D. Allen

Mixed Bag

Revisado: 07-01-24

As someone who was alive for all but the first couple of years of the "space race" and who followed it fanatically until the end of the Apollo program, there was nothing new here to me. However, someone considerably younger would probably find this an informative but incomplete history.

I gave the performance two stars because Kate Mulgrew consistently pronounces NASA as "Nassau." Someone please inform Kate that Nassau is a city in The Bahamas and that the acronym for National Aeronautics and Space Administration is pronounced /ˈnæs.ə/ ?

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Stop Being Fooled

Revisado: 12-09-21

I hear so many people say that they know "facts" that "prove" that the murder of JFK was a conspiracy. Unfortunately, most of these "facts" were gleaned from books written by authors who have no basis for their claims and statements. This book is different. While Vincent Bugliosi's "Reclaiming History" is far more thorough, if you don't have time to listen to that work, this book is your next best book.

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Short on flying

Revisado: 04-03-21

I went to high school in Atchison, Kansas, where Amelia Earhart was born. So, the first third of the book which deals with her childhood it was interesting to me because I recognized some of the locations mentioned in the book. The last 2/3 of the book, which cover her flying career, seemingly didn’t contain a lot of flying. That is, not much of the narrative was dedicated to describing her flights. That might be unsurprising if there was a little record of what transpired on Amelia‘s flights. However, Amelia wrote two books, one of which described her trip across the Atlantic as a passenger, and the other of her solo flight across the Atlantic. So, you would think they would be more content about her adventures in the air. However, still a compelling story of a complex and enigmatic figure in American history.

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One-third great

Revisado: 01-15-18

This book is divided into roughly three parts; 1) JFK's early life and presidency; 2) his assassination; 3) the impact JFK and his assassination had on American politics and the presidency after his death. I would rate the first of those three parts as average, not great. Author Larry Sabato profiles JFK's personality perhaps a bit less than would have been ideal, but he provides a solid basis for the rest of the book in describing JFK's early life with family and his rise to the Senate and presidency. The second part is where this book is weakest. The author adds nothing new to the pre-existing mountain of JFK conspiracy literature, and sometimes borders on sensationalism. At times he holds the same drumstick that lesser authors do, repeating inaccurate and misleading statements. For example, he reiterates the unconsidered opinion that the Warren Commission Report was a brief, rushed, incomplete, and dangerously flawed document (in truth, the Warren Commission report was nearly 900 pages long and an additional 26 hearing volumes contained testimonies from 550 witnesses and evidence. No other murder in American history was scrutinized, investigated, researched, and documented than the death of JFK). To his credit the author provides some balance in addressing the question of whether the JFK assassination was the work of one man or a conspiracy, but in tone it generally it panders to the conspiracy theorists. Perhaps the author believed that a discussion of the assassination in depth, including the conspiracy theories, would be expected by anyone purchasing a book on JFK, but I believe this section of the book does little to complement the remainder of the work. The last part of this book is where Sabato shines. I had never before considered the lasting impact that JFK, and his assassination, had on the American presidency. The author does a masterful job of getting into the minds of LBJ, Jimmy Carter, and Ronald Reagan, later presidents who either suffered from or reveled in the legacy of the assassinated president. This book is worth experiencing for this part of the book alone.

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Some gems, but overall disjointed and poorly read.

Revisado: 08-23-17

What would have made Native American Tribes: The History and Culture of the Sioux better?

Better writing, better performance.

How would you have changed the story to make it more enjoyable?

The narrative did not flow very well, changing subjects without wrapping up the previous topic and without adequate introduction for the next. It sounds very much like it was haphazardly condensed from a longer work.

What didn’t you like about Tracy Turner’s performance?

His heavy Southern US accent was annoying. Also, he mispronounced several ENGLISH words ("hearth" was mispronounced "herth" and "writhing" was mispronounced "rithing") as well as the names of several Native American tribes ("Sisseton" was mispronounced "Siss-EE-ton" and "Arikara" was mispronounced "Ar-i-KOW-a"). This just comes across as lazy.

If you could play editor, what scene or scenes would you have cut from Native American Tribes: The History and Culture of the Sioux?

I would have had someone more familiar with Native American history and culture proof the performance.

Any additional comments?

I would have enjoyed this much more except for the mispronunciations and the choppy narrative.

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