Not much to choose between the two editions, for readers adult or otherwise.
Meltzer and Mensch’s melodramatic 2018 account of a plot that would have definitely changed the outcome of the Revolutionary War, reissued in modestly tightened form for younger audiences.
In dozens of short chapters featuring barrages of orotund, present-tense prose, the authors spin a scanty web of evidence into a whirl of conspiracy. First, though, come paeans to George Washington’s sterling character and irreplaceability along with an extended overview of the war’s run-up from the occupation and abandonment of Boston to the British fleet’s arrival in New York harbor. It’s in the stews of New York (“Drinking. Disease. Filth. Secret plots”—but the syphilis and prostitutes to be found there in the adult edition seem to be absent) that ousted Loyalist governor William Tryon hatches a scheme to commit widespread sabotage and, as a hyperventilating contemporary dubs it, “SACRICIDE,” and also there that the conspirators give themselves away just prior to the disastrous Battle of Long Island. Though most escape punishment, one prisoner is hanged on the very day that the Continental Congress sees the first draft of the Declaration of Independence. Further chapters on Washington’s own spycraft, on his changing attitude toward allowing free blacks to enlist, and other conspiracies real or drummed up serve to enrich the page count as well as, sometimes, the content. Massive sections of endnotes and scholarly sources are carried over from the original.
Not much to choose between the two editions, for readers adult or otherwise. (index) (Nonfiction. 12-15)Pub Date: Jan. 7, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-24483-3
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Roaring Brook Press
Review Posted Online: Oct. 27, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2019
In either iteration, a provocative counter to conventional, blinkered views of our national story.
A classic framing of this country’s history from a multicultural perspective, clumsily cut and recast into more simplified language for young readers.
Veering away from the standard “Master Narrative” to tell “the story of a nation peopled by the world,” the violence- and injustice-laden account focuses on minorities, from African- Americans (“the central minority throughout our country’s history”), Mexicans and Native Americans to Japanese, Vietnamese, Sikh, Russian Jewish and Muslim immigrants. Stefoff reduces Takaki’s scholarly but fluid narrative (1993, revised 2008) to choppy sentences and sound-bite quotes. She also adds debatable generalizations, such as a sweeping claim that Native Americans “lived outside of white society’s borders,” and an incorrect one that the Emancipation Proclamation “freed the slaves.” Readers may take a stronger interest in their own cultural heritage from this broad picture of the United States as, historically, a tapestry of ethnic identities that are “separate but also shared”—but being more readable and, by page count at least, only about a third longer, the original version won’t be out of reach of much of the intended audience, despite its denser prose.
In either iteration, a provocative counter to conventional, blinkered views of our national story. (endnotes, glossary, index) (Nonfiction. 12-15)Pub Date: Aug. 28, 2012
ISBN: 978-1-60980-416-9
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Seven Stories
Review Posted Online: July 21, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2012
Thorough to a fault, and for young readers at least, no replacement for Jim Murphy’s oldie but goodie The Long Road to...
Wagonloads of detail weigh down this overstuffed account of the Civil War’s most significant battle and its aftermath.
Martin builds his narrative around numerous eyewitness accounts, despite the implication of the subtitle. He covers events from the rival armies’ preliminary jockeying for position to Lee’s retreat, the heroic efforts to care for the thousands of wounded soldiers left behind, as well as the establishment some months later of the cemetery that was the occasion for Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address. The battle itself, though, quickly becomes a dizzying tally of this regiment going here, that brigade charging there, the movements insufficiently supported by the small, hard-to-read battle maps. Overheated lines like “As the armies met in battle, the ground…soaked up the blood of Americans flowing into the soil” have a melodramatic effect. Moreover, as nearly everyone mentioned even once gets one or more period portraits, the illustrations become a tedious gallery of look-alike shots of scowling men with heavy facial hair. Still, the author does offer a cogent, carefully researched view of the battle and its significance in both the short and long terms.
Thorough to a fault, and for young readers at least, no replacement for Jim Murphy’s oldie but goodie The Long Road to Gettysburg (1992). (glossary, index, bibliography) (Nonfiction. 12-15)Pub Date: June 1, 2013
ISBN: 978-1-62087-532-2
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Sky Pony Press
Review Posted Online: March 26, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
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