The Unknown American Revolution

It wasn't quite as good as I'd hoped--I found it a little difficult to follow because I wasn't familiar with the period to start with, apart from a little bit of general knowledge. It expects you to know the events of the main 'American Revolution' (why is it a revolution and not a war of independence? When I lived in America it was referred to as the American War of Independence. All of a sudden it's the American Revolution...). I did make notes, and they are slightly less confusing than the ones I did for the Origins of the Second World War would be, but I read a large chunk of it in the car and that made it hard to make notes so I kinda gave up.

Anyway, here goes.

Roots of the Revolution: Jailbreaks at Newark. Yeoman farmers were asserting their claims to land. The New Jersey land system was very confused. Scottish proprietiers tried to assert their rights, which led to violent dispute. Erupted mid 1740s. The gentry saw it as treason against the crown, especially when they were threatened with house-pulling (basically what it says on the tin--a mob would get a bunch of ropes and collapse the house). The yeoman argued that they'd improved it so it was their land. There were religious tensions between the two groups as well--the gentry were Anglican, the yeoman more radical. The Awakeners preached antimaterialism and condemned the rich. There were tenant revolts in New Work, North and South Carolina and Vermont. The case against the monarchy and aristocracy was being built. Christ's Poor was a group full of enthusiasm, with a message that God did not operate through clergy and aristocracy, but through all. There was anger over the fact that people with no formal teaching started to teach others. The group appealed to slaves. Ministers feared that they would take moral license. The Declaration of Rights in Virginia 1776 guaranteed religious freedom. "Little Carpenter's Dilemma"--Cherokee-English alliance had been in place, but coming to an end in 1750s. 7 Years War led to breakdown in relations (this book kept coming back to the issue of Native Americans, suggesting that it was a kind of double war, with a background of settler v native fights going on).
"The Mobbish Turn" in Boston (Massachusetts). Town meetings there allowed low social ranks to outvote gentlemen (basically, they had a bit of a democracy going already). There were huge protests over attempts to press gang men into Royal Navy ships. The Militia was called in toturn away rioting crowd, but most were part of the crowd already. Boston was nearly bombarded, but it was averted after the release of townsmen. 'Independent Advisor'--a newspaper for labourers--was launched in 1748. Leveller sentiments were echoed in it. There was a general fear that the town meetings would be overthrown in 1760.
There were problems on the frontier in Philadelphia, which poisoned the air. 20 peaceful Indians were murdered, which led to 'verbal civil war' between Quakers and Presbyterians. There were arguemetns over instituting the royal government too. Discussion everywhere, with pamphleteers using lots of strong language.
There was a general longing for freedom amongst the many slaves. Lots of slaves were held in the south, many of whom were treated badly. They worked towards freedom as best they could. This period also saw the start of a call for abolition. Lay (who was a Quaker) became determined to stop his fellow Quakers owning slaves. This work continued after his death in 1759.
The hated Stamp Act was passed on March 22 1765 (apparently this is what most people think of as the cause of the American Revolution--I thought it was to do with taxing tea and the Boston Tea Party...). Anyway, the crowds were angry because they didn't think Parliament had any right to pass an internal law. Parliament were trying to pay for the 7 Years War, and they figured it was pretty fair to get some of the money off the Americans. However, there was a bit of a mob revolt on August 14 1765, with pulling down the building to distribute stamps, then having a big bonfire and destroying the Lieutenant Governer's carriage. It spread to other areas too, and the Stamp Act enforcers homes were destroyed and they were forced to resign.

Anyway, that just gives you a bit of a flavour of the sort of stuff in the book. Wow, did you know it'd take about 2million 2 ounce packages of jell-o to fill the white house? Sorry, I was just on the nanowrimo forums... Right. Back to the book. It was quite interesting, but, like I said, difficult to follow when you don't really know the 'known' American Revolution. There was a lot about slaves, women and Native Americans in relation to the politics of the time, and very little on the fighting etc. Fairly interesting, but unless you know something to start with and want to know more about the experiences of 'ordinary' people, I wouldn't really recommend it.

The Well Between The Worlds

I got given this book as a proof copy through the Teenage Readers Group at the Harris, so I thought I'd better actually finish it. The first few chapters were tedious, backgroundy stuff. To be honest, I was highly tempted to give it up as a bad job. It was about a different world, and this guy was accused of being a monster because he fell in the sea and didn't drown, so they were going to kill him. But instead of killing him, he was rescued by another guy and taken to the big city. There he learns that they have to capture monsters from this other world. That's when it starts to get interesting, exploring the morals of exploiting these creatures, with the main character possessed of greater than usual power. I did enjoy the middle. But the ending was terrible. Imagine, if you've read Eragon, that at the end of the first book, after going through all his trials and emerging from the fight with the Shade injured but alive, Eragon decides to get on Saphira's back and fly off and leave the world to sort out its own problems. Or imagine that in Assassin's Apprentice, Fitz abruptly decides that people getting Forged is none of his business and leaves forever. Or James Adams in the Cherub series completes his training and then decides he can't be bothered to go out and be a spy and help catch criminals. It was genuinely that disappointing. I was expecting, as I got near the end, that either there would be a success in the quest, or that when it failed the stage would be set for a sequel. Instead, the character randomly decides he doesn't care any more and leaves. I was so disappointed in the ending, having got through a mediocre beginning and then enjoyed the middle. If you do end up reading this book, it's pretty good up till about the last three chapters. Just stop there and imagine that's where it finished and that there's going to be a sequel.

Too Black, Too Strong

I don't often read poetry. In fact, this is the second book of poetry I've ever read voluntarily. I just happened to see it on the shelf in the library, on a special poetry display, and I've enjoyed Benjamin Zephaniah's books since reading Refugee Boy at high school (and a couple of others after enjoying that one loads). I'd heard some of his poetry before too. Anyway, I really enjoyed it. For all the not reading poetry thing, his poetry is really good. There was a nice range of topics in his book, and it has a real ring to it. I think it's probably even better to listen to, but reading it was good. It's got a lot of rhythm to it, and the words are words that you hear everyday. It feels contemporary, as well as dealing with contemporary issues--racism, crime, life in general. I read one or two every day until I'd finished the book, quite often reading them while my computer was switching on. Unlike some poetry, it doesn't take a huge amount of effort to understand what he's saying, but it's hard-hitting, brilliant.

So, there is the first poetry review I've ever written on this blog. I'd certainly recommend it, although if you can get it on tape/cd, that would be even better.

Ice Station Zebra

I don't think I've reviewed this before, but it definitely wasn't the first time I've read it. By Alaistar MacLean, it has, like all of his book, plenty of excitement, unexpected twists, and intriguing characters. MacLean really is one of the greatest thriller writers ever--even though you'd expect his books to now feel out of date, they're still just as interesting as ever (although having seen the film of one of them, I must confess I found that one rather out of date...). This one involves a mission to the Arctic, to Ice Station Zebra, a meteorological station, in a nuclear submarine. The base has suffered a devastating fire, and the submarine is in a desperate race to find thin ice where they can surface, close enough to the Station that they can give effective rescue. But when they get there, all is not as it seems. Somebody set the fire deliberately. And of those killed, not all of them merely died from the fire. Some were shot, including the narrator's own brother.

A brilliant read, it's fast-paced throughout, and with plenty of unexpected twists. I'd certainly recommend it.

The Tiger Warrior

I enjoyed this one. The most recent by Alan Gibbons, it was brilliant. The descriptions of the 'lost' Roman legion was brilliant, and it blended the story of the ancient warriors with that of Jack Howard and his team of archaeologists. They're following in the footsteps of Jack's great-great-grandfather, in an attempt to unravel an ancient mystery. It's the fourth book in the series, and they just keep getting better. Atlantis was the first, and (amazingly for me), I've read the series in the order they were actually published, rather than in a totally random order as I've managed to find them from the library. I love the character of Jack Howard as well as the action and the descriptions of the ancient world (and the not quite so ancient world), and this book allows greater insight into his character. He's quite enigmatic, and so you find yourself rereading any detail of his former life with intense interest (or at least, I do :D). You also meet Jack's daughter for the first time (I never knew he had one... Maybe I missed something? Or maybe it's just another feature of Jack's past that he keeps quiet about.). To a certain extent, I thought Rebecca was a poor character, but that might just be in contrast with Jack who's a lot more developed. At any rate, I'd highly recommend this book and the rest in the series.

National Novel Writing Month!!

Well, on October 1st, the new Nanowrimo site launched for this year. I discovered this yesterday, when I thought I'd just go see if anything was happening. So I am now an official participant for 2009, yay! I'm quite excited. I have a story idea, based on a dream. I have one character for said story. I have a novel to finish before it gets to November, and I'm going to try and get ahead with college work/distance learning course work, so that I have more time in November to write. I'm excited already. Hopefully that doesn't mean I end up abandoning this idea and writing something else, but we'll have to see. Whatever I write, I'm sure I'll enjoy it. I have done the last two years.

If you've never done Nanowrimo, I'd really recommend it. Basically: you try and write a novel of 50000 plus words during one month, that of November. A large number of other people are writing at the same time, which is quite encouraging. I know 50000 words seems a lot, but it's definitely doable. It's only 1667 words per day. I think the first year I did it, I managed to get the words done by getting up an hour earlier in the morning, and that was it, other than typing up. Last year, I didn't get up early, I just squished it in whenever I had time, and I still managed it with time to spare (although I didn't write as much because the story finished before I got to quite as high a word count as in the first year). So yeh, it's great fun. Stories that you think started out pretty sensible/boring end up with a bazillion unexpected twists. Because you can't stop and edit, you do get interesting author's notes (NB: This character no longer exists, is the worst example from last year...). But you also get a novel length book at the end of it, and the satisfaction of having done it in a month. I wish I'd heard of Nanowrimo earlier on in my life, but I've really enjoyed it the past two years, and I've made some great friends through it and the follow on events (Nanocomo is the site I'm most active on). It makes you realise you're not the only writer in the world :D.

So yeh, go for it! It's free, it doesn't take anything but time and a keyboard (and internet access so that you can verify your wordcount and get a cool certificate). And it's fun.

The Origins of the Second World War

I was surprised at how readable this book was. Not at all dry like I was expecting. I have made notes on the first few chapters, I may as well type them up here, then at least I'll know where they are, rather than having to fish for a notebook (which I'll have to do now...). I read it through first, and then I thought I perhaps should make notes, so I went back over some of it, but didn't quite finish. Anyway, here goes...

Main theme: Hitler had no grand strategy. He allowed events to develop and then took as much advantage of them as possible. Appeasement may have been weak, but it was only viable option at times.
Key overall features of buld up to WWII: America utterly excluded by own choice. Soviet Union excluded until later on, then included by British in attempt to push Hitler into agreeing by show of solidarity. Not treated as Great Power, believed that ideological matters too divergent for such an agreement. Britain wanted to revise Versailles from start.

Actually, on second thoughts, I'll leave the typing up at that bit. The other notes probably won't make sense to anyone but me, and they're rather fragmentary.

Another interesting claim that AJP Taylor makes is that the fact reparations weren't settled straight off meant that the Germans failed to gradually come to accept them. However, I think the invasion of the Ruhr was more of a problem--the resulting hyper-inflation meant that the Germans could see that the French were causing them problems. It was easy enough to blame them. We've just been looking at Locarno, and Taylor suggests it was a bit of a nightmare. He says it led to the 'delusion' that Italy was powerful, and the pact with Mussolini undermined the British as a democractic power. Furthermore, there was the whole issue with Poland not being settled. Then he said something interesting: that it was war with the US which was the one most expected in Britain. I suppose they were having a sort of mini-naval race despite the Washington agreement.

Anyway, I found it a very interesting book, but I did not agree with AJP Taylor about everything. I don't think the alliance with Italy really undermined the democratic powers. Let's be frank--Britain has allied with various non-democracies over the years. The USA has supported dictatorships. That doesn't particularly undermine democracy.

So there you go. The Origins of the Second World War by AJP Taylor. Pretty good book, quite interesting even if you don't agree.

The Fall of Lucifer

It took me a little while to get into this book--the first few chapters were hard work and not much seemed to happen. It was a lot of setting the scene. However, I'd been told by various people that it was really good once you got into it, so I persevered, and I have to say it was worth the effort of getting through the first bit. The descriptions became very involving, and the plot was interesting. It was about, like the title says, the Fall of Lucifer. Mostly using the author's imagination, although some of it comes from the Bible too. The stuff with the DNA was interesting, although rather complicated.

It's a good read if you like fantasy. I haven't read the second yet, I don't know how soon I'll get round to it (or if I will...), but I certainly enjoyed this one.

Creative Writing Group

Well, yesterday I took the Creative Writing Group at college. It was quite interesting. I showed up pretty much exactly on time, and there were already a bunch of people in the classroom waiting! I'd hoped to get there early, but I didn't. Oops. Anyway, it went pretty okay, but everyone was so quiet at first! Maybe that was just cos I got them to read a piece of writing (that I'd done) which introduced two characters. I think I'll stick it up here in a moment. Hmm, yeh, why not?

He was in the wrong part of town. Anywhere else, he wouldn't have got a second glance, just another Birdie, one of Enlan's virtual slaves. And even here, he could have been ignored, were it not for the simple fact that he was just standing there, at the edge of Number 7's winding drive, leaning against a lamppost, large black wings draped loosely over his back, trailing against the sides of the gleaming metal.
The midday sun was bright and cold, barely burning away the layers of frost that had built up the previous night. White flakes still lingered in the shade, and everywhere puddles were built from ice. The Birdie was not dressed for the weather. He was wearing tattered jeans, the hems frayed with an inbuilt greying of grime. They were too long, probably an inch when they were new, now worn down to nearer the right length. The only concession to the weather was that the equally battered black leather jacket was zipped up fully, bulking out further the short, solid frame.

His hands were jammed in his pockets, the fingers of the left drumming against his thigh, causing the fabric to stretch and tighten. Other than that, and the odd ripple that the wind cast through his shoulder length, tightly curled black hair, he was completely still. The golden eyes were impassive, watching the road, watching the sky. He was not watching behind, but he didn't need to. He would hear anyone trying to sneak up from that direction.

There was nothing to watch at the moment, but the implacable peace of Residential District 7 did not last for long. With a well-tuned roar, a nu-kar turned into the street on which he stood. It was black, low slung, the darkly mirrored windows reflecting the expressionless face of the Birdie as it ground to a halt precisely in front of him.

It sat there, thrumming softly, for several seconds before there was any action. The rear door opened slowly, gliding to a stop at its full extension. Steam trickled out in rivulets as the warm air of the interior met the sharply frozen exterior, and a man emerged from amongst it.

He was well over a foot taller than the Birdie, and appeared twice as broad, although much of the bulk was down to the furs with which he had enveloped himself. The coat was the thick downy white of polar bear skin, the trousers peering out from beneath the long folds, visible only for about two inches just below the knee, had the sleek shine that came from butchered seals, and the boots that swallowed the bottom part were of indeterminate, though presumably animal, origin. Curled around his head was a fluffy black cat, which shifted position lazily and tightened its grip as he entered the frigid air.

“Are you aware that this is Residential District Seven?” the man asked. His voice was clipped and precise, laden with upper class overtones.

A very faint smile traced the corners of the Birdie's lips and then it was gone again.

“I shall call the police if you persist in remaining here. We cannot condone your kind coming here.”

The Birdie reached into his back product and produced an identity card. “I'm Ash Lunnoth of the LPD. You've probably heard of me.”

The man spat on the floor. “The Lunon Police Department has a better sense of propriety than to send you here. Particularly as you are doing nothing. You do realise that impersonating an officer, even if that officer is a Birdie, is not something the police approve of.” He reached into his own back pocket and withdrew a gun. “Leave. Now.”

The Birdie continued to regard him impassively, not moving from his position against the lamppost. “I am Ash Lunnoth of the LPD. We are investigating a multiple homicide with a probable gang connection.”

“Terrorists,” the man spat. “You're more likely to be one of them. Leave this area, or I will shoot.”

“That would be a mistake.”

“Wiping scum such as you off the face of the earth is never a mistake.” The man leaned in closer. “I am Governor Highton. You have presumably heard of me. I have killed dozens of Birdies, dozens. One more is not going to bother me. And if pressed, my chauffeur will back me up. It was self defence. Not that it will ever reach trial.” He pressed the gun against Ash's stomach. His eyes were a very pale blue, and they locked onto Ash's. They were not cold—they were animated, alive. He smiled, and then he screamed as Ash snapped the arm that was holding the gun with a vicious twist that forced him to drop the weapon, the crack of breaking bone loud upon the still air.

“Get back in the car and go home.” Ash was still completely calm. “Write this off to experience.”

The governor collapsed to the floor, wailing with pain. The cat, though clearly well trained, could not ignore its instinct to leap clear, and the man's head hit the floor hard. Ash grabbed the cat by the scruff of its neck and hurled it into the still open door of the nu-kar, then seized the governor roughly by the shoulder and tossing him after it.

“Take him home,” he ordered the chauffeur, before slamming the door. The nu-kar drew slowly away.

Ash flexed his hands slowly, staring into the mid distance, then shrugged and resumed his watch.

Anyway, after that I wrote some ideas on the board and had them do character profiles, and then get into pairs/threes and first work out how to get their characters to meet and then come up with a bit of dialogue based on that. Then we did a fun dialogue thing with the whole group, but we kinda ran out of time. But yeh, I think it went fairly well. I hope other people thought the same :D.

Overkill

I think I've reviewed Pandemic already, so I'm kinda skipping past that (I've definitely read it more than once...). Anyway, like I said, I'm still way way behind with regard to what I read over the summer, so I'll move onto the next on my list. By the same author.

Overkill is the first Paul Richter book, and it's brilliant! Sometimes the earlier ones aren't as good, but this one was certainly exciting. Not only was there a lot of action, there was a lot of physical movement too, with Richter travelling in a Tornado across half the world... The descriptions are top, the plot's got a good chunk of conspiracy (though not perhaps as intriguing a conspiracy as that in Pandemic), I really enjoyed it in short. Definitely one of my favourite writers.

History, History, Maths

Well, today was quite fun. I have Modern History, followed by Ancient History (after break), then lunch, then maths, and then home, yay! It's really interesting what we're doing at the moment. And kind of amusing to compare the stuff we're doing about democracy/political systems/politicians in modern regarding British foreign policy in the 20s with the radical democracy in Athens. At first I wondered why it was called 'radical'. I mean, democracy is just democracy, right? Well, their system seems pretty radical to me... Although they didn't let women have any say whatsoever :( . But that seems to be about standard (although one of the states, can't offhand remember which, did enfranchise women during the American Revolution in the late eighteenth century--obviously much later on though). Basically, everyone could go along to the Ecclesia (assuming you were an Athenian citizen, over eighteen/twenty one and male) and have a vote over the various aspects of policy. Instead of electing representatives, everything was run through the Ecclesia first, even the really mundane stuff. Quite interesting. And it was all in the open air, and by either show of hands or chucking pebbles in a box. Makes you wonder why we don't have referendums on at least some of the important issue (like the EU, hint hint Gordon Brown!). Although I am dubious about the actual realities of some of this stuff. I would so laugh if one day we realised that various people never really existed. We had a bit of a look at the trial of Socrates, and apparently, he never wrote anything down. My history teacher said he did exist, but it just makes you wonder whether Plato just invented him to explore a moral issue.

Democracy was less radical in the twentieth century. Although to their credit, they did have a somewhat wider franchise (all men from 1918, all women from 1928). Which meant that all of a sudden they had to appeal to the entire population. And the liberals got pretty well thrashed. I'm wondering if they're gonna make a comeback, what with nobody really liking Labour any more, and nobody really thinking Cameron would make a mega good replacement. But I have no idea what the Liberals are any more (I'm assuming they'll have changed like the other parties). I think they're still split. Hmm... Anyway, that's about it. Oh yeh, I said maths in the title, didn't I? We were just looking at e, ln and that sort of thing. Integrating and differentiating fractions using ln etc. I'm just annoyed that John didn't tell us why lnx differentiates to 1/x. Maybe it's really really complicated...

The English Civil War--A people's history

This one was by Dianne Purkiss. It was pretty good, I enjoyed the attention it gave to ordinary people, including women. Some of the same names cropped up again from God's Fury, England's Fire--Nehemiah Wallington collector of pamphlets, amongst the obvious ones like Cromwell, Pym and so on. One thing that did disappoint me a bit was that the pamphlets it had pictures included of were almost all the same as the ones in the other book. But it was very readable in style. Sometimes amusing, fairly gripping, but I can't say I learnt a huge amount from it. It was interesting, yes. It didn't really speak a whole lot about the big things--it was more about the experiences of people, and focussed a bit on iconoclasm, the banning of Christmas, etc. I've still not managed to read anything particularly about what happened afterwards, with the exception of A Short History of England.

Probably worth reading if you're interested in the period and don't know a whole lot already. Anyone know a good book about what happened after the Civil War?

Blest

I'm pretty knackered today I have to say. I didn't get home till about 11:15 or so, and then I woke up really early (as in quarter to six early) and couldn't get back to sleep for ages. But Blest was awesome! While we were singing 'This Is Our God' (Hillsongs), I just sensed that there were angels all around, and I was nearly crying. It was just incredible.

Sarah was talking about prayer, and she did an ace job. I didn't want her to stop. She just really brought it to life. I would've taken more notes, but it was kinda dark so I couldn't actually see my Bible... But she was talking about praying as we went through the day. So I prayed that the gears would change on my bike properly, and they did... but then the chain fell off. Meh. But it did go back on again without too much of a faff, so that was okay. Oh well. I didn't get run over or anything, so that was okay.

Oh yeh, and I've managed to volunteer myself for something again. Well, I've volunteered myself to do the first Creative Writing Group on Wednesday (we'll be talking about characters), and I also volunteered myself to play my clarinet at the next Blest. Maybe I should stop just randomly agreeing to do stuff, but it is quite fun. I'm looking forward to it.

Agent Zigzag

This was the one by Ben Macintyre (there seem to be a couple out there...). It was fascinating! A real insight into the Double Cross system attained by following the story of Eddie Chapman. What a story! It read almost (well, it did read) like fiction. Absolutely phenomenal.

Not only did it give the experiences of Eddie Chapman (and they were, it has to be said, rather incredible. He recruited himself into the Abwehr after the Channel Island where he was hiding from the British police on was occupied by the Germans, convinced them eventually that he was genuine, contrived to be parachuted into England, and instantly went to the British authorities who used him as a double agent as part of the Double Cross scheme, then let him return to Germany via Norway and yeh, what an adventure I won't say too much because you should read it), it also gave you a real feel for how the Double Cross system worked. Basically, after nabbing the German agents (who were pretty shockingly equipped), they got them to broadcast back false reports. Chapman's spy masters were so impressed they awarded him the Iron Cross! They even managed to fake destruction of the Mosquito plant! And then there was the way they took a picture of a new British mine with a special tape measure to make it look really really tiny and scare the u-boat captains. And one of the cleverest things (in my opinion) that they did was related to the V-bombs. They told the Germans they were landing farther to the West than they were, so that the Germans would adjust the trajectories so they missed London! It's absolutely fascinating, I'd really recommend it, not just as a historical book but also as a spy thriller which has the added bonus of being true.

William I

This is a purple jacketed book. Actually, I can do better than that, I'll just walk over to my bookcase and I can tell you who the author is (I reckon there's probably more than one book called William I, hence the distinction that it's the purple jacketed one...). Maurice Ashley, that's who wrote it. And it was published by the Book Club Associates. I paid about 20p for it. There's a lot of pictures too—mainly of the Bayeux Tapestry which is absolutely amazing, I saw it when I went to Normandy on holiday. It's massive! I can't imagine how long it took them to sew it all.

Apparently, Harold wasn't killed by an arrow. The tapestry's been misinterpreted, it's actually a sword. It still looks rather like an arrow to me, but there you go. We were told it was an arrow, a chance shot, when we studied it in history (think that would've been Year 8 or 9). The Battle of Hastings, according to history at that level, was won by a stray shot, and that let the Normans come to power. Anyway, you still get the impression it was a spot of luck that let William the Conqueror (or William the Bastard as he was apparently known back then, being illegitimate and all, which they definitely don't tell you in history :D) managed to go from being the Duke of a rather tiddly little country called Normandy to also being the King of England.

One other interesting thing I'd like to pick out is that according to a general history of England I was reading (review later—I'd read the bit on William and decided it made sense to then read the book which was just about William), William brought great sophistication over from Normandy, and helped to make England what it was. Ashley suggests that actually, England was more sophisticated before William came tootling over and mucked stuff up. Certainly there was conflict between the Norman masters and the (all of a sudden) subservient English. I wonder which way round it really was. I reckon the English of back then would probably tell you the Normans mucked things up, while the Normans accused them of being ignorant gits...

It was certainly an interesting period to look at, but I'm not convinced 'The Life and Times of William I' is the most interesting book around on this period. I may have to look for something else about it. The little old book 'A Short History of England' was perhaps more interesting about this chunk of history. But the pictures were nice :D.