A highly readable, engaging, astute microhistory of an overlooked event.
A sharply focused study of Fidel Castro’s significant visit to New York City for the opening session of the U.N. in September 1960.
Although Castro was only in New York for 10 days, Hall, a professor of modern history, argues that his stay had a powerful effect in terms of galvanizing the forces of black civil rights, promoting the politics of anti-imperialism, and freezing the already icy relations between the U.S. and the Soviet Union. Moreover, the visit "all but guaranteed a decisive and fateful rupture in US–Cuban relations." After a wide-ranging scene-setter in which the author marshals the seismic historical events occurring at the time—e.g., the last months of Dwight Eisenhower's presidential tenure, the “crisis” in Belgian Congo that led to independence, the Soviet downing of an American U-2 spy plane, the beginning of the sit-ins at Woolworth's lunch counters and elsewhere to protest segregation—Hall moves chronologically, organizing his work by each day's activities in the Cuban delegation's schedule. Especially illuminating is the author’s account of the delegation's stunning move from the midtown Shelburne Hotel, where they felt unwelcome, to the Hotel Theresa in Harlem, where the entire neighborhood turned out rapturously and Castro held court with such luminaries as Malcolm X, Nikita Khrushchev, Gamal Abdel Nasser, and Jawaharlal Nehru. On Sept. 26, Castro's nearly five-hour speech to the General Assembly—which, “according to one wag…covered everything except the dispute between Britain and Iceland over the sardine harvest”—upstaged those by Eisenhower and Khrushchev and memorably gave his young country a voice and the "people's revolution" the attention of the world. In a narrative packed with fascinating historical detail and terrific photos, Hall makes an engaging argument that Castro's trip established his reputation as "hero for the oppressed peoples of the world"—and spurred leftist movements everywhere.
A highly readable, engaging, astute microhistory of an overlooked event.Pub Date: Sept. 8, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-5713-5306-4
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Faber & Faber
Review Posted Online: June 2, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
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
It’s not Shakespeare, not by a long shot. But at least it’s not James Franco.
A noted actor turns to verse: “Poems are a Saturday in the middle of the week.”
McConaughey, author of the gracefully written memoir Greenlights, has been writing poems since his teens, closing with one “written in an Australian bathtub” that reads just as a poem by an 18-year-old (Rimbaud excepted) should read: “Ignorant minds of the fortunate man / Blind of the fate shaping every land.” McConaughey is fearless in his commitment to the rhyme, no matter how slight the result (“Oops, took a quick peek at the sky before I got my glasses, / now I can’t see shit, sure hope this passes”). And, sad to say, the slight is what is most on display throughout, punctuated by some odd koanlike aperçus: “Eating all we can / at the all-we-can-eat buffet, / gives us a 3.8 education / and a 4.2 GPA.” “Never give up your right to do the next right thing. This is how we find our way home.” “Memory never forgets. Even though we do.” The prayer portion of the program is deeply felt, but it’s just as sentimental; only when he writes of life-changing events—a court appearance to file a restraining order against a stalker, his decision to quit smoking weed—do we catch a glimpse of the effortlessly fluent, effortlessly charming McConaughey as exemplified by the David Wooderson (“alright, alright, alright”) of Dazed and Confused. The rest is mostly a soufflé in verse. McConaughey’s heart is very clearly in the right place, but on the whole the book suggests an old saw: Don’t give up your day job.
It’s not Shakespeare, not by a long shot. But at least it’s not James Franco.Pub Date: Sept. 16, 2025
ISBN: 9781984862105
Page Count: 208
Publisher: Crown
Review Posted Online: Aug. 15, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
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