MixedThe Star TribuneThe Heartland is awash in interesting and fresh information. Hoganson’s thesis, however, is not entirely persuasive. Readers sympathetic to conventional wisdom about the Midwest may see little in the book to convince them that the region is not more insulated and isolated, stable and inward-looking than other places in the United States. Nor does Hoganson make a compelling case that her accounts of searches for products and markets, weather forecasting and birds provide bricks in the edifice of American imperialism. That said, Hoganson is surely right that some aspects of the heartland myth are better left behind.
