Outstanding look at the events in North America before the American Revolution. Taylor juggles a number of threads very well, helped along by the book’s cogent structure that tends to follow areas through time instead of offering slices of the whole continent at once. He does an especially great job tying in the environmental history, showing how each group shaped their habitat and the effects they wrought, purposely or accidentally. Taylor lays out the material forces at work and doesn’t shy away from depicting the colonists in all their ugliness.

I haven’t read much about this period since the textbook in high-school, and this was such a huge jump in clarity, understanding, and depth. Excited to read Taylor’s two subsequent books covering the revolution and aftermath.