity is stifled. This is a valid point from the perspective of the artist.
What is wonderful about this book is that it gives extensive insight into WHY one should cover a scene in a certain way. Directing as a profession requires a certain amount of preparation and PROOF that you have a handle on the film. Producers want reassurance that you have a vision worth pouring tens of millions of dollars into. Armed with the ability to properly express yourself in regard to your vision, you will have a much easier time convincing others to follow you.
So, in the end, if you are interested in studying the language of film and the methodology behind classic film composition and editing, then this book and the accompanying Film Directing: Cinematic Motion are essential.
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