Reviews for The U.S. Chess Championship 1845-1985

The average rating for The U.S. Chess Championship 1845-1985 based on 2 reviews is 3 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2012-03-13 00:00:00 Randy Chamberlain This is the only book devoted entirely to John Wilkes Booth's stage career, and it offers much more information on the subject than any other book I know of. The writing is execrable, and the publisher didn't bother to have it proofread, let alone edited, but for anyone interested in the subject (or in 19th century theater), there's nothing else like it. There are also plenty of photos, both of Booth and of playbills of his appearances.

Review # 2 was written on 2014-11-23 00:00:00 Krolpromise Promise If someone were doing a giant research project on the Tom Swift books, this book would be invaluable. It traces the history of Tom Swift in a number of detailed ways, looking at everything from the sci-fi qualities of the character's inventions to the possible locations of his hometown. From there, though, Dizer broadens out to talk about all of the Stratemeyer Syndicate's boys books, in terms of contemporary literary critiques, political attitudes (containing a lengthy chapter on the problematic treatment of race in these books that felt a little reductive), and their literary influences and what they then turned to influence. Since I'm researching Stratemeyer's girls' books, this is not directly or strongly applicable to what I'm doing. Still, this is detailed and far-reaching enough that I'll be able to make use of it in regards to The Moving Picture Girls. It's wildly biased, by the author's own admission, but thorough enough that there's still plenty useful there, particularly for scholars of Stratemeyer's boys' series books.