Tow #15 A Vengeful Fury Greg Grandin’s ‘Empire of Necessity’ By: Andrew Delbanco

A powerful new book has been released by Greg Grandin about slavery. In his book he talks about how there were many people who lost their lives to slavery and how it fueled the growth and power of Europe. The author of the book goes into a lot of detail when describing the conditions and what the slaves had to do. Grandin also does a very good job at passing through years of time. The author skips from time period to time period in order to fit the scope of his book. This is detectable and might bother some people. However it is a seamless transition from time period to time period. Another way that the author of the book is able to portray the tragedies of slavery is through short stories that he has found. The author does elaborate on some parts of the history, but he does keep with his theme of the tragedies of slavery. One such story is the one of two New England farmers who would have never been in contact with slaves if it had not been one who ran away telling them of their pains and sorrows as a slave. The author of this review is Andrew Delbanco, the director of American studies in Columbia University. He wrote this review in order for the average person to understand this complex and deep book. He wanted the people who read the New York Times to go and read a book that hey might not have picked up to read. By portraying the book as an intellectually challenging and interesting book the author of this review does accomplish his purpose of getting other people to read this book.