5 comments about Empty Without You: The Intimate Letters of Eleanor Roosevelt and Lorena Hickok.

1. Eleanor Roosevelt has been an inspiration ever since I was a young girl, a terrific role model for political activists, humanitarians, and women and girls of all ages. But she is often portrayed in biographies (excepting Blanche Wiesen Cook's wonderful recent work) as a cold fish in her personal life. This is one of the reasons that any fan of ER should read these letters. ER is passionate, caring, needy, annoyed - real emotions from a real woman. We also get a look at Lorena Hickok - Hick - beyond the stereotypes, as a woman deeply in love and troubled by the lack of an exclusive relationship.

   One problem I have with the book, though, is not letting whole letters speak for themselves, revealing more of the political discussions that seem to have been a big part of both women's lives and their attraction to one another. Were they lovers? They were certainly "in love," and regardless of where they drew the physical line, this book reveals foremothers any woman, lesbians included, should be proud to claim.




2. As an avid reader of all things Roosevelt, I was rather disappointed in Rodger Streitmatter's Empty Without You: The Intimate Letters of Eleanor Roosevelt and Lorena Hickok. The story of how Eleanor and Lorena (Hick) became such intimate friends (maybe even physically intimate) is a fascinating one. Hick was a hard-nosed AP reporter who had a successful 20 year career in a profession dominated almost exclusively by men. In the course of covering FDR's first campaign, she found a kindred spirit in Eleanor. Both women were needy: they both had tough childhoods, suffered humiliations and tragedies, and were deeply wounded by those they loved. They struck up a lifelong friendship, although the intensity of this relationship waned after the first 3 years. During the course of this friendship, they wrote each other almost every day, and sometimes more than one letter in a day. Hick also lived at the White House for some of this time.

   What I found so disappointing about Empty Without You is that out of the many thousands of letters that Eleanor and Hick exchanged throughout their lifetime, Hick destroyed a good many of them-especially those letters from the beginning of their relationship when it was the most intense. There are not many surprises here, and those few that allow a peak at their level of intimacy have been extensively quoted in other Roosevelt books. Also, I found that the story itself is rather depressing. Hick gave Eleanor the knowledge and power to recast the job of First Lady so that Eleanor could better achieve her own political agenda. She encouraged Eleanor to give weekly news conferences with only women reporters invited. She also prodded Eleanor to start writing newspaper columns-monthly at first, and then her daily My Day column that ran for 27 years. Finally, Hick suggested that Eleanor write her autobiography before FDR's first term was even finished. At first, Eleanor depended on Hick to help her with her writing. But Eleanor was a quick study and soon no longer needed Hick. Unfortunately, in broadening her horizons, Eleanor had less and less time for Hick. To make matters worse, Hick was forced to give up her newspaper job because of conflicts of interest, and took on a job traveling the country on behalf of FERA to report on the progress of relief programs. Hick missed the career that had brought her great success, name recognition, positive reinforcement and financial security. Hick also suffered from depression and mood swings-especially when her time with Eleanor did not go as planned. Unfortunately for Hick, her ugly and frequent outbursts were an embarrassment to Eleanor and had just the opposite effect: instead of bringing them even closer, Eleanor started to pull away. Still, Eleanor never completely abandoned Hick and did much to take care of her (especially financially) as they aged.

   One thing that I did enjoy about Empty Without You are the reports that Hick wrote for FERA. Although she mostly gave snippets of these in her letters to Eleanor, boss Harry Hopkins was correct when he predicted that Hick's well-written reports would in the future become a window on the Great Depression. But overall, there is not much new or enlightening in this book. If you want to know more about the relationship between Eleanor and Lorena, I'd stick with Doris Faber's Life of Lorena Hickok: E.R.'s Friend.




3. If you read the letters and not the "explanations" of Streitmatter, you know that this was a classic love affair of the first order. Passionate, intense, full of high levels of emotion, intermixed with politics and social issues of the day. For anyone to read these letters and deny that these women enjoyed each others bodies as much as their minds is really outside the realm of human experience. The question of course that remains is the unequivocal statement by both John Kerrey and John Edwards in the debates in 2004 when they proclaimed that you are "born" a lesbian as they tried to make political points with the sexual orientation of Dick Cheney's daughter. Did Eleanor have a lesbian relationship with "Hick?" Most certainly. Was she born that way and have a "traditional" marriage with many kids fathered by FDR just as a cover? I doubt it, but who knows; which was Bush's much more honest answer in response to the "lesbian" question.
   Was FDR a liar of the first order? He ran in 1940 for the unprecedented third term on the basis of never "sending American men to fight foreign wars" while planning to do so at the same time. Someone so deceitful was most certainly well practiced in the art while having affairs with women at the same time Eleanor was bearing his children. Did she turn to other women for the love that FDR failed to give her, or did he turn to other women because she was really "born" a lesbian. We will probably never know the truth of their relationship, but the letters between Eleanor and "Hick" are pure honest love. The only reason I don't give this book five stars is that the author gets in the way of the story.



4. This well-edited book definitely preserves the intimacy of the relationship between ER and Hick. Regardless of your personal interpretation of their relationship, the book makes for fascinating reading. There are many "behind the scenes" details of the workings of the New Deal and other social and political events of the time. This book is nothing less than fascinating.



5. A woman I knew so little about comes to life in this book. I generally don't like biographies or autobiographies but this one is the exception!! Order from Amazon to get it quick!!

5 comments about Hemingway: The Paris Years.

1. I've been trying to read two other books, on top of The Paris Years, but put them both down yesterday so that I could finish this one. The biggest thing that stands out about it is the excellence of Michael Reynolds' prose. He has the rare skills which enable readers to successfully jettison themselves back in time.
   
   This is the perfect companion to A Moveable Feast and elucidates the historical nature of the characters present in The Sun Also Rises as well. Reynolds, although sometimes pretending to do otherwise, is a psychologizing narrator. The good news is that most of his observations have the ring of truth. The biographer seems to understand his subject which is of great benefit to the rest of us. Hemingway's first marriage is discussed extensively and the coming of Pauline Pfeiffer is also elucidated at the very end. Hemingway had Ford and Pound as his philandering role models, and, eventually, he proves to be a most capable student.
   
   What I liked best about the book was the way in which Reynolds lets us know what Hemingway's writing process was; the daily habits he undertook which allowed him to excel at his craft. He struggled mightily to master the short story and, throughout this work, his emergence as a novelist is far from certain. The scenes in Pamplona are vivid as is the depiction of the cafe life in Paris. You may well want to go back and tour it as badly as I do by the time you're done. Ah, the past. Anyway, it is unfortunate that more on F. Scott Fitzgerald was not included, but you'll understand Ford Maddox Ford almost as well as Hemingway once the last page is turned. Overall, it was simply outstanding, I may well read the other editions of the biography now based on what I discovered here.



2. Ah, this is one of those books that a reader savors. This is one of the most enjoyable books for the student of Hemingway or for those writing prose fiction in general. Many, many of Hemingway's techniques are explained here. Also, for those of us who have been putting up a good fight--writing short stories and novels all these years--it helps seeing what a beating Hemingway took when he started. This is a fabulous book and the only thing that mitigated its conclusion was the knowledge that Michael Reynolds wrote another three more books in this series. They too are great but this is the best one.



3. This is an engrossing book that makes you feel like you are actually walking alongside Hemingway during his early years in Paris. I could feel the cold that he felt on his cheek, I could see the smile that Hadley gave him every time he walked into their dark little apartment after a hard day of writing in the cafes. This is due to Michael Reynolds superb, painstaking research, the photographs, and the copies of original manuscript that he included in this biography. I cannot stress enough how unlike an usual biography this is...Hemingway literally leaps out at you from the first sentence and pulls you into his world, lets you experience his poverty and first marriage in Paris, the birth of his son, the arrival of his first mistress, and the amazing literary scene in Paris that has now apparently died for good. Hemingway has amazing quotes on writing, life, living through your failures, and it was a pleasure to get to read the library list of every book he checked out during this time period. This is an amazing book, and the best biography I have EVER read in my life.



4. Here's the thing with most biographies...they're biographies. I'm a lover of fiction, the crafted tale, the sculpted language. There is a certain freedom of the word that seems to only exist in the "made up" story. A freedom almost never captured in the strict confines of an accurate and truthful biography. Enter Michael Reynolds. He tells the tale of Hemingway's Paris years with so much fluidity and grace you'd swear he fabricated this Hemingway guy out of his own gorgeous imagination. This reads like a novel and a damn good one. It's peppered with minute historical facts ie: the value of the dollar, the franc, the German mark, the pound, at any given time. Political unrest, social change, fashion, food, and most importantly...the state of literature at that point in time. All of this swirls around the incredibly multi dimensional main character. You'll read it three times.



5. Isn't it strange that having lived up with Hem's books and later with all the student's stuff on him - every book and most writers take you back to those early day's good feeling which you had after having read his shortstory stuff?? And having read almost everything which is written about Hem until today, this is still one of my absolute favourites. I like his style and I appreciate the accuracy and all the work that is behind every project he publish on Hem. I recommend this book.

5 comments about John Adams: The American Presidents Series.

1. To start with and to avoid disappointment for those looking for something other than what this is, some of the trade reviews are just plain wrong: this is not a biography focusing on Adams childhood and youth. In fact, it isn't really a biography at all. What it is is a short, to the point but nevertheless fairly deep analysis of Adams' political thought with a particular emphasis on the politics of his presidential administration. It is written from a very positive view point (one shared by David McCullough) and from a view point that is quite hostile to Thomas Jefferson. As such it is an invaluable read for anyone interested in the development of presidential politics in America as well as anyone seeking the "rest of the story" regarding Adams, Jefferson, and their relationship.



2. It hasn't been hard to notice that John Adams's reputation has been undergoing a serious rehabilitation in recent years. Joseph Ellis in particular has been dedicated to revising our understandings of both Adams and his nemesis/friend Thomas Jefferson. In his PASSIONATE SAGE: THE CHARACTER AND LEGACY OF JOHN ADAMS, FOUNDING BROTHERS: THE REVOLUTIONARY GENERATION, and AMERICAN SPHINX: THE CHARACTER OF THOMAS JEFFERSON, Ellis has been challenging a long established scenario in which the arch conservative John Adams was pitted against the populist liberal Thomas Jefferson for the political destiny of America, and the hero Jefferson triumphed over the mildly villainous Adams. Ellis has been questioning whether any part of this scenario makes any sense, whether Adams is at all a villain, and whether Jefferson is nearly as heroic. He has done this not by asserting the virtues of conservativism, but whether Adams has been correctly understood at all, both by his contemporaries and by subsequent generations. This reevaluation of Adams was continued by the spectacular and unanticipated mega-bestseller by David McCullough of 2001. This process of reassessment is clearly carried forward by John Patrick Diggins. For the record, I find the rehabilitation of Adams by these and other writers to be both welcome and highly convincing.
   
   For two hundred years, our view of Adams came very much through the lenses of his critics and opponents. The truism that history is written from the standpoint of the victors is perhaps truer of Adams than any other major political figure in United States history. Adams was said to be a closet monarchist, a favorer of aristocracy. In the face of this criticism, Adams explicitly challenged Jefferson to point to a single passage in any of his writings that endorses monarchy or aristocracy. In fact, if one reads extensively in Adams works, as argued by Ellis, Diggins, and McCullough, one finds instead a powerful and subtle critique of the dangers of the development and influence of an economic elite, placing him at the opposite extreme of Alexander Hamilton, whose ideal of government came very close to the espousal of plutocracy. Adams did hope for the emergence of natural elites, but this was based on ability and character, not on wealth. Contained in the reassessment of Adams is implied a questioning of whether Adams is the arch conservative he is often portrayed as being. The case for Adams's conservativism is based largely on his belief in monarchism, his favoring aristocracy, his support for a bicameral Congress, his looking to the past for guidance, and his opposition to the French Revolution. As these authors have shown, Adams transparently did not favor monarchy or the growth of an aristocratic class and a bicameral legislature in the United States has not resulted in the Senate being a sort of House of Lords. Today many leftist historians have found grounds for critiquing the French Revolution, and a host of leftist political figures have found inspiration for their beliefs in the past (not least Karl Marx, who was a student of the Greeks and Romans). Furthermore, Adams was hardly a passionate capitalist, and was suspicious of a life devoted to the acquisition of wealth. In fact, if you compare Adams and Jefferson to that modern conservative icon Ronald Reagan, it is hard to find many issues that Adams would not differ sharply on from Reagan, while one can see a number of points of contact between Adams and Reagan. Diggins, in fact, finds numerous points of contact between Adams's political writings and many French radical writers of the late 20th century. I will say that as a leftist myself, I find much to love in Adams's thought. I share his fear of the negative effects that economic elites have on the democratic process, his belief in the need for a strong central government to protect citizens from the pernicious influence of greed (Adams would understand my fear of deregulation), and his instincts that government rather than less or no government is a better safeguard of individual liberty. Diggins rightly states that the American president who would most closely incarnate Adams's principles would be Teddy Roosevelt, who envisioned government as the means of breaking trusts and promoting economic justice.
   
   Of all the books in the Schlesinger series on the American presidents, this is probably the one that I found most provocative intellectually. It is a dense, rich book, in large part because Diggins focuses more on the thought of Adams than his life. Diggins is more intent on explaining Adams ideas than the various events in his life. In one sense this is a weakness as a biography, but because his discussion of Adams's ideas is so clear and interesting, it more than makes up for the lack of biographical detail. I do regret some of the sketchiness of the biographical narrative. For instance, he doesn't' deal in any detail on how Adams became either vice president or president. This contrasts sharply with the rather deep discussion of Adams's ideas. This is in line with Diggins's role as apologist for Adams. On the purely historical side, most of Diggins's effort is put into dispelling the myth that the election of 1800 represented the defeat of Federalism by Republicanism (that's Jeffersonian Republicanism, not what we associate today with the GOP). I personally found this section less interesting that the sections dealing with Adams's thought.
   
   I would strongly encourage anyone reading this volume to consider picking up the new volume THE PORTABLE JOHN ADAMS, edited by Diggins. I completely agree with Diggins that Adams's writings are more interesting than his presidency, and that he may be the most unjustly neglected political writer in American history. This new volume contains a wide ranging collection of his writings, not merely from his theoretical writings, but his diaries and letters as well.



3. This isn't much of a biography. It gives just a quick history of Mr. Adams early life. It mainly focuses on his political and philosophical career and his feuds with Jefferson and Hamilton. It does a good job of reviewing his term as second president and the policies and precedents he initiated. This book may be a stepping stone to a more comprehensive analysis of Mr. Adams's personal and political life.



4. John Adams (1735 --1826) was rescued from relative obsurity by David McCullough's popular and accessible biography. Engaging as it is, McCullough's work has little on the thought and writings of John Adams and on the impact of his thinking on American government and on Adams's own presidency. John Patrick Diggins's short biography, written as part of the American Presidents series, helps remedy this lack. It provides a deeper picture of an American political philosopher and president. Diggins is a distinguished professor of American history at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York. He has written widely on American intellectual history, including books on Abraham Lincoln, Ronald Reagan, pragmatism, and the American left.
   
   Adams was born to a family of modest means in Massachusetts. Following graduation from Harvard, he became a lawyer and married Abigail Smith. Adams early became involved in the Revolutionary movement and served in the Continental Congress. During the Revolutionary War, Adams was abroad where he made vital contributions to the war effort in France and Holland. He helped draft the treaty by which the United States secured its independence. Adams served restlessly as Washington's vice-president and then became the second president in a close election against Thomas Jefferson, who became vice-president. After his narrow defeat by Jefferson for reelection in 1800, Adams retired to his home in Quincy.
   
   More important than these external events, Adams was a writer and a thinker who wrote works in support of American independence in the 1770s and books expounding his political philosophy and his understanding of American constitutionalism in the late 1780s and continuing early into his tenure as vice-president. Adams continued his writings in his long retirement, particularly in a wonderful series of letters he exchanged with his former rival, Jefferson.
   
   Diggins gives a good overview of a complex body of thought. Adams was opposed to the French Revolution and to writers such as Thomas Paine whose works helped to spearhead the American Revolution. Adams developed a philosophy based upon the unreliable and depraved nature of the human heart and its ambitions for power, wealth and success. He argued that a diverse government structured to allow for the wealthy classes and the common people, headed by a strong executive, would be the best way to restrain human greed and folly and to channel these traits for the common good. He objected to the French Revolution for its levelling tendencies -- for its attempt to obliterate distinctions, which Adams thought, were ingrained in the human desire to compete and excel, and which could not be artifically supressed. Adams also objected to the French Revolution because it was not properly succeeded with a solid institutional form of government. The American Revolution, which unlike the French revolution, was not based upon classes within the United States, and the American Constitution, with its separation of powers and strong executive were, for Adams, the antithesis of the French Revolution.
   
   During his presidency, Adams was excoriated by his fellow-Federalist Alexander Hamilton, who found Adams too weak and vacillating and by Thomas Jefferson, who attacked what he claimed were aristocratic and monarchical tendencies in Adams. Yet Adams worked carefully and delicately to avoid a war with France, the most significant accomplishment of his presidency. He established a tax system and pardoned a group of protesters who had been found guilty of treason by opposing it. Adams strengthened the military and left the budget with a surplus at the conclusion of his presidency. During his presidency, Congress enacted, and Adams enforced, the Alien and Sedition Acts, which Diggins somewhat downplays in his account.
   
   In 1800, under attack from both Hamilton and Jefferson, Adams came in a close third to Jefferson and Burr in the presidential race. Jefferson prevailed in the House of Representatives when Hamilton lent his influence and support. This hotly contested and little-known election marked a watershed in American politics as it marked a peaceful transition from Adams to a leader and a party with a far different stated political agenda. The American era of party politics, based upon images, perceptions, and the pursuit of power, had begun.
   
   Diggins is not afraid to state his own positions, and he shows a marked sympathy for John Adams over his rival, Jefferson. He sees Adams as a unique example of a president who tried to govern based upon principle rather than party or power. Together with Lincoln, Jefferson, Madison, and perhaps Theodore Roosevelt and Wilson, Diggins places Adams in a small group of American presidents who demonstrated intellectual leadership and accomplishment prior to and in the Executive Office.
   
   For Diggins, Adams's strengths as a thinker, together with his curmudgeonly disposition, led to the weaknesses of his presidency. He writes (p. 174) "At times the sin of pride cursed the Adams presidency. He often preferred to work alone, rarely sharing his thoughts or seeking the input of others as we was making up his mind. ... Adams was one of America's most solitary presidents, and the isolation of the mind, while healthy for poetry or phiosophy, is fatal in the sphere of politics.... politics dwells in the present, in bargains and distortions, naneuvers and manipulations, and other strategies of exigency that had no appeal to a thinker better at analyzing power than dealing with people."
   
   Diggins has written a thoughtful introduction to a thinker and president who remains incompletely understood. This short book should inspire reflection on Adams and on the nature of the political system which he helped bequeath to us.
   
   Robin Friedman



5. Excellent read. A new appreciation for John Adams' contribution to the founding. Once again, Jefferson comes out as the original "conniving politician."

5 comments about Winter Brothers: A Season at the Edge of America.

1. After enjoying listening to Ivan Doig's autobiographical books, I was anxious to hear more and chose the "Winter Brothers" book on tape. The common theme that ties the two stories in this book together are fairly solid, but for me the two stories together were frustrating and less easy to follow than his other books. Although a major problem was the fact that the reader didn't use much of a voice change to differentiate between Doig and Swan (maybe in this case reading the book would have been better), I at times found myself wishing that the Swan entries could be less interrupted. Also, while Doig is an artist with word descriptions, they were occasionally a bit distracting. On the positive side, the descriptions of the Northwest setting and the character of Swan and his relations with the Indians were fascinating and educational. And even though I wished for the Swan story to be less interrupted, it sounds like Swan was a very prolific diarist and it was nice that Doig did the gleaning of the most interesting parts for us and filled in the background context that so enriched them.



2. I've enjoyed this delightful book more than once. Doig writes a travel narrative as he retraces the life and journeys of a fellow named Swan who left detailed daily diaries of life on Washington's Olympic Peninsula during the 1850s. This book provides an insightful look at the Pacific Northwest and the early interaction between settlers and the native Northwest Coast Makah tribes at Neah Bay and Cape Alava. This book is a must-read, just like Doig's "The Sea Runners" and Annie Dillard's "The Living," if you are to understand the Pacific Northwest of the past or present. Doig (via Swan's experiences living on the reservation as an English teacher to Makah children) discusses Haida native art and mythology as well as whale-hunting and potlatches. Just an awesome and insightful read, especially for a cold winter evening by the fire. Makes me want to pull out my copy and read it again, and again, and again.



3. 
   Ivan Doig found gold when he came across the unpublished diaries of James Gilchrist Swan in the Manuscripts Section of the University of Washington library. Swan was a pioneer on the Olympic Peninsular, living mainly among the Indians at Neah Bay and Cape Flattery, the western-most edge of the contiguous United States. Doig spent one full winter season, 90 days, living on the Peninsular, during which he kept a daily journal of his own, almost all of it incorporating an examination of Swan's 1862-1898 diaries. It's a fascinating book.
   
   Doig, a prodigious writer himself, is ever in awe of the sheer massiveness of Swan's diary. Spread across dozens of pocket-sized (for the most part) diaries, comprising two-and-a-half million words, and spanning four decades, Swan's magnum opus recorded daily life, from the mundane ("swept out the schoolhouse again") to the (for him) magnificent (the Smithsonian finally gets around to publishing his manuscript on the Makah Indians). "The diaries dazzle and dazzle me" [Doig writes] "first simply by their total and variety." Again and again he reminds us of Swan's quantitative achievement, describing in loving detain the physicality of the diaries: their varying sizes, the neat handwriting, the care he took in recording weather information. He also quotes freely from them, in random clips, interesting encounters with people on the Peninsular: Indians come to him seeking advice, friends share drinks with him in a saloon, fishing and hunting trip companions shoot the breeze with him about the latest gossip. The diary seems a perfect marriage of the simple data of day-to-day life and Swan's loftier reflections on what they all might mean. Doig has obviously gained much from his 90 days spent with Swan and his extensive diary, and he makes us eager and willing companions in this exploration. It's my favorite of Doig's books. Highly recommended.



4. Generally, I love what Doig has written, but I had trouble getting into this book. I hung in and completed it; and by the end, I was sorry to finish it. I guess I'm saying I prefer his fiction.



5. Ivan Doig is a poet who writes lovely stories and autobiographical tales of old Montana. He is right up there with Wallace Stegner, but his prose and stories are more resonant.
   
   Washington Post said a few years ago that Ivan Doig is one of the 'finest writers' in America. I agree. Had the pleasure of spending a couple of days with Ivan and his wife, Carol, at a Stanford Old West seminar in 2000. What a terrific and humble guy.
   
   I recommend you read one of Doig's TRILOGY first. They are semi-biographical about his family settling from Scotland into the Two Medicine high country of Montana last century. "Dancing at the Rascal Fair" is #1, followed by "English Creek", my favorite. Fabulous writing, period.
   
   Assuming you read and like "Winter Brothers", you will love Doig's others novels and autbiographical books. He is a treasure to the art of writing.
   
   Peter B. Liebowitz

5 comments about Radical Son: A Generational Odyssey.

1. This biography of a 1960's new left radical traces his journey from idealism's promise to its ugly reality. Born in 1939 and raised by communist parents his early years were surrounded by an ideology that permeated every aspect of his life. His transformation from his leftist past to Conservatism came at great struggle over many years. Rarely is an individual given to such total introspection, that he is able to see the self delusion and denial of reality that had motivated his political life since the beginning.
   
   Horowitz' life grabs the reader with its intensity of feeling, drawing the reader into the emotions of disillusionment and guilt, fear, and failure. Through years of working with the Black Panthers, questioning the dichotomy between what was claimed and what was really happening, brought him to an awakening. He began to see that Socialism, what the new left was calling Progressive or Liberal, was not compatible with freedom. He realized that it can only be sustained by totalitarianism because it is contrary to human nature. This new understanding had been growing in him but it was a monstrous event that provided the final jarring reality that broke his attachment to an ideology that was nothing but a lies and empty idealism.
   
   Horowitz torturous journey will stir the reader to empathy, understanding, and appreciation for a man with great courage. He goes through the fire of self-recrimination, to a place where he had to let go of all his previous beliefs and admit that he and his entire social, political, and career community had been wrong. The reader will also admire his courage to stand up against the hate, the criticism, the threats, and the attempts to destroy him from his former colleagues. He is an extraordinary human being. I highly recommend this book.



2. A fascinating biography by a former radical Marxist who saw the light and became one of the most superb conservative commentators of our time. Horowitz started having second thoughts about Marxism when a female colleague was murdered by other Marxists in the San Francisco bay area. The book covers Horowitz transition in gripping detail. Few write about the left like Horowitz does because few know the left like he does. A 'do not miss' read...



3. It falls short of classic, but frankly this is one of the most mind-altering things I've ever read. It's the closest I've ever gotten into the mind of a conservative (I'm a proud center-liberal), and it makes utterly believable a thesis I would have formerly thought ridiculous: that the bases for modern liberal thought, that universal human unity is necessary in order to avoid environmental or nuclear extinction, are lies manufactured by homegrown agents of Soviet Communism who populate modern journalism and academia.
   
   Horowitz never explicitly makes this claim, and that is the supreme flaw of the book. He leads you convincingly enough through his disillusionment with 60's student radicalism, and presents a detailed case that its roots lie with children of communists, like Horowitz himself. His account of the Black Panthers and the experience that would become his turning point make riveting reading. But, as others have pointed out, the narrative breaks down toward the end of the book. I was with him up to the point where he is coming to an acceptance of the inevitable persistence and humanity of markets, hierarchies, inequalities, etc. But the path out of the center left to the far right pronouncements of the latter third of the book is frustratingly spotty. The incendiary David Horowitz of Front Page Mag. fame pops up infrequently delivering party line zingers almost out of nowhere.
   
   This is especially frustrating for me, as Horowitz' growing fascination with the right during the 80's and 90's parallels a time when my parents were moving away from Reagan toward the left as they felt the growing influence of the similarly radical (as Horowitz admits) Goldwater republican movement. The appeal that this movement would have for Horowitz is strangely missing from the book. Horowitz briefly but memorably recounts the rebirth and justification of his firebrand rhetorical style, but doesn't expound on the conviction behind his latest ravings. He mentions authoritarian puritanical goons within the conservative movement, and never really retracts those statements, but, if they are really goons, why does he not distance himself from them? It's almost like a Straussian secret writing. So either he's paid or threatened to write his current outrageous stuff, OR
   
   ... and here I assume the thesis above. Horowitz ignores most of the arguments of the contemporary left, because they inevitably originate in an international community of academics and journalists who want America to be a socialist state simply because they grew up sons and daughters and friends of communists. The thing is, he might just be correct... and from now on, my life is going to be dedicated to finding out. If he isn't correct, I hope he lives long enough to be jarred once more out of a beautiful political dream.



4. I wish I had read this years ago! As cultural history, Radical Son is as monumental as the Diary of Anne Frank - but Horowitz' autobiography is a literary masterpiece in its own right. Most importantly, Radical Son is one of the few honestly historical accounts of the campus movement that changed America from the inside out - and left Marxism as the official religion of our universities.
   
   If you wonder what our current presidential candidates mean when they call themselves "progressive" - then you really, REALLY need to read this book.



5. I had always been disappointed by the memoirs of political figures on the left because of their inability to reflect on themselves---to even attempt to understand why they had seen the world the way they had, and how their visions had affected who they were. I did not think this omission accidental. If radicalism was a displacement of personal grievance, it wasn't surprising that radicals could not confront their interior lives. "The Left, the author eventually realized, "lived by its radical myths, which were crucial to its sense of moral superiority, of being chosen as humanity's moral vanguard." "When I looked into myself, I saw how integral my radical views were to my sense of myself and the world around me." The above words, bereft of quotes, are not mine, incidentally, but the author's too, explaining why he wrote "Radical Son": "The collapse of this faith had been inseparable from the collapse of the life I had lived. I could not conceive of an autobiographical work that would not attempt to plumb this connection." Mr. Horowitz was the child of Communists, was inculcated into this faith, as it were. The real bounties his parents had achieved in America, the author states, hardly impressed them. "Success like theirs was so common that they took it for granted. What my family longed for," rather, he writes herein, "was an impossible fantasy: that mankind would be released from history, which included individual success and failure; their ambition was that poverty and inequality would disappear from the earth. To realize this fantasy they dedicated themselves to the Communist cause."
   
   Mr. Horowitz's parents were Jewish, and like Marx and Spinoza were "of Judaism but not in it" and whose outsider status had led to their revolutionary views."
   
   It's interesting moreover how many Marxist sympathizers were Jewish as well. It was believed by such folk that "Socialism would `solve' the Jewish question by eliminating Judaism, along with other ethnic and national identities." "What we had to ask ourselves,' Horowitz once explained at a public forum, "was whether Marx wasn't a self-hating Jew, and whether socialism was anything more than a wish to be included."
   
   "Fusion and unity---this was the cry of my father's Communist heart, writes the author herein, "His unquenchable longing to belong."
   
   For many years Mr. Horowitz was also a Communist, becoming eventually a prominent writer and figure of the 1960s Left, himself focusing as he did "on the issues of equality and freedom that once inspired [him] as a radical." Khrushchev's secret speech in 1956 shook many Communists, but Horowitz states that, at the time, "I was not sure what to make of it all. Monstrous crimes had been committed, and much else had gone terribly wrong. But did this mean it was necessary to abandon socialism? I was not ready for that," he writes herein. "The socialist vision provided the only way I knew of looking at the world that would distinguish right from wrong that gave hope for a better future. Socialism was the desire for justice. I did not see how I could give that up."
   
   So it wasn't surprising when he took another leap of faith when a "New Left" began forming out of the ashes of the old; participants like Horowitz, doing so, "out of the conviction that the original passion could be born again, and that we could create a new socialist vision free from the taint that Stalin had placed on the movement our parents had served."
   
   Interestingly, a lot of this generation, its leaders I'm speaking about specifically, were born in red diapers, that is, were born to members of the socialist vanguard that existed in the 1920s 1930s. Hence the commonplace phrase: "Like many radicals, he was a self-exiled son of the middle class."
   
   "He was a vociferous opponent of America's war in Vietnam and any American intervention anywhere. JFK was "an arch Cold warrior, a liberal agent of the imperial ruling class," in his view. He "harangued students about the dangers of radioactive fallout, and the dark forces in Washington that were leading us to `a universal grave.'" Horowitz was also an editor of "Ramparts," the magazine of the "New Left."
   
   But the Left didn't rise up because of the Vietnam issue. Rather, the author has a different take on this topic: "My speech illustrated the real importance of Vietnam to the radical cause, which was not ultimately about Vietnam but about our own antagonism to America, our desire for revolution. Vietnam served to justify the desire; we needed the war and its violent images to vindicate our destructive intentions."
   
   The arrival on the scene of an organization such as the Black Panthers reinforced this view. Mr. Horowitz knew these people and when asked by a Panther's member to suggest someone that could help a community center run by the Panthers manage their finances he recommended fellow leftist Betty Van Patter. Betty, some speculated later, asked too many questions about the Panthers' money and as a result disappeared. "When her body finally turned up and the future was no longer unknown, I,' admitted the author, "was forced to confront myself in a way I never had to before." "I had to understand my relation to this deed, this murder of innocence, committed by my political comrades." Because the Panthers "had been made the symbol of the revolution, they could not be condemned without negative consequences for everything we stood for and had said." "I had schooled myself in Hegel and Marx, and where had they led me? I had worshipped the gods of reason, and they had delivered me into the company of killers." "Until now, my political comrades had felt like a family I could trust. We had all been recruited from the same tribe of sentiment, raging with common indignation over the injustices we perceived, and sharing visions of a retribution that would make things right." "But a mother of three, who was also one of us, had been murdered by people we knew." "There were dozens, if not hundreds, of activists with direct links to the Party...who were aware of what happened to Betty. Yet no one came forward." "This silence was more than unusual for people who normally felt compelled to protest injustices---even those that took place at the far ends of the earth." But for Betty "there was only silence." "The incident had no usable political meaning, and was therefore best forgotten."
   
   "We thought of ourselves as self-effacing, but in fact we were arrogant. We regarded ourselves as better than others from our privileged caste who were unwilling to perform the deeds we did. That was why we didn't listen and couldn't see. Like all radicals, we were intoxicated by our own virtue."
   
   And what about the media, why didn't they investigate this murder, or other murders by the Black Panthers? Or expose the issue of who filled the jails of Cuba, or Russia? Well, because, as the author eventually realized there exists an odd operating principle within the Left: "The responsibility of progressive journalists was to suppress facts that hurt the progressive cause, and to print only those truths that served it."
   
   Thus Jimmy Carter's "decision, in 1979, to let the Sandinistas take power in Nicaragua without American intervention" was cheered by journalists and those on the Left in general, but not by Mr. Horowitz. When it came time to choose between Walter Mondale and Ronald Reagan in 1984 (another Orwellian moment, this time in Nicaragua) the author had had enough, and voted for the first time in his life for a Republican, this while a new generation was organizing "solidarity committees" to support the Sandinistas. It was one thing to support Castro when he promised everything under the sun for Cuba but, unlike other Leftists, Mr. Horowitz couldn't continue to support Castro after it was apparent to all but the blind that "Cuba had been transformed into a totalitarian state, its economy ruined by socialist plans, its jails filled with political dissenters." "Nor was the tragedy of Cuba unique. Every socialist state created by Marxists had been transformed into an economic sinkhole and a national prison. There were no exceptions."
   
   And the Sandinistas were Marxist protégés of Castro, after all "This time, "he posited, "I could not plead ignorance of what was going to happen if radicals had their way."
   
   Having watched history unfold he came to the view "that socialists had contrived to demonstrate by bloody example what everyone else already knew: Equality and freedom are inherently in conflict. This was really all that socialist efforts had shown, over the dead bodies of millions of people. In talent, intelligence, and physical attributes, individuals were by nature different and unequal; consequently, the attempt to make them equal could only be achieved by restricting---ultimately eliminating---their individual freedom." He reflected on his own children: "The four children we had spawned were all so different in character and disposition that they posed a challenge to my radical worldview. The belief that environment shaped human destinies, and that therefore human character could be molded in some fundamental way, was essential to all utopian schemes. You could not change the world if you could not change the people in it."
   "Socialism could not even achieve the general welfare that its adherents promised. Socialist efforts to create economic equality invariably led, in practice, to the imposition of poverty on society as a whole, because socialism destroyed the incentives to produce. There were entire socialist libraries devoted to the confiscation and division of existing wealth, but not a single article on how people were motivated to create wealth. Socialists did not know how to make a society work. That was the lesson of the Communist debacle, which the Left had refused to learn. "The revolutionary failures of the Twentieth Century had demonstrated the wisdom of the American founding, and validated its tenets: private property, individual rights, and a limited state."
   
   "The idea of original sin---that we are born flawed, that the capacity for evil is lodged within us (no matter how our consciousness may be raised)---would have instilled in me a necessary caution about individuals like Huey Newton, [of the Blank Panthers] and movements like ours."
   
   "If evil was a choice that any individual could make, then human beings would always pose a danger to each other, and there could be no `withering away of the state'. There would always be a need for law above individuals, for police to enforce the law, and for prisons to contain those who broke it." After all, "how could we dispense with `bourgeois' law, the best system of rules and institutions yet devised to protect individuals from the predations of their government and each other?"
   
   Horowitz, because of this book and his outspokenness, has been demonized for having had second thoughts and has been subjected to savage personal attacks by his former comrades. The "problem" is that the world "is (and must remain) forever imperfect. The refusal to come to terms with this reality is the heart of the radical impulse and accounts for its destructiveness, and thus for much of the bloody history of our age."
   
   Mr. Horowitz includes several pages of personal photographs in "Radical Son." The last page of these, interestingly, shows Mr. Horowitz with his mom, a picture of his dad alone (indicative of his lack of personal closeness with his father perhaps), and a photo of the author receiving an award from Ronald Reagan in 1991. In a way, the pictures seem to suggest the author's life; an estrangement and lack of closeness with his Marxist father, a father who never gave him his approval; a Marxist mother who eventually put family before politics; and finally, the individual, happy to accept a teaching award from a retired American president, that the author himself ultimately became.
   
   Thereafter he "become involved...with the idea of doing something of immediate benefit for people in the community." "I was tired," said he, "of pouring energy into grand abstractions like `the revolution,' and longed to see my efforts lead to practical results."

4 comments about The Long Pursuit: Abraham Lincoln's Thirty-Year Struggle with Stephen Douglas for the Heart and Soul of America.

1. Abraham Lincoln is probably the most famous past president in our history, with the possible exception of George Washington. Lincoln was a great man, but most people don't remember that for much of his life, he was largely a political failure, if a principled one. The chief reason for this was a political rival, a Democrat named Stephen A. Douglas. Douglas was a powerhouse in the Senate for a quarter century, forging compromises and legislation, arguing the cause of compromise with the South so that discord didn't destroy his party and country. Douglas and Lincoln met in debate repeatedly, and were rivals in Illinois politics for a considerable time.
   
   While they were rivals, they were also at least cordial, if not outright friends. Finally, in 1857, Lincoln was nominated for the Senate seat Douglas held, and the two met in a series of debates. Douglas won the election, but had to say things in the debates that alienated the South, while Lincoln managed to engage, even energize the Republican sentiment in much of the country with his side in the debates. Within two years, Douglas was a weak candidate for president, fatally wounded by a rival Democrat nominated by the Southern Democratic party, and so Lincoln triumphed in the presidential election in 1860.
   
   The story of all of this is very well-recounted in this book by Roy Morris Jr. Morris is careful to give Douglas his due. Frankly, Stephen A. Douglas should be a better-known figure in American politics. When Lincoln won the presidency in 1860, Douglas, in spite of the animosity that had permeated the election, immediately endorsed Lincoln, and castigated the South for their threats to secede. This sort of politics is today very unusual, and you wonder whether anyone today thinks they could learn from the past.
   
   I really enjoyed this book and would recommend it to anyone interested in Lincoln or the 19th Century.



2. It is a common observation that we are shaped, morally and intellectually, by the people we choose as friends. As demonstrated by this book, we may be shaped even more dramatically by our enemies and competitors.
   
   Abraham Lincoln was such an amazing president that we often forget how difficult was his climb from obscurity. As Roy Morris makes clear, Stephen Douglas was essential to Lincoln's training. The competition between these two men brought out the best in Lincoln, and forced him to refine his political skills and ideas. In particular, it forced Lincoln to define a moral yet measured approach to limiting the scope of slavery in the territories, with the hope of sending the institution to its ultimate extinction.
   
   My main surprise was Morris' limited treatment of the Lincoln-Douglas debates. However, he makes up for that deficiency with many insights into related issues, such as Douglas' struggles within the Democratic Party at the time of the 1860 presidential election.
   
   Morris weaves into his narrative many interesting opinions and suppositions about Lincoln's subjective reactions to the events swirling around him. However, at times Morris seems to get carried away, and projects onto Lincoln opinions that are inconsistent with the historical record. For example, he makes a passing reference to the "notably irreligious Lincoln," which is hard to reconcile with Lincoln's profound religious beliefs, reflected in his many speeches and letters, and culminating in his powerful Second Inaugural address. (See e.g. White, Lincoln's Greatest Speech)



3. Coming, as I do, from the Land of Lincoln, new books on our 16th president are always of interest. Rarely do they seem to take a new tack on an old story. Though some are better written than others, many seem to cover the same ground. Morris, however, does something interesting in his book, The Long Pursuit. He gives us a look at Lincoln through the long-standing relationship/rivalry between Lincoln and the other important Illinois politician of the time, Stephen Douglas.
   
   In fact, if the truth be told, Douglas was the more important of the two figures right up to the point that Lincoln won the presidency in 1860. Throughout the 1850's, Douglas was the powerhouse Democratic senator from Illinois and perennial candidate for president while Lincoln remained, if not an unknown, certainly a small-time, provincial politician. It was, of course, his series of debates with Douglas and the resulting fallout during the senate election of 1858 that finally took Lincoln to national prominence and gave him his shot at the presidency two years later.
   
   In some ways, it is too bad that Douglas has been all but forgotten except as Lincoln's foil in those all important debates. (Can you tell I'm from one of the cities in which those debates took place?) Considering his impact during those antebellum years, Douglas deserves better. And, to his credit, Morris does him justice here. We are offered plenty of fair insight into Douglas's character here and how he tried to navigate his way through difficult times while being a powerful leader. In many ways, I feel I know Stephen Douglas much better from reading this book.
   
   Still, this is Lincoln's story. And it is Lincoln's story under a spotlight focused on a very particular period of time. We get very little of Lincoln's youth, now well-passed into legend. The story really picks up with Lincoln's arrival at New Salem, Illinois, as a young man, soon to enter political life. It follows Lincoln through his ups and downs in Illinois, his encounters with Douglas (including details on those all important debates), his positioning as the Republican candidate for president, his improbable yet inevitable election, and finishing up with his swearing in as president. Nothing is mentioned of his years in the White House. Which is just what this book needs as it tells a different story. Within months of Lincoln's swearing in, Douglas was dead.
   
   In the end, this is an excellent book. In a well-ploughed field of history, it is unique. Not only that, it is well-written and informative about a period of Lincoln's life that is less well-known and brings back to life Stephen Douglas--a man who, but for some twists of fate, could be as well-remembered as Lincoln (if not as well-respected, perhaps). For anyone interested in Lincoln's life, this is a book that should be read.



4. Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglas were the two preeminent Illinois politicians of the pre-Civil War era, and their debates are an important part of American political history. On the eve of the 150th anniversary of these debates comes the release of "The Long Pursuit," which chronicles the complicated political relationship of these men far beyond these famous debates. I'm a neophyte to Lincoln history, so I approached this book with some trepidation. Fortunately, the book is well-written and straight-forward enough that I was able to follow along without knowing a great deal of Lincoln history.
   
   The average person knows Douglas mostly through his debates with Lincoln, and Roy Morris Jr. notes with irony that most people think that Douglas lost the political race in which the debates occurred. Instead, Douglas won the Illinois Senate race against Lincoln; he was considered a star in politics, whereas Lincoln remained essentially a relatively obscure country lawyer. When Douglas became an obvious Democratic nominee for the Presidency, these debates actually ended up helping Lincoln, as his supporters in the Republican Party could argue that Lincoln knew Douglas and his debating style so well that he could match up well with Dougles, despite the earlier loss. Fortunately for Lincoln, his stance against the spread of slavery into new territories gained greater acceptance in the North than did Douglas' appeasement approach, and he managed to spring to the Presidency over the better known Douglas (helped by the entry into the race of several third party candidates).
   
   Indeed, throughout his early career, Lincoln seemed to be inexorably tethered to Douglas, although history obviously has dimmed the reputation of Douglas, who was known as the Little Giant in his day. "The Long Pursuit" is interesting reading, and the material is certainly timely given the anniversary of their famous debates. Roy Morris Jr. does a good job placing their relationship in historical context and including enough interesting stories to keep this Lincoln newbie interested. I was a bit disappointed that the Lincoln-Douglas debates were not covered in greater detail; however, that simply may have been beyond the scope of this book, and that material does seem to be covered in many other texts. What this book did do is whet my appetite for more information and to seek out other books on the topic.

2 comments about Commander in Chief: Abraham Lincoln and the Civil War.

1. For the first time, I came to know Lincoln not as an iconified hero, but as a funny, direct, engaging and committed human being as I read this book. The author has thorough notes of very detailed research and tells a story that others omitted or overlooked. It made me want to read much more about Lincoln, especially more of the piercing wit and emotional perseverance shared in this book.



2. A Marrin is a wonderful author. He makes history come alive. He writes in an interesting manner and doesn't have a lot of excess verbage. I have several of his books and have enjoyed each one of them.

1 comments about After the Revolution: Profiles of Early American Culture.

1. This book was published in 1979, so Mr. Ellis doesn't have the same writing style as he does in "His Excellency" and "American Sphinx." If you can get past the tortuous Preface (or better yet, skip it) and the two boring and uninteresting introductory chapters, the four individual chapters highlighting Charles Willson Peale, Hugh Henry Brackenridge, Wiliam Dunlap and Noah Webster are very interesting. In reading these four mini-biographies, I have plans to read "Modern Chivalry" by Brackenridge and the works of Charles Brockden Brown, a close friend of Dunlap's.

5 comments about Grand Central Winter.

1. This was the worst book I ever read.I thought the story was going to be about the homeless in Grand Central.Yet all the
   main character Lee talks about is his work with a newspaper
   written by the homeless.The book drags on and on going nowhere.
   The characters Lee mentions in the book are as dull as the book
   itself.I was trully disappionted.The only thing this book is good
   for is putting you to sleep.



2. I stuck the book out for about 2/3 of it always hoping for some point to be made from the various unconnected stories he tells, but most have no point or real end...such as the story of the blonde hooker who becomes central to his life for many months or the even less understandable the defrocked Greek priest who wants to be in the newspaper.Very little of this book is about how it is to be homeless or to sleep under subway tunnels etc. It's mostly about his hustling newspapers and cans and taking drugs,but even that is surface level & not very detailed.



3. This book is an autobiographical account of a time in the author's life, Lee Stringer. Mr.Stringer begins the book describing his life as a homeless, crack addict who finds a pencil he intends to use to clean his crack pipe with. Then he realizes that a pen can be a very powerful tool and he starts to write. He writes about the streets where the homeless are seen but so often overlooked and his eventual position as a writer for a newspaper.Stringer has realized in this book that "the pen is indeed mightier than the sword" as he goes about seeking Recovery and Redemption. This book is a very well written account of a man's struggle to free himself from a serious addiction.The reader will cheer for Mr. Stringer as he tries to regain his Life and his Dignity.



4. I encountered this book on a sale rack and didn't expect much from it. After all why would be so discounted?
   
   I was wrong. This was a chilling and real depiction of life on the streets as a crack addict. What it may lack in direction, it makes up for with hard-hitting writing.
   
   If you are looking for a nice breezy read, this is not the book for you. If you want some food for thought, then don't miss it.



5. Several reviewers criticize Stringer's Grand Central Winter for what they see as its lack of information about life on the streets as well as an absence of narrative cohesion. While I sympathize with both of these complaints, I also think they're misguided.
   
   In the first place, Stringer doesn't claim to be writing social commentary or advocating social reforms. His book is a memoir, pure and simple. His stories are from the street, as the book's subtitle announces, but not necessarily about the street. Obviously in describing his life on the streets, Stringer necessarily sheds some light on what street life in general is like. Just as obviously, he also has a few things to say in passing about public policy (he's especially bitter about the "antiseptic Good Samaritanism" of large-scale relief agencies). But the focus of his book is sharing his own experiences living on the street.
   
   And this takes us to the second point: Stringer's writes about selected experiences. He's not really trying to tell a neatly packaged story with a clear beginning, middle, and end. (Philosophers might describe his approach as "phenomenological.") I don't know why Stringer chose to write about the episodes in his life he did. Some of them are probably consciously chosen; others may've forced themselves onto the empty page. But the point is that they're vignettes, not sequential episodes that together tell a full-fledged story.
   
   For my money, the vignettes are wonderfully written. Their minimalist style sets an almost photographic tone: to the point, revelatory, unsentimental, sometimes grim. Stringer successfully resists the temptation to demonize or romanticize.

5 comments about Inventing Wyatt Earp: His Life and Many Legends.

1. Interesting facts and rumors has made this book very intriguing. Allen Barra analyzes theories and accounts from recorded statments and newspaper articles. Separating biased from unbiased statments, this book is a must read for wild west history fans.



2. I enjoyed this book on Wyatt Earp even though I have read several others primarily because I like the author's writing style and presentation. He assumes that you at least have a familiarity on Wyatt and he interjects his take on various controversies and adds a perspective based on facts and sometimes, although less concrete, on a point of view that seems to complement what rationally occurred. In these cases, it virtually feels like he has stopped to talk to you about the controversy as opposed to writing a dissertation. An example is his periodic references to other authors such as when he refers to Paula Mitchell Marks (Live and Die in the West: The Story of the OK Corral) who wrote a book with a fascinating sociological point of view. Barra challenges her when he references her comment that the judge presiding over the charges against the Earps and Holliday after the OK Corral fight was biased in favor of the Earps, Barras points out that judges are always biased in favor of those that enforce the law unless they are proven to be grossly negligent thus her point of view, in his opinion, is not relevant. Thus the book is not just a retelling of the facts and that is what makes it most interesting. The book covers the early days, Tombstone, Earp's post Tombstone career where he continuously seems to be a speculator looking for the big investment while times change around him particularly in regards to gambling, betting and saloons and the author has a very relevant look at Earp and the movies with an excellent review of all the Earp films, their misrepresentations and some detail on why many distort the real story, such as John Ford's desire to sell a movie and not necessarily a straight history. One nugget that I enjoyed was reading about Wyatt's offer of peace with Ike Clanton after the severe wounding of his brother Virgil that was reportedly turned down by Clanton. This, which I have not read before, would reinforce that Earp was not a rash man but one who acted with straight forwardness and deliberation. Only after the murder of his brother who was shot in the back and after Clanton and Frank Stillwell appear near the train station in Tucson as the wounded Virgil prepares to departs does Wyatt start his vendetta ride. Some previous reviewers note that the book has several errors, and there certainly may be a few, but I wish each would name some of them to justify their complaints. In doing so, that would provide constructive criticism and allow for reference checks and perhaps more debate. The story of Tombstone, like the Earps, will never die and Tombstone is still a fascinating place to visit, virtually a living history, with lots to see, like the original Birdcage Saloon. It may be out of the way but anyone fascinated with the west and the story of the OK Corral (or the alley next to Fly's studio to be more accurate) will find the trip and town a rewarding experience.



3. I got this as a Christmas gift for my Grandfather and he seemed to like it.



4. When I start a project, I generally finish it. That includes reading a book. But I can't tell you how many times I nearly shelved this book in disgust all because of the MANY typos, omitted words, unclosed quotes and unclosed parentheses, etc., as other reviewers have previously noted. Mr. Barra thanks his proofreader in the acknowledgments but I don't know why. If she is the one responsible for all these many mistakes - I lost count but there must be scores - Mr. Barra's gratitude is misplaced. That the book is informative is without question. It is, accordingly, unfortunate to the extreme that mere editorial sloppiness made reading it almost painful. I'm not usually uncharitable in my remarks about the well-researched work of others but this book is undeniably the poorest example of editing that I have ever encountered for published material. It's sad that simple things like spelling and grammar and syntax overshadow scholarship.



5. The review appearing here by Ardell Young, which I expected to be well-researched in view of other reviews under that name, was misleading. It cites Glenn Boyer in the same rabid anti-Earp category as Frank Waters. The fact is that, Boyer, a lifelong friend of the Earp family, did more than anyone to turn around the debunking of Earp by such writers as Waters. His books are all pro-Earp, and his research added another 95% to public knowledge of the Earps compared to what was known (and assumed to be all that would ever be known about them) when his first book Suppressed Murder of Wyatt Earp appeared in 1967. It is available on Amazon still in an updated edition. Young's review, in the light of the facts is libelous. As premier Earp-authority and author Lee Silva commented, "We wouldn't know much about Wyatt Earp if it wasn't for Glenn Boyer's research and writing." Anyone who reads Boyer's published works will be as confused as I over Young's review. Did this individual ever read Boyer? A good place to start in highlighting Young's misconceptions is the Epilogue to I Married Wyatt Earp.(Also available on Amazon.)
   
   As for Barra's book, it's a fun read, especially if you know a lot about the Earps, which Barra didn't when he started out. He can write circles around the highly-touted insta-authority, Casey Tefertiller.