Book cover of The Ghost Ship of Brooklyn: An Untold Story of the American Revolution

Book description

Moored off the coast of Brooklyn, the derelict HMS Jersey was a living hell for thousands of Americans either captured by the British or accused of disloyalty. Crammed below deck without light or fresh air, the disease-ridden prisoners were scarcely given food and water. More Americans died in its ghastly…

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Why read it?

1 author picked The Ghost Ship of Brooklyn as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

Watching reenactors wearing tricorne hats and stockings, I never associated the American Revolution with war atrocities until I read this book. What’s worse is it happened in my own backyard. After the British landed and routed Washington’s fledging army, they occupied Manhattan. 

Their biggest problem was prisoners of war. They were housed in twenty-something “hulked” ships with cannon and sails removed in Wallabout Bay off Brooklyn. Watson focuses on the most infamous of these floating prisons, the HMS Jersey.

His vivid descriptions of the thousand or so men and boys shackled there make for claustrophobic reading. After the war, the…

From Jerry's list on history of the Civil Rights Movement.

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Book cover of December on 5C4

December on 5C4 by Adam Strassberg,

Magical realism meets the magic of Christmas in this mix of Jewish, New Testament, and Santa stories–all reenacted in an urban psychiatric hospital!

On locked ward 5C4, Josh, a patient with many similarities to Jesus, is hospitalized concurrently with Nick, a patient with many similarities to Santa. The two argue…

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