Book of the Week: 'Land of Hope'

In Land of Hope: An Invitation to the Great American Story, Wilfred M. McClay has produced an inspiring exploration of America's past that is out of step with the fashionably fractured narratives found in most U.S. history textbooks. More to the point, Land of Hope reads like a direct challenge to Howard Zinn's wildly popular A People's History of the United States. McClay's book idoes not whitewash our history, but presents an honest and fair accounting that recognizes the astonishing success of the American experiment. If any U.S. history survey in recent memory has a chance to unseat Zinn in the classroom, it just might be McClay's delightfully written tome.