Now all roads lead to France and heavy is the tread Of the living; but the dead returning lightly dance. Edward Thomas, Roads.
When I first heard about this book being released, I was very excited. It's somewhat easy to find books, or websites, devoted to the efforts of Eastern and many Midwestern states in the Great War. For the most part, once the story gets west of the Mississippi, less is available to read.
Considering I am heavily involved in the commemoration of the war in California, I'd been wanting to find a book like this since ! I put it on my birthday gift idea list and eagerly waited until the book ended up in my possession. North no doubt did her research. Though the book runs nearly pages, nearly 40 percent of the text is notes, indexes, and the like. A lengthy introduction sets the scene, and then the volume is broken down into three main sections: the war overseas, the home front, and the security state.
The chapters on the war overseas are filled with information some of which was new to me , and yet they feel somewhat cursory. Both the men and the women who made it to Europe are profiled. I rather had the feeling that Dr. North would have skipped this section entirely if she could have. This is unfortunate since it was the part of the book I had the most interest in.
However, I have no question that it was the topic that was of least appeal to the author. The book then moves to the home front, filled to the brim with information on the war economy, wages for workers, the influenza pandemic, the military bases that sprung up here, the agricultural boom, and topics of that sort. The author pointed out the efforts to round up slackers and made it seem like it was a huge crisis. However, when she related the numbers of those who tried getting out of serving, it was a very low percentage.
