One Summer; America, 1927

New York: Doubleday, 2013. First United States Edition [stated], First Printing [stated]. Hardcover. Very good/Very good. John Fontana (Jacket Design). [14], 509, [5] pages. Notes on Sources and Further Reading. Bibliography. Photography Credits. Index. DJ has slight wear and soiling. Corners of a couple of pages creased. William McGuire Bryson OBE HonFRS (/ bra s n/; born 8 December 1951) is an Anglo-American author of books on travel, the English language, science, and other non-fiction topics. Born in the United States, he has been a resident of Britain for most of his adult life, returning to the United States between 1995 and 2003. He served as the chancellor of Durham University from 2005 to 2011. Bryson came to prominence in the United Kingdom with the publication of Notes from a Small Island (1995), an exploration of Britain, and its accompanying television series. He received widespread recognition again with the publication of A Short History of Nearly Everything (2003), a book widely acclaimed for its accessible communication of science. Derived from a Kirkus review: A popular chronicler of life and lore vividly charts a particularly pivotal season in American history. Bryson reanimates the events and principal players across five key months in 1927. He establishes an early-20th-century, trial-and-error chronology of aviation evolution cresting with Charles Lindbergh. Braided into Lindbergh's saga are profiles of cultural icons like Herbert Hoover, Al Capone, and baseball players Lou Gehrig and Babe Ruth. Bryson enthusiastically draws on the heroic lives of President Calvin Coolidge and Jack Dempsey and artfully interweaves into Lindbergh's meteoric rise the pitfalls of Prohibition. Collectively, what Bryson offers is a creatively written regeneration of historical facts; the revelations, while few, appear in the form of eccentric personal factoids demarcating that scrutinized summer of dreamers and innovators. Bryson's American pride saturates this rewarding book. A distinctively drawn time capsule from a definitive epoch.