Tom Shachtman
|
"Shachtman is like a maestro, masterfully conducting an orchestra of history, anthropology, psychology, sociology, and journalism together in a harmonious and evocative symphony of all things Amish. He follows the lives of numerous young Amish in the midst of the tumultuous "Rumspringa" years .... I fully expect to see this book short-listed next year come literary awards time." Christian Science Monitor Publishers Weekly starred review: "Shachtman is a sensitive and nimble chronicler of Amish teens, devoting ample space to allowing them to tell their stories in their own words. Throughout, he uses the Amish rumspringa experience as a foil for understanding American adolescence and identity formation in general, and also contextualizes rumspringa throughout the rapidly growing and changing Amish world. This is not only one of the most absorbing books ever written about the Plain People, but a perceptive snapshot of the larger culture in which they live and move." "Writer, novelist, and documentarian Shachtman has created a fascinating and near-unprecedented glimpse into the inner lives of Amish society. High recommended." Library Journal "A riveting and instructive portrait," Kirkus Reviews "Mr. Shachtman's wonderfully rich portrait and history of the Amish as a people and a faith helps to show why one of the strictest religious communities in America is better at holding a flock than some of the most liberal." Wall Street Journal Reviews of other books by Tom Shachtman ABSOLUTE ZERO AND THE CONQUEST OF COLD (Houghton Mifflin) "Analyzes the social impact of the chill factor, explains the science of cold and tells the curious tales behind inventions like the thermometer, the fridge and the thermos flask …. Excellent use of analogies … [an] astonishing observation … a fascinating finale …. Recounts the history of cold with passion and clarity." –- New York Times Book Review "Intriguing … a disarming portrait of an exquisite, ferocious, world-ending extreme." -- Kirkus "An absorbing account to chill out with." –- Booklist "The pursuit of absolute zero may not, at first, seem important or exciting ... But Shachtman –- who has a gift for telling scientific adventure stories –- has done a wonderful job of conveying the excitement …. This is a truly wonderful book: purchase this before it becomes an episode of Nova. –- Library Journal (starred review) "Shachtman … holds the reader’s attention with the skill of a novelist as he relates the 400-year effort to fill out what scientists have called ‘the map of Frigor.’" – Scientific American "This esoteric scientific adventure story –- as keenly pursued as the simultaneous quest for the arctic regions –- is masterfully told …. In many ways an absolute delight, chock-full of quirky characters questing for ever-lower temperatures and discovering fundamental properties of matter along the way …. Shachtman has achieved an enormous feat, combining science, biography and analysis into a compelling narrative full of explosions, obsessed experimentalists and unexpected revelations." – Atlanta Journal-Constitution "For a subject bound to leave many readers, well, cold, [Shachtman] has compiled here a surprisingly fascinating account of what cold is and the role it has played and plays in our lives and nature." -- Copley News Service. AROUND THE BLOCK: The Business of a Neighborhood (Harcourt Brace) "A ‘near-classic’ ... One of the best descriptions of American business in microcosm to come out of the 1990s [and] the sort of business book that is published too rarely .... Its subject goes to the heart of modern American business -- and in the process tells you more about social conflicts, immigration, education and, indeed, America itself than countless loftier works .... Most memorable are the characters .... Mr. Shachtman is wonderful at detailing the obstinacy of small businessmen .... One of the book’s best chapters is on the stout defence put up by a gym and a video store against two national chains that move in across the street .... Another fascinating section looks at the economics of three deli-groceries ...." -- The Economist "To answer such questions as whether small businesses create jobs and how they survive the competition with big business, Shachtman spent a year exploring the assorted enterprises in a square block of Manhattan’s Chelsea. The book is crowded with real people speaking candidly about plans and problems as varied as their occupations, which range from dog grooming to wholesale plumbing supplies. A grand idea, splendidly executed." -- The New Yorker. "Fascinating detail, [a] terrific new book ... a lively, insightful chronicle of a year in the business life of a Manhattan block .... AROUND THE BLOCK is a wonderful weave of personal stories and big-picture trends. Mr. Shachtman has mastered the art of the disciplined digression: his side trips into architecture, history and macroeconomics are short and sharply illuminating." -- The New York Times, Business Section. "A complex and detailed [study of] the gradual, almost invisible creation of jobs, wealth and economic growth through the establishment and nurturing of small businesses .... A thoughtful, interesting book ..... Tom Shachtman has written a good and useful book that -- unlike so much else these days -- gives cause to look to the future with hope." -- Washington Post Book World SKYSCRAPER DREAMS: THE GREAT REAL ESTATE FAMILIES OF NEW YORK. (Harcourt) “A fascinating history, showing how the city has been molded by the edifice complexes of risk-takers .... Shachtman ably sketches the rise and fall of these family empires .... The feuds of these real estate kingpins are the stuff of grand comedy ... wonderful fun.” -- Business Week. “Superb reporting on the industry’s wheeling and dealing .... Shachtman has done an enormous amount of research, and the story of how Manhattan was built is a fascinating one.” New York Times Book Review. “Reads like a novel ... about the dreamers and doers who built the skyscrapers of New York City. The book is filled with intrigue, dirt, corruption and everything else involved in the building of our greatest city.” -- Cincinnati Enquirer. |
Welcome
Hi -- I'm Tom Shachtman, writer, filmmaker, and educator. I've written nearly two dozen histories, social commentaries, and children's books, and have collaborated on a dozen others with such people as CEOs, the FBI agent who coined the term 'serial killers,' a tough-as-nails woman judge, the chief investigator for the country's largest medical examiner's office, and an American hero wrongly imprisoned in Russia. Two of my books have recently been released as e-books, the widely acclaimed RUMSPRINGA: TO BE OR NOT TO BE AMISH; and the classic 'true crime' bible, WHOEVER FIGHTS MONSTERS, which I wrote with Robert K. Ressler, dean of the FBI's profilers.
I'm also a documentarian, having written (and occasionally produced and directed) documentaries for the major television networks ABC, CBS, NBC, and PBS. My most recent writing for documentaries was the two-hour NOVA based on my book ABSOLUTE ZERO AND THE CONQUEST OF COLD, broadcast in 2008. The script and documentary won the prestigious science-writing award from the American Institute of Physics in 2010. My newest book, published in November 2011, is AMERICAN ICONOCLAST: THE LIFE AND TIMES OF ERIC HOFFER, the "longshoreman philosopher." This is the first full biography of an important American thinker from the '50s, '60s, and '70s, and it includes a reinterpreting of his works for the post-9/11 world. It is published by Hopewell Press, which has republished most of Hoffer's work. Hoffer's insights into "true believers," the nature of drastic change, and the social strain of permanently altering the character of work, have perhaps greater resonance today than in his lifetime (1898?-1983). The reaction from early reviewers and readers has been quite wonderful. In the January 2, 2012 Weekly Standard, Fred Siegel writes that "Tom Shachtman has brought this extraordinary, but unfortunately forgotten figure back into the public eye with this new biography .... [An] engaging and clearly written account." "As complete and masterful a biography as could be imagined," writes Herbert S. Parmet, biographer of Presidents Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson, and Nixon. "A long overdue rediscovery of the longshoreman philosopher by a fine writer," writes Walter W. Woodward, Connecticut's State Historian. I've written a series of op-eds about Hoffer in The Lakeville Journal, the most recent one about Occupy Wall Street and the Tea Party as mass movements a la Hoffer. An earlier one about Hoffer a good introduction to him, is in the Lakeville Journal for May 5, 2011, and is reprinted on my newsletter page. Recent long articles/reviews of the book are in The Litchfield County Times, the Waterbury Republican-American, and The Lakeville Journal. Recent events: Reading and signing AMERICAN ICONOCLAST, johnnycake books, Salisbury, CT, Saturday December 10, 3-5PM. Reading and discussion, Oliver Wolcott Library, Litchfield, CT. December 8, 7PM. My most recent Huffington Post article, "The Rosetta Stone of the Right," a bit of historical sleuthing, is at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/tom-shachtman/rosetta-stone-of-the-right_b_834904.html. THE FORTY YEARS WAR: THE RISE AND FALL OF THE NEOCONS, FROM NIXON TO OBAMA, written with Len Colodny was published in 2009 by HarperCollins. It is now out in paperback, and also available as an e-book. Published in January 2011, an article in the Hoover Digest about the friendship of Bill Scheinman and Tom Mboya, the men behind the airlift of my book, AIRLIFT TO AMERICA, published by St, Martins Press in 2009. Link to the article: http://www.hoover.org/publications/hoover-digest/article/62106. Other recent articles: Huffington Post, January 14, 2011, "A Dozen Ways To Elminate the Middle Class," based on some prescient predictions of mine from 2002 that I recently found; November 23, 2010: "Somewhere, Osama Bin Laden is Laughing ..." (about airport scanning, groping, and more) and November 8, 2010, 'Five Truths Your Newly Elected Rep Won't Tell You.' All of these have been widely re-posted. An op-ed in The Lakeville Journal, Oct. 28, 2010, "Learning You Can Take A Punch," about an alarming trend of suicides among people of the "baby boomer" generation. A copy is on my newsletter page. In 2010 I was delighted to be invited to address a group at the Library of Congress, to read from and discuss AIRLIFT TO AMERICA, for the 50th anniversary of the Africa Section of the library. Webcast link: http://www.loc.gov/today/cyberlc/feature_wdesc.php?rec=4864 April 21, 2010, at the Africa Table luncheon at Stanford University, on AIRLIFT TO AMERICA and the recently opened archives of William X. Scheinman, founder of the airlift, which are at the Hoover Institution on the Stanford campus. In February 2010, when the AIP, American Institute of Physics, awarded me and ABSOLUTE ZERO producer/director David Dugan its science writing prize, we were pleased to learn from an educational materials vendor that ABSOLUTE ZERO has become its best-selling science video, more requested than any of the other Nova programs.
Len Colodny and I were the featured guests at the Washington, D.C., World Affairs Council on January 7, 2010 in a ninety-minute discussion taped by C-Span. First shown on January 31, 2010, it is now available for viewing on their website, at: http://www.c-spanarchives.org/program/291579-1 We are pleased that more than 3,000 people have since looked at excepts of the program on the C-Span Book TV website or downloaded the video.
Other publicity about THE FORTY YEARS WAR: February 21, 2010, my 'op-ed' about 'Al Haig's Dark Side,' in the Huffington Post, based on THE FORTY YEARS WAR. (For the full text, see my newsletter page.) December 8, 2009. My article in the Washington Post book blog, "Where are the Neocons Today?" Link: http://voices.washingtonpost.com/shortstack/ History News Network (HNN) blog, my article about "The Nixon Quartet," dealing with the uneasy interactions of Nixon, Kissinger, Haig, and Fritz Kraemer during the years of the Nixon Presidency -- a prelude to the longer discussion in THE FORTY YEARS WAR. Link: http://hnn.us/articles/119555.html Also on Huffington Post, my article about former VP Dick Cheney's channeling of the thoughts of Fritz Kraemer, the long-dead guu of the neocos. Link: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/tom-shachtman/railing-against-obama-che_b_380196.html
AIRLIFT TO AMERICA: HOW BARACK OBAMA SR., JOHN F. KENNEDY, TOM MBOYA, AND 800 EAST AFRICAN STUDENTS CHANGED THEIR WORLD AND OURS was published in 2009 by St. Martin's Press. Reviews from the Washington Post and The Nation echoed pre-pub reviews by Kirkus and Publishers Weekly. The foreword is by the great singer and social activist Harry Belafonte, who along with Jackie Robinson and Sidney Poitier signed the first appeal to the public for support for the airlift, fifty years ago.
Washington Post: “This book fills in a piece of Barack Obama's background. Quite an important piece, in that the subject is the so-called airlift, between 1959 and '63, of hundreds of young Africans to the United States, where they studied at colleges and universities …. The idea was to let promising young Africans experience firsthand the freedom and promise of American life. No less an analyst than the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. thought the program would advance the cause of civil rights on both continents.” The Nation. “Airlift offers an intriguing tidbit of US history and a look back at a brief moment when Many Americans and Africans caught glimpses of a shared and hopeful future.” Kirkus Service lauded the book's "revealing character sketches" of individual students and their fascinating lives, and summed up the book by saying it offers "a compelling portrait of nation-building abroad and nation-changing at home." Publishers Weekly: "A memorable and poignant recounting of a significant endeavor that is still scoring successes around the world, this book is not to be missed by African and American history buffs." BookBrowse --Editors Choice -- "This thorough, patiently researched, and at times moving account of dedicated young people hungry for an education and those who helped them receive it will appeal to students of American history in the 1960's in particular, and anyone interested in an important turning-point in the struggle for human rights in the U.S. and in Africa .... I came away with my idealism refreshed. The architects of the student airlifts believed in freedom, human dignity and self-determination; the students they helped believed that through education they could help a nation. By having the courage to act on those beliefs, and the determination to persevere through delay and defeat, they would change the world in ways they could never have imagined." AIRLIFT TO AMERICA is the never-before-told and quite heroic story of the 1959-1963 airlifts from East Africa that helped Barack Obama, Sr., father of the president, and Wangari Maathai, future winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, among hundreds of others, to study at American and Canadian colleges and universities. The airlifts and their graduates changed not only the future course of Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, and other nations of East Africa, but also the course of U.S. race relations. Jack Kennedy's donation to enable the 1960 airlift became an important issue in that year's American presidential election, and was a factor in swinging enough African-American votes into his column to give him the victory. RUMSPRINGA, TO BE OR NOT TO BE AMISH, now in paperback, has become a favored title for book discussion groups as a starting point for dialogues on faith, and on the difficulties of raising teenagers (and being teenagers) in fast-paced America. You'll find some excerpted reviews in the column immediately to the left. Another recent paperback is of my fulmination about language, THE INARTICULATE SOCIETY: ELOQUENCE AND CULTURE IN AMERICA. Originally published in 1995, it has been reissued in paperback because of continued interest in the book and its subject -- articulate behavior. As with RUMSPRINGA, it has become a favorite of book clubs seeking good topics for discussions. Here's why, in a review from the American Library Association: "People talk more and say less, and that summarizes Shachtman's wide-ranging analysis of the verbal ineptitude that television so obviously fosters. But he doesn't saddle the tube with sole responsibility for ineloquence. It more abets than causes the crisis, which emanates from deeper problems, such as the mass appetite for witless entertainment in talk shows, sitcoms, or action movies. Trenchant examples of disjointed, muddled speech overlay the scholarly linguistic theories that Shachtman explains, making this a rich warning about the ever-growing impoverishment of public rhetoric." SKYSCRAPER DREAMS: THE GREAT REAL ESTATE FAMILIES OF NEW YORK continues to be a valuable book for insights into how to make money (and lose money) in real estate, and the lives of the multi-generational families who have built modern Manhattan. THE PHONY WAR, 1939-1940, is still the best book about this early period of World War II, during which nothing appeared to happen but the rest of the war was essentially determined. EDITH AND WOODROW: A PRESIDENTIAL ROMANCE, about a romance in the White House, and its effect on national and international policy, is also a perennial seller. I have written books on a wide variety of historic, economic, and social subjects, such as World War II science and technology (TERRORS AND MARVELS), the 1929 Stock Market Crash (THE DAY AMERICA CRASHED), the 1960s (DECADE OF SHOCKS), a single block in New York (AROUND THE BLOCK), and a trilogy of novels about animal behavior, BEACHMASTER, WAVEBENDER, and DRIFTWHISTLER. In addition to books solely under my own name, I have collaborated with some fascinating people on their stories. With Shiya Ribowsky, a civilian in the New York City Medical Examiner's office, who was in charge of identifying the victims of the World Trade Center bombings, I wrote DEAD CENTER: TALES FROM THE WORLD'S LARGEST MEDICAL EXAMINER'S OFFICE, published in September, 2006. Shiya, born into the Orthodox Jewish community in New York, is also a cantor, and one with a morbid sense of humor and a great memory for the more than 8,000 other deaths that he's investigated for the NYC ME's office. One of my most successful earlier collaborations has just been re-released. It is THE GILDED LEAF: TRIUMPH, TRAGEDY, AND TOBACCO, by Patrick Reynolds and me; it is about Patrick's family, the R. J. Reynolds family, and, not incidentally, his path to becoming one of the country's leading anti-smoking activists. Critics agreed it was a "fascinating" read. Still in print are my collaborations (three books) with Robert K. Ressler, the ex-FBI man who coined the term 'serial killer' (WHOEVER FIGHTS MONSTERS; I HAVE LIVED IN THE MONSTER, and JUSTICE IS SERVED). So is my 2001 collaboration with Edmond D. Pope, the former Navy intelligence man convicted of espionage in Russia in 2000 and released after eight months in Putin's jails (TORPEDOED). For more details, see the following pages. |
|
