RaveThe New York Journal of Books... gripping ... Donner, a great-great-niece of Mildred, writes with clarity and intensity of purpose. She does not hold back in presenting the gruesome realities of life in Nazi Germany. Her descriptions regarding the last days for Mildred, forced to live and then beheaded in the squalor of the Ravensbrück concentration camp (exclusively for women) north of Berlin, are graphic; but they are also accurate and truthful, even in the revelation of what happened to the lifeless bodies of Mildred and many other tortured women convicted of various crimes ... Donner decided not to follow strict chronology in developing her story line. The effect is to build suspense, even as she introduces a host of interesting characters ... an exceptionally well-crafted book. The story line will keep readers turning pages, perhaps even hoping that by some positive twist of fate Mildred, Arvid, and others involved in their resistance Circle will survive. That they didn’t does not mean that they failed, rather that they nobly tried to succeed, as dramatically and poignantly presented by Rebecca Donner in this very moving and thoughtful book.
Matthew Lockwood
PanThe New York Journal of BooksThese biographical portraits can be vivid or confusing, depending on what the author wants the reader to learn from his twisting and turning storylines ... Readers will need to keep factors of basic logic in mind should they choose to pore through these pages. Considering the fallacy of post hoc, ergo propter hoc, did all these global developments happen just because the American Revolution took place? Does the author actually present evidence that proves rather than just asserts direct connections? And what about causal explanations that reach beyond the mechanistic, blame game determinism that pervades in this study? ... Is it possible that the Revolution resulted in any positive outcomes for the world? Thomas Paine thought so when composing Common Sense. He viewed the autocratic old world as overrun by corruption, and he hoped the Revolution would serve as a model of liberation for peoples everywhere. That the author decided to ignore this broadened likelihood, to stand alongside his negative presentation, marks To Begin the World Over Again as a book much narrower in scope, vision, content, and interpretive value than it could have been.
Christopher Edmonds
RaveThe New York Journal of BooksMany stories have survived about acts of heroism in World War II. This book beautifully captures one of these events ... encompasses a powerful story about human brotherhood and comradeship reckoning with—and overcoming—the evil realities of Hitler’s Nazi regime. We should all be grateful that Roddie’s wartime diaries did survive to become the basis for this very thoughtful and engaging book.
Martha Saxton
MixedNew York Journal of BooksThe Widow Washington represents an engaging, although not a necessarily convincing new portrait of George Washington’s mother ... Saxton can’t quite make up her mind whether she admires or just feels sorry for Mary, living as she did in an era when slavery dominated as an accepted labor system in Virginia ... The author bounces around in presenting her findings, with topics often abruptly changing from paragraph to paragraph. Moreover, the text is full of speculation as to what Mary was doing and thinking at any given moment ... readers may question whether Mary was nothing more than a victim of an insensitive patriarchal social order or an irritable woman full of agency who deeply loved her famous son but felt starved for more attention from him. The proper answer is still waiting to be determined.
