Category: America

January 26, 2011

The Things they Carried by Tim O’Brien *** (of 4)

A series of related stories about the life of U.S. soldiers trying to get by during the grind of the Vietnam War. O’Brien wavers across...

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November 23, 2010

The Tenth Parallel by Eliza Griswold ** (of 4)

Griswold travels the around the globe hanging out approximately 10 degrees north of the equator. In Nigeria, Sudan, Somalia, Indonesia, Malaysia, and the Philippines it’s...

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November 13, 2010

Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen *** (of 4)

A depression era circus full of interpersonal and interspecies drama occurs as characters and the circus menagerie travel by train from city to city. The...

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September 8, 2010

A Fiery Peace in a Cold War by Neal Sheehan ** (of 4)

Bennie Schriever invents and promotes Inter Continental Ballistic Missiles to assure the mutual destruction of the Soviet Union (and the world) in the event that...

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July 27, 2010

Soldier’s Heart by Elizabeth Samet ** (of 4)

It’s a fascinating insight into West Point. Samet, a civilian professor of English literature wrestles with what to teach plebes. Looking at a sea of...

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July 26, 2010

97 Orchard by Jane Ziegelman ** (of 4)

It’s an interesting thesis. Jane Ziegelman, a food historian working at the Tenement Museum traces the food history of five immigrant families that settled on...

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July 20, 2010

The Imperfectionists ** (of 4)

An English language newspaper based in Rome is staffed by a bunch of losers: men with four ex-wives, women with no self-esteem, Asian over-achievers with...

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July 14, 2010

Gettysburg by Stephen W. Sears

According to the Times, Jay Winik, “Sears’s reconstruction is “The Civil War equivalent of a modern spy satellite photograph. He hovers above the action, giving...

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July 14, 2010

Skeleton Man by Tony Hillerman *** (of 4)

What’s not to like about Hillerman. The man can wrte, he can educate, describe southwestern landscape and indian personalities, and he can write suspense without...

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July 14, 2010