Mayflower

This book is tedious at times, and sometimes the author contradicts himself. If I wasn't the type of person that has to finish a book once started, I would have dropped this book after a few chapters. In the end though, I am glad to have read it and gleaned a bit of history from it.

Very well written. A great introduction to the "Mayflower" people that sailed to America in 1620. I read it just before traveling to Boston and visiting the Plimouth Plantation ... a must for anyone who has relatives that sailed in 1620!

A great audiobook narrative that illustrates the complex relationships within the early settlement communities, between them and with those with the local, indigenous native peoples. This audiobook has traveled widely and has been shared among friends and is made all the more interesting as I descend from two of those complex characters.

NOTE: DON'T BUY THE KINDLE VERSION UNLESS YOU WANT TO GO W/OUT THE MAPS.

Other people have commented far more cogently than I can concerning the content of this book. As a corrective for the middle-school history version of the Plymouth colony I found it an informative and entertaining invitation to investigate other histories of the Pilgrims. I'd definitely recommend the print version of the book.

The digital version, however leaves much to be desired, primarily because the publisher seems to have taken no care to insure that the digital reproductions of the maps were legible. I own the second version of the Kindle, which has the capacity to magnify illustrations--and they still weren't legible. I know that illustrations are hardly the Kindle's strong suit, but the maps, as far as I can tell, were simple line drawings. Nobody seems to have checked to see if they actually displayed properly. Instead everything was allowed to remain a faint illegible gray--magnification didn't help. That they could have potentially been a great addition to the narrative was made frustratingly clear each time I advanced from an illustration to a page of text--the illustration would briefly flash in stunningly vivid contrast, then vanish as the next page of text appeared. The same thing would happen when shifting between the default scale and the magnified version. Neither worked properly. Poor job all around.

Incredibly researched, this fresh look at the founding of our country hurls the reader back in time. While the romanticized version of events so well ingrained into our education system has caused us to look upon this time with pride, the author presents a rather more realistic view of the Pilgrims, the Puritans and the Dutch in New York city. The sad history of our displacement and slaughter of native Americans began with the Pilgrims and and continued right across the continent. Who knew that the Pilgrims actually participated in the early slave trade. The book encourages the reader to re access what was actually involved in the expansion of this country.

This readable retelling of a familiar take is best as an exploration of an early conflict that reveals the logic of Anglo-American racism. Anyone pondering the racial dynamics of the U.S. in the 21st century should read the story of what came to be known as King Phillip's War. Philbrick is weakest in his reliance on, and hero worship of, Benjamin Church.

Tells what happened after the first Thanksgiving. Introduced me to King Phillips War, something avoided, I’m sure, in most all classrooms. Although a history, the book reads like an exciting adventure story. Yet these were real events of the early to middle 17th Century in what would become the United States.

An easy read ... informative (often surprisingly so) and engaging. Offers, in ways you can relate to, a feel for the ways of the time, and those living through them. Should be of interest to folks anywhere, but especially resonate with New Englanders, and Massachusetts especially. I found myself with a pencil in hand, marking various tidbits in the margins. You'll want to share information you gleaned with others ... I recommend it.

I loved this book. I was fascinated from start to finish, learned more about the REAL struggle that was involved in the formative years of our great nation. I would recommend this book to anyone who has an interest in our forefathers.

An enjoyable read about the arrival in America of the Pilgrims at Plymouth Rock. As a descendant of the young man who fell overboard on the trip over, I found it quite interesting. Thank you for listing it.

If you like books about the Indians and their impact on the English in the early 17th century, this book is for you. I for one wore out at the end during the discussion of King Philip's War.. Being one of 35 million descendants (through John Howland and Elizabeth Tilley) I wanted more about the journey, their life and how things were during the first few years. Instead, the Indian relationship was a strong theme. I guess this is due to a lack of real records of the events that took place. Anyway. It's a meh for me.

Philbrick is a wonderful, engaging author...my favorite. I listened to this 6 years ago and I'm purchasing it now for my personal collection. When we travel with our children and grandchildren we all enjoy listening to his titles. He puts you in "the moment". The are all hooked up and we always have great conversations around the topic. They call me now with " did you know?" questions and we discuss what they're reading or listening to. I can hardly wait for his next title!

A number of myths have been spun surrounding the pilgrims who landed on Plymouth Rock ranging from freedom loving dissidents who sought only to worship God as they saw fit to genocidal pioneers propelled by malice to destroy Eden. Of course, since these myths are constructed by people living now with scant regard for facts and are simply engines to express their own political points of view, they are so much rubbish and nonsense.

In truth, the pilgrims were probably the most tiresome neighbors you could imagine.

They were the sort of people who would run out on Christmas day and confiscate the ball their neighbors were using to play a game called stumps on the grounds God was worried about this. Imagine the reaction of the Native Americans when these bores showed up uninvited and unannounced droning on and on about what rotten people the pilgrims had to put up with. The fact that blows came to gunfire and murder is not surprising.

Even the neighboring puritans found the pilgrims to be self-righteous and narrow-minded which is really saying something.

In Nathanial Philbrick's Mayflower, the author delves into both the history of the pilgrim's landing in New England and the subsequent fifty years which culminated in the intense and bloody King Philip's War, the first of the major Indian wars in which the English colonists hung onto their homes by the skin of their teeth.

However, if the pilgrims weren't so convinced of their own exceptionalism, they would never have embarked on the Mayflower to begin with nor would they have persevered in the new world. For instance, their rock solid certainty that God was on their side allowed them to sail with only half the rations they thought they needed to get through the first year on the Massachusetts coast. They were right but squeaked through anyway. It also allowed them to keep their humor up, but in ways that are unfamiliar to modern ears. For instance, when a sailor with the reputation for swearing constantly suddenly died, the pilgrims took grim satisfaction in the view that everything was as it should be.

Sadly, Philbrick's excellent book stumbles slightly at this point when he goes out of his way to make mountains out of mole hills when it comes to the first contacts between the pilgrims and the Indians on Cape Cod. Philbrick makes much out of how the pilgrims stole a store of buried corn soon after landing but later concedes that without this seed corn, the pilgrims would never have survived their second year. This act, Philbrick seems to claim, is the original sin of the colonists in their new Eden.

If Philbrick thinks that people who are confronting starvation won't snatch some unguarded food in whatever form, he hasn't been paying attention to his own books. In his account of the whaling ship Essex, he goes into great detail about how the sailors were forced to revert to cannibalism while adrift in the South Pacific and how this was understandable, all things considered. Why he acts as if he is shocked by the pilgrims is disingenuous to say the least.

Nevertheless, Philbrick does manage to shoot down the myth that the pilgrims and puritans simply stole the land from the Indians. Or even that the unscrupulous colonists bamboozled the naïve Indians into selling their birthright for a pile of trade beads and a tomahawk. Instead, noting that the graves of Indians began to fill with European manufactured goods soon after the arrival of the colonists, he points out that the land transactions suited both sides. The Indians had no other source of European goods and the colonists had no other source of land. Both sides placed equal value on the possessions of the other, and a standard business transaction ensued. Philbrick provides firm evidence the Native Americans were well aware of the meaning of the contracts they signed over the years and willingly embarked on them. In fact so aware of them, some of the Native Americans weren't above double dealing.

For instance, King Philip, the leader of the Pokanoket tribe, very deliberately sold every acre his tribe owned in order to raise money to buy flintlock muskets and ammunition. With these weapons, he planned to slaughter the colonists and take back his lands by force. Sadly for him, the war didn't end quite as he planned given that his head wound up stuck on a stake in Plymouth, the pilgrim stronghold.

But it was, as I have mentioned, a close run thing. By the end of the King Philip war, the colonists had lost nearly 8% of the men in New England and western Massachusetts was depopulated. By comparison, the bloodiest war in American history, the Civil War, cost the country between 4% and 5% of the male population. The Second World War took slightly less than 1% of the men.

The book is an excellent history for anyone who is interested in the real story of the founding of New England.

This is a fine book, engaging and well written that offers some exceptional insights behind the story of the Pilgrims, the founding of Plymouth Colony, and the tragedies of King Phillip's War. I find myself wondering if some of the information concerning the native peoples was a bit over-simplified, but it is clear to me that there was a significant attempt on the part of the author to get those stories right, too. My direct ancestors were residents of Lancaster in Massachusetts Bay Colony at the time that Mary Rowlandson was taken captive, and so I find I have a direct connection to the events and the ideas presented here, and I appreciate the depth and care of the story-telling and analysis in this book. I plan to read his recent book concerning the time between King Phillip's War and the Revolution soon.

Overall, enjoyed the book. I was hoping for a bit more history on the Pilgrims, Plymouth and New England during the 1620-1640 period. Much of the book was spent on the second generation of inhabitants and natives (Philip). would have been right on if it was titled "King Philips War" and not Mayflower. Again, enjoyed the book and would recommend.

My overall sense of this book is the question "Will any of this be on the final exam?'. During the first one hundred plus pages we are presented with a reasearch driven bombardment of so many names, some historically significant and many others never to be heard from again that for me, it immediately became difficult to focus on anyone. With all due respect to the deceased, is the wife of the son of the guy who died who herself died not long after another guy learned about the planned Indian invasion of Plymouth significant enough to add to the already too long lineup of players most of us readers are struggling to assign importance to? I would not have noticed this misplaced attention to detail had the author actually spent some dedicated effort describing The Mayflower's actual journey across the Atlantic. You called your book 'Mayflower" ...give it more than a few pages out of the 350. This leads to the subject of poor editing. One reference to Shakespeares 'The Tempest' would have been enough but two in the same section seems like sloppy writing . Also, not smart people like me love illustrations but none of the ones included make any sense. The first is a discussion of a prayer building with a notable carving of a serpent above it which would have been interesting but the photographs are two blurry shots of what could be any random exterior. The poorly thought out graphics continue with basically the same map of New England every fifteen pages and some pictures of chairs, a mountain and a chest included without any relevance. In fact, I didn't find one schematic or cross section of the acutal Mayflower (or even a photo of the modern reconstruction as mentioned at the beginning of the book) to give me reference as to it's size or scale as compared to a ship of today which should have been an obvious inclusion. Again, you did title the book "Mayflower" after all. Finally, why care about what obviously took so much time to write or the characters that inhabit this work? I don't. This book reads like a steographer taking notes during a dry college class on Pilgrims, not like something that trasnsports me to another time in history. The author did nothing to breathe life into the characters and in fact suffocated them by deciding to rely on interspersing quotes from their writings randomly in a lazy attempt to 'let them speak for themselves' out of context which portrays them just as the one dimensional cartoon characters they appeared to most of us as children which the author claims to disdain.

An interesting account of the events before and after the Mayflower landing. Events focused on many people and continued through several generations. The span of time put the story in perspective well, but you almost need notes to keep track of the main characters. In the end, you were left with an interesting perspective on the formation of our national character.

I recommend this book to anyone who is interested in the story of the Pilgrims and the English beginnings in our country. It is very readable and gives lots of information about the reasons and organization of the trip to America, events of the crossing in the Mayflower, landing on the cold shores of Massachusetts, and the first year here. I have always been interested in the story of the Pilgrims and have visited Plimoth Plantation and the Mayflower II, but I gained a much more realistic view of the people and events. We tend to idealize the people but this book shows them as real people with strengths, flaws, and temperments. I enjoyed this book and felt like I was there. It reads like a historical fiction.

This is presented as a story taking the reader beyond the landing on Cape Cod and into the interior telling a story about the interaction with the native Americans. The difference is that is written with a fiction tone although it is not. An excellent way to obtain an historical grasp of the times without the boring data presentaiton.

I bought this book last Thanksgiving season and have yet to read it all still. I think I need to read up on it before this holiday so I don't feel too bad about it. It's written really well, a lot to digest much like the meal. I always find myself thinking back to how people lived in these times or how my coastal community looked then too. Oh to go back just for a day or two.

I really enjoyed Philbrick's Heart of the Sea and The Last Stand, but just couldn't get into this book. And, I don't really know why. I did learn a lot about a period of history of which I knew little, and I developed a real respect for the Pilgirms, et. al, who sufferred to found the country. And, as usual there were the usual number of atrocities against the Indians. However, they were a pretty tough bunch also. I stopped reading with about a hundred pages left becuase I found it was kind of like plowing ground. Maybe there were too many characters, too many battles that sounded pretty much the same, or too many Indian names I could not keep straight. Maybe it was the author's writing which was a bit too journalistic. I did think the author went on a bit about just how important Kng Phillip's War was when in most instances the warring groups numbered in the tens, not thousands. Anyway, I did not find this to be an enjoyable read at all.

A different read story than what I remember growing up. Fascinating as I was concurrently finishing up genealogy research
proving John Howland and Elizabeth Tilley as ancestors that came over on the Mayflower. The story about John being thrown
overboard and being saved is a made for tv drama.

Thorough description of a little known part of American history.

The maps, at least in the electronic version, are terrible. Makes it hard to understand what is going on.

More integration of Puritan world view into the motivation of the Pilgrims would have been interesting and helpful. The rather strict historical account that is presented is somewhat dry.

Certainly, a fascinating story, and important to understand how the New World came to be New England. If you only know the outline, fill in the broad strokes with these carefully researched and compiled details.

While I was a history major in college, this book recounts a piece of American history which I knew little or nothing about. It also begins the explain the basis of our cultural foundation and our early relationship with Native Americans. Philbrick's The Last Stand sort of picks up where this book leaves off.

excellent and readable - I had no idea that the Indians were as organized (albeit into tribes) -- guess I thought they hid behind trees and shot arrows. they were highly intelligent, and sadly, the white settlers treated most of them badly. The Mayflower contract had a lasting effect on our country's history.

Living in New England it is interesting how many of the Mayflower family names are still around.

The title is a trifle misleading. The book covers the Mayflower Pilgrims of 1620, but the bulk of the book is about the Indian wars of 1675-1690 when an Indian revolt throughout New England killed thousands of white settlers, and ended up decimating the Indians of that area. It told me a lot of things that I had not known about and put Plymouth in perspective with the rest of New England. This is well worth reading, despite the title. I enjoyed it.

Nathaniel Philbrick is one of the best historical authors that I
have read. He is a top notch researcher, one of best when it comes
to describing historical events. The ideas he writes are clear and
logical. The reason I chose MAYFLOWER to read was because I
enjoyed reading Philbrick's last book published this year, THE
LAST STAND, the history of Custer and the Little Big Horn, the book
that must stand on the top of the long list of books on this subject. I am now reading a third book by Philbrick.
MAYFLOWER is the complex history of the Pilgrims and others
who left Holland for the New World and the fifty years that would
follow in New England, including that of the numerous Indian tribes
in the area. This history makes the schoolboy history of Plymouth
history look like junk!

My sister recommended this book. Once I picked it up I would play games with myself to "make time" for reading it. During the

1970's I lived within five miles of The Great Swamp in Rhode Island. What? Didn't have a clue about it. Over the years learned sketchy information. Well, now I have the big picture!My ancestors were settlers in Salem, Mass. in 1635 and this gave me an idea of what their "life style" might have been.

My only problem with the book was that I had a hard time keeping the players and locations straight in my head. A Key

might have helped and a straightforward map with old and new names would have been great. Now I want to read more of Mr. Philbrick's books. How nice that he has a good old New England name to go with such a historical book. Mary in NH

Makes a historical "correction" to the long ago and heroic efforts of the pilgrims so that the story is more realistic and believable. Their efforts are still heroic, but times were definitely tough and some of the intentions of the settlers were not always so honorable.

Really great writing and research. I was spending Thanksgiving in Provincetown and decided this west-coast-boy needed a primer. This was perfect. It went into such detail on the lives of individual native americans. I didn't know this knowledge even existed. Will probably read it again.

What a great account of the story of the pilgrims and their interaction with native Americans in southeastern new england. I found it extremely interesting, much more detail that any information provided in school history books.

This is a well-written and well-researched history of the pilgrims dating from their arrival in America through King Philip's War. Mr. Philbrick has a very readable style. I learned a lot about the Indian population of the time. I would highly recommend this book to anyone who is interested in the pilgrims and their complicated relationships with the native peoples of America.

I am the 10th Great Granddaughter of John Howland and Elizabeth Tilley. This book was filled with great information, that painted a picture, of our forefathers journey, struggles and triumphs.

Great reading! Thank you Mr. Philbrick.

I was expecting more attention to the social/religious life in the colony. Much of the book, deals with the relationships and eventual wars with and between the Indian tribes. Well written and interesting in its own right, just not exactly what I expected.