Thursday, June 10, 2010

A Nation Rising (Kenneth C. Davis)


There are about a million historical accounts that never make it into a school textbook. Textbooks usually do not have the space to give anything but the bare minimum for any given topic. A Nation Rising attempts to correct this injustice by delving deeply into these untold stories.

Aaron Burr...what do we think of when we hear his name? In most textbooks and in the minds of most Americans, he is reduced to one sentence. Aaron Burr was the one who killed Alexander Hamilton in a duel. Davis goes much further than this...offering up a 61 page account of Aaron Burr's trial, not for murder (dueling was common in those days), but for treason!! Davis includes six such chapters in this fascinating book about life in the early 1800s, from Burr's "trial-of-the-century" to severe conflicts over religion in Philadelphia.

This period of history is often overlooked as it is the bridge from the Revolutionary to the Civil War. Davis certainly gives it its due in A Nation Rising.

MY RATING - 4

This review can also be found at www.bookloons.com.