Winston Groom may be best known for his novel that was turned into the 1994 blockbuster hit Forest Gump, but his works as a non-fiction writer deserve the same accolades. Focusing on American history, Groom has delivered great looks into wars from the Civil War to World War II. The Patriots is Groom’s investigative storytelling foray into our country’s founding fathers, the actions of our young country, and the motivations behind some of the biggest decisions of the era. While Groom looks directly at the actions of Alexander Hamilton, Thomas Jefferson, and John Adams, the supporting cast of founders including George Washington, Aaron Burr, Benedict Arnold, and more shine through the pages as well. This is a book about not only the positive moments most of us learned in school, but also the mistakes and challenges these very human men faced while bringing our country to the forefront of worldwide politics.
I give The Patriots 4 out of 5 stars. After reading so much about our first three Presidents and their contemporaries, I have heard most of the information included here before. However, Groom’s ability to weave a story kept me intrigued throughout. While, like most nonfiction books, this reads a bit like a textbook at some points, this is very informative and juxtaposes events together than I hadn’t read about together before this book. I was pleasantly surprised to at how the author kept my interest throughout, especially after having recently finished Thomas Jefferson and the Tripoli Pirates, the events of which are accounted for here in a slightly different lens.
I would recommend this book to readers who are interested in the Founding Fathers, the birth of our country, or just American history in general. This book is a great summary to the others I’ve recently read about both Adams and Jefferson, putting each President’s decisions into perspective of the greater events of the country. I would also recommend this to readers who don’t like non-fiction because it can sometimes read like text books – Groom really makes the narrative come alive in this book! As with any book about this time period, I would caution this book for younger audiences given discussions of war, violence, and death.
I chose The Patriots as my nonfiction read for May. This was a free included book with my Audible plus subscription. I didn’t realize what the author is best known for until after I finished reading this book – I can’t believe I missed that! This was an easy read and quick for me. If you are looking for a medium length book on this topic – this would be a great choice!
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What I’m Reading
- Current print book: Rich People Problems, Kevin Kwan
- Current audio book: The Beach at Summerly, Beatriz Williams
- Book I’m most looking forward to: Legends of the Fall, Jim Harrison
Read With Lindsey 
Nice post.I subscribed. Have a happy weekend🍀☘️💝
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