100 Turning Points in American History

by Alan Axelrod

100 Turning Points in American History is the first in a series of books about the critical decisions, events, inventions, and discoveries that shaped our nation, our world, and our civilization. Each volume presents the stories of 100 decisions/events/ breakthroughs in chronological order and includes, as a special feature, a list of the “Top Ten” ranked in order of impact, with a discussion justifying the ranking. Each decision/event/breakthrough includes sidebar features (“boxes”) highlighting relevant key personalities. Each volume is illustrated with (public domain) photos, images and maps.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, American History

392 pages, Kindle Edition

Published April 1, 2019

About the author

Alan Axelrod, Ph.D., is a prolific author of history, business and management books. As of October 2018, he had written more than 150 books, as noted in an online introduction by Lynn Ware Peek before an interview with Axelrod on the National Public Radio station KPCW. Axelrod resides in Atlanta, Georgia.

Reviews

[Tony Laplume]

His myopic obsession with the last hundred years (half the book covers this period) becomes a real problem when he diverges completely from an objective pretext in the final selections. I’m sure he’s been very pleased with the prospects for a new edition since the most recent presidential election.

[Vanessa Olson]

This was a good read. While it's true these are essentially just quick hits about each of the 100 events, I felt it was informative and well-researched. The closer to present day we got, the more the author tiptoed into making the book more political, which is the reason this wasn't a 5 star for me.

I made note of a few things I want to read more comprehensive books on, and that's a win for me! It would have been helpful in the audiobook if the events were numbered.

[Robert G.]

Too shallow to have any depth

A quick read of 200 years of history does a disservice to the complexities and subtleties of actual events.

Relying on this book as the “Cliffs Notes” of American History leaves one poorly prepared for the “final exam” of maintaining a functional democracy.

[Bruce Steinheiser]

Political rag from a leftist author

Every segment of the book has a left leaning view of history. I give it two stars only because the author was able to get the dates correct and had relatively few spelling issues

[Thomas Orsini]

Extremely informative, hopefully will help me in APUSH

[Mark Anderson]

Definite left-leaning narrative in the telling of current events especially. Overall, very informative and easy to read given the short 2-4 page chapters for each “turning point”.