American Uprising has been getting a lot of attention on various blogs, and I wanted to share a few of my favorite reviews:
““Rasmussen writes with a youthful enthusiasm and is very passionate about this material, and it shows. His detailed descriptions of life during that time, garnered from very thorough research, put the reader in the center of the action and it’s hard to put the book down…a riveting, empowering account of one of American history’s best kept secrets, told through the eye of a promising young historian whose desire set the record straight makes for a compelling and informative read.”
–The Grio
“This riveting book will keep you glued to your chair from start to finish…. It is non-fiction but reads like a suspense novel”
“American Uprising: The Untold Story of America’s Largest Slave Revolt, by Daniel Rasmussen is one of those books that once again brings into sharp relief just how much the stories we accept as history are crafted for the benefit of whomever is doing the telling, and that they have an intended audience. History is not innocent, it is served up with a particular purpose in mind. American Uprising focuses on a slave revolt planned by Akan warriors Kook and Quamana, and biracial slave driver Charles Deslondes which took place January 1811 just outside of New Orleans. Despite the unprecedented magnitude of the revolt and evidence that the organizers intended for it to have far-reaching political consequences, the uprising was purposefully classed as run of the mill criminal activity, defanged and largely forgotten for two hundred years. The much smaller, and in some ways less scary rebellions, of Nat Turner, Gabriel Prosser, Denmark Vesey and John Brown are widely known, their details widely studied and disseminated.”
“American Uprising is engaging and well-researched… [American Uprising] offers a much-needed contribution to scholarship in this field. As Rasmussen notes in his concluding remarks, Kook, Quamana, and Charles Deslondes are not names that people see on landmarks in and around New Orleans, nor are they names that people can easily find in history books. Because history is written by the victors, the revolt has been largely obscured until now. The publishing of American Uprising is a big step towards correcting this erasure.”
“ A highly readable 200 pages, American Uprising provides a solid general background on a shameful chapter on American history. The details and documentation that would have provided the information necessary for a book length account of this slave revolt are lost to history, but Mr. Rasmussen has done a good job rescuing this story and bringing it to our attention. I think it would make a fine addition to any tenth grade history class.”
“Fortunately for those of us who want to know as much as we can about American history—good and bad—historian Daniel Rasmussen uses extensive original research and superb narrative skill to vividly recount what happened in American Uprising. Beyond the story of approximately 500 men who yearned to be free and were willing to put their lives on the line to achieve it, Rasmussen’s book is about the expansion of the United States and how greed and power worked to distort America’s highest ideals…. American Uprising is certainly difficult to read in places because of the grim nature of the subject, but anyone interested in slavery in the U.S. or in the history of our country will find it illuminating as we strive to better understand our past.”
