Sunday, October 07, 2007

On... the Path Between the Seas by David McCullough

This book is not for the light-hearted, fair-weather history reader. While David McCullough writes many books that appeal to a much larger audience than most historians this book is thick and very full of information.

I suppose that it was a little more difficult to read this book because I'm not familiar with the subject in any way at all. Of course I know about the Panama Canal but not much about the building (the main theme of the book).

There isn't one central character...unless one counts the Canal itself... so many names flow in and out of the book. I often had to flip back to reacquaint myself with a character if the name (usually the last name) reappears.

I learned an awful lot about the building of the canal and about David McCulough's writing style. I'm amazed at the amount of knowledge this man has if he can write a 600 thoroughly researched book in a subject area that is not his area of expertise. (That would be the American Revolution).

1 comment:

Joyful Days said...

It is interesting just because you mention the Canal might be actually a character. I've recently started reading a lot of historical fiction. I'll see if it is at the library.