Sunday, October 2, 2016

Mayflower by Nathaniel Philbrick

First sentence:

"For sixty-five days, the Mayflower had blundered her way through storms and headwinds, her bottom a shaggy pelt of seaweed and barnacles, her leaky decks spewing salt water onto her passengers' devoted heads."

Description:

"How did America begin?

That simple question launches acclaimed author Nathaniel Philbrick on an extraordinary journey to understand the truth behind our most sacred national myth: the voyage of the Mayflower and the settlement of Plymouth Colony. As Philbrick reveals in this electrifying new history of the Pilgrims, the story of Plymouth Colony was a fifty-five year epic that began in peril and ended in war. New England erupted into a bloody conflict that nearly wiped out the English colonists and natives alike/ These events shaped the existing communities and the country that would grow from them." -- from the back cover

My thoughts:

I learned a lot from this book concerning early interactions between Europeans and the various tribes in New England. For example, I didn't know, before reading the book, that Plymouth was a separate colony from the Massachusetts Bay colony to the north. I also learned that a big part of the reasons for the wars between the settlers and the natives was desire for power and for land.

Date read: 10/1/2016
Rating: 3*/5 = good
Genre: History

ISBN-10: 0143111973
ISBN-13: 9780143111979
Publisher: Penguin Books
Year: 2006
# of pages: 463
Binding: Trade Paperback
LibraryThing page

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