Schlesinger: The Imperial Historian by Richard Aldous. W.W. Norton, 2017. Hardcover, 486 pages, $30. John C. Chalberg Early on in his magisterial biography of an “imperial historian,” biographer Richard Aldous asks a question that he never really answers: Was Arthur...
The Road Not Taken: Edward Lansdale and the American Tragedy in Vietnam by Max Boot. Liveright Publishing, 2018. Hardcover, 715 pages, $35. JOHN C. CHALBERG In this massive biography of Colonel Edward Lansdale, biographer Max Boot has given us the story of a quiet...
Nixon’s White House Wars: The Battles That Made and Broke a President and Divided America Forever by Patrick J. Buchanan. Crown Forum, 2017. Hardcover, 436 pages, $30.To read Pat Buchanan’s memoir of his tour of duty during President Richard Nixon’s White House...
Herbert Hoover in the White House: The Ordeal of the Presidency by Charles Rappleye. Simon and Schuster, 2016. Hardcover, 551 pages, $32.50. The title and subtitle of this book do—and do not—accurately advertise what it contains. Something a good deal less than a full...
The State of the American Mind: 16 Leading Critics on the New Anti-Intellectualism edited by Mark Bauerlein and Adam Bellow. Templeton Press, 2015. Hardcover, 280 pages, $28.Nearly three decades after Allan Bloom pronounced the “Closing of the American Mind,” Mark...
Smith’s claims are sobering, but they do raise important questions related to how to be religious and pass on the Christian faith in the modern age. - @PhilDavignon