Welcome! We're starting something new today- both hubby and I are avid history readers- I would call him more of a fanatic as he is VERY into WW II history (even was a WW II re-enactor in his single days!). We both feel very strongly about teaching history as it was, not how we want to change it to be eons later to make it look prettier/less offensive. So when we come across great books, we want to share them with you, so you can make your own decisions. I can't promise it will be every week, or bi-weekly- when we come across a great book, you'll get a History Corner Lesson on Thursday!
We're going to start off this week with a great book that Hachette was kind enough to send to us for review (BIG thanks Miriam for making that happen!)This week hubby gets to review the book, as it is his milleu. so be patient!
Premise: In 1905 President Teddy Roosevelt (TR) dispatched Secretary of War William Howard Taft on the largest U.S. diplomatic mission in history to Hawaii, Japan, the Philippines, China, and Korea. Roosevelt's glamorous twenty-one year old daughter Alice served as mistress of the cruise, which included senators and congressmen. Each port of call prompts a case study of American misdeeds: the brutal counterinsurgency in the Philippines; the takeover of Hawaii by American sugar barons; TR's betrayal of promises to protect Korea (which the author believes green-lighted Japanese expansionism and thus makes TR responsible for Pearl Harbor). On this trip, Taft concluded secret agreements in Roosevelt's name. In 2005, a century later, James Bradley traveled in the wake of TR's mission and discovered what had transpired in Honolulu, Tokyo, Manila, Beijing and Seoul, that would help secure America's westward push into the Pacific.
Hubby says: I just finished "The Imperial Cruise A Secret History of Empire and War" by James Bradley (Bestselling author of Flags of Our Fathers).
The author went to great lengths to review old documents and accounts of things that happened during this era, and during the cruise TR sent Howard Taft and his daughter Alice Roosevelt on .
It will either be a love or hate book for most readers, people who love Teddy Roosevelt and his cowboy persona might not be too enthused with it, or the decidedly racist views the president is portrayed as having, but if you take a deep breath and look at the history reviewed you may enjoy this reading along with a grain of salt.
I would give it 3 or 4 stars out of 5, as some of the negatives about the US may be slanted, by the author's personal feelings, but I do know not everything our country has done in the past, has been correct or right (our actions against Native Americans of a good example of the bad).
I am not going to talk about the in-depth content of the book, as you need to read it and make your own conclusions but I would recommend it for an interesting read on a missing part of our country's history!
Disclosure: We received this book, free of charge from Hachette Publishing, for review purposes. We were NOT told how to review the book however.