A rousing historical treasure hunt.
Fireworks and treasure off the Spanish Main.
Journalist and historian Sancton, author of Madhouse at the End of the Earth, emphasizes the story of Roger Dooley, a self-described underwater archeologist who found a great sunken treasure ship. Sancton sets the scene in 1708 in the Caribbean, where a Spanish treasure fleet met a hostile British squadron. In the battle that followed, the galleon San José sank somewhere in waters off Colombia. Early chapters describe undersea treasure hunting, a wild-west get-rich-quick occupation dominated by larger-than-life characters who chew through fortunes from naïve investors and rarely hit the jackpot. The treasure hunters employ violent methods, including dynamite that destroys historical artifacts and gives them a terrible reputation among archeologists. Born in 1944 New Jersey to a Cuban mother who returned to the island with her son, Dooley quickly adapted to his new country. Fascinated by diving and the newly invented Aqua-Lung and mostly self-educated, he turned himself into a skilled underwater archeologist. He was intrigued by the San José, thought to contain unimaginable wealth. Commercial treasure hunters had found a wreck that they claimed was the San José but produced no convincing evidence. Immersed in Spanish archives, Dooley discovered documents and maps that revealed the treasure fleet’s route more accurately. Organizing his own investors, he contracted with Colombia’s government and in 2015 found a wreck 2,000 feet deep and extracted artifacts that proved it was the San José. A national celebration followed discovery of this icon of Colombian history, during which Dooley’s name was not mentioned. It is likewise rarely mentioned in the avalanche of lawsuits that continue to clog the courts from Spain (the ship’s original owner), Peru (whose mines produced the treasure), Indigenous groups (whose enslaved people extracted it), and former treasure hunters (whose contracts are supposedly still in force). Now in his 80s, Dooley remains a peripheral figure in stalled efforts to raise or simply celebrate this precious relic.
A rousing historical treasure hunt.Pub Date: Jan. 27, 2026
ISBN: 9780593594179
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Sept. 27, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: yesterday
BOOK REVIEW
Dogged original research and superb narrative skills come together in this gripping account of pitiless evil.
Greed, depravity, and serial murder in 1920s Oklahoma.
During that time, enrolled members of the Osage Indian nation were among the wealthiest people per capita in the world. The rich oil fields beneath their reservation brought millions of dollars into the tribe annually, distributed to tribal members holding "headrights" that could not be bought or sold but only inherited. This vast wealth attracted the attention of unscrupulous whites who found ways to divert it to themselves by marrying Osage women or by having Osage declared legally incompetent so the whites could fleece them through the administration of their estates. For some, however, these deceptive tactics were not enough, and a plague of violent death—by shooting, poison, orchestrated automobile accident, and bombing—began to decimate the Osage in what they came to call the "Reign of Terror." Corrupt and incompetent law enforcement and judicial systems ensured that the perpetrators were never found or punished until the young J. Edgar Hoover saw cracking these cases as a means of burnishing the reputation of the newly professionalized FBI. Bestselling New Yorkerstaff writer Grann (The Devil and Sherlock Holmes: Tales of Murder, Madness, and Obsession, 2010, etc.) follows Special Agent Tom White and his assistants as they track the killers of one extended Osage family through a closed local culture of greed, bigotry, and lies in pursuit of protection for the survivors and justice for the dead. But he doesn't stop there; relying almost entirely on primary and unpublished sources, the author goes on to expose a web of conspiracy and corruption that extended far wider than even the FBI ever suspected. This page-turner surges forward with the pacing of a true-crime thriller, elevated by Grann's crisp and evocative prose and enhanced by dozens of period photographs.
Dogged original research and superb narrative skills come together in this gripping account of pitiless evil.Pub Date: April 18, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-385-53424-6
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: Feb. 1, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2017
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
A blissfully vicarious, heartfelt glimpse into the life of a Manhattan burlesque dancer.
A former New York City dancer reflects on her zesty heyday in the 1970s.
Discovered on a Manhattan street in 2020 and introduced on Stanton’s Humans of New York Instagram page, Johnson, then 76, shares her dynamic history as a “fiercely independent” Black burlesque dancer who used the stage name Tanqueray and became a celebrated fixture in midtown adult theaters. “I was the only black girl making white girl money,” she boasts, telling a vibrant story about sex and struggle in a bygone era. Frank and unapologetic, Johnson vividly captures aspects of her former life as a stage seductress shimmying to blues tracks during 18-minute sets or sewing lingerie for plus-sized dancers. Though her work was far from the Broadway shows she dreamed about, it eventually became all about the nightly hustle to simply survive. Her anecdotes are humorous, heartfelt, and supremely captivating, recounted with the passion of a true survivor and the acerbic wit of a weathered, street-wise New Yorker. She shares stories of growing up in an abusive household in Albany in the 1940s, a teenage pregnancy, and prison time for robbery as nonchalantly as she recalls selling rhinestone G-strings to prostitutes to make them sparkle in the headlights of passing cars. Complemented by an array of revealing personal photographs, the narrative alternates between heartfelt nostalgia about the seedier side of Manhattan’s go-go scene and funny quips about her unconventional stage performances. Encounters with a variety of hardworking dancers, drag queens, and pimps, plus an account of the complexities of a first love with a drug-addled hustler, fill out the memoir with personality and candor. With a narrative assist from Stanton, the result is a consistently titillating and often moving story of human struggle as well as an insider glimpse into the days when Times Square was considered the Big Apple’s gloriously unpolished underbelly. The book also includes Yee’s lush watercolor illustrations.
A blissfully vicarious, heartfelt glimpse into the life of a Manhattan burlesque dancer.Pub Date: July 12, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-250-27827-2
Page Count: 192
Publisher: St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: July 27, 2022
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