A tremendous work of well-structured research that will appeal to a wide audience.
A thoroughgoing history of how the U.S. moved from the Monroe Doctrine to “regional hegemony.”
As Mirski, a lawyer and foreign policy scholar, delineates, becoming an interventionist power in its own hemisphere was a dangerous moral compromise for the U.S., a fraught trajectory that many observers still don’t feel comfortable examining. The author offers an evenhanded account of the political gains and drawbacks of annexation, occupation, and intervention in troubled regional states from 1870 to 1945 as well as the moral challenge of not acting like the imperialist Old World powers. While the U.S. was torn by civil war, France and Spain made moves into Mexico, challenging the Monroe Doctrine. Mirski looks closely at decisions by successive secretaries of state and presidents regarding these incursions, and he takes each regional crisis in turn: Haiti, Chile, Venezuela (twice), Nicaragua, the Dominican Republic, the Philippines, Puerto Rico, and Guam, among others. He also chronicles the annexation of Hawaii and the 1898 war with Spain to liberate Cuba, thereby joining “the great power club.” The Panama Canal, by connecting the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, effectively doubled the size of Theodore Roosevelt’s beloved Navy, and the so-called “Roosevelt Corollary” to the Monroe Doctrine essentially forced the U.S. to become “an international police power,” which ushered in a brief but disastrous interventionist period. Mirski offers an extensive, incisive analysis of why the interventionist period did not work, and his excellent, relevant conclusion about current moves by Russia and China shows how rising powers tend to embrace “expansion and aggression.” Regarding the former, the author writes, “Since the Soviet Union’s collapse, several of Russia’s neighbors have experienced chronic domestic unrest, including ‘color revolutions’ that replaced neutral or Russia-aligned regimes with pro-Western ones. Moscow blames Europe and the United States for the trouble, and it has responded by aggressively exploiting its neighbors’ instability for its own ends.”
A tremendous work of well-structured research that will appeal to a wide audience.Pub Date: June 27, 2023
ISBN: 9781541758438
Page Count: 512
Publisher: PublicAffairs
Review Posted Online: April 5, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2023
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
A short, smart analysis of perhaps the most famous passage in American history reveals its potency and unfulfilled promise.
Words that made a nation.
Isaacson is known for expansive biographies of great thinkers (and Elon Musk), but here he pens a succinct, stimulating commentary on the Founding Fathers’ ode to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” His close reading of the Declaration of Independence’s second sentence, published to mark the 250th anniversary of the document’s adoption, doesn’t downplay its “moral contradiction.” Thomas Jefferson enslaved hundreds of people yet called slavery “a cruel war against human nature” in his first draft of the Declaration. All but 15 of the document’s 56 signers owned enslaved people. While the sentence in question asserted “all men are created equal” and possess “unalienable rights,” the Founders “consciously and intentionally” excluded women, Native Americans, and enslaved people. And yet the sentence is powerful, Isaacson writes, because it names a young nation’s “aspirations.” He mounts a solid defense of what ought to be shared goals, among them economic fairness, “moral compassion,” and a willingness to compromise. “Democracy depends on this,” he writes. Isaacson is excellent when explaining how Enlightenment intellectuals abroad influenced the founders. Benjamin Franklin, one of the Declaration’s “five-person drafting committee,” stayed in David Hume’s home for a month in the early 1770s, “discussing ideas of natural rights” with the Scottish philosopher. Also strong is Isaacson’s discussion of the “edits and tweaks” made to Jefferson’s draft. As recommended by Franklin and others, the changes were substantial, leaving Jefferson “distraught.” Franklin, who emerges as the book’s hero, helped establish municipal services, founded a library, and encouraged religious diversity—the kind of civic-mindedness that we could use more of today, Isaacson reminds us.
A short, smart analysis of perhaps the most famous passage in American history reveals its potency and unfulfilled promise.Pub Date: Nov. 18, 2025
ISBN: 9781982181314
Page Count: 80
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Aug. 29, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
