White Bicycles: Making Music in the 1960s

Book Description

"This is the best book about music I've read in years, and a gripping piece of social history."-Brian Eno

When Muddy Waters came to London at the start of the 1960s, a kid from Boston called Joe Boyd was his tour manager; when Dylan went electric at the Newport Festival, Joe Boyd was plugging in his guitar; when the summer of love got going, Joe Boyd was running UFO, the coolest club in London; when a bunch of club regulars called Pink Floyd recorded their first single, Joe Boyd was the producer; when a young songwriter named Nick Drake wanted to give his demo tape to someone, he chose Joe Boyd.

More than any previous sixties music autobiography, Joe Boyd's White Bicycles offers the real story of what it was like to be there at the time. As well as the sixties heavy-hitters, this book also offers wonderfully vivid portraits of a whole host of other musicians: everyone from the great jazzman Coleman Hawkins to the folk diva Sandy Denny, Lonnie Johnson to Eric Clapton, Sister Rosetta Tharpe to Fairport Convention.

Record and film producer Joe Boyd was born in Boston in 1942 and graduated from Harvard in 1964. He went on to produce Pink Floyd, Nick Drake, Fairport Convention, R.E.M., and many others. He produced the documentary Jimi Hendrix and the film Scandal. In 1980 he started Hannibal Records and ran it for twenty years. He lives in London.

Customer Reviews:

Very slow and tiring read.......2007-08-31

This has got to be the most boring book about the music business I've ever read. I really tried to make myself believe it was going to be a true page turner, but it wasn't. The only reason I continued to turn the page is because, well... I'd paid for the book! I'm not the biggest fan of folk music, but I do like it and I love the blues, but this book made me dislike both genres (while I was reading, mind you). Mr. Boyd had such a long and fulfilling career in the music business, but the way he told the story was just plain boring. I've read many biographies on this business and have read some real bizarre stuff, but this book was quite tame. Don't get me wrong, I was GLAD that it was tame. I was quite impressed with Mr. Boyd's self-control and his professionalism. He sounds like a total "stand-up guy." But boy, does he tell a boring story. I usually pass my books on to friends so that they we can converse on the book, it's characters, the author, and so on. I must admit, when I FINALLY finished this book, I promptly threw it in the trash. I will give Mr. Boyd one other thing, I was so happy that he made mention of all the blues greats that have graced stages and auditoriums worldwide. That in itself was very much worth this book purchase, but that's about it.

"Matter of Fact".......2007-08-20

Woody Allen made a film called "Zelig" about a little guy who found his way into all the significant events of the 20th Century.

Well, record producer Joe Boyd's life in the 60's was kind of like that. He was all over the place, at the Newport Festivals (both jazz and folk), touring with bluesmen through Europe, and finally at the epicenter of both the British psychedelic and English Folk Rock scenes.

With all that material to draw from, you would think that this book would be a regular psychedelic sundae, vibrating like a day-glo art poster. Nope. It's just a recounting of Joe's ups and downs in the music business. There are nice reminiscences about Sandy Denny and Nick Drake, and Joe drops some little known facts about his resume, such as his involvement in the Eric Clapton/Steve Winwood "Powerhouse" recordings, and his production of Pink Floyd's "Arnold Layne"--plus his notable failures, such as missing out on opportunities to sign Procol Harum, or to profit from the Abba catalogue.

But, Joe is primarily known for his involvement with Folk-Rock, and he doesn't really pour forth with details, here. What about "Liege and Lief", generally called the greatest British folk-rock album of all time? What about Vashti Bunyan, a cult artist in her own right? She gets about one paragraph. And what about Linda (Peters) Thompson? Joe lets it drop that he was in an intimate relationship with her, yet she merits only a sentence or two.

This book isn't badly written, but it doesn't really give you a great picture of the music. It could have been much better. People who are curious about the time would be better served checking out the music. I guess a CD sampler of Joe's productions, also called "White Bicycles", is available. Otherwise, there is the great "Nuggets II" box set, which I recommend without reservation.

What a trip! And I wasn't even born yet when most of it happened!.......2007-08-10

As a musician and general music junkie, I'd rate this as a must have. Joe Boyd is just as important to learn from as those blues and jazz bands he resurrected in the last 50s and early 60s. I also sensed the sadness and reverence he had towards Nick Drake, the sad honesty about Sandy Denny, as well as rejoicing in the still flourishing career of Richard Thompson, all of which are influences of mine.

I wonder if he has ever been to the Philadelphia Folk Festival.

Somewhat interesting, ultimately disappointing.......2007-07-22

As previous reviewers said, I "couldn't NOT read this book" and "devour" it with the special anticipation of having seen the words 'Produced by Joe Boyd' on so many of my cherished album covers. However, though it contains a few new facts about the artists and some insight regarding the music business only an insider would know, the book was a disappointment. As earlier reviewers here have stated, it's too short - with not enough information about the actual sessions and music-making itself. The text also seems to be missing something - perhaps over-edited? Perhaps shortened for some reason at the last minute? And some of the potentially fascinating little stories he relates are left dangling in space. The subtitle of the book is 'Making Music in the 1960s', but there's very little of that in the narrative. I wanted to find out what is was like to observe luminaries such as Nick Drake at work in the studio. I wanted to be a fly on the wall at a Fairport Convention session with Sandy Denny & Richard Thompson. What made the Incredible String Band tick? How did these artists get their signature SOUNDS? I was looking for a window on Joe Boyd's working world; What we get are mildly interesting and too-quick glances of the surface of '60s-'70s music.

Sight Unseen, Sound Unheard.......2007-07-17

In the mid to late 60s, there were so many unheralded masterpieces, even the recording companies couldn't keep up with them. Most were relegated to
the old school, family-owned record store. Illinois Speed Press, The United States of America and Joe Boyd and the Field Hippies were a few of them. Some of their members went on to nominal fame in other groups, but they mostly languished in the bargain bins. If this is the same Joe Boyd,
and his way with prose is as adroit as his way with music, you are in
for an incredibly interesting ride. I haven't read the book yet, but I
haven't been moved to make a purchase of anything sight unseen or sound
unheard since I read an article in Hit Parader about CSN three months before their debut album was released in 1969.

Civil Rights Chronicle (The African-American Struggle for Freedom)

Average customer rating:

This deserves more than six stars!
Great Book!!
exceptional view of history

Civil Rights Chronicle (The African-American Struggle for Freedom)
Todd Steven Burroughs , Ella Forbes , and Jim Haskins
Manufacturer: Publications International
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

General | History | Bargain Books | Stores | Books

United States | History | Bargain Books | Stores | Books

All Titles | Qualifying Textbooks - Fall 2007 | Stores | Books

Civil Rights & Liberties | Current Events | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books

General | Politics | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books
Similar Items:

ASIN: 0785349243

Product Description

After three centuries of oppression, black Americans had reached their limit. Tired of inferior schools, "Jim Crow" laws, and the threat of being lynched for trying to vote, African-Americans risked their lives for justice - most notably in the 1950s and '60s.

Customer Reviews:

This deserves more than six stars!.......2005-02-24

Wow! I've always been interested in the Civil Rights movement, so naturally I was drawn to this book when I spied it in the bookstore. I especially liked that I got a discount on it, which is always a nice thing. I paged through it in the bookstore, was impressed, bought it, took it home, and was just blown away. It's a very informative and outstanding book on the subject and if you are interested in this topic, then you should definitely check this book out. It also contains scores of photographs, so it is somewhat like an encyclopedia. It definitely helped me gain a better understanding of this dark part of our history.

Once again - WOW!

Great Book!!.......2004-03-13

I highly recommend this book to teenagers because it tells you about a lot of things that you don't learn in the classroom.

exceptional view of history.......2004-02-29

The Civil Rights Chronicle belongs in every library, every school, and every home. This honest look at the enslavement of people is not to be missed. The struggle for independence and freedom is chronicled here for all, black, white, or 'other', to read and understand. There are so many things in this world that should never be allowed to happen again!

Book Description

Capturing the perfect wave

"The book has the effect of a time capsule, bringing back an era that continues to resonate for us in shades of Technicolor and black and white." - Los Angeles Times Book Review, Los Angeles

At a time when surfing is more popular than ever, it's fitting to look back at the years that brought the sport into the mainstream. Developed by Hawaiian islanders over five centuries ago, surfing began to peak on the mainland in the 1950s, taking America--and the world--by storm. Surfing became not just a sport, but a way of life, and the culture that surrounded it was admired and exported across the globe. One of the key image-makers from that period is LeRoy Grannis, a surfer since 1931, who began photographing the scene in California and Hawaii in the longboard Gidget era of the early 1960s.

Customer Reviews:

In My Opinion.............2007-08-23

In my opinion, this book is one of THE BEST surf books ever. The visuals are clean and classic and takes one back to the golden age of surfing. The writing is short but informative. LeRoy Grannis put his stamp in this world and is a legend among all surf photographers. I am a big fan of Mr. Grannis and of surfing as well.
Buy the book, put it on your coffee table, have some friends over and discuss.

Surf Photography of the 60's and 70's.......2007-08-13

This was purchased as a gift - specifically requested by the recepient - and so I have never seen it - but they said they loved it - very beautiful pictures that brought back lots of memories for them....

Stunning.......2007-07-10

"Granny"s magnificent book is a must for any surfer's library. The art of Leroy Grannis' photographs is not only his beautiful composition and exposure, but also his portrayal of the ambiance, exuberance, and joy of the surfing world of the 1960's and 1970's. He has incitefully memorialized the icons of the period.

Grannis is the Master !!.......2007-07-06

LeRoy Grannis is the Master of California and Hawaii's burgeoning surf culture. His photographs become your eyes in the critical moment, whether in the water or on the beach. Grannis found the action, as if nobody knew he was there. Every surfer should own this beautiful book...a treasure of surfing's greatest moments !!

His best stuff isn't in this book........2007-06-01

It depends on what you're looking for. Yes there are many pages of nice photos of SoCal 1960s beach culture, and lots of pages are taken up with the surfmag ads Grannis shot, for boards and boardshorts. But I was hoping for and expected the majority of the photos to be of SURFING! There are surf photos but not enough. Plus I was expecting to see certain awesome photos Grannis took, Johnnie Fain in a radical bottom turn at overhead Malibu, Dora hanging five, Butch Van Artsdalen flying down a bitchin' big Pipeline wall on a longboard; classic stuff and the very best of Grannis. Unfortunately not a single one of those shots are in the book. They ARE available on his website, for sale in collections of 9 for the absurd price of between $3000 and $7000!!!

All Souls: A Family Story from Southie (Ballantine Reader's Circle)

Average customer rating:

I mean....
Winged Cockroaches Drowning in Sprite
A Gripping, Informative Memoir
inspiring
Amazing, enraging, beautiful, heartbraking,inspiring

All Souls: A Family Story from Southie (Ballantine Reader's Circle)
Michael Patrick Macdonald
Manufacturer: Ballantine Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Ethnic & National | Biographies & Memoirs | Subjects | Books

Irish | Ethnic & National | Biographies & Memoirs | Subjects | Books

General | Biographies & Memoirs | Subjects | Books

New England | Regional U.S. | Biographies & Memoirs | Subjects | Books

Memoirs | Biographies & Memoirs | Subjects | Books

Biographies & Memoirs | Book Clubs | Specialty Stores | Books
Similar Items:

ASIN: 034544177X
Release Date: 2000-10-03

Book Description

Michael Patrick MacDonald grew up in "the best place in the world"--the Old Colony projects of South Boston--where 85% of the residents collect welfare in an area with the highest concentration of impoverished whites in the U.S. In All Souls, MacDonald takes us deep into the secret heart of Southie. With radiant insight, he opens up a contradictory world, where residents are besieged by gangs and crime but refuse to admit any problems, remaining fiercely loyal to their community. MacDonald also introduces us to the unforgettable people who inhabit this proud neighborhood. We meet his mother, Ma MacDonald, an accordion-playing, spiked-heel-wearing, indomitable mother to all; Whitey Bulger, the lord of Southie, gangster and father figure, protector and punisher; and Michael's beloved siblings, nearly half of whom were lost forever to drugs, murder, or suicide. By turns explosive and touching, All Souls ultimately shares a powerful message of hope, renewal, and redemption.

Customer Reviews:

I mean...........2007-08-25

This guy had a LIFE. I don't envy him and I'm happy that he has come out on top...as far as an "Angela's Ashes"...not even close. I read this after a "true story" about a guy that worked for Whitey Bulger in Southie...I thought this would be another perspective and I looooved Angela's Ashes...I just wasn't hooked to any of the family except for the author...it was an interesting read but not that emotional or moving...again, I'm so glad he made it through his awful life but I don't think I'd make my friends read it...

Winged Cockroaches Drowning in Sprite.......2007-07-07

An ancient slander against the Irish holds that they would sell their own children for money to buy whiskey and damn if that isn't exactly what one of Michael MacDonald's sisters tries to do in "All Souls", MacDonald's didactic tale of coming of age in the Old Colony projects in South Boston. The sister in question wants to sell her child for money to buy crack, not whiskey, but it's the same difference in a case of life imitating stereotype.

In Old Colony, where "everyone is Irish or claims to be", the MacDonald family is, as they might say in Donegal, callanach and barbartha (rowdy and uncivilized), even when measured by shanty project standards. The family matriarch (there is no patriarch), "Ma", had ten children by three men. She supplements the welfare check by playing the accordion in taverns and her kids run wild in the streets, with predictable results-crime, drug addiction, mental illness, and suicide. The residents consider the project "the greatest place in the world", and pretend to live by something called the "Southie Code"-all for one and one for all, don't steal from your neighbor, throw the bums a dime, and above all, don't snitch. Of course, they rob each other blind, sell each other dope, and kill each other with distressing regularity. The only Southie Commandment they all seem to honor is "Thou Shall Not Snitch", since the police are the bad guys and the criminals, who have supplanted the missing fathers, the criminals are the neighborhood heroes.

"All Souls" is brisk and thoughtful. The book has value because it shows that urban poverty will produce the same social plagues regardless of race. It compares favorably to Claude Brown's classic about growing up amid the squalor and violence of Harlem, "Manchild in the Promised Land". High praise indeed. The narrative, however, is seriously flawed. One has to wonder how a five year-old MacDonald can so vividly recall visiting a brother in a mental hospital, or how an eight year-old MacDonald can so meticulously recount the Southie anti-busing riots, when he was "filled with the spirit of rebellion". The writing also suffers from wrenching, abrupt shifts. For example, one brother, an athlete, a boxer on the verge of making it, a man who wouldn't drink beer in public and who admonishes those that do because it sets a bad example for neighborhood kids, this man is suddenly shot dead while robbing an armored car because somehow, unannounced to the reader, he had developed a "major cocaine addiction".

Winged cockroaches drowning in Sprite? Mr. MacDonald finds twenty dead cockroaches (ubiquitous in the project) floating in cup of Sprite
and realizes that they have wings:

"They all floated in the cup with their useless
wings spread out. I stared at them for a good
long time wondering if they didn't know how to
use their wings, or if they just didn't know
they had them, until it was too late to save
themselves".

As metaphors go, that is about as sappy as it gets. Mr. MacDonald did, though, spread his wings and save himself from the Sprite of the project mentality.

A Gripping, Informative Memoir.......2007-04-10

I've never been to Boston, my upbringing was about as suburban as you can get, and I loved "All Souls." It's the memoirs of Michael Patrick MacDonald, who grew up in the largely Irish-Catholic South Boston ("Southie") in the tumultuous 60s and 70s. The Publishers Weekly review summed up the book better than I could, so I will just add some of my own observations.

1.) "All Souls" is instrumental in publicizing a largely-neglected aspect of American history- the Boston busing riots. Aside from a few passing references to it in history textbooks, I'm not aware of any other book where the topic is explored from the viewpoint of someone who was actually there. Basically, William Garrity, a federal judge in Boston, found that the schools in Boston were segregated, and ordered that students should be bused to achieve an equal racial balance. The protest in South Boston was fierce. The people there resented the decision, and threw rocks at the first buses carrying black students into the South Boston area. If students were in a neighborhood assigned to be bused to the predominately black schools, then their parents would send them to a private school if they could afford it. Many times the students would simply drop out. When the busing started, fights broke out between the black and white students. Racism was rampant in South Boston, and many used the "n word" with abandon. Yet not all of the opposition to busing was racially motivated. Mostly the parents were concerned for the safety of their children, and resented the tight-knit community being forcibly torn apart.

2.) Another fascinating aspect of "All Souls" was the code of silence that enveloped Southie until very recently. If there were murders or suicides, you didn't mention it to the police. The myth was "in Southie, everyone looks out for each other." And to a certain extent that was true- it was a tight-knit community. The problem is that when someone was in real trouble, such as getting shot in a botched robbery, no one would come forward to give information that could save lives and rectify the situation. Whitey Bulger was largely responsible for perpetuating the code of silence and the "people look out for each other" myth. And he could say this, since he was comfortably living in a mansion, while most of the people in Southie were in public housing projects.

3.) The author's portrayal of poverty is fascinating and heartbreaking. We can see the effects of the breakdown of the family unit firsthand through the author's eyes. Most families had no father to look after them, and many of the mothers were on welfare. MacDonald's mother, Helen King, or "Ma" as he calls her, is one tough cookie. She managed to raise 10 kids on her own without a father- and the only income she received was from welfare and whatever tips she could scrape by playing the accordion at pubs. Most mothers were not as dedicated as this one, unfortunately. MacDonald never preaches about the issue, and there is much in here for people of all political persuasions to think about.

I love it how the book begins and ends with the author, now a grown man, attending a meeting of the newly-formed South Boston Vigil Group on All-Souls Day. They are people from all over South Boston who are ready to break the silence, and name the names of loved ones lost to murder, drugs, or suicide. Fans of gripping biography, social history, Irish-American history, and American history in general will not want to miss this.

inspiring.......2007-03-29

Even though there are pages upon pages of great reviews for this book, I had to add my two cents.

Having grown up as a unidentified upper-middle class American in the 80's, searching for connection with community and my family's origins, I found this book to be inspiring. Macdonald's recollection of his community and pride in his flawed family induced me to appreciate my own average life, as well as appreciate those full of tragedy.

Amazing, enraging, beautiful, heartbraking,inspiring .......2007-03-26

I can't say enough about this book,it is a must read for every single American citizen that has ever been foolish enough to believe that our so called government does not promote and encourage acts of violence against the most vulnerable communities in this country.

Brothers: The Hidden History of the Kennedy Years

Average customer rating:

Credibility
Capital!
Thought Provoking Tale of the Kennedy Years
A very moving reminder of the Kennedys
This book shows the extreme strain JFK and RFK had within their government

Brothers: The Hidden History of the Kennedy Years
David Talbot
Manufacturer: Free Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

Political | Leaders & Notable People | Biographies & Memoirs | Subjects | Books

Presidents & Heads of State | Leaders & Notable People | Biographies & Memoirs | Subjects | Books

Conspiracy Theories | Current Events | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books
Similar Items:

ASIN: 0743269187
Release Date: 2007-05-08

Book Description

For decades, books about John or Robert Kennedy have woven either a shimmering tale of Camelot gallantry or a tawdry story of runaway ambition and reckless personal behavior. But the real story of the Kennedys in the 1960s has long been submerged -- until now. In Brothers: The Hidden History of the Kennedy Years, David Talbot sheds a dramatic new light on the tumultuous inner life of the Kennedy presidency and its stunning aftermath. Talbot, the founder of Salon.com, has written a gripping political history that is sure to be one of the most talked-about books of the year.

Brothers begins on the shattering afternoon of November 22, 1963, as a grief-stricken Robert Kennedy urgently demands answers about the assassination of his brother. Bobby's suspicions immediately focus on the nest of CIA spies, gangsters, and Cuban exiles that had long been plotting a violent regime change in Cuba. The Kennedys had struggled to control this swamp of anti-Castro intrigue based in southern Florida, but with little success.

Brothers then shifts back in time, revealing the shadowy conflicts that tore apart the Kennedy administration, pitting the young president and his even younger brother against their own national security apparatus. The Kennedy brothers and a small circle of their most trusted advisors -- men like Theodore Sorensen, Robert McNamara, and Kenneth O'Donnell, who were so close the Kennedys regarded them as family -- repeatedly thwarted Washington's warrior caste. These hard-line generals and spymasters were hell-bent on a showdown with the Communist foe -- in Berlin, Laos, Vietnam, and especially Cuba. But the Kennedys continually frustrated their militaristic ambitions, pushing instead for a peaceful resolution to the Cold War. The tensions within the Kennedy administration were heading for an explosive climax, when a burst of gunfire in a sunny Dallas plaza terminated John F. Kennedy's presidency.

Based on interviews with more than one hundred fifty people -- including many of the Kennedys' aging "band of brothers," whose testimony here might be their final word on this epic political story -- as well as newly released government documents, Brothers reveals the compelling, untold story of the Kennedy years, including JFK's heroic efforts to keep the country out of a cataclysmic war and Bobby Kennedy's secret quest to solve his beloved brother's murder. Bobby's subterranean search was a dangerous one and led, in part, to his own quest for power in 1968, in a passion-filled campaign that ended with his own murder. As Talbot reveals here, RFK might have been the victim of the same plotters he suspected of killing his brother. This is historical storytelling at its riveting best -- meticulously researched and movingly told.

Brothers is a sprawling narrative about the clash of powerful men and the darker side of the Cold War -- a tale of tragic grandeur that is certain to change our understanding of the relentlessly fascinating Kennedy saga.

Customer Reviews:

Credibility.......2007-10-17

There are so many crazy books written about this event in time. For some reason this one is credible, and puts things in perspective for me. It answered a lot of questions and the answers seem to ring true.

Capital!.......2007-09-22

Along with Richard Mahoney's Sons And Brothers, you won't find a better rendering of the shadows playing around the Kennedy brothers than in this very well-researched and well-written study. One fact stands out: the JFK assassination will be debated from now until doomsday, pending conclusive proof of this theory or that. I say "theory" because for all the millions of words spoken and written it basically remains an unsolved crime. Media efforts, with all the subtlety of an exploding frangible bullet, to drive home the Lone-Nut theory into our collective consciousness will destructively collide with Mr Talbot's sane and bold
approach, leaving only a few dust-like fragments.

Thought Provoking Tale of the Kennedy Years.......2007-09-11

This book is an enjoyable read. It is heavily footnoted with the footnotes conveniently separated from the main text at the back of the book. Documentation is critical for credibility given the nature of arguing one way or another concerning a conspiracy to murder the president.

After reading this book, I felt well supplied with a good historical knowledge of the period: the Bay of Pigs, the October Missile Crises, the CIA, Cuban Exiles, the Mafia, Jimmy Hoffa, the McClellan Commission, the Warren Commission, Conspiracy Theories, Bobby's reaction to the assassination, the Church Committee, and the House Select Committee on Assassinations.

It's difficult to summarize what I think is the core of this book in a few lines but here goes: The CIA and Cuban exiles expected Kennedy to supply air cover for the Bay of Pigs invasion, Kennedy did not. The mission failed. This set the hostile relationship between the CIA/Cubans/Joint Chiefs toward Kennedy for the rest of the Kennedy Administration. The settlement of the Cuban Missile Crises shut the door to the CIA's and Cuban exile's expectation that the US Government would support an invasion to topple Castro. The mob was angry at Kennedy because of Bobby's active effort as Attorney General to bust the mafia - even though the mob helped JFK win a close election (the Chicago Machine). It appears the author believes the CIA, Cuban exiles, and the Mob conspired to put a hit out on the president; then Bobby's assassination ended any hope of the Kennedy circle to unravel the conspiracy once Bobby had the power to investigate the murder.

By reading this book, one cannot unequivocally conclude there was or was not a conspiracy; but it is fun to speculate. There are so many tantalizing facts, such as all the people who mysteriously died who could have shed light on the assassination, some of those named include: Dorothy Kilgallen, David Morales, Lee Harvey Oswald, Jack Ruby, Sam Giancana, Johnny Roselli, and RFK (wins CA primary, thus odds higher to become president, so taken out?). Add to this the two failed plots in Miami and Chicago, both just before the Nov. 22, 1963 assassination, and both plots similar to the successful Oswald shooting; thus it is no surprise people still have questions concerning the official Warren Report.

A few notes: 1.The book points out that Curtis Le May urged Kennedy to go nuclear but it did not note that Fidel Castro urged Khrushchev to fire tactical nuclear missiles at the U.S. during the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962. 2. Kennedy and Khrushchev deserve our everlasting thanks for not going nuclear in 1962 despite great pressure to do so. 3. Should we believe the private or public RFK? When anyone holds at least two different versions of any subject, it is then obvious to question the truth of either. The author tells us that Robert Kennedy privately believed there was a powerful group of conspirators (i.e. the CIA in conjunction with the Mob and Cuban exiles) that plotted and carried out his brother's murder (this might be some of the "hidden history" in the subtitle) despite the fact that Bobby did publicly endorse the Warren Commission Report. 4. Abraham Zapruder (famous Zapruder film), David Powers and Kenneth O'Donnell (car behind JFK's) all say they heard shots fired from the grassy knoll but the Warren Commission only wanted to hear from David Powers when he changed his story and they didn't want to hear from Ken O'Donnell because he would not change his view that he heard shots from the grassy knoll. Instead the Warren Commission adopted Arlen Specter's "Magic Bullet Theory." The Warren Commission, Hoover, and much of the political establishment wanted to get over with the investigation as quickly as possible (and to have a simple explanation the country could easily understand) so that the country could move on. Also, Allen Dulles (who the book says had a disproportionate influence on the Warren Commission) may have been biased in search of the truth.

A very moving reminder of the Kennedys.......2007-09-05

David Talbot has written a very important book. It is very well researched and thoughtfully expresses the saga of the nation's inadequate search for truth around the killing of the Kennedy's. With so much at stake in national politics, it is a grim reminder that Americans, for all our patriotic bluster about standing for truth, liberty and freedom for all, cannot seem to look into the dark forces that often overrule our governments higher calling. And until we do, there is little hope that we can overcome those forces and avoid further debacles like Vietnam, Iraq and the killing of leaders that try to expose the deeper underpinnings of our country. The result being that we constantly lurch from one poorly thought out policy to another.
The young Kennedys, for all their faults and failings, were a powerful force for justice, and this nation has sorely missed their passion - and David Talbot has reminded us of what we lost and what little we did to find out why.

This book shows the extreme strain JFK and RFK had within their government.......2007-09-02

This book provides excellent facts and interviews with REAL people from the Kennedy days. These people were close to the Kennedy brothers and they provide a lot of insight on what happened behind closed doors. This is the best book about the Kennedys and this is also the best book to provide evidence for an overwhelming conspiracy involving our government. BUY IT IMMEDIATELY. YOU WILL NEVER THINK THE SAME!

Average customer rating:

Like its title, brilliant flashes over soggy stretches
shallow flashbacks
Much of the time I had absolutely no idea what Robert Stone was talking about!
ho hum
If you can remember the Sixties this well, well...

Prime Green: Remembering the Sixties
Robert Stone
Manufacturer: Ecco
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

Authors | Arts & Literature | Biographies & Memoirs | Subjects | Books

General | Biographies & Memoirs | Subjects | Books

Memoirs | Biographies & Memoirs | Subjects | Books

ASIN: 0060198168
Release Date: 2007-01-05

Book Description

PRIME GREEN opens during Robert Stone's last year in the Navy, when he took part in operation Deep Freeze 3, an Anarctic trip that involved circumnavigating the globe. Once out of the Navy, Stone worked for the old New York Daily News and started school at NYU. He started hanging out at the Cedar Tavern just to be in the same room as Kline and DeKooning.

From there they drifted to the French Quarter of New Orleans, where they tried to make a living reading poetry to jazz and working for the Census Bureau. Eventually, in 1962, they went to California, where Ken Kesey had just finished participating in the LSD experiments that were to contribute to the age of psychedelia. Stone experienced the mid–60s of The Merry Pranksters and The Grateful Dead first–hand, accompanied by heavy doses of psychedelics. He travelled for a time on Kesey's celebrated Furthur bus tour, and experienced his 'Acid Test' parties that were later detailed in Tom Wolfe's "The Electric Kool–Aid Acid Test". The book closes in Vietnam, where Stone witnessed the invasion of Laos as a correspondent for a counter–cultural publication.

A powerful memoir, PRIME GREEN, provides an insiders look at a time many knew about only distantly. Stone's expertise as a novelist has helped him here, in his first book–length work of non–fiction, to forge a moving and adventurous portrait of a unique moment in American history.

Customer Reviews:

Like its title, brilliant flashes over soggy stretches.......2007-10-03

The title comes from the "green flash" which Stone, stoned, glimpsed from a Mexican beach. Much of the insight here resembles the recollectons one might expect from a friend of Ken Kesey, an acquaintance of Tim Leary, and one who hung out with the scions of the counterculture in New York City, New Orleans, California north and south, London, Mexico, and Vietnam. That is, pages at a time become illuminated with wisdom-- before sinking again into a miasma of mundane names, places, and events filtered muddily or waveringly through uninspired, if competent, prose. I have only read two novels by Stone, "A Flag for Sunrise," and the disappointing "Damascus Gate." Like the latter book, "Prime Green" stumbles when it could have soared on a promising premise.

The opening chapter rambles on about his stint in the Navy; polar-driven wind and the feel of being at the bridge gain evocative detail, but then the narrative wanders off into recollections of an Australian swimmer he fancied, a bit of action he glimpsed during the Suez crisis, and exchanging Playboys with a Soviet crew. All three anecdotes fizzle. They almost follow randomly, such is the nature of this compilation of memories. Perhaps this casual style conceals careful craft. But, from a writer of Stone's level, that is, of critical acclaim more than another hack bestselling scribe, the offhanded attitude towards such potentially valuable incidents became disappoining. They are treated so offhandedly you wonder why he troubled to bring them up. Much of this book follows suit. It reminds me of a few all-nighters, if you could tape them, with a great storyteller; the difference is, you tend to edit mentally what you were bored or confused by, and highlight the stories which enraptured you, to replay again in your memory. I'd return to this book in the same manner.

For instance, the Bowery and its sudden replacement of white old bums with tough young blacks released from prison circa 1960 sets up a treatise on this sociological phenomenon. But, suddenly, Stone in the next paragraph sidles off into how he wrote copy for a furniture firm. Admittedly, he excels at his harrowing yet hilarious description of writing for the right-wing populist NY Daily News, which like certain media today manages to arouse the contempt of the working class for the system that supposedly favors those less qualified, yet deflects any blame from capitalism or the rich themselves for this inequality and this cynical game of having the victims turn on one another.

His send-up of another bottom-feeding journalistic stint at what he calls the National Thunder, a sort of Weekly World News, is priceless. Anyone who could survive a paper that created headlines like "Armless Veteran Beaten for Not Saluting Flag" or a close runner-up, "Skydiver Devoured By Starving Birds," merits some acclaim for such anecdotes. His accounts of being under the knife for a burst vessel in his brain, of interviewing bitter draftees in Vietnam, of watching the moon on the night of the first landing in 1969 from the California hills, all ring true; his narrative leaps to fitful if brief elegance in these sections. On drugs, Stone glimpses time's wheel and struggles to convey his psychedelic revelation. I wonder if any bard from this time can do so?

The remainder of the book, once Stone leaves in search of the elusive authenticity that takes him, seemingly with little money and the kindness of many strangers become friends, to Stanford on a fellowship, to London, to Vietnam, and to Mexico in a tumultuous but-- for a while-- rather childlike time despite his wife and two children (who are barely mentioned) to support does create in this reader a sense of how much could be seen and heard and experienced by carefree Americans with not much cash, plenty of drugs, and a sense of adventure that in our day has narrowed and priced out all but the affluent or the heavily guarded! Comparing his coming of age with the later century, the combination of a strong dollar, cheap costs of living, and goodwill manage, nearly, to create a glimpse of utopia. On the other hand, his escape from menacing sailors on a Greyhound bus ride from hell that winds up with him barely getting away from the ironically if improbably named hamlet of Highspire, Pennsylvania marks a gothic tale where Poe meets Genet.

If you want a sense of the Sixties, disjointed and disconnected, with wisdom scattered along with a lot of langour, this does re-create a tone appropriate to these times. No history, or even tightly written account, nonetheless for all its faults, I learned from it. The conclusions are the expected sadness at the decade's waste of its promise, and the government infiltration and corporate co-opting of its ideals and its innocence. Not as many knockout punches as I expected, for the book needed editing and substantial tightening. It keeps reeling about, when it should have cut the flab and trimmed up under a drill sargeant of an editor, such as he used to work for in Manhattan in the early 60s.

The book bumps into the famous, nods, chats, and shuffles off again, In its slackness, casual air of street cred meets the dinner party, and Hollywood mingling with the Bowery, perhaps Stone, who managed to be in all of the proper places, dreadful or erotic, exotic or hilarious, remains the jester-cynic who sneers at the powers that be but knows if he had his chance on the throne (he gets a quick perch during his Hollywood visit), he'd settle down there comfortably enough. Stone, in a sloppy but occasionally memorable account, emerges rather blowsily, yet endearingly avuncular. He's slightly askew, a fitting if exasperatingly rambling witness and slyly calculating chronicler for a messy decade.

shallow flashbacks.......2007-08-30

Robert Stone does a good job of objectively recounting his role as a writer and minor player in the countercultural revolution of the sixties. He doesn't fall into the trap of over-glamorizing the period as a mystical awakening or a brief utopia. Nor does he come down on the other side, writing it off as naïve fantasies of a drug addled and decadent youth. And that's the problem. A neutral stance does not often lead to engrossing reading.

This book is a dispassionate chronology of events in his life and it has some value just at that level. It's at its most interesting when big things are happening around him, like when he is hanging out with Ken Kesey and the Merry Pranksters. But I had a hard time convincing myself that I shouldn't just put the book down and read some Ken Kesey. He saves any critical analysis of the larger social movements of his generation for the epilogue and it's sadly too little too late.

He also beats up on himself a little bit for having only written one good book. And when he tells of the process of his novel being turned into a bad movie, it's just sad. He seems to still have a lot of unprocessed grief over the career that he almost had.

I've read some glowing reviews, so maybe it's a great book with a lot to say, and I somehow missed the point. I didn't even find it a terrible book, but- in parallel to his career as a novelist- a disappointing one that doesn't seem to live up to its potential.

Much of the time I had absolutely no idea what Robert Stone was talking about!.......2007-07-19

After reading about 2/3 of "Prime Green: Remembering the Sixties" I finally gave up. I decided that attempting to muddle through the rest of this book simply was not worth my time. As I plodded through this book I often thought to myself that this was a window to a world that I never really knew. In some ways I envy Robert Stone. During the 1960's while I was attending Catholic high school and working after school at mundane jobs trying to help pay the tuition Robert Stone was back and forth between the coasts working very hard to launch a career as a writer. As a member of the Navy he had already been all over the world and now he found himself smack dab in the middle of the cultural revolution. Surely this was an exciting time to be young and free but like so many others during those days Robert Stone got caught up in the drug culture. And it seems to be that it is this part of his lifestyle that "Prime Green: Remembering The Sixties" seems to be mostly about. For me it was a giant turnoff. Although Robert Stone has a very elegant vocabulary it was clearly wasted in this book. Time and again I had absolutely no idea what he was talking about. He just seemed to ramble on and on about something and it was unclear to me just what point he was trying to make. I guess you had to be there to understand. Or perhaps it is a book for druggies by a druggie. In any case, in the final analysis I learned precious little from this book nor did I gain much insight about the period Stone was writing about.
Chalk this one up as a major dissappointment. Not recommended.

ho hum.......2007-05-04

Ask me what this book is about, and I can only reply, "some guy."

Every now and then I buy a book that makes me regret spending the money. This was one of them. I was under the impression that Remembering the Sixties would be more about life in general during a great time -- a memoir that would make me think, "Oh, yeah...I remember that!"

This is definitely NOT that kind of book. I put this book down after reading half of it. It just doesn't "take off." It took too much effort to read as far as I did, so I doubt I will even finish it (a rarity for me).

I find Mr. Stone's writing to be more of a display of his vast knowledge of vocabulary. It is very impressive; but, unfortunately, it is also a distraction. The writing just doesn't flow smoothly, and I often found myself thinking, "Great words, but just what are you trying to say?"

Readers' attention gets drawn to the uncommon -- but great -- words. The content then becomes lost; and, in this book, one must be careful to hold onto what little content there may be.

Sorry, Mr. Stone. Your book is just not for me. Oh, and by the way...
There is a typographical error in the second paragraph in first chapter: "...the Navy had patched together the Arneb as America's contibution." (An early-on typo is a real turn-off!)

If you can remember the Sixties this well, well..........2007-04-30

The clliched quip, "If you can remember the Sixties you weren't really there," gets a firm refutation here. That may be the only good news. The bad news is that so little of what Stone has to offer here is worth remembering. Sure, there is no point in lying about the Sixties, or making up stories just to sound good, but a litany of drugs (covering a wide range), alcohol, infidelity, a bad movie, mindless jobs, and cheap apartments obscures a writing talent and any truly enjoyable reflection on the era. If you are looking for nostalgia, this isn't going to provide much meaningful insight or satisfaction, just primarily name and drug dropping. If you are looking for a stream-of-consciousness, muddled, trail through the fortgettable parts of the Sixties, you might find this to be of interest.

At Canaan's Edge: America in the King Years, 1965-68 (America in the King Years)

Average customer rating:

Thank you, J. Edgar
Death & Transfiguration
Must read for students if the civil rights movement
must read for all americans
Bringing Reality to History

At Canaan's Edge: America in the King Years, 1965-68 (America in the King Years)
Taylor Branch
Manufacturer: Simon & Schuster
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Ethnic & National | Biographies & Memoirs | Subjects | Books

Civil Rights & Liberties | Current Events | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books

Human Rights | Constitutional Law | Law | Subjects | Books
Similar Items:

ASIN: 0684857138

Amazon.com

One of the greatest of American stories has found its great chronicler in Taylor Branch. Beginning with Parting the Waters in 1988, followed 10 years later by Pillar of Fire, and closing now with At Canaan's Edge, Branch has given the short life of Martin Luther King Jr. and the nonviolent revolution he led the epic treatment they deserve. The three books of Branch's America in the King Years trilogy are lyrical and dramatic, social history as much as biography, woven from the ever more complex strands of King's movement, with portraits of figures like Lyndon Johnson, Bob Moses, J. Edgar Hoover, and Diane Nash as compelling as that of his central character.

King's movement may have been nonviolent, but his times were not, and each of Branch's volumes ends with an assassination: JFK, then Malcolm X, and finally King's murder in Memphis. We know that's where At Canaan's Edge is headed, but it starts with King's last great national success, the marches for voting rights in Selma, Alabama, in 1965. Once again, the violent response to nonviolent protest brought national attention and support to King's cause, and within months his sometime ally Lyndon Johnson was able to push through the Voting Rights Act. But alongside those events, forces were gathering that would pull King's movement apart and threaten his national leadership. The day after Selma's "Bloody Sunday," the first U.S. combat troops arrived in South Vietnam, while five days after the signing of the Voting Rights Act, the Watts riots began in Los Angeles. As the escalating carnage in Vietnam and the frustrating pace of reform at home drove many in the movement, most notably Stokely Carmichael, away from nonviolence, King kept to his most cherished principle and followed where its logic took him: to war protests that broke his alliance with Johnson and to a widening battle against poverty in the North as well as the South that caused both critics and allies to declare his movement unfocused and irrelevant.

Branch knows that you can't tell King's story without following these many threads, and he spends nearly as much time in Johnson's war councils as he does in the equally fractious meetings of King's Southern Christian Leadership Conference. Branch's knotty, allusive style can be challenging, but it vividly evokes the density of those days and the countless demands on King's manic stoicism. The whirlwind finally slows in the book's final pages for a bittersweet tour through King's last hours at the Lorraine Motel--King horsing around with his brother and friends and calling his mother (in between visits to his mistresses), Jesse Jackson rehearsing movement singers, an FBI agent watching through binoculars from across the street--that complete his work of humanizing a great man forever in danger of flattening into an icon. --Tom Nissley

Timeline of a Trilogy

Taylor Branch's America in the King Years series is both a biography of Martin Luther King and a history of his age. No timeline can do justice to its wide cast of characters and its intricate web of incident, but here are some of the highlights, which might be useful as a scorecard to the trilogy's nearly 3,000 pages.

King The King Years

Parting the Waters: America in the King Years, 1954-63

May: At age 25, King gives his first sermon as pastor-designate of Montgomery's Dexter Avenue Baptist Church. 1954 May: French surrender to Viet Minh at Dien Bien Phu. Unanimous Supreme Court decision in Brown v. Board outlaws segregated public education.

December: Rosa Parks is arrested for refusing to give up her seat on a public bus, leading to the Montgomery bus boycott, which King is drafted to lead. 1955

October: King spends his first night in jail, following his participation in an Atlanta sit-in. 1960 February: Four students attempting to integrate a Greensboro, North Carolina, lunch counter spark a national sit-in movement.
April: The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee is founded.
November: Election of President John F. Kennedy

May: The Freedom Rides begin, drawing violent responses as they challenge segregation throughout the South. King supports the riders during an overnight siege in Montgomery. 1961 July: SNCC worker Bob Moses arrives for his first summer of voter registration in rural Mississippi.
August: East German soldiers seal off West Berlin behind the Berlin Wall.

March: J. Edgar Hoover authorizes the bugging of Stanley Levinson, King's closest white advisor. 1962 September: James Meredith integrates the University of Mississippi under massive federal protection.

April: King, imprisoned for demonstrating in Birmingham, writes the "Letter from Birmingham Jail."
May: Images of police violence against marching children in Birmingham rivet the country.
August: King delivers his "I Have a Dream" speech before hundreds of thousands at the March on Washington.
September: The Ku Klux Klan bombing of Birmingham's 16th Street Baptist Church kills four young girls. 1963 June: Mississippi NAACP leader Medgar Evers assassinated.
November: President Kennedy assassinated.

Pillar of Fire: America in the King Years, 1963-65

November: Lyndon Johnson, in his first speech before Congress as president, promises to push through Kennedy's proposed civil rights bill.

March: King meets Malcolm X for the only time during Senate filibuster of civil rights legislation.
June: King joins St. Augustine, Florida, movement after months of protests and Klan violence.
October: King awarded the Nobel Peace Prize and campaigns for Johnson's reelection.
November: Hoover calls King "the most notorious liar in the country" and the FBI sends King an anonymous "suicide package" containing scandalous surveillance tapes. 1964 January: Johnson announces his "War on Poverty."
March: Malcolm X leaves the Nation of Islam following conflict with its leader, Elijah Muhammad.
June: Hundreds of volunteers arrive in the South for SNCC's Freedom Summer, three of whom are soon murdered in Philadelphia, Mississippi.
July: Johnson signs Civil Rights Act outlawing discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, or national origin.
August: Congress passes Gulf of Tonkin resolution authorizing military force in Vietnam. Democratic National Convention rebuffs the request by the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party to be seated in favor of all-white state delegation.
November: Johnson wins a landslide reelection.

January: King's first visit to Selma, Alabama, where mass meetings and demonstrations will build through the winter. 1965 February: Malcolm X speaks in Selma in support of movement, three weeks before his assassination in New York by Nation of Islam members.

At Canaan's Edge: America in the King Years, 1965-68

March: Voting rights movement in Selma peaks with "Bloody Sunday" police attacks and, two weeks later, a successful march of thousands to Montgomery.
August: King rebuffed by Los Angeles officials when he attempts to advocate reforms after the Watts riots. March: First U.S. combat troops arrive in South Vietnam. Johnson's "We Shall Overcome" speech makes his most direct embrace of the civil rights movement.
May: Vietnam "teach-in" protest in Berkeley attracts 30,000.
June: Influential federal Moynihan Report describes the "pathologies" of black family structure.
August: Johnson signs the Voting Rights Act. Five days later, the Watts riots begin in Los Angeles.

January: King moves his family into a Chicago slum apartment to mark his first sustained movement in a Northern city.
June: King and Stokely Carmichael continue James Meredith's March Against Fear after Meredith is shot and wounded. Carmichael gives his first "black power" speech.
July: King's marches for fair housing in Chicago face bombs, bricks, and "white power" shouts. 1966 February: Operation Rolling Thunder, massive U.S. bombing of North Vietnam, begins.
May: Stokely Carmichael wins the presidency of SNCC and quickly turns the organization away from nonviolence.
October: National Organization for Women founded, modeled after black civil rights groups.

April: King's speech against the Vietnam War at New York's Riverside Church raises a storm of criticism
December: King announces plans for major campaign against poverty in Washington, D.C., for 1968. 1967 May: Huey Newton leads Black Panthers in armed demonstration in California state assembly.
June: Johnson nominates former NAACP lawyer Thurgood Marshall to the Supreme Court.
July: Riots in Newark and Detroit.
October: Massive mobilization against the Vietnam War in Washington, D.C.

March: King joins strike of Memphis sanitation workers.
April: King gives his "Mountaintop" speech in Memphis. A day later, he is assassinated at the Lorraine Motel. 1968 January: In Tet Offensive, Communist guerillas stage a surprise coordinated attack across South Vietnam.
March: Johnson cites divisions in the country over the war for his decision not to seek reelection in 1968.

Book Description

At Canaan's Edge concludes America in the King Years, a three-volume history that will endure as a masterpiece of storytelling on American race, violence, and democracy. Pulitzer Prize-winner and bestselling author Taylor Branch makes clear in this magisterial account of the civil rights movement that Martin Luther King, Jr., earned a place next to James Madison and Abraham Lincoln in the pantheon of American history.

Customer Reviews:

Thank you, J. Edgar .......2007-05-27

This is the third book in Taylor Branch's masterful series on Martin Luther King and his times, but don't feel you have to read the first two before picking this one up. I read the second volume, Pillar of Fire : America in the King Years 1963-65 (America in the King Years) before the first, Parting the Waters : America in the King Years 1954-63 (America in the King Years) and managed to survive. Each book stands on its own as a masterful work of historical scholarship and dramatic narrative.
One difference for me is that this third volume is the first in the series that records events I can actually remember. It is astonishing to think of how dramatically America has changed in my lifetime, and how much of that change is the result of Rev. King's courage. In a recent biography of Alexander Hamilton it was suggested that Hamilton may have been the most important American who had never become President, and he was more important than most Presidents. A similar case can be made for King.
Rev. King is obviously central to the book, but the book offers vivid portraits of his colleagues Andrew Young, Julian Bond and the ever ambitious Jesse Jackson; rivals such as Stokely Carmichael and partner/rival Lyndon Johnson as well as Bobby Kennedy.
During the time described in this book, the Vietnam war escalated to such a level that it overwhelmed the civil rights story as the central news story of the day. King grappled with the issue, and with taking on a President he regarded as the "best civil rights president in history". His conflict between his obligation as an advocate of non-violence to speak out against the war and his civil rights work at home make for some of the most compelling reading in the book and show how it tore the movement apart. Newspaper columnist Carl Rowan is seen blasting King for his criticism of the U.S. Army, which was (and perhaps still is) the most effectively integrated institution in the country.
It is impossible to read this book, especially the sections relating to Vietnam, and not reflect on the current circumstances in Iraq. The most startling difference is in the character of the central players in the White House. Johnson's grappling with the issues in Vietnam, struggling to find a solution to stop the killing before eventually realizing the only possible solution involves him standing down, is a startling contrast to our current smirking, self-centered, political hack of a commander-in-chief.
Another contrast with our times is to realize that in many ways, King's civil rights work in the South was a campaign against terrorism. We are so busy patting ourselves on the back with the idea that "it can't happen here" we forget that our history includes numerous homegrown terrorist organizations like the Ku Klux Klan. In general, the book recalls a time when people could look to the federal government to be a problem solver.
Finally, a word of thanks to J. Edgar Hoover, the paranoid cross dresser who seems to have tapped half the phone lines in America during his interminable time as director of the FBI. (Okay, so the book also recalls a time when the feds were an active part of the problem - it is a full, nuanced portrait of a complicated time.) The fact that Branch was able to rely on first hand conversations for so much of his material clearly added a lot to this remarkable book.

Death & Transfiguration .......2007-03-15

This third and final volume of Branch Taylor's trilogy is of all the three the most unambiguously tragic. At times, reading the previous two volumes, I was so heartbroken at the succession of tragic setbacks in the movement that I wondered when and where the great, decisive victories against segregation ended. And ACE is of all the three the one with the most devastating setbacks. It leaves one to ponder if the Civil Rights Movement eventually achieved its immediate goals so sweepingly precisely because the white power structure finally recognized --so to speak--that those goals were compatible with its continued flourishing.

For readers interesting in buying this book: bear in mind that this trilogy is to all intents and purposes a biography of Martin Luther King, Jr. It is NOT a hagiography; Branch frequently mentions the roiling emotions and infidelities of MLK. When contemporary observers remark that a particular appearance or speech fell flat, Branch says so. Perhaps Branch knows this narrative technique is more effective at inspiring admiration than unalloyed praise would have been; perhaps not. But in truth, it's difficult to imagine any sensitive reader not being filled with wonder that such a moral giant like King could even exist.

Rather than duplicate the effort of the other reviewers (particularly the excellent review by G. Bestick, posted below on January 24, 2006), I want to comment on something that has not been addressed by the others. I believe the single most important theme in the trilogy was the exposition of King's doctrine of "nonviolence." I use quotes because "nonviolence" is such an inadequate word to describe the doctrine. Elsewhere, Branch alludes to King's opposition to "enemy-ism," in which King rejects lines of reasoning that culminate in demonization or vilification of one's adversaries. First, King's doctrine acknowledged the common humanity of all people; humans deviated in different paths of moral conduct depending on reasons that are compelling--perhaps irresistible--at the time. Perpetrators are also victims. Second, the resolution of injustice through violence was untenable; the oppressor in any relationship would always win any challenge that employed violence, if for no other reason than because the victorious liberator would become a new oppressor. Third, the practice of nonviolence required unusual discipline and courage, and King was able to transmit the latter through the force of his oratory.

In POF (please see my review for that, also), the rival doctrine was belligerent posturing as practiced by the Nation of Islam and by the segregationist authorities. The upheaval of the '64 elections tended to reflect the loss of face of an earlier generation of white elites, and their replacement by redneck "enforcers." While the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) remained true to the principles of nonviolence, a major ally, the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) repudiated nonviolence in favor of Black Power. The new SNCC was utterly ineffectual and quickly vanished. The Black Panthers was doomed from the start with its scorn of all "white" ideologies and its lack of any coherent replacement. New converts to the ideology of self-defensive violence like Charles Evers could not even bring themselves to target known killers; Byron de la Beckwith, universally known to have murdered Ever's brother Medgar, was never threatened by the SNCC.

White supremacist violence now became endemic; before, there were exceptional cases such as the 9/15/63 bombing of a church in Birmingham; but cases of ambush and murder proliferated dramatically after 1965. The destabilization of white supremacist violence now challenged the very survival of American institutions and Southern police forces increasingly intervened against their former Klan allies.

Looming over everything was the Vietnam War, which for King was the most urgent injustice he faced. Johnson hated the war (Stanley Karnow's *Vietnam* confirms this) but was unable to accept defeat in it; King was unable to compromise with a known evil, and the most conservative 60% of white American public opinion dreaded facing up to an unbeatable foe. Frustration and ambient racism further stimulated conservative support for the war, while the fiscal woes inflicted by the war extinguished every remaining trace of Johnson's Great Society. The failure of progressive initiatives, when void of King's own nonviolent doctrines, was universal and inevitable. At the time of his death, King was not so much defeated or even overwhelmed, as he was offset in a floodtide of squalid reaction.

After King, the depressing deluge; and after that, his stunning achievements, like a field of tulip bulbs, bloomed amid the receding glacier. But the triumph of nonviolence was like the glimmers of lightning in a summer electric storm, flashing without warning in random corners of the sky.

Must read for students if the civil rights movement.......2007-03-03

If you are a student of the civil rights movement in particular or the 1960s in general you must read Taylor Branch's book on Martin Luther King. The book guides you momement by moment through King's hardfought but peaceful successes at Montomery & Selma and throughout the South and as the movement moved north with less than peaceful outcomes in Watts, Detroit, New Jersey, etc. Very interesting and insightful read.

must read for all americans.......2007-02-18

this is one of the best history books i've ever read. in fact, it transcends the history genre. canaan's edge is first and foremost about one of the most courageous men in american history -- martin luther king jr. of course, king didn't lead the 60's civil rights movement by himself -- branch's book shows the courage of many people known and unknown.
it also casts other historical figures in a new light. primary among these, for me, is lyndon johnson, who comes thru in these pages as a brave supporter of civil rights, whose civil rights record was eclipsed by his mistakes with the vietnam war. beautifully written, moving, filled with people and powerful vignettes, this is a must read for all americans.

Bringing Reality to History.......2006-12-06

For many who were young during the turbulent 60s, this era has a mythical feel to it. Great figures have been romanticized, whether it was Kennedy and Camelot or Martin Luther King, Jr. and "I Have a Dream." Taylor Branch has found a way to bring reality to those tales. He refuses to glamorize his subject; refuses to sanitize his main character. For an epic look at a story smack in the epicenter of American history, "At Canaan's Edge" is the place to stand.

Reviewer: Bob Kellemen, Ph.D., is the author of Beyond the Suffering: Embracing the Legacy of African American Soul Care and Spiritual Direction.

Average customer rating:

Nice coffee table book
Far Out
good hippie book
One flower short of a bouquet
Great look, terrible text

Hippie
Barry Miles
Manufacturer: Sterling
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

Modern | Schools, Periods & Styles | Arts & Photography | Subjects | Books

General | Arts & Photography | Subjects | Books

20th Century | World | History | Subjects | Books

Social History | Historical Study | History | Subjects | Books

ASIN: 1402714424

Book Description

It’s the celebration of an era. At a mind-blowing price, this ultimate, beautiful, illuminating, and really groovy look at the 1960s counterculture is rich in illustrations and filled with the history, politics, sayings, and slogans that defined the age. For those who were there, this volume will flash them back. For those who weren’t, they’ll wish they had been.

Sex, drugs, and rock and roll; peace rallies and riots in the ghettos; Flower Power, Black Power, and Gay Power; Mothers of Invention and Women’s Liberation; Woodstock, Monterey Pop, and Altamont. It was the best of times, it was the worst of times: it all depends on whom you ask. But without a doubt the hippies transformed society. Every significant moment of the era comes vibrantly alive once again in psychedelic images, rare portraits of writers and musicians, dynamite poster and album artwork, and photographic records of political events that shook the world. Hundreds of unforgettable quotations come from seminal figures such as Ken Kesey, Timothy Leary, Grace Slick and George Harrison. Proceeding year by year from 1965 to 1971, Hippie gives an unprecedented degree of shape and coherence to an age—that is kaleidoscopically astounding.

Barry Miles was a central figure in the counterculture milieu. He wrote Paul McCartney: Many Years from Now, as well as The Beatles: A Diary; contributed to I Want to Take You Higher, the Rock Music Hall of Fame’s chronicle of psychedelic music. The Sixties is Miles’ own memoir of the decade.

Customer Reviews:

Nice coffee table book.......2007-06-12

That's actually a very nice coffee table book with amazing pictures and good stories. Good for random "excursions" into the era of the hippie movement and the love generation. I also liked a lot the print quality. Overall, strongly recommended if you're looking for a coffee table book. If you are looking for a more detailed narrative, "The Haight-Ashbury: A History", by Charles Perry, might be more appropriate.

Far Out.......2007-06-01

I just received this book at work and quickly went through it, I noticed some reviewers were not that happy about the way it was written, considering the price and wealth of original illustrations and images this is a must have for anyone who is interested in the counterculture, looking at the images alone can give you a feel of a whole era, I loved it

good hippie book.......2007-05-22

This book is great. I loved all the pictures and information. I even got an idea from the book for my wedding! I love the hippie lifestyle!

One flower short of a bouquet.......2007-01-02

Great photos, but not a great read. Still, it's fun. Get it cheap...
Barnes & Noble recently marked it down to $5.

Great look, terrible text.......2006-12-11

I very much wanted to like this book. And I do, for the pictures, for the quotes, and for the book itself, which is nicely sized, has great cover art, and a satisfying heft. However, the writting itself is terrible.

The style of the writting could be generously called journalistic. Miles, the author, is not a writer, and his tone is that of someone dictating a grocery list, and thus the text fails to express any of the excitement and vitality which it describes.

Furthermore, there are numerous factual errors and lapses in editing. For example, San Francisco's big park is Golden Gate Park, not Central Park. To walk from SF's Filmore to Golden Gate Park, you have to walk west, not east (actually, more north-west, but let's not quibble). In terms of editing, there were several mispellings and typos, including the consistant use of quotation marks (") instead of apostropheses ('). Thus "David's" becomes "David"s." This is very sloppy editing. Was this book done on the cheap, or in a great hurry?

However, the book is only $14.95, and the pictures alone are worth the price. However, just don't buy it expecting much in terms of the writting.

Ultimate Sacrifice: John and Robert Kennedy, the Plan for a Coup in Cuba, and the Murder of JFK

Average customer rating:

A BETTER UNDERSTANDING OF WHAT HAPPENED
Too Many Unsubstantiated Facts Leading Nowhere
Worth the time
The Mafia Did It: A Script and Play Written By CIA Productions Inc.
Very Interesting

Ultimate Sacrifice: John and Robert Kennedy, the Plan for a Coup in Cuba, and the Murder of JFK
Lamar Waldron , and Thom Hartmann
Manufacturer: Carroll & Graf
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Essays | Historical Study | History | Subjects | Books

Conspiracy Theories | Current Events | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books
Similar Items:

ASIN: 0786718323

Book Description

Cuba's number 2 official today — Commander Juan Almeida — was secretly working with JFK in November 1963 to overthrow Fidel. The US government recently revealed Almeida's work for JFK, allowing the updated trade paperback of Ultimate Sacrifice to tell the full story for the first time (complete with new photos and documents).
The authors obtained the story from almost two dozen associates of John and Robert Kennedy, starting in 1990 with JFK's Secretary of State Dean Rusk. Their accounts are supported by thousands of newly-released files at the National Archives.
Almeida's "palace coup" set for December 1, 1963, was to be backed up by US forces "invited" in by Commander Almeida, then Chief of the Cuban Army. However, three Mafia bosses being targeted by Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy used several CIA assets to infiltrate the secret plot and murder JFK.
This resulted in cover-ups by officials like RFK and LBJ, to prevent the exposure of Almeida and a possible nuclear confrontation with the Soviets. The new edition explains why Almeida was not a double agent, why Fidel suspected Almeida's ally Che Guevara, and what Fidel did in 1990 when he finally found out about Almeida's work for JFK.

Customer Reviews:

A BETTER UNDERSTANDING OF WHAT HAPPENED.......2007-10-16

A clear, understandable recital of the facts. Well documented.
One of the best-if not the best,I've read on the subject.
There is a great deal of material, but can be digested.
Clear and precise in showing WHY and HOW things happened on Nov 22, 1963.

Too Many Unsubstantiated Facts Leading Nowhere.......2007-09-13

As with most books about the JFK Assassination, 'Ultimate Sacrifice' suffers from its own evangelism; having decided on a theory, the authors opt for proselytizing over objectivity. Authors Waldron and Hartmann start by taking themselves and their theory much too seriously, trying to convince the reader of the correctness of their conclusions by presenting a gigantic load of so called facts to overwhelm the reader. Most of these "facts", however, are far from substantiated, coming as they are from the usual secondary sources rather than original research, while ignoring much good evidence that detract from them.

There are way too many assumptions of unproven allegations in this book for me to take the authors' conclusions seriously, despite the new evidence they provide from some admirable original research to try to back them up. To take just a few examples:

1. The authors accept without question that Oswald was an American agent before he went to Russia. They cite the usual suspicious, yet inconclusive evidence about this such as the 'phony' suicide attempt, Oswald seen with unsavory characters while in Japan, an alleged false defector program the US was supposed to have run, and just the general feeling that it seems to make sense. And yet, the authors completely ignore the much greater evidence opposed to this inference found in the well-researched chapters on Oswald's time in Russia in the Mailer biography, much of it coming from KGB sources who had been watching him constantly. Indeed, not one shred of spy-like behavior was made evident too them by their subject during his entire stay.

2. The authors believe Oswald did not take his Marxism seriously, but was only pretending to be a true believer as part of his cover. Were this true, Oswald must have been the best method actor of all time, never getting out of character, even with his wife and close friends. And oh yes, all those commie books in his room were `planted'. Amazing analysis!

3. The authors decide to accept with little question the interpretation of the ambiguous ballistic and medical data of the assassination that best fits their theory, namely that the fatal shot came from the Grassy Knoll, while discounting the Single Bullet theory. Once more they completely neglect the most scientific data available that counters this notion: the Barger Acoustic analysis done during the HSCA hearings. Nor do they cite the excellent analysis of the first shots in the Zapruder film done for the Frontline special on Oswald that clearly shows the flap of Connelly's collar being flipped up as the bullet -- the same bullet that emerged from Kennedy's throat -- passes through into his shoulder.

There is much more of this type of thing, too much so for me to find much value in what evidence the authors do present. I say this believing indeed that JFK was assassinated as the result of a conspiracy involving elements of Cosa Nostra and CIA. But the breadth of scope of their arguments is just too much for the lack of depth of the evidence they provide.

Do not mistake me, there is some value in this book. The research on the Tampa and Chicago threats is intriguing. The details on the CIA-Mafia assassination plots is both informative and believable. And the presentation of Ruby's ties to Organize crime is the most convincing and thorough I have seen. Unfortunately, when the authors try to cover all the mysterious associations of Johnny Roselli, the Mafia point man on the assassination, they mainly rely on a single secondary source, All American Mafioso by Charles Rappleye and Ed Becker while completely neglecting to cite the most curious close friendship he maintained with top CIA officer William K. Harvey, point man for Executive Action assassinations, until his death. The same tactic of using a very small number of JFK assassination books to back up their arguments is used to show the actions and meaningfull associations of the other mobsters involved in the conspiracy as well.

What is needed in the field of JFK assassination research is not more rehash of old and untested data to backup new conspiracy theories, but a well constructed analysis focused on manageable areas of the assassination using original research, including validating rather than blindly accepting evidence cited in previous works. At times Ultimate Sacrifice does attempt this, but far too seldom; and in the end, the books bites off more than it can chew and concludes very little.

Worth the time.......2007-08-16

I finished this book. Took awhile, but did it. Close to 900 pages. "We'll explain further in another chapter," or words to that effect were sprinkled throughout and wore thin, but explain they did. I've wondered, over the years, why RFK wasn't more aggressive about pursuing the truth and why he presented obstacles to Garrison's investigation, etc--and this book explains all that and more. The theories make sense, and the documentation is laid out nicely. And next to Bugliosi's bag of hot air and overwrought opinion, Ultimate Sacrifice looks even more important. I see it's now available in paperback, so the investment is halved. I'd say it surely deserves a spot on serious researchers' shelves.

The Mafia Did It: A Script and Play Written By CIA Productions Inc........2007-07-26

This is a difficult book for one to get his head around. Not only because the subject matter unfolds like a reverse Russian Doll - as each new puzzle is opened, a larger more interesting one with an even deeper subtext emerges -- but also because of the artful ambiguity with which the source documents (upon which the story is based) makes themselves an integral part of the plot itself.

This is my fourth attempt at writing a review, the first two having been rejected out of hand; and although the third was accepted; mercifully it too was later withdrawn after I tried to amend it several times. However, if this one is accepted, after my third reading of the book, I will not be amending it.

Prologue

As an integral whole, there is yet another way to view the JFK assassination story told here. Imagine it to be an intramural chess game between competing teams within the U.S. government. On one side are the Kennedy brothers, whose goal is C-Day and presumably a return of Cuba to a free and independent state. On the other side, are the anti-Kennedy forces which includes: the front line of the CIA, the mob, J. Edgar Hoover and the FBI, the moneyed anti-Kennedy interests, primarily centered in Texas, and the state of Israel. The goal of side B is to checkmate the Kennedys, using C-Day as the cornerstone of the cover-up.

Each side has an array of forces and assets to deploy during the course of the game. And while the pawns, or minor pieces are interchangeable (and consist of Cuban exiles, low-level FBI and CIA operatives, Mafia, hired foreign assassins and their related patsies) the heavy artillery, or the pieces on the back rows of the respective sides, are not. The Kennedys have as their heavier artillery: the U.S. State Department, key executive advisors, various aspects of DOJ, and disparate elements of the intelligence community, including DIA. Importantly, neither the CIA nor the FBI are reliable major pieces for the Kennedy side, but the Kennedys seem to be unaware of this unreliability. Both sides also have at their discretion use of the press to either signal or conceal their respective side's motives and strategies.

The heavy artillery for the anti-JFK side include the middle echelon of the Mafia, namely, Santos Trafficante, Carlos Marcellos, John Roselli, and Sam Giancana; the upper hierarchy of the CIA itself, namely, Richard Helms, William Harvey, Desmond Fitzgerald, James Jesus Angleton, Colonel Sheffield Edwards, E. Howard Hunt, and David Atlee Phillips. At an even higher echelon of movers and shakers, (above the level of the government)