Burroughs's book is a wonderful tale of exploration into the dense, winding, wonderful Waccamaw River in SC, and into the mostly forgotten past of his native Horry County. His marvelous sense of detail, poetic sensibility, and grand sympathies with all things natural and human make this a memoroble book indeed. I know Prof. Burroughs might hoot at the comparison, but I enjoyed this book as much as anything I've read in Thoreau.

A human life, I think, should be well rooted in some spot of native land, where it may get the love of tender kinship for the face of the earth, for the labors men go forth to, for the sounds and accents that haunt it, for whatever will give that early home a familiar, unmistakable difference amidst the future widening of knowledge: a spot where the definiteness of early memories may be inwrought with affection, and kindly acquaintance with all neighbors, even to dogs and donkeys, may spread not by sentimental effort and reflection, but as a sweet habit of the blood. -George Eliot (Daniel Deronda)

This sentiment and the chance discovery of Nathaniel Holmes Bishop's The Voyage of the Paper Canoe (1878), detailing a canoe trip down the East Coast which included a side trip on the Waccamaw River, were the twin impulses that lead Burroughs to return to his native Horry County, SC and make his own trip down the Waccamaw. Burroughs, a professor at Bowdoin, published a terrific collection of essays Billy Watson's Croker Sack in 1991 (it even made Mr. Doggett's Suggested Summer Reading List for Students) and this book is every bit as good.

Whether he's detailing the history of the county, the river and his own family or relating his encounters with the river's unique residents or describing the wildlife he encounters, Burroughs has a sharp eye, a sympathetic ear and a silver tongue. Here is his description of one bird he meets:

Yesterday a red-shouldered hawk had called the day to order, and got its business underway. Today it was a pileated woodpecker: a staccato drum-burst against a hollow tree, then the bird itself. It flew across in front of me, with its peculiar alternation of flap, swoop, and collapse, and its last swoop fetched it up against the trunk of a cypress. It clung there a moment, cocked and primed, a perfectly congruous mixture of Woody Woodpecker, frock-coated nineteenth-century deacon and pterodactyl. Then it gave the tree an abrupt, jackhammer strafing, rolled out its lordly call, and swooped away, leaving the day to its own devices.

If you've ever seen one, you know that a pileated woodpecker has never been described better and if you haven't you must almost feel that now you have.

This is a wonderful bucolic look at the history and nature of the Waccamaw, which will leave you wishing that you too had such a place coursing through your blood.

GRADE: A

For a meteorologist, this is clearly a must read if you're at all interested in knowing more about some of the most influential people in our field. The author obviously has done considerable homework and made some of the pioneers in this field come alive, instead of just being names and old b&w photographs. Since the book is unprecedented and I didn't know many of these people personally, it's not possible for me to say how accurate these word descriptions are, but they have the "ring of truth" to me. Some very interesting parallels can be drawn from the past to the present with the information in this terrific book!

John Cox is, and has always been, a phenomenal reporter and writer. This book deserves to be widely read. As a work of history, it is very much welcome -- a book that sheds light on the past of a subject which is, too often, shrouded in myth.
-- Keay Davidson, Science Writer, San Francisco Chronicle

This is a book of high interest to my 5th and 6th grade students. Benjamin Franklin came alive on the pages of this book, and even inspired one young man to do further research into the life of this truly amazing American. The language is simple and straight forward making comprehenshion possible even for my students who are struggling with a very limited knowledge of the English language. I believe that this book is not only appropriate for children, but also an enjoyable reading experience for adults that are reading along with their children, or adults who are building their own reading skills. It never "talks down" to the reader. The world is hungry for heroes, and leaders who live and teach old-fashioned virtues. This book meets this need in an entertaining way.

This book has been very informative for both my 6th grade and my college-aged ESL students. It brings to life one of the most inventive and creative personalities in American history. He is presented in a very positive way, making him a role model that can be an example to younger and older people alike. This book is written in language that is easily understood by young or foreign readers. While it uses vocabulary that stretches the limits of a young person's ability, it also gives explantion for difficult passages. It gives thoughtful insight into American history preceding the Revolutionary War and the reasons for the War.

I read this book for business school and enjoyed it thoroughly enough to recommend it to friends and family who are interested in the recent history of business. This book documents the major events and themes in American Business during the past 80 years. The writing gives enough detail without being boring. In addition, I found it interesting to see how certain themes persist through time proving that history does repeat itself. The book is a very quick read and provides the reader with enough information on each era. After that, the reader can use the suggested reading list to learn more about the subjects, eras and people that might interest him/her. Overall, a great read.

Savage brilliantly demonstrates that much of the eventual success of the 60's civil rights struggle can be traced to the insights learned by African American leaders in the 40s as they began to master the presentation of their cause on radio. By shifting the movment's earlier focus on "converting" individuals to developing methods for intervening with the media which reach virtually every citizen, African American leaders were able to introduce a new black voice on the radio, especially programming sponsored by the federal government during WWII. This programming challenged accepted stereotypes of black abilities and placed African American accomplishments at the heart of American history. Using seldom seen archives of radio material and the recollections of surviving participants in this dramatic phenomenon, Savage makes the case that many of the lessons learned during this era served the civil rights movement well. Just as radio became a forum for debates about race in the 40s, so too television functioned in the 50s and 60s. While black leaders could not control either radio or television, they understood from their earlier work with radio how television needed "images" only they could supply. The awareness of the potential power of an "alliance" between African Americans and televion was one of the legacies of the 40s radio programming Savage unearthed.. I have to say that Savage is an especially fluid and engaging writer. A lot of the material would have been a painful slog in a less capable writer's hands. I suspect that this book will become a "core text" on the evolution of the civil rights movement. Personally, I can't wait to see what else Savage tackles.

Leroy Davis is a briliant scholar and an excellent teacher. His depth of knowledge on John Hope is amazing, and the real man comes through in this great book.

-Adam Rothwell

Dr George Matthews, a psychiatrist, encounters a patient who claims he is paid by a leprechaun to wear a flower in his hair. Another, he claims, pays him to whistle at Carnegie Hall during performances. A third pays him to give quarters away. Jacob Blunt wants Dr Matthews to confirm that he's mad. Dr Matthews is curious, so he accompanies his patient to a rendezvous with one of the leprechauns. His name is Eustace and he isn't at all pleased to see the doctor.

So begins the Deadly Percheron. After that it gets strange. First published in 1946 this unique murder mystery transcends the boundaries of the genre. It's noir, it's nightmarish, it's compulsive. John Franklin Bardin drags the reader into a world where the nature of identity is constantly questioned. Is our hero who he says he is? Can he be trusted? Is he, in fact, sane? Reality, as seen through his eyes, is a shifting kaleidoscope of memories.

As the murders mount up the fragments of his shattered psyche are slotted together. Slowly reality stabilises. At the end of the novel, but only then, it all makes sense. Who killed Frances Raye? Well, now, let's start at the beginning..."Jacob Blunt was my last patient. He came into my office wearing a scarlet hibiscus in his curly blond hair. He sat down in the easy chair across from my desk, and said, "Doctor, I think I'm losing my mind.""

First let me say that I rarely read non-fiction and even when I do, I rarely manage to finish an entire book of it. Democracy Betrayed is an exception. The writing was clear, precise, right-on, and interesting. And, perhaps most importantly, educational. I was born and raised in North Carolina and knew nothing--absolutely nothing--about the Wilmington Race Riots or the subject of Cecelski's essay Abraham Galloway. I am female and was a victim of gender based racial violence myself so I was aware of the issues raised in Gilmore's essay and White's essay, but I have never seen the issues written about so well. What I most like about this book is that it destroys stereotypes about class and race. After all isn't it the most well-to-do who most benefit from race violence so why should we be surprised to learn that it was not the so-called "white trash" who began the racial massacre in 1898, but the rich, the ones who were most likely to benefit from forcing the elected fusionist party officials out of office and placing themselves in their offices. I never knew--it certainly wasn't taught in my public school--that in 1896 every office in North Carolina was held by a progressive fusionist party member, elected by the fusion of lower class whites and blacks. Imagine how different this state would be, how advanced in talent and intelligence, if the massacre hadn't occurred, if black doctors, lawyers, real estate agents, newspaper editors and writers, etc, hadn't been forced from the state and if the elected officials had been allowed to remain in office. Perhaps what is most important is the book succeeds in "drawing public attention to the tragedy", a tragedy that is apparantly very much in the consciousness of Black Wilmington citizens and very much needs to be in the consciousness of all humans.

This is an excellent fictional account of Franklin's *overland* expedition to the Arctic Ocean. Through the device of multiple narration, it presents us with both the Aboriginal and European perspective on the events. Wiebe did his homework: the novel is solidly based on the first-hand accounts of Franklin, Back, Hearne, and others. The influence of Faulkner is evident in narrative style, prose style and theme. Faulkner's great story The Bear was clearly an influence

Great! THis is the best book I've ever read