Category: History

June 16, 2010

The Billionaire’s Vinegar by Benjamin Wallace *** (of 4)

I had no idea there were still bottles of wine worth drinking from the 18th and 19th centuries or that collectors frequently amassed cellars with...

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April 30, 2010

The True History of the Kelly Gang by Peter Carey * (of 4)

An Irish western outlaw in 1870s Australia. I think the book won some famous prize. I found it unreadable, predictable drek. Recommended by Terri Laufer

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April 30, 2010

The Songs of the Kings by Barry Unsworth * (of 4)

Winner of the Booker Prize totally boring Midrash of the Iliad. I couldn’t finish it.

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April 29, 2010

QBVII by Leon Uris *** (of 4)

About a trial of a libelous author who writes about Nazis, autobiographical. Uris is a class-act story teller making big books go by in quickly.

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April 29, 2010

Old Men at Midnight, by Chaim Potok *** (of 4)

Enigmatic. I went back and forth between thinking the three short stories were too simple, too typical, not completely unique recountings of Jewish suffering in...

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April 29, 2010

Nuremberg: The Reckoning, by William F. Buckley * (of 4)

It was surprisingly bad. I learned a fair amount about the Nuremberg trials after WWII, but was shocked by how trivial the plot was and...

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April 29, 2010

Mila 18 by Leon Uris **** (of 4)

One of my absolute favorite books about the Warsaw ghetto uprising. A real page turner with wonderful characterizations.

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April 29, 2010

Mercy by Toni Morrison **** (of 4)

A novella told mostly in the first person perspectives of an enslaved African woman, her daughter, a trader from the north, his wife, a Native...

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April 29, 2010

Martin Dressler: The tale of an American Dreamer, by Steven Millhauser *** (of 4)

The title character, Martin Dressler, is the son of German immigrants in New York City who’s dreams and successes coincide with the burgeoning of the...

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April 29, 2010

Inheritance by Natalie Danford ** (of 4)

A too carefully crafted book of remembering and forgetting. A 30-something daughter of an Italian immigrant father with Alzheimer’s returns to Urbina, Italy to discover...

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