Some valuable material swamped in a poorly organized text.
A chronicle of the American Revolution spotlighting the “marginalized yet invaluable voices” usually left out of the history books.
Among those journalist and popular historian Kiernan strives to give their proper place in the struggle for American Independence are the Indigenous and the enslaved. Nanye’hi—a Cherokee woman whose efforts to keep peace with the invading whites eventually led her to warn settlers of impending attacks—is one of her featured players. So, too, is Mary Perth, an enslaved woman in Virginia prompted by the Great Awakening to become a Methodist lay preacher, who later was one of the many Black people fleeing to the British in hopes of freedom. (Kiernan frequently, and rightly, points out the contradiction between patriot cries for liberty and their support of slavery.) Among the white actors is Mary Katharine Goddard, who published a newspaper and served as postmaster in Baltimore, printed broadsides for the Continental Congress, and affixed her name as printer to the “authenticated” copy of the Declaration of Independence sent to the states in 1777. Loyalists as well as patriots are included; Kiernan appears to be emulating Ken Burns’ inclusive approach in his documentaries, which blend the experiences of ordinary people with the more famous to convey the texture of daily life in a period of upheaval. While Kiernan does occasionally give a good sense of that texture, she lacks Burns’ skill in weaving individual stories into a coherent narrative. Instead, we are introduced far too quickly to each of the people she has selected as representatives of the unsung masses, and their ongoing activities are dropped into a traditional chronology of the war that hopscotches wildly—for example, from a smallpox epidemic in British-controlled Charles Town to Benedict Arnold’s assignment to take command of West Point. Interspersed chapters about her travels to various historic sites, which read like tourist guidebooks, add to the confusion.
Some valuable material swamped in a poorly organized text.Pub Date: June 23, 2026
ISBN: 9780593183434
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Dutton
Review Posted Online: April 20, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2026
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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
An inspiration for those fighting for democratic rights in the face of authoritarianism.
A spirited history of homegrown noncompliance.
There’s the history we know, and then, below that iceberg’s tip, all that we don’t. Stoermer, a public historian and teacher, does yeoman work in digging up stories that are far from the “safe, sanitized, often nationalistic version of the past.” Early on in his narrative, for example, come complex events out of early colonial New England. First is the revolt of Indigenous peoples led by the sachem Metacomet, a revolt that blossomed into “proportionally, the deadliest war in American history for the colonials,” one that textbooks would prefer to forget in favor of rosy stories of the first Thanksgiving. A decade later follows the not-unconnected Salem witchcraft trials, met by dissenters called the Unconfessed, who refused to accept the inquisitors’ assertions of heresy and sorcery, rebuking “a state that demanded its citizens validate its lies.” Given the flood of lies that inundates the country today, their resistance is a particularly valuable lesson. Almost unknown outside specialist circles is Stoermer’s account of the so-called Six, abolitionists who, prosperous and influential, “had accepted that tactical violence was necessary” in resisting slavery, financing, and otherwise supporting John Brown’s rebellion. Their story does not end happily; when the bullets flew, most of them withdrew. Throughout, Stoermer draws lessons to offer by way of a primer for today’s dissenters—for instance, “When systematic oppression operates at scale, resistance needs people who can build sophisticated infrastructure,” and, in doing so, who can contribute to a machinery of resistance to combat the machinery of the state. Usefully, he also reminds readers that even in defeat can come victory of sorts, as with the anti-Federalists who demanded that the Constitution contain amendments that “would later be used to challenge Jim Crow, expand civil rights, and protect individual liberty against state power.”
An inspiration for those fighting for democratic rights in the face of authoritarianism.Pub Date: June 2, 2026
ISBN: 9781586424367
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Steerforth
Review Posted Online: May 4, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2026
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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