Rating: 
Summary: a wonderful continuation of a stirring, heroic epic
Review: Picking up where we left off in the supurb Parting the Waters, the book's first chapter introduces the rising struggle for recognition of Elijah Muhummad's Nation of Islam. After religious services at a Los Angles Mosque, Chief Parker's strongarm crew stomps around outside and causes a whole lot of trouble. An ensuing riot followed, leaving several people dead and many more wounded. There were many arrests and only the Muslims were charged with murder. This tale leads to the growing notoriety of Malcolm X and his eventual split with the Nation of Islam, which lead, most likely, to his murder. Then the book branches out to many other areas, from St. Augustine, Florida, the continent's oldest city, to brutality in Alabama and Mississippi. The only trouble with the book, is Branch's primary focus on Martin Luther King. Not that these stories aren't fascinating, but the intrigue and dangerous plots of the Nation of Islam split is far more interesting. Perhaps it's just me, with my utter fascination with behind-the-scenes spy games and hit squads, but J. Edgar Hoover and a paranoid Lyndon Johnson, screaming into telephones with highly classified information that, only now, thirty-two years after the fact someone (Mr. Branch in this case) had the energy and the wisdom to interpret with seemingly objective storytelling. These books are actually just one long, continuous book, stopping and starting as our faithful historian brackets off the fourteen years however he sees fit to start and stop with specific eras. I am eagerly awaiting At Caanan's Edge in a few years time.
Rating:
Summary: Terrific Second Volume In Planned Three-Volume Series!
Review: Presenting an authentic and comprehensive picture of the mammoth civil rights movement in the United States in the post WWII era is a daunting task, yet noted author and journalist Taylor Branch has succeeded masterfully with this, the second of a planned three-volume history of the struggle of blacks in America to find justice, equality and parity with the mainstream white society. Detailing the final desperate years of the mature and charismatic Rev. Martin Luther King, Branch sets the stage for a wide range of events, personalities, and public issues. This is truly a wonderful read, fascinating, entertaining, and endlessly detailed in its description of people and events, and quite insightful in its chronicling of the fortune of those social forces that created, sustained, and accomplished the single most momentous feat of meaningful social action in our nation's contemporary history. His range of subjects is necessarily wide and deep, and we find coverage of every aspect of the tumultuous struggle as it reaches into the final desperate efforts of the mature Martin Luther King, a man haunted by efforts at blackmail, internal bickering and dissension, and racist hatred as he continues the efforts to rectify the social evils of segregation and works toward greater civil rights and justice under the law. As in the first volume, this work at times borders on becoming a biography of Martin Luther King and his times, yet Branch so extends his coverage of the eddies and currents of the movement itself that it appears to be by far the most comprehensive and fair-minded treatment of the civil rights movement published to date. Indeed, in detailing these critical years of the movement, Branch offers a wonderfully recreated portrait of all of the participants in this momentous and historical struggle, illustrating just how close to the breaking point our society came during these fateful years, and therefore memorably engages the reader with every element of this and a thousand other personalities, issues, and events that helped to carve out the history of our country for almost twenty years. Here one finds a very detailed coverage of the rise of black firebrand Malcolm X and how he influenced the ongoing movement, of J. Edgar Hoover, perpetually obsessed with King and his sexual exploits, and of Lyndon Johnson, who, acting out of his concern for his dream for the Great Society, forcefully twisted the forces of the U.S. Congress toward accepting meaningful civil rights legislation. So too, do we find lesser known names and personalities covered, from Diane Nash to Robert Moses to Fannie Lou Hamer, all of who played critical and fateful roles in the unfolding of the civil rights movement. The names and places and events described here are legion, and one gets the sense that anyone who had a conscience was involved, and many of the names mentioned later went on to greater accomplishment and further noteworthy contribution in their public lives and careers. This, then, is a stupendous second book in a wonderful planned three-volume history of the civil rights movement in the United States; the first volume covered the period from the late 1950s when the first rumblings of the movement were sounded until just after the assassination of John F. Kennedy in Dallas in November of 1963. This second volume picks up the thread thereafter, extending out through the Johnson years and including aspects of the coalescence of the movement with the Vietnam anti-war protest. This is a wonderful book, and one I would consider essential reading for anyone with an interest in American history in the 20th century. I highly recommend both of the books already published, and I hope you appreciate reading them as much as I did while we wait for the arrival of the third and final volume. Enjoy!
Rating: 
Summary: Too much, too little, a bit late, Mr. Branch
Review: Some reviewers point to the yawn-inspiring length and density of printed matter making up this effort. Not so much of a problem had it been engagingly written and/or illuminating. PTW was both of those things. I intended to use Mr. Branch's book as a primary resource in conjunction with a paper I'm writing on women leaders in the Civil Rights Movement. Imagine my very predictable chagrin when women are barely mentioned. Pictures of Rosa Parks and Ella Baker are supplemented by thumbnail sketches while we are fed a dizzying amount of minutiae about a man whose hagiography is probably in the bottom drawer of the Pope's desk. Minute by minute, we are led through King's life, but the larger context in which he operated seems missing. Where is the strife between MLK, CORE, SNCC, SCLC, due to their different organizing philosophies and methods of producing change? Where are we now? The dearth of visible, radical black leadership we are experiencing may well be a response to the shots that still echo from the '60's to the present.
Rating:
Summary: History teacher gives thumbs-up
Review: Taylor Branch has written an epic novel (yes, Mr. I Left It On a Plane, this is a novel!), which gives the "inside scoop" on three critical years of the civil rights movement. As a high school history teacher, I found this book not only a fascinating read (though, don't get me wrong, not "easy" like reading Grisham or some such pap)but one which made me go "oh, THAT's why that happened" many times over. For example, the question of why the Republican Party in 1964 ceased (forever?) to be the Party of Lincoln...or what kind of pressures were on LBJ and MLK to support each other and yet not be SEEN as supporting each other...or what exactly WAS the deal with Malcolm X's rift with the Black Muslims...or dozens of other questions finally, comprehensively, and interestingly answered!
Rating:
Summary: History teacher gives thumbs-up
Review: Taylor Branch has written an epic novel (yes, Mr. I Left It On a Plane, this is a novel!), which gives the "inside scoop" on three critical years of the civil rights movement. As a high school history teacher, I found this book not only a fascinating read (though, don't get me wrong, not "easy" like reading Grisham or some such pap)but one which made me go "oh, THAT's why that happened" many times over. For example, the question of why the Republican Party in 1964 ceased (forever?) to be the Party of Lincoln...or what kind of pressures were on LBJ and MLK to support each other and yet not be SEEN as supporting each other...or what exactly WAS the deal with Malcolm X's rift with the Black Muslims...or dozens of other questions finally, comprehensively, and interestingly answered!
Rating: 
Summary: More tangled than Parting the Waters but just as good
Review: The rather straight line story of the civil rights movement that is told in Parting the Waters becomes much more tangled and complex in Taylor Branch's second book. Here the movement begins to intersect more directly with the other currents of social unrest in the country and the conflicts both within and outside of the movement blur the lines of clear right and wrong. This is a great piece of social history with the civil rights movement and MLK as the focus. The more success King achieved the more pressure he was under - both from his enemies and his supporters. This was a difficult time for the country and for all those who were - in whatever way - trying to change it. Branch does an invaluable job in trying to distill the mass of detail and the great complexity of the sociopolitical scene into a coherent story. It's harder to do here than in the first book, but he manages nicely. Good job. Worth reading carefully.
Rating:
Summary: Monumental research, but writing could be better
Review: This book addresses subjects which should be known to all Americans, such as the FBI's underhanded efforts to discredit Martin Luther King, Jr., and the unlawful interference by elected officials with African-Americans' right to vote. The author clearly put monumental work into researching this book and his prior volume, Parting the Waters. Unfortunately, the obscure writing style and the inclusion of many details of limited relevance make the book a chore to read.
Rating:
Summary: A thorough and fascnating historical review
Review: This book not only covers the height of King's work, but also the events surrounding the assassination of Malcolm X with great detail. Read this, and you might begin to doubt Spike Lee's version of events in his 1992 film on Malcolm X. This is not supposed to be a novel. It is not an easy read. This is NOT a watered down history book. People who want the light stuff, please refer to the books by Tom Brokaw or William Bennett.
Rating:
Summary: Powerful tribute to nonviolent protest
Review: This impressive history is best at emphasizing one of the most striking facts of the Civil Rights Movement: how so many people, over such a long period of time, in the face of so much violence--remained nonviolent. Unstated, but implied, is the fact that absent such nonviolence the gains won during the Movement would have been fewer and slower in coming. There is much else of interest here, too, e.g., the power dynamics at play among the Kennedys, LBJ, Hoover, and King, and also among the central figures within the Nation of Islam. My only beef: Branch doesn't seem able to say "no" to any detail, no matter how trivial. As a result I often found myself asking why he was including such obscure, even bizarre, factoids--a phenomenom which distracted me from the otherwise fascinating material.
Rating:
Summary: fascinating tho not quite as good as Parting the Waters
Review: This is a book which will catch you up, no matter how familiar you are with the events it relates. It pays more attention to Malcolm X than the standard news accounts of the period did, but that story is great interest--tho one doesn't think it did much for the goals that King and his fellow workers had.
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