Reading this and following it up with Killers of the Flower Moon has been a sad dive into the mistreatment of the Native people. While I learned about the Mayflower in school at some point, the Mayflower was a good short book about the first years of time when the Mayflower and its passengers landed in the Americas. I recommend this for anyone who wants to hear more about the the passengers and their journey to freedom (which absolutely came at the expense of the Native Americans).

Hmm I’m not entirely certain what I was expecting, but for me this book was only very…okay. Philbrick is an excellent writer and he keeps the narrative moving and packs in a lot of telling details. However, for me the problem was the parts didn’t equal my expectations.

Every American of a certain age remembers the story of the Pilgrims and the first Thanksgiving. Many of us even got to play a part in the annual Thanksgiving play (I was a turkey), but the story of the Pilgrims can get lost amid the build up to the first holiday meal.

These were separatists who abandoned their homeland to pursue religious freedom. They immigrated first to Holland and then risked literally everything to come to a new continent to build a community of believers. Driven by faith they took a gamble and payed a huge price, before finding ultimate success on Plymouth Rock or so the story went.

The story Philbrick tells is a bit more complex. He relates the old standbys and the old favorites still show up-Miles Standish, Priscilla Mullens, Governor Bradford, etc. But the first generation is a prologue of sorts.

By and large this is really a book about King Phillip’s War, a war fought between 2nd generation Pilgrims and Native Americans. Philbrick wants to explore how the first generation of Pilgrims recognized that compromise and cohabitation with Native Americans was essential for their survival, whereas their children did not. In a sense, the Pilgrims experience seems to be presented primarily to offer a contrast between how two generations viewed relations with Native Americans.

The publishers' title of Mayflower-Story of a Community is a bit misleading, especially during King Phillip’s War when the Pilgrims have spread into different communities making an exploration of community more and more abstract.

As the book devolves into an account of various battles at various locations the narrative tends to ebb and flow uneasily. As the book ventures further and further into battles I found myself wishing the focus had been more centered on the original community or had better explained the geography of these communities.

Still this is an informative book that will make you think much about the price Native Americans and the original settlers played once European colonization begins (events such as the Mary Rowlands saga makes any attempt at easy categorization utterly impossible), for as Philbrick illustrates both sides gained and lost from the early decades of colonization.

This was the third book by the author to have read. (Previously read “Valiant Ambition: George Washington, Benedict Arnold, and the Fate of the American Revolution.” also “The Last Stand: Custer, Sitting Bull, and the Battle of the Little Big Horn.) So glad to pick this one! Not only to pull another book off my bookshelves, always a good checkmark, but the author has done his research and had written another interesting history book. Add the perk to have toured the Mayflower II sloop and toured an exhibit on the passengers on the Mayflower in Plymouth, MA. I’m eying a couple more titles by this author! At some point I intend to read Philbrick’s “Bunker Hill: A City, a Siege, a Revolution”

In 1620, New England was far from being a paradise of abundance and peace. Indeed the New World was, in many ways, much like the Old – a place where the fertility of the soil was a constant concern, a place where disease and war were omnipresent threats.

Whenever I hear about how volatile, vitriolic, and vicious the current state of American politics is, or I run into someone who believes that America is divided now more than ever, and they suggest things were better ‘before’ the way they are now, and that at some point in this nation’s history, or even at some point in world history, there was a utopian nation populated with people who did not argue, quarrel, or suffer from a number of social maladies including but not limited to economic fluctuation, ideological contention, religious persecution, class distinction, or racial tension, I find myself wishing that they would simply pick up a history book.

There seems to be a prevalent and misleading viewpoint of American history, particularly of its founding. Contrary to popular belief, not all thirteen colonies unhesitatingly rose in unison in their declaration of independence; during the Civil War the North and the South were not diametrically opposed, rather had ambiguous battle lines traced through economics, social policy, political ideology, and individual’s assumed duty to state; and, as it applies to Mayflower, by Nathaniel Philbrick, not all those who sailed on the Mayflower were united in common purpose to establish a nation where religious freedom, life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness would be guaranteed for all.

Such perpetuations are pure fantasy, simplifications of a much more complex reality in which stereotypical Hollywood patriotism and nobility is absent, replaced instead by real people and real situations with all their conflicting loyalties, motivations, complexities, and faults. There was never a period in this nations’ history that was devoid of disagreement and conflict, rather, this country was born from, and continues on in the face of, adversity. To believe otherwise is a form of historical revisionism, a reductionist philosophy of the past which reshapes reality into convenient boxes of national and political propaganda to be used for questionable platforms, or to sway, admonish, or invigorate the public with Disney-like half-truths.

Like all Puritans, these English exiles believed that the Church of England must be purged of its many excesses and abuses. But these were Puritans with a vengeance. Instead of working for change within the established church, they had resolved to draw away from the Church of England. Known as Separatists, they represented the radical fringe of the Puritan movement.

The history of Plymouth colony is, initially, the simple story of a very small group of people seeking religious freedom from a nation they felt was corrupt and oppressive. That part is true, but what gets left out is that almost half of those on board the Mayflower were interested in enterprise rather than religious freedom; that the Mayflower Compact was less about establishing a permanent government and written in order to stem the dissension between the two groups of passengers; that the Native American population was not united into a single pan-Indian coalition and that there were many tribal differences, and an entire diplomatic hornet’s nest of which the Pilgrims found themselves as additional players; that the agreement between the colony and the Wampanoag tribe (the original Thanksgiving) was just as much a diplomatic necessity as it was a celebration or compassionate offering; that even with the most noble of motivations, in the span of a single generation, relations between the politically-shifting Indian tribes, and the ever-growing colonies, would lead to a catastrophic period now known as King Phillip's War, which would result in the deaths of thousands of settlers and Indians, alike.

From beginning to end the entire story plays out like Greek tragedy – fathers fighting to maintain a peace that their sons ultimately forego in order to satisfy a lust for land, property, and power.

...by the time Philip appeared in Plymouth, the officials from Massachusetts had changed their position. Plymouth was right, and the Pokanokets were wrong. The treaty he was subsequently forced to sign amounted to a total and mortifying capitulation. He must turn over all his weapons, and he must pay a fine of £100. Even worse, he was now a subject of Plymouth and must pay the colony an annual tribute of five wolves' heads. Plymouth had given Philip no options: if he was to survive as sachem of the Pokanokets, he must now go to war.

Just as he did with n  In the Heart of the Sean, Philbrick manages to both educate and entertain. This period of history is a personal favorite of mine, and I found every bit of Mayflower to be well-written, informative, and altogether enthralling. While some authors covering this period may fall into the simplicity of portraying either side as villain, Philbrick is both appropriate and fair, diving into the tapestry of alliances that made up the New World landscape and giving voice to a number of tribes and people.

A notable amount of research went into the production of this account, and while it is representative of a period for which there are few primary sources (particularly on the Native American side), I never felt that Philbrick was assuming too much, or too little. He includes an exhaustive notes section for each chapter which provides additional insight into his sources as well as his choices in what he chose to present to the reader. The reasoning and causes for a number of disagreements and conflicts are presented with well-stated motivations for all sides, and all factions are presented earnestly. The early 1600's were just as complicated, divided, and personally challenging as the period we live in now, despite what many may think otherwise, and Philbrick's research and presentation is a truly impressive feat that brings it to life.

The only critique that I have for the book is that the first half, which primarily discusses the establishment and survival of Plymouth colony, reads a bit easier than the latter half, which is practically an after-action report of King Phillip’s War. There were a significant number of factions involved in that war, being the breakdown of relations between the many colonies and the many Indian tribes in the region. Each of these factions includes their own list of leaders, warriors, and locations, all of which collate into pages of names that can be a bit overwhelming unless the reader is paying very close attention or taking notes.

With that said, besides being bogged down by details in some sections, the entire book is a very worthy read for someone interested in an interesting, well-written, and entertaining overview of the permanent colonization of the New World, the war that set the stage for the spread of settlers west, the resulting Indians wars, and the founding of a nation. It is an often ugly, sordid, history despite being birthed of noble intentions, and Mayflower captures it in engaging style.

It is easy to mock past attempts to venerate and sanctify the Pilgrims, especially given what their sons and grandsons did to the Native Americans. And yet we must look with something more than cynicism at a people who maintained more than half a century of peace with their Native neighbors. The great mystery of this story is how America emerged from the terrible darkness of King Phillips’ War to become the United States.

1. How well written is it?

Philbrick is an excellent writer. Every book he's written has been readable and enjoyable. That being said, I was a little disappointed with this book. While it is well written, it isn't quite up to the standards that I expect from him.

2. How interesting is the subject?

The Mayflower is a subject that I think most Americans are interested in, but do not really know too much about. We know the Pilgrims and the Mayflower have been immortalized in some sort of Utopian mythology that is celebrated every Thanksgiving, but what do most of us really know?

At the same time, it isn't really a subject that drives people to the bookstore.

3. Does the book offer novel insight into the subject or is it just regurgitating already known facts?

Since I was not familiar with the subject, I'd say that this is a nice welcome to the field. It puts the history of the Pilgrims into an easy to digest text.

I am not going to write up a synopsis because I just don't want to. It is a dry read and had a hard time getting into and retaining information. Research is there but still hints of speculation here and there because there is not a lot of first accounts stories around and if they are they are usually one sided accounts. Yep, that is all I want to say.

I typically steer clear of a book with this many pages but the author does a phenomenal job of writing the facts in a manner to urge the reader to continue on. Although the story of our history is generally known from our childhood school days, this book brings the story to life in a way that makes the information so easily understood and eye-opening.

This is the story of the Pilgrims that we never learned in school. A long but fascinating story.

Who knew the tale of the Pilgrims at Plymouth Rock could be so enthralling? A gripping and most enjoyable read.

Well-written (and well read by George Guidall), this book covers the voyage of the Mayflower (1620) to King Philip's War (1675-78).

Philbrick's premise is that we have romanticized the Mayflower story, turning it into our own national legend. He aims to set the record straight. But throughout the book it was the same story I have always heard (with the possible exception of a negative portrayal of Squanto). I think Philbrick was primarily referring to King Philip's War, a tragic sequel of the Pilgrim's grandchildren, and a bit of history often overlooked in our hurry to move from 1620 to 1776.

Except for a few snide remarks about the religion of the Pilgrims (at one point he says they were almost a cult), this was a wonderful retelling of the Mayflower story including the horrible aftermath of hostility with the Native Americans. He connects the dots from the peace of the first Thanksgiving to the horror of bloodshed just a few years later, a chilling commentary on the effects of the Half-Way Covenant. It doesn't matter who one's grandfather is, each generation must defend the truth on its own.

Clear, interesting history of the Pilgrims and their voyage to the New England. I found this book engrossing and not dry reading at all which sometimes histories can be. So glad I read this as I've been to Plymouth and can picture where the events took place. Would recommend this highly.

8/16 - Just as good as the first time reading. I really like hearing about places where events took place and looking them up on google or wikipedia to see what they look like today.

I found the account of my ancestor who was swept overboard and barely rescued in this book. It added to our family culture.

This account of the Mayflower and the subsequent colonies in New England was balanced, detailed and quite readable.