Since professing a love of historical sites, museums, commemorative plaques and the like in her essay about retracing the Trail of Tears, Sarah Vowell has become to American history what John Stewart is to politics. Her writing matches the narration of historical facts with a sharp wit that consistently makes her work accessible without sacrificing its thoughtfulness. This book resembles a standard work on American history more than any of her previous work, focusing as it does on a series of primary sources: diaries, journals, and published pamphlets produced by the early settlers of the Massachusetts Bay Colony. There is less here of Vowell's tendency to filter her history lessons through the lens of her personal experience touring museums and interviewing tour guides, and I missed those elements to some extent. But the book is no less a showcase for Vowell's brand of patriotism, which here seeks to dispel misconceptions about the Puritans while celebrating some of their most influential ideas. ( )

The settlement of Massachusetts and the founding of Boston told in an entertaining, non-canonical, smart-assy kind of way. ( )

A relaxed, informative, and very entertaining history of the Puritans in New England. Sarah Vowell is a very bright woman, who by halfway through the book-- which is on its surface a chatty memoir-- has absorbed so much of the historical source material she's begun taking on some of the major American historians of the period, chiding them and trying to set them straight. I was very entertained by her good-hearted poking at Perry Miller. This is definitely a worthy book-- spend a few days in intimate chat with Sarah Vowell, and come away with a very good background on a complex and important historical period. ( )

Not really sure what to expect from the book, I found that Wordy Shipmates didn't really know what to expect from me either. This is a look at the religiosity of the colony in Boston, its spiritual/community leaders and the colonies it spawned. But this book didn't know whether it was trying to really provide a well-researched new angle to a classic story or whether it was trying to provide a series of amusing 'Hey Didja Know That?' factoids for the casual observer to whip out at cocktail parties. At times analytical, at times informal, Vowell's dry humor and sarcasm were present throughout. Yet the combination of writing styles struck me as incongruous and odd, and I kept expecting the other style whenever it switched. It seemed that the book was simultaneously aimed at two separate audiences but fell a bit short for both. ( )

Unlike her previous book, this one felt more like straight history, with a unique twist. I appreciated how she focused so tightly on a specific time period, place and people/sources. A very good analysis of what common phrases like 'city on a hill' really mean to this place and time. The touch of commentary lightened the whole thing up quite enjoyably too. ( )