Book Log 2015 #21: One Summer: America, 1927 by Bill Bryson

Charles Lindbergh crosses the Atlantic. Babe Ruth keeps hitting home runs. Calvin Coolidge tours the west and announces he won't be running for re-election. There are some of the major events that marked the summer of 1927, which Bill Bryson recounts in this highly engaging book. It's not just the major events and their detailed recounting that makes the book so engaging (the in-depth review of the failures of trans-Atlantic flight is a great example of this), it's also the way that minor events (or events that were major at the time but have faded over time) are woven in to give a fuller account of the summer. Flagpole sitters, sash weight murderers, and oddly named socialites all give added color.

I brought this book on vacation, figuring that two weeks and two longish plane flights would give me enough time to finish this. I wound up blowing through it before the first week was up, stealing time during the trip to continue reading. So yes, recommended.

(Popsugar Reading Challenge: a book with a number in the title, a book you own but never read)