David McCullough’s 1776 is a masterpiece of writing and historical study. 1776 continues McCullough’s string of excellent books. The book generally covers the time period from when King George III addressed Parliament on the rebellion (October 1775) to the Continental Army’s victories at Princeton, New Jersey (January 1777). McCullough does not provide a blow-by-blow account [...]
Franklin Foer is set to take over as top editor of The New Republic magazine according to this New York Times article: For a small outfit, The New Republic has always gone long on drama. Its changes in leadership have usually arrived in the form of rolling coups or lightning bolts from above. So it [...]
Last week we were talking about futuristic novels that posit “what if” type scenarios and then allow the reader to watch them play out. I noted that this is tricky business. If you push things too far you may lose the reader, but if you don’t push things the resulting plot won’t raise interesting questions [...]