Book reviews

Book reviews with a Boston bent. Be it a book that takes place in Boston, or was written by a writer from Boston. Or one on the history of Boston. From comic book to graphic novels to the strange and weird. If it is about Boston you will find it here

Tuesday, January 14, 2014

Sorry I have been gone so long

I kept reading, I just stopped writing!

I am currently reading A Great and Noble Scheme The story of the Expulsion of the French Acadians from their home land. Very well written book, each chapter covers a short sad history of a group of French settlers and their Native American allies. Reminding the reader how hard it was to be a Catholic in the early days of the colonization of what is now Canada and The United States. It is a hard read, but then it has to be. What happened was a terrible thing, some thing that very few people know about. This book is a little bit about my history too, as we trace our family roots to the expulsion. So if you have roots in the area, if any of your ancestors were involved, this is a must read! Not book tells this sad story in 480 pages, and is very well footnoted for anyone interested in getting deeper into the history. I finished reading a nice little book The Pledge At 188 pages this is a short book for me. It starts as a wonderful well researched history about Francis Bellamy the Bostonian former clergyman who in 1892 wrote the original much shorter Pledge of Allegiance. The remainder of the book looks at the changes that have been made in the Pledge; including an entire chapter dedicated to the 1954 decision to add "under god" during the Cold War. An interesting look at how the pledge came to be, and how it has changed over the years. I wonder what Mr. Bellamy would think of his pledge today? On my to read shelf, The Name of War" About King Phillips war in 1675 and what it meant for New England. Followed by Death of an Empire The rise and fall of Salem Massachusetts, which was once the richest city in America. I am always looking for suggestions of new books to read, feel free to leave suggestions in the comments section.