An account of powerful people behaving badly that’s hard to resist.
Royals profited handsomely from slavery, says this account.
Historian Newman, author of A Dark Inheritance: Blood, Race, and Sex in Colonial Jamaica, opens in 1558, when Elizabeth I assumed the throne of a nation with an empty treasury and an economy dwarfed by three European empires: France, Spain, and Portugal. The queen did well, although Newman points out unsettling details. Spain and Portugal fiercely defended trade monopolies over gold, silver, and agricultural products from Africa. Slavery was harder to defend because some Africans had no objection to selling members of other tribes, and English traders often simply raided coastal towns and kidnapped their inhabitants. Elizabeth encouraged this semi-piratical behavior, often loaning navy vessels and always insisting on a percentage of the take. Profits continued under successors James I and Charles I, who encouraged settlements throughout North America. The first major colony at Jamestown was a catastrophe before settlers discovered that tobacco farming was profitable. Growing tobacco is grueling; hired or indentured labor proved unsatisfactory, so growers quickly tapped into the thriving African slave trade. All 13 colonies possessed slaves until early in the 19th century, although most went to southern states to grow tobacco and later cotton. As Britain’s monarchs lost power after upheavals in 1640 and 1688—especially power to levy taxes—their involvement with slavery increased because they needed money. Beginning with Charles II (reigned 1660-1685) and ending with George IV (Britain abolished slavery in 1834), they used their remaining authority to grant monopolies; accepted cash, stock, and honors from slavers who hoped for favors; and used influence with Parliament and rival monarchs to line their pockets. Readers may grow tired of gnashing their teeth, since every monarch acted shamefully and the author herself discovers disgraceful racism in the traditional heroes of abolition, but it’s an engrossing tale.
An account of powerful people behaving badly that’s hard to resist.Pub Date: Jan. 27, 2026
ISBN: 9780063290976
Page Count: 464
Publisher: Mariner Books
Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2025
Dogged original research and superb narrative skills come together in this gripping account of pitiless evil.
Greed, depravity, and serial murder in 1920s Oklahoma.
During that time, enrolled members of the Osage Indian nation were among the wealthiest people per capita in the world. The rich oil fields beneath their reservation brought millions of dollars into the tribe annually, distributed to tribal members holding "headrights" that could not be bought or sold but only inherited. This vast wealth attracted the attention of unscrupulous whites who found ways to divert it to themselves by marrying Osage women or by having Osage declared legally incompetent so the whites could fleece them through the administration of their estates. For some, however, these deceptive tactics were not enough, and a plague of violent death—by shooting, poison, orchestrated automobile accident, and bombing—began to decimate the Osage in what they came to call the "Reign of Terror." Corrupt and incompetent law enforcement and judicial systems ensured that the perpetrators were never found or punished until the young J. Edgar Hoover saw cracking these cases as a means of burnishing the reputation of the newly professionalized FBI. Bestselling New Yorkerstaff writer Grann (The Devil and Sherlock Holmes: Tales of Murder, Madness, and Obsession, 2010, etc.) follows Special Agent Tom White and his assistants as they track the killers of one extended Osage family through a closed local culture of greed, bigotry, and lies in pursuit of protection for the survivors and justice for the dead. But he doesn't stop there; relying almost entirely on primary and unpublished sources, the author goes on to expose a web of conspiracy and corruption that extended far wider than even the FBI ever suspected. This page-turner surges forward with the pacing of a true-crime thriller, elevated by Grann's crisp and evocative prose and enhanced by dozens of period photographs.
Dogged original research and superb narrative skills come together in this gripping account of pitiless evil.Pub Date: April 18, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-385-53424-6
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2017
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
Not so deep, but a delightful tip of the hat to the pleasures—and power—of glamour.
A coffee-table book celebrates Michelle Obama’s sense of fashion.
Illustrated with hundreds of full-color photographs, Obama’s chatty latest book begins with some school portraits from the author’s childhood in Chicago and fond memories of back-to-school shopping at Sears, then jumps into the intricacies of clothing oneself as the spouse of a presidential candidate and as the first lady. “People looked forward to the outfits, and once I got their attention, they listened to what I had to say. This is the soft power of fashion,” she says. Obama is grateful and frank about all the help she got along the way, and the volume includes a long section written by her primary wardrobe stylist, Koop—28 years old when she first took the job—and shorter sections by makeup artists and several hair stylists, who worked with wigs and hair extensions as Obama transitioned back to her natural hair, and grew out her bangs, at the end of her husband’s second term. Many of the designers of the author’s gowns, notably Jason Wu, who designed several of her more striking outfits, also contribute appreciative memories. Besides candid and more formal photographs, the volume features many sketches of her gowns by their designers, closeups on details of those gowns, and magazine covers from Better Homes & Gardens to Vogue. The author writes that as a Black woman, “I was under a particularly white-hot glare, constantly appraised for whether my outfits were ‘acceptable’ and ‘appropriate,’ the color of my skin somehow inviting even more judgment than the color of my dresses.” Overall, though, this is generally a canny, upbeat volume, with little in the way of surprising revelations.
Not so deep, but a delightful tip of the hat to the pleasures—and power—of glamour.Pub Date: Nov. 4, 2025
ISBN: 9780593800706
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 7, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2026
SEEN & HEARD
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