DOWNLOAD One Summer (America, 1927) by Bill Bryson

Book Description

One of the most admired nonfiction writers of our time retells the story of one truly fabulous year in the life of his native country—a fascinating and gripping narrative featuring such outsized American heroes as Charles Lindbergh, Babe Ruth, and yes Herbert Hoover, and a gallery of criminals (Al Capone), eccentrics (Shipwreck Kelly), and close-mouthed politicians (Calvin Coolidge). It was the year Americans attempted and accomplished outsized things and came of age in a big, brawling manner. What a country. What a summer. And what a writer to bring it all so vividly alive for us on the page in this certain bestseller.

It’s been said that some people can sing the phone book and make it sound beautiful. Bill Bryson could write the phone book and make it interesting and entertaining, not that One Summer, America, 1927 is comparable at all to a phone book. One Summer vividly explores the U.S. during a particularly entrancing time when explorers were taking to the sky, Babe Ruth blasted onto the baseball field, talking pictures were invented and gangsters were rolling in the dough, getting rich from prohibition.

This is an excellent book – riveting from beginning to end. Every time I read a Bill Bryson book I have forgotten just how wonderful he is. I think high school kids would be better off ditching their dry history courses and would learn more from reading this book. The stories would certainly have more of an impact.

Review

“A popular chronicler of life and lore vividly charts a particularly pivotal season in American history. . . . Bryson’s American pride saturates this rewarding book. A distinctively drawn time capsule from a definitive epoch.”
—Kirkus Reviews

Product Details

Hardcover: 528 pages
Publisher: Doubleday (October 1, 2013)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0767919408
ISBN-13: 978-0767919401