Rating: 
Summary: Nice Little Piece of Historical Fiction
Review: Ok so maybe little is the wrong word to use, at 522 pages it is a weighty book. But "Dark Eagle" does an admiral job of being light and easy reading, and yet still staying true to it historical roots. I would compare the writing done by John Ensor Harr in this book to "Winter Soldiers" by Richard Ketchum. You will be left with the sense of the gray area that history includes, and the feeling that all sides of the American Revolution have been fairly represented. If I have one complaint it is that Mr. Harr choose to treat Benedict Arnold's life as being over when he switched sides, which is not the case. Benedict Arnold was a very busy and complicated man, and should been known for far more that just being a turn coat who happened to get caught.
Rating: 
Summary: Who's the Traitor?
Review: This is one of those rare books I had to put down in the middle. That it's about the American Revolution makes it even more strange that I should find it so hard to stomach. I am a big fan of historical fiction. I am not a fan of the kind of wrongheadedness that Mr. Harr seems to espouse.Once I started reading, I assumed Harr was English, which would excuse some of the less wretched instances of classism, racism and sycophancy that marr his text. After appreciating aristocratic Englishmen for their fine sense of honor and polished boots while painting true American heroes as dithering, vain, and conflicted at best, as drunken bullies at worst, the author goes on to empathetically describe the difficulty of a slave owner whose slaves are simply 'confused' by offers of freedom. I just had to stop reading. Harr seems taxed to find anything positive to say about the Declaration of Independence, the Continental Congress, John Adams, Horatio Gates, Philip Schuyler, Thomas Jefferson, or George Washington. This is not a book for fans of the American Revolution. Like those unfortunate Loyalists that Harr sides with, perhaps he should reconsider his priorities, or he might end up tarred and feathered.
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