"Good read but .....

Far too many proof reader errors.
Was able to figure most of them out but very distracting. Because of this I decided not to purchase the third book in the series.



"

"Not bad!

Good read. A trail to fallow along with. Great character .. Not a lit of mystery just goid detective work. You still need a prof reader. A lot of mistakes way tooooo many."

"It's conceptually interesting and important to know about the very real effects of Nazism in America. This book does a good job of summarizing the history of Nazi sympathizers during world war II. It takes the story one step further by contextualizing the Trump administration in the history of Nazi sympathizers in this country.

However by focusing on Fringe poorly organized groups in order to create the most sensational possible story of Nazis in America, this book trivializes the history of hate in this country.

Do you understand the deep seeded roots of hate in our politics you do not and should not need to look to avowed Nazis."

"I waited a few days to write a review on this book because I wanted time to process what I read and use a clear mind. I was a bit disappointed with this book. I love All Things WWII and was certainly interested in learning about Hitler's propaganda campaign in the US during this time (as I assumed the title suggested). However, I felt that the author had an underlying agenda of his own throughout the book, and frankly, it felt a tad...well, creepy. I'll expound.

First of all, I found the book to be dreadfully boring through sections and I link this to the way it was written. To ME (and this is just my opinion), the book read like a high school text book: loads of information and facts, but just crammed in there, like a thick heavy oatmeal that you choke down for breakfast. There was no 'flow' to the information coming at you, to read more 'story-like' instead of text book. Every chapter read the same way, STARTING with the finishing point of the author, only to be taken to a 'Pre-time' and then worked back to Brad Hart's original start for the chapter. EVERY chapter read this way. There was just so much information that the links seemed to be clumsy and as a reader, I found my self looking 'in the rear-view mirror' a few times trying to figure out where I just came from. When a book feels like homework (and I am well past those years...lol), it becomes more of a TASK than enjoyment, and that was disappointing.

As I stated earlier, while I did enjoy most of the information that Brad Hart presented, and was certainly intrigued by the concepts presented, I couldn't shake the feeling of the 'hidden agenda'. And then I found it in the Chapter on the America First Committee. Now, let me preface this by stating that I had NO political ambitions for this book, but simply sought to add to my interest in World War Two history. But the author, Brad Hart, really seemed to have this desire to link this group (and several others mentioned in the book) to the Trump rallies. I don't care if you voted for the man or not, love him or despise him, linking his rallies to some deep-seeded Nazi sympathizers from the 1930's is repugnant and frankly a stretch.

The problem I had with many of Mr. Hart's conclusions about several of these groups and especially the America First Committee was that many of these groups started out basically as anti-war groups, NOT Nazi sympathizer groups. There were a lot of people at this time that did not want the U.S. to jump into this war in Europe, especially so soon after WWI. Many Americans rejected the idea of getting involved in the Iraq war and Afghanistan, but I certainly don't see ANY link to Nazi-ism. NOW, that doesn't mean that Hitler didn't see opportunity in infiltrating these groups to push the Reich propaganda, but as the reader sees in Hart's research, this often led to the demise of the group.

There was also resistance to FDR's New Deal and domestic policies, along with resistance to entering the war, but simply disagreeing with a political opponent does not make you a Nazi (though that sentiment seems to have been carried on into our present-day politics). Hart mentions this, very briefly and subtly, but it is pointed out. This is seen by the treatment and opinion of Charles Lindbergh. Once celebrated as an American hero, as soon as he opposed to joining the war, he was 'suspected' of being a Nazi sympathizer and the information presented in this book is quite circumstantial at best. If there was any truth in this (and it's quite possible he might have been), I didn't find concrete evidence here.

The problem I had with much of the research is that many (if not most) of the footnotes referenced newspaper or magazine articles. I wouldn't take issue with this if the reference was in regards to a direct quote from the "suspected" individual or a factual incident. However, most of the footnotes just highlighted the articles themselves, which is just accepting the journalist's opinions or conclusions as fact, and THAT is not credible to me. Just because someone writes a story in a newspaper and then hypothesizes a conclusion, doesn't mean that it is fact. I generally seek the information from footnotes, but was discouraged by Mr. Hart's resources. Don't get me wrong, there were many well researched facts. They just seemed to get lost or diluted by the 'conjecture'.

I did manage to wade through this book, even though it became a tedious venture, mainly because of the writing style. I was looking for another 'piece to the puzzle' of WWII history, but the subtle left-leaning opinions left a sour taste in my mouth. Many of the theories seemed 'forced' and that is a No-no in my eyes, especially when the book is a dull read. Two stars awarded because there WAS some great information and interesting parts, but not enough to grab another star. Just my 2 cents."