RaveThe New York Times Book Review... [a] luminous guide to a tumultuous decade ... Boyle elegantly narrates the ’60s through his three lenses—race, militarism and sexuality—and The Shattering wears its scholarship lightly. Still, there are some things he might have done differently. His early chapters sketch the background decades but try to cover too much ground and end up disjointed. He also might have made less of the War on Poverty’s original intention ... But these are all small challenges on the margins of Boyle’s bright narrative.
Deirdre Bair
PositiveThe New York Times Book ReviewBair discovers a rich trove of legends — one that reverberates with the romance of ethnic America four and five generations removed from the immigrants themselves. But that’s the problem: The living relatives are too young to shed much light on the gangster and his times ... Where Bair makes a major contribution is not so much in retelling the Capone legends but in reappraising them. She deftly sifts through the famous stories for half-truths and fictions ... Bair is a wise and often iconoclastic guide through Capone mythology.
