A bustling, knowledgeable history.
The author of Jerusalem: The Biography (2011) surveys epochal turbulence in a contested region.
Historian Montefiore’s ambitious effort to chronicle Middle Eastern life since 1900 is learned, clear-eyed, and unavoidably diffuse. His prodigious research suggests that it is “the only region on earth today that is becoming less and less diverse and tolerant, not more so.” This is due in significant measure to the 1979 Iranian Revolution, an event as impactful as the French and Russian Revolutions, he contends. The book’s first third covers the Ottoman Empire’s collapse, the two world wars, massacres, colonization and foreign invasions, the birth of new states, and the dawning of the “age of oil.” Montefiore’s chronological narrative hopscotches from one capital to another. In a representative section, two pages on Egypt are followed by two on Jerusalem, and two on Iraq. Still, there are memorable glimpses of scuttled aspiration, among them a hoped-for “socialistic partnership” linking Jewish and Arab agricultural communities. In the book’s heart, which is focused on post–World War II decades, the author slows the pace, digging deeply into the cycles of violence that have so powerfully shaped contemporary life. In other forums, he has sharply criticized some arguments advanced by pro-Palestinian voices, but here his version of events is not that of an Israel apologist. He condemns the “reckless messianism and nationalist supremacism” that took root in Israel after the country won the 1967 Six-Day War and has since “threatened the very existence of Jewish democracy.” Another well-documented throughline concerns an underreported outcome of radical Islamist terrorism: Arab Christians “have suffered the greatest purge” in recent regional history. Addressing conflicts that extend to the current war in Gaza, Montefiore concludes that there is reason to hope: “All the way through this history, many lived as they wished and as they should and valued an open, tolerant vision of the Middle East that is every bit as authentic and powerful as that of the intolerant and violent. The choices of how to live in the future belong to the peoples themselves.”
A bustling, knowledgeable history.Pub Date: Sept. 29, 2026
ISBN: 9780593805053
Page Count: 528
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: July 20, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2026
A rousing, suspenseful adventure tale.
A harrowing expedition to Antarctica, recounted by Departures senior features editor Sancton, who has reported from every continent on the planet.
On Aug. 16, 1897, the steam whaler Belgica set off from Belgium with young Adrien de Gerlache as commandant. Thus begins Sancton’s riveting history of exploration, ingenuity, and survival. The commandant’s inexperienced, often unruly crew, half non-Belgian, included scientists, a rookie engineer, and first mate Roald Amundsen, who would later become a celebrated polar explorer. After loading a half ton of explosive tonite, the ship set sail with 23 crew members and two cats. In Rio de Janeiro, they were joined by Dr. Frederick Cook, a young, shameless huckster who had accompanied Robert Peary as a surgeon and ethnologist on an expedition to northern Greenland. In Punta Arenas, four seamen were removed for insubordination, and rats snuck onboard. In Tierra del Fuego, the ship ran aground for a while. Sancton evokes a calm anxiety as he chronicles the ship’s journey south. On Jan. 19, 1898, near the South Shetland Islands, the crew spotted the first icebergs. Rough waves swept someone overboard. Days later, they saw Antarctica in the distance. Glory was “finally within reach.” The author describes the discovery and naming of new lands and the work of the scientists gathering specimens. The ship continued through a perilous, ice-littered sea, as the commandant was anxious to reach a record-setting latitude. On March 6, the Belgica became icebound. The crew did everything they could to prepare for a dark, below-freezing winter, but they were wracked with despair, suffering headaches, insomnia, dizziness, and later, madness—all vividly capture by Sancton. The sun returned on July 22, and by March 1899, they were able to escape the ice. With a cast of intriguing characters and drama galore, this history reads like fiction and will thrill fans of Endurance and In the Kingdom of Ice.
A rousing, suspenseful adventure tale.Pub Date: May 4, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-984824-33-2
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Jan. 29, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
A valuable contribution to our understanding of one of history’s most vital figures.
An epistolary memoir of Nelson Mandela’s prison years.
From August 1962 to February 1990, Mandela (1918-2013) was imprisoned by the apartheid state of South Africa. During his more than 27 years in prison, the bulk of which he served on the notorious Robben Island prison off the shores of Cape Town, he wrote thousands of letters to family and friends, lawyers and fellow African National Congress members, prison officials, and members of the government. Heavily censored for both content and length, letters from Robben Island and South Africa’s other political prisons did not always reach their intended targets; when they did, the censorship could make them virtually unintelligible. To assemble this vitally important collection, Venter (A Free Mind: Ahmed Kathrada's Notebook from Robben Island, 2006, etc.), a longtime Johannesburg-based editor and journalist, pored through these letters in various public and private archives across South Africa and beyond as well as Mandela’s own notebooks, in which he transcribed versions of these letters. The result is a necessary, intimate portrait of the great leader. The man who emerges is warm and intelligent and a savvy, persuasive, and strategic thinker. During his life, Mandela was a loving husband and father, a devotee of the ANC’s struggle, and capable of interacting with prominent statesmen and the ANC’s rank and file. He was not above flattery or hard-nosed steeliness toward his captors as suited his needs, and he was always yearning for freedom, not only—or even primarily—for himself, but rather for his people, a goal that is the constant theme of this collection and was the consuming vision of his entire time as a prisoner. Venter adds tremendous value with his annotations and introductions to the work as a whole and to the book’s various sections.
A valuable contribution to our understanding of one of history’s most vital figures.Pub Date: July 10, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-63149-117-7
Page Count: 640
Publisher: Liveright/Norton
Review Posted Online: April 3, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2018
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