Myth America: Historians Take On the Biggest Legends and Lies About Our Past

by Kevin M. Kruse (Editor), Julian E. Zelizer (Editor), Akhil Reed Amar

In this “incisive” ( Vanity Fair ) and “authoritative” (New York Times ) instant New York Times bestseller, America’s top historians set the record straight on the most pernicious myths about our nation’s past

The United States is in the grip of a crisis of bad history. Distortions of the past promoted in the conservative media have led large numbers of Americans to believe in fictions over facts, making constructive dialogue impossible and imperiling our democracy.   
 
In Myth America , Kevin M. Kruse and Julian E. Zelizer have assembled an all-star team of fellow historians to push back against this misinformation. The contributors debunk narratives that portray the New Deal and Great Society as failures, immigrants as hostile invaders, and feminists as anti-family warriors—among numerous other partisan lies. Based on a firm foundation of historical scholarship, their findings revitalize our understanding of American history.  
  
Replacing myths with research and reality, Myth America is essential reading amid today’s heated debates about our nation’s past.  
 
With Essays By 
 
Akhil Reed Amar • Kathleen Belew • Carol Anderson • Kevin M. Kruse • Erika Lee • Daniel Immerwahr • Elizabeth Hinton • Naomi Oreskes • Erik M. Conway • Ari Kelman • Geraldo Cadava • David A. Bell • Joshua Zeitz • Sarah Churchwell • Michael Kazin • Karen L. Cox • Eric Rauchway • Glenda Gilmore • Natalia Mehlman Petrzela • Lawrence B. Glickman • Julian E. Zelizer 

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Politics, American History, Essays, Audiobook, Historical

400 pages, Paperback

First published October 18, 2022

About the author

Kevin M. Kruse (PhD, Cornell University) is Professor of History at Princeton University. Dr. Kruse studies the political, social, and urban/suburban history of 20th-century America. Focused on conflicts over race, rights, and religion, he has particular interests in segregation and the civil rights movement, the rise of religious nationalism and the making of modern conservatism.

Reviews

[Brandon Westlake · Rating 4 out of 5]

I am familiar with both Kruse and Zelizer and their work on post 1973 history. Really like the concept of this collected set of essays on everything from American Exceptionalism to police violence. This is a great edition for someone wanting to cut through a lot of the research to understand key ideas in American historiography. They all stand equally to me, although there are some historians that I was looking forward to reading over others. The risk in these works is that it is usually unbalanced, with some very strong and then some very weak entries. Kruse and Zelizer found the best people for the topics that are in this book, and expertise, along with clarity is what this book offers the best. I feel this is a book that casual readers may be attracted to (although, any conservative Trump supporters will be turned off immediately by the introduction, but in all fairness, the America First chapter was the one I think I learned the most through). As a well-read history teacher, I can't say there was a lot that I had not known or considered, but I think for undergrads, this is a great look at history by breaking down concepts that we think we know, or, those that students may just not have background information on to adequately explain.

[Grouchy Historian · Rating 2 out of 5]

I felt this book was very uneven in the quality of the essays. Some of them were excellent and thought provoking, others could have been essays in the New Republic, Salon or Vox.

The vast majority of them are attacks on conservatives, Republicans, and especially Donald Trump, who continues to live in the heads of liberals everywhere.

Does it correct American myths? I’m uncertain. Does it rigorously advance numerous liberal talking points. Completely.

Be skeptical.

[Jessa Franco · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was expecting "George Washington and the Cherry Tree" types of myths, but this was very different. Well researched and fascinating!

[Wick Welker · Rating 5 out of 5]

Greatest hits to disprove historical revisionists.

This is a good book to keep in your quiver when trying to fight a lot of BS historical revisionist crap going on right now to justify awful policies and politicians in the US. This book is a series of highly readable essays by a bevy of historians. I'll give just a quick run down of the topics treated here. James Madison wasn't as influential in the constitution as he is portrayed. Federalist paper 10 which talks about an explicit rejection by the Founding Fathers of the principles of a direct democracy was not as influential at that time as people would have you believe today. The authors assert that the constitution was Washington's and he was the cultural and political powerhouse of his time.

There is no right to state secession. There was a whole war about that, remember? The constitution was very pro-democratic for its time. "Democracy" and "Republic" where often used synonymously during the Founder's time despite many trying to split those historical hairs right now. True, the US is a constitutional republic but I see a lot of people using this as a proto-fascist talking point that a constitutional republic is somehow the antithesis of a democracy. It's not. The US is clearly a combination of a constitutional republic and a functional representative democracy and sometimes even a direct democracy (ever hear of a ballot initiative?)

There's a great essay about the immigration myth and the "they just keep coming" rhetoric about immigrants that has been going on since the inception of this country including with the Chinse Exclusion act of 1882. The US basically incentivizes immigrants to come for their labor and then start anti-immigration campaigns to get them out when they reach some critical mass of cultural influence. It happened then, it's happening now.

The New Deal era policies worked. They did. Anyone arguing otherwise is a politician or someone influenced by that politician or think tank. Some like to argue it was WW2 that caused the economy boom not the New Deal. But when you look at the unemployment data before WW2 it's clear: the WPA decreased unemployment. That's a fact. New Deal ear policies helped create the wealthiest generation that has ever existed. And no, I'm sorry Friedrich Hayek, the social democratic polices of the New Deal era did not result in an American totalitarian state.

The Southern Strategy, where conservative ideology switched from the Democratic part to the Republican party is not a leftist historical revision: it's a well documented political phenomenon with tons of historical data. The Republican party clearly abandoned progressive politics and courted white voters beginning as early as the 1950s which continued well into the 1970s with Richard Nixon. Acolytes of which party now wave the Confederate Flag? Give me a break. It happened.

You'll get a lot of other stuff about the rise of confederate statues (which happened mostly during the reconstruction era to assert white supremacy), assaults against the Voting Right's Act and a fair bit about white nationalism, police brutality and a lot of other topics.

I recommend this illuminating read.

[Diogenes Grief · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read Dr. Michael Kazin’s piece on LitHub a couple of weeks ago (https://lithub.com/a-brief-history-of...), about the long history of “socialism” in the United States of Hypocrisy, and saw that it’s part of this new and trending (on Barnes & Noble) compilation of essays written by concerned historians sticking their thumbs into the eyes of all the pathological liars and fantasyland grifters on the paleoconservative Right, backing everything up with cited sources everyone has access to. I then bought the e-book. From FDR’s “New Deal” to the negation of Native American voices to the chronic boogeyman of immigration to the grand delusions of “the magical market” to just about every other conjured chimera the GOP has exhaustively played out for the last one-hundred years, Myth America attempts to drive a stake through the heart of all its monstrous disinformation. But the GOP keeps conjuring demons out of their delusional idiocracy (i.e., Critical Race Theory [which their banning of only reinforces the need for CRT], the LBGTQ+ community and its striving for actual equal rights, women’s right to bodily autonomy, gas stoves, “woke-ness” [which is actually called Progressivism, morons], the “Welfare State” [just not corporate welfare!], Hunter Biden’s stupid laptop, microchips secreted into vaccines, Helter Skelter and “the Great Replacement”, “systemic voter fraud”, and every other b.s. devil they fear the most). Toffler’s Future Shock seems to have diseased the Right far faster and deeper than the Left. (A Vietnam vet I work with asked me a few weeks ago, “When was it OK to stick a sign in your front yard with [the f-bomb] on it?” That’s a very good question worthy of understanding just how far societal norms have deteriorated. Sociologists, earn your pay.)

Look, the “Left” is far from perfect, but it’s nowhere near the shores of clownish Insanityland as the Right is. There can be intelligent, sober debates about the role of government and the nature of capitalism, but you know where I stand on those. Of course no book will truly matter to exorcizing the demonic belief system of the GOP disinformation machine. It was bad under Nixon, but now it’s just flirting with power-mad authoritarianism. From the crackpot politicians white-knuckling the levers of power, to Fox News and it’s lesser ilk spouting manure and backed by billionaires who don’t want to pay their fair share of taxes, to all the Alex Jones types selling garbage to yokels, to every poorly educated American who feeds off their fearmongering, and to every educated American voting against their own interests and the future of the planet, this is an entrenched strategy decades in the making, exacerbated by an unregulated internet with other billionaires not wanting to police up the destructive lies propagated on their precious, Pavlovian social-media machines.

This is a great book to have as a reference for contemporary issues and tracing their taproots back into the past. Of course there are other books that perform deep dives into each issue, but if factual nonfiction is not to your liking or attention span, Myth America works great. As one of the essayists concludes her piece (and the entire book), “Myths masquerading as reality do enormous damage” (p. 322). We have overwhelming evidence of that too. The United States and so many other parts of the world have been poisoned by flagrant disinformation pushed by unregulated media outlets and the unregulated internet. We have to understand that there will be no armistice in the culture wars with one side weaponized by disinformation and abject pathological lies, until their media outlets are neutralized and the internet is appropriately policed. Since that is unlikely to happen, the onus falls on each and every one of us to be properly informed, to vet our sources of information, to understand the anatomy of propaganda and the ultimate agents behind its propagation, and to vote these vacuous puppets out. Oftentimes this is tough work, but the future of the country depends upon it.

When President Lyndon Johnson “marveled that the issues he saw as a Congressman in 1937 were still painfully apparent in 1963—and we should be stupefied that they are still painfully present TODAY—shows how little has actually been accomplished to better society and the world at large. Civil rights, healthcare, education, senior care, poverty and homelessness, mental healthcare, higher education, and nutrition are still septic wounds on society. Yes, things have certainly improved, but obviously not far enough nor fast enough. As Michael Herrington presciently wrote in 1962, “[t]he fate of the poor hangs upon the decision of the better-off. If this anger and shame are not forthcoming, someone can write a book about the other America a generation from now and it will be the same or worse. Until these facts shame us, until they stir I us to action, the other America will continue to exist, a monstrous example of needless suffering in the most advanced society in the world.” We’re three generations from then and inequality has reached grotesque proportions. The filthy rich manipulate white backlash on everything they can, being the undereducated, easily manipulated, and easily enraged “Christians” they are. There will be no peace made with them. We have to mobilize everyone to fight against it, to drown their voices out, and allow them to see how progressivism (call if whatever you like) is the ONLY way forward if we are to save humanity from itself, and save what remains of the bio-systems of the Earth from humanity’s wanton, selfish, voracious greed.

Earnest May and Richard Neustadt explored the ways clumsy misapplications of history can create catastrophes in public policy in their 1988 book Thinking in Time: The Uses of History for Decision-Makers. We’re now in an era of people trying to create their alternative histories, post-truths and post-facts, thanks in large part to the f-ing internet. This is what authoritarians do, and what Orwell illustrated perfectly with: “Who controls the past controls the future.”

Know your accurate history and take control of our shared future and the future of those yet born.

[Colleen Browne · Rating 5 out of 5]

Every American should read this excellent book to reach a fuller understanding of our history. One myth after another is dispelled and replaced with the truth. Beginning with the concept of American exceptionalism, the author notes that every country is exceptional in one or more ways and that there is no evidence to suggest that America stands significantly above them in all ways.

Immigration has been an issue for many Americans since the birth of the republic. The purpose of the Alien and Sedition Acts was to keep undesirables out of the country so as not to pollute the voting pool with foreign (French) influences that some believed would destroy the country. The issue has been used multiple times-usually with the goal of limiting the voter pool. Know Nothings targeted particularly the Irish. The Red Scare following WWI led to massive arrests and deportations. Currently, Trump has called migrants rapists and prevented Muslim immigrants from entering the country. The use of the word socialism, including its many definitions (usually ignorance from people who don't know any better.) People have been jailed and deported for their beliefs. There is also the belief that capitalism is somehow written into our Constitution when it contains nothing of the sort.

The so-called Reagan Revolution used the shining city on a hill to describe the country using tactics used since Nixon to do it. The Southern Strategy has been used by Republicans to pick up support in the South where the presence of bigotry is most visible.
White backlash has recurred ever since Reconstruction in an attempt to restore and preserve white supremacy.

Political violence has become more frequent as a means of restoring the 1950s, When one looks at the 1950's, America was overwhelmingly white, and Jim Crow laws kept blacks from voting. The themes run through American history, on the one hand declaring ourselves a free country while at the same time suppressing the rights of much of the population. The book serves as a great lesson in history and as well a warning about our future.

[April · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars... What's here is well researched and well argued, but there is a pretty serious lack of balance to the collection of essays. Instead of a consideration of ALL of the "biggest legends and lies" in American history/culture, this is essentially a consideration of what conservatives believe that is wrong. In selecting ideas that are central to political discourse and electoral politics in the 2020s, the essays feel relevant. But I found myself thinking that the title is a gross misrepresentation of the content, and I wanted to hear some consideration of what liberals might believe deeply but be mistaken about or not consider fully.

The essays themselves were individually interesting and complete. The way the essays fit together was also very methodical. The ideas meshed and referenced one another without being redundant in a way that essay collections don't always do. It did feel like a cohesive book rather than a collection of disparate essays.

A lot of my criticism could be negated by shifting the title/blurb. Partisan argument and information chosen for a purpose isn't a problem... it only became a problem for me because of what the book seems to purport to be, which it really isn't.

[Arianne X · Rating 5 out of 5]

The 20 + 1 Myth Syndrome

Mu full review could not be posted due to the limitations of Goodreads, not enough space. The book is presented in twenty chapters by twenty different authors, each covering a widely believed myth about American history, culture, and politics. My full review was a summary of each chapter with my exegetical analysis.

My Editorial Comment

The more civilization advances, the greater is the resistance from retrograde religious believers. It never has been the case that a dying class or belief system surrenders its position voluntarily without a fight. The dying classes and belief systems will attempt to organize resistance to the forces of progress. This is why beneficial progress is never achieved without struggle. The march of progress compels the retrograde forces to resist, and the resistance sharpens the struggle.

[Caleb Lagerwey · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was overall an excellent collection of essays by some of my favorite historians that addressed really important topics well.

I appreciated how they didn't pull punches when calling out modern misuses of history, yet there were times when the book felt a little too much like its goal was scoring partisan points, rather than correcting history. The essays were accurate and many authors correctly pointed out the widespread misuse of history by the contemporary right, but I would have appreciated some balance--without creating a false equivalency--that called out some of the myths or misconceptions about history often found among the political left. As others have said, there is also the issue of some of the "myths" simply being matters of interpretation or of lesser-known history; while all chapters were legitimate historical discourses, some took on myths that were actually widespread fabrications of history created by dishonest actors.

Particular highlights for me include the chapters on "Founding Myths" by Akhil Reed Amar, "The New Deal" by Eric Rauchway, "The Southern Strategy" by Kevin M. Kruse, "The Good Society" by Joshua Zeitz, and "The Good Protest" by Glenda Gilmore.

Honorable mentions for summarizing excellent books I've read go to Ari Kelman's "Vanishing Indian" for being a shorter summary of The Heartbeat of Wounded Knee: Native America from 1890 to the Present, to "Immigration" by Erika Lee for being a shorter version of her America for Americans: A History of Xenophobia in the United States, to "The United States is an Empire" by Daniel Immerwahr for being a shorter version of his How to Hide an Empire: A History of the Greater United States, to Karen L. Cox's "Confederate Monuments" for summarizing her No Common Ground: Confederate Monuments and the Ongoing Fight for Racial Justice and Dixie's Daughters: The United Daughters of the Confederacy and the Preservation of Confederate Culture, to Elizabeth Hinton's "Police Violence" and its connections to her book America On Fire: The Untold History of Police Violence and Black Rebellion Since the 1960s, to Carol Anderson's "Voter Fraud" that summarized parts of her books White Rage: The Unspoken Truth of Our Racial Divide and One Person, No Vote: How Voter Suppression Is Destroying Our Democracy.

I highly recommend this book to anyone seeking to debunk bad history a la Dinesh D'Souza, but especially history educators and instructors: it ably summarizing a lot of really important recent scholarship and portions can easily be assigned to secondary or undergraduate classes.

[Ryan Boissonneault · Rating 5 out of 5]

Amateur history written by non-historians with obvious and blatant political bias might just be the most socially harmful genre of writing in existence. This is history at its worst; oversimplified accounts with conclusions established ahead of time and facts either ignored or invented to support the desired interpretation.

Although it is true that historical facts and events often lend themselves to varying interpretations, it is also true that there exists a rich literature of research from credible professionals that limit the scope of reasonable interpretations in history.

It is only when non-specialists deviate from this consensus—often for what are clearly political motivations—that serious problems arise, and, unfortunately, we see this most often and most egregiously from the political right. Many conservatives have become so disconnected from reality that the only possible way to compete in the marketplace of ideas more broadly—and historical writing more specifically—is to cast doubt on legitimate institutions of learning, research, and communication. It’s no surprise, then, that universities, the media, and the institutions of science itself have all come under attack. For those on the right, conservatives aren’t crazy; EVERYONE ELSE is part of some vast global conspiracy.

A good example of blatant conservative political bias was President Trump’s 1776 Commission, which promised a version of history that would enable “patriotic education.” The only problem: the authors of the final “1776 report” included NO American historians. This is like creating a task force to study a particular disease or disorder and recruiting a team that lacks a single medical doctor—opting instead for non-licensed homeopathic healers.

That’s why Myth America is so critical for people to read; it’s a collection of essays from actual historians—i.e., people who know what they’re talking about because they’ve spent their entire lives studying historical sources, not having propaganda pieces ghost-written for them—debunking common myths spread largely by non-historians. It’s an opportunity to actually learn about the complexities of history that may or may not align with your preconceived beliefs.

What is so striking about the essays might be the fact that modern conservative arguments—consisting largely of conspiracy- and fear-mongering and blatant xenophobia and racism—are nothing new. The names and targets have changed, but the plot is the same.

In the 19th century, for example, it was Irish Catholics that triggered conservative fear and resentment; in the 20th century, it was Asians and Eastern Europeans; and in the 21st century, Muslims and Mexicans. So while many people celebrate the US as a “country of immigrants” and welcome the benefits of a diverse population, there has always been an undercurrent of racism and xenophobia that has largely defined American conservatism. These essays make this inescapable fact abundantly clear.

Several other conservative myths circulate among the less-informed or hyper-partisan. Myths such as: the US is not a democracy; the New Deal and Great Society were failures; the Civil War was not primarily fought over slavery; Confederate monuments are not primarily about the celebration of white supremacy; socialism is un-American; free enterprise is part of the Constitution; free markets can solve all problems; and voter fraud is not imaginary.

Instead, you’ll learn things like:

- The history of socialism in the US, and the socialists that campaigned strongly for changes, are largely responsible for progressive policies such as women’s suffrage, the minimum wage, workplace safety and overtime laws, expanded health insurance, and civil rights. Once considered radical ideas, who would dare call for these policies to be reversed now?

- Policies like Social Security and Medicare, while initially labeled as “socialist” and “un-American” by conservatives, turned out to be among the nation’s most popular policies no politician would now dare touch.

- There are countless historical sources showing that Confederate monuments were erected specifically to promote the continuation of white supremecist ideology.

- In surveys, two-thirds of borderland residents (along the US/Mexico border) reported that they “absolutely” did not want Trump’s wall to get built, while another 10 percent thought that it “probably” should not get built.

- The argument that World War II ended the Depression is an argument that the New Deal should have been BIGGER. It was federal spending during the war that stimulated the economy, so as the author wrote, “If federally created jobs building tanks and airplanes could wipe out the Depression, so could federally created jobs building schools and roads.”

- Ronald Reagan famously said, “Lyndon Johnson declared war on poverty, and poverty won,” in reference to LBJ’s Great Society program. But here’s the thing: as the author states, “Even without accounting for near-cash assistance, the national poverty rate declined from 20 percent to 12 percent under LBJ’s watch.” The number never moved under Reagan. This shows how easy it is to spread myths through soundbites that have nothing to do with reality.

- Claims of voter fraud are not only unfounded, but thinly-veiled guises to institute voter suppression laws, of which there is a rich history in the US. True to form, conservatives cast blame on others for what they themselves are doing; voter fraud is an issue only insofar as Republicans try to decrease voter turnout. Voter fraud in the form claimed by conservatives is imaginary; as GOP attorney Benjamin Ginsberg, who had spent four decades litigating election cases for the Republicans, admitted, “proof of systematic fraud has become the Loch Ness Monster of the Republican Party. People have spent a lot of time looking for it, but it doesn’t exist.” A federal judge also called Trump’s claims of rampant voter fraud to be based on “levels of hearsay” so “speculative” as to be “fantastical.”

You will learn all of this and much more across 20 deeply researched essays from specialists in each area.

This is not to say that the book is without problems, however. It would have been nice, for instance, to have a short bio of each author and their specializations as an intro to each essay. The quality of the essays also vary, with some more persuasive, well-researched, or balanced than others. There’s also the possibility that those more versed in history will view some of these myths as so idiotic as to not be worth refuting. But, unfortunately, these are not straw man arguments; these are things conservatives actually believe.

Overall, while the execution might not be perfect, this is just the book we need to start fighting back against dangerous far-right conservative mythology, which has been and always will be nothing more than a clever guise for racism, xenophobia, and the preservation of income inequality under the name of “election integrity,” “America first,” or “state rights.”

[Duane Gosser · Rating 1 out of 5]

If you are interested enough in history to be interested in this book then you probably will find it as useless as I did. The selected "myths" were a lot of recycled material that brought nothing to light for anyone even moderately familiar with factual US history. And for all of their very lengthy talk about discussing only facts, several of these myth busters clearly were not presenting fully honest discussion themselves. Seriously, don't waste your time on this book. There are lots of other books on key US history events that will provide much better/balanced information that will allow you to understand US history and it's interactions with the rest of the world.

[Marc Brueggemann · Rating 5 out of 5]

The book focuses on new and old myths surrounding United States history, the impacts of those myths and their consequences, and how they have shaped our history and politics today. Topics from Confederate Statues to The New Deal are addressed by specific historians and scholars. Mostly I have seen complaints on this book being too focused on Republicans and Conservatives, even the majority of the myths these historians and scholars tackle on literally come from Conservatives trying to white-wash US history with the glorification and worship of the Confederacy to demonizing FDR and the New Deal thinking it didn't do nothing to help Americans struggling in the great depression. These historians and scholars, with their heavy research, attention to detail, and critical thinking show why these myths are false, and at the same time, how these myths impact our culture as well as policies that are passed. A great book that debunks the lies and myths of our country!

[Rebecca Brenner Graham · Rating 4 out of 5]

edited by Princeton History Professors Kevin Kruse and Julian Zelizer, each chapter of Myth America unpacks, historicizes, and debunks an American myth. chapters include the topics of immigration from Erika Lee, empire from Daniel Immerwahr, socialism from Michael Kazin, the New Deal from Eric Rachway, the Lost Cause from Karen L. Cox, and many additional chapters relating to contemporary politics by Glenda Gilmore, Lawrence Glickman, Elizabeth Hinton, Kathleen Belew, Natalia Mehlman Petrzela, and more. introduction historicizes myth-making: the media environment and the Right’s assault on truth. the contributors’ chapters transcend that context. myths involving exceptionalism, “vanishing” Native Americans, hidden empire, and the Lost Cause have consistently infiltrated the full political spectrum. Myth America takes a stab at unpacking and debunking them.

[David Kent · Rating 5 out of 5]

Perhaps the most important book of the year and a must-read for all Americans. The essays - each by scholars that are recognized experts in their topic area - tackle many of the most profound myths in our nation's history. Covered are such hot topics as American exceptionalism, immigration, the border, socialism, market dynamics, confederate monuments, Ronald Reagan, police violence, voter fraud, and much more. Each issue is parsed for the mythology ingrained in it and the reality. What we find is that political forces largely - and intentionally and dishonestly - misrepresent our history as a means of preserving the status quo, in particular the power structure that disdains much of what America stands for.

Everyone should read this book. And take notes.

David J. Kent
Author of Lincoln: The Fire of Genius
President, Lincoln Group of DC

[Douglas Noakes · Rating 5 out of 5]

This good is a good resource for anybody who finds himself or herself dealing with a person who engages in conservative/reactionary revisionism in American history. The arguments and fact-gathering that each of the essayists undertakes here are valuable for providing strong and annotated references to refute wrong-headed notions about immigration, voter fraud, the efficacy of the regulatory state, the general successes of the New Deal and Great Society Eras, the real reasons for Confederate monuments, etc.

Conservatives might do well to read this book and see if they could refute these well-reasoned and researched essays, all done by genuine historians and not the pop-history best-seller types who reinforce prejudices rather than lead the reader to a broader perspective.

[Charlie White · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book has a misleading title. At first glance, it seems to be a book about general history, legends and lies that have found their way to our shared history of the United States. However, this book is solely about race relations, racism, the deplorable Republican Party, and all of its dirty tricks it has committed over the years.

It’s not that I mind hearing about all the reprehensible schemes and lies the Republicans have dreamed up to torture those who are less fortunate. I also abhor the naked racism with which conservatives, the religious right and the Republican Party treats anyone who is not white in America. Those are all important topics, but I wanted to hear about more than race relations in the United States.

Not that I don’t want to learn about race relations. I want to know as much as I can about it, and there are many books specializing in that from which I learned a tremendous amount. It’s a crucial topic at this moment, and will be for many years — maybe forever. I will keep reading about it. But if someone is writing a book about race relations, I would appreciate that to be in the title of the book and in all the descriptions accompanying it.

[Ashley · Rating 3 out of 5]

Another great read from Kevin Kruse and Julian Zelizer that follows in the footsteps of their previous publication Fault Lines. The historians take on popular controversial topics such as confederate monuments, police violence, voter fraud, etc. draws the reader in and provides a framework for making comparisons to what we hear in the modern news cycles. Special shoutout to the final chapter by Carol Anderson who has written quite a few excellent books in recent years regarding voting and the impact of race and the 2nd amendment.

Thanks to Net Galley for the digital advanced reader copy!

[Stephanie Stoneback · Rating 4 out of 5]

God…it’s insane and infuriating how stupid Americans are. But also completely unsurprising since we literally aren’t allowed to teach REAL history, like this book, in public schools. Also, it’s def more depressing and frustrating to be aware of the truth.

Anyways, there was not a ton of new information in this for me, but I really enjoyed it nonetheless. I like the format of a collection of essays, each one debunking a myth of American popular opinion. Incredibly well-written and well-supported history! 4.5 stars!

I can think of so many people that I wish I could force to read this…

[Katie · Rating 3 out of 5]

A good concept but somewhat uneven in execution. Some essays are very strong, framing the given myth in terms of its present day damage and offering clear and insightful clarifications (Carol Anderson on voter fraud, for example), some are solid but familiar (Kevin Kruse, Joshua Zeitz), some seem to me actively out of touch, vague, or skirting the relevant issue (Akhil Reed Amar, Ari Kelman).

[Mike Coté · Rating 2 out of 5]

Blatant partisanship masquerading as objective historical myth-busting. Not worth reading unless you already agree with the premise.

[Benjamin]

Ultimately DNFd
I enjoyed it but not enough to stick with it through the parts I didn’t find interesting and once my library hold got returned I ultimately wasn’t going to wait out another hold and jump back in.

[Ella Chang · Rating 4 out of 5]

on my hachette basic books grind

[Rob1 · Rating 4 out of 5]

Well constructed book of essays that are written by academics for a lay audience to better understand the truth of American history.

[Brian Miller · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book ought to be required reading for all American History majors. It debunks many of the most common myths in American history in a clear, entertaining way.

[Kim Bongiorno · Rating 5 out of 5]

This should be considered a reference book for modern times.

Each time something comes up in the news, there’s a chapter here to give an accurate framework in order to have an informed perspective.

Anyone working on equity in their community or beyond should give this a read.

[Dave · Rating 4 out of 5]

Myth America is not for everyone. Certainly it is not for those that have unofficially declared themselves to be students of history without a whiff of sound credentials. Historians have been fighting an uphill battle against rhetoric peddlers and purveyors of misinformation since history was an academic discipline. For example, the opening salvo is lobbed in a chapter on the myth of American Exceptionalism. While Newt Gingrich did his damnedest convincing scores of the American populace (he didn’t have to work very hard) that America was the global torch bearer in morality, freedom, or faith. In contemporary times, a cursory search of Freedom House, an organization that evaluates nations on their commitment to social and political freedom among other things, reveals that the United States is considerably behind several countries including most Scandinavian ones in terms of overall “freedom” and has, unsurprisingly, been downgraded the last few years. Instead of proclaiming personal patriotism to shroud blind nationalism, it’s exceedingly more productive to openly discuss our collective faults in order to rectify them. This is but a foretaste of the multiple literary moments in which scholars, professors and historians come correct in setting the record straight about the pervasive fabrications and half-truths that have underpinned the discourse surrounding the shaping of our nation. Other fallacies disrupted include:

* the xenophobic trope that immigrants (today, particularly brown ones) only bring problems and take away our jobs
* the utter failure of the New Deal
* the notion that Confederate monuments and battle flags are icons of heritage
* the widespread escalation of violence by protestors causing violent suppression by police
* the narrative that January 6, 2021 was a protest
* how feminism eroded family values
* how Reagan transformed the methodology of government
* the epidemic of fraudulent voting practices

While there are others, these highlights can be addressed bluntly with: They don’t. It didn’t. They aren’t (they’re white supremacist trash). Escalation is easy to pin on the subjugated. It was an insurrection. It didn’t. He didn’t. And there is no such thing. Hope this clarification helps wayward minds regain a foothold in civic academia so, as a society, we can move forward and not regress. Should you need more details, see for yourself within the confines of the pages or corroborate the information against your own chosen resources on your own time.

[Karsten Kutterer · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book was a chore to get through and I’m not quite sure who their intended audience was. Disillusioned Republicans? Democrats wanting to feel justified about their political affiliations?

Out of the 20 essays, I found less than half to be thought provoking. Those I found to be interesting had me wanting more. The essays about the founding fathers, the Mexico border, immigration, “America First,” confederate monuments and socialism were great.

And then, unfortunately, the rest seemed more focused on attacking the Republican Party instead of providing insightful content. These were long-winded monologues of what the Republican Party has done and is doing wrong and at times I wasn’t exactly sure what myth they were trying to dispel. Did they highlight real problems with the party, yes. But did they do anything other than point fingers? No.

Maybe my problem was that I went into this book thinking it would be more balanced. This book was obviously biased (a few of the essays were not) against the Republican Party. But I really feel like I didn’t get an accurate, full accounting of “American Myths.”

[Bonnie_Rae · Rating 3 out of 5]

I got about halfway through the book - selecting the chapters I wanted to read and skipping some others. Overall, this is a pretty decent book but there are definitely people who have the skills to condense some dense, complex material into a long-form essay and others who do not. Some essays were more informative and thought-provoking then others - there were a couple of chapters with so many $10 words and vague concepts I felt like I spent more time consulting a dictionary and Google Scholar trying to figure what these things meant more than I did reading the actual text.

To me, this feels like a solid introduction to the different myths that have permeated American culture more recently (the Raegan Revolution) and have always been there (the scary immigrants - first the "swarthy" Germans, then the Chinese who helped build the railroads, then Mexican immigrants who were both exploited and vilified in the pursuit of capitalism along with Muslims - namely the brown and dark skinned Muslims).

I did notice some spelling errors in the book (I spotted a fedeoral instead of federal in Chapter 2) and some clunky writing, which should have been caught and edited.

[Wanda · Rating 5 out of 5]

So enlightening and in-depth. This lays bare the lies we have been and continue to be told about election fraud, trickle-down economics, and race disenfranchisement.

It's akin to LIES MY TEACHER TOLD ME, but it is more hard-hitting and inclusive.

One of my favorites is when a judge in the late 1800s agreed there hadn't been a fair election in the south since 1875, and opined that anyone who denied this was a moral idiot. His solution...remove all black voters, then the whites wouldn't be forced to.stuff the ballot box and fight to keep blacks from.voting.

Jeez. Sums up.our racial policy most concisely.

[David · Rating 5 out of 5]

Everyone loves their narratives, especially when it's convenient to their values or their perspective, but it always pays to ask whether something that is claimed to be true really is true and, if so, how long. Whether it's something as innocuous as who had the bigger influence on the Constitution (Madison or Washington) or issues much more serious such as insurrection, economic policy, and so much more, this is a great collection of essays by some bonafide historians who look at where some of our biggest myths originate.