Daniel James Brown: The Boys in the Boat

This is another book that I read because of my AP class. I do have to admit that I enjoyed it more than I thought I was going to.

The Boys in the Boat tells the story of the 1936 U.S. Olympic rowing team. This team came from Washington State and was made up of a seemingly rag-tag group of boys. One boy in particular, Joe, came from very humble circumstances. Having been basically abandoned by his family multiple times in his childhood, Joe lacked confidence. By the time he got to the Olympics, his coaches had helped him succeed.

I know next to nothing about rowing, but that was not a requirement to understand this book. Daniel James Brown does a great job of explaining the sport, and also introducing the mechanics of the boats themselves. I thought much of the background information he provided about boats and the legendary builder of them fascinating, but at times unnecessary.

Joe's story is in many ways inspiring but also heartbreaking. Brown describes his childhood and how he was abandoned several times by his father. Each time this happens, Joe found himself having to fend for himself to survive, and since it was the 1930s when no one had any money, this was incredibly difficult for him. The inspiration is that he never gave up, and he just kept struggling on. Eventually, he found himself on the Olympic team and in Berlin.

I've always wondered what it was like in Germany both during World War II and leading up to it. I found that Brown shined a light on conditions in Germany well. I feel like, as Americans, we've always tried to explain away antisemitism by saying the regular German people just didn't know what was happening, and honestly, after I read this book, I found that harder to believe. While it isn't the central focal point of the book, I thought that Brown made it clear that antisemitism was high in both Europe and the United States, which ultimately laid the groundwork for the tragedy that was the Holocaust.

In all, this was a fascinating book that tied together for me several aspects of American history that have always seemed unrelated. I forget that some of these events overlap: such as the Dust Bowl overlaps with the Great Depression, that bleeds into the rise of Hitler and the start of World War II. This book did a great job of tying up those historical events.

Like I said, I enjoyed this book a lot more than I thought I would.

I rate it PG

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

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