sophronisba 's review for:

Summer of Blood: The Peasants' Revolt of 1381 by Dan Jones

4.0

dark informative tense fast-paced

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A fast-paced account of the fourteenth century Wat Tyler riots, this book never stops moving. Dan Jones is very good at scene-setting, and I also thought he did well contextualizing the often strange choices of Richard II, who was after all a mere fourteen years old. Toward the end of the book, though, I felt lost in a sea of names, and it also frustrated me that Jones was speeding through history so quickly that he often omitted citations and data that would have been helpful when evaluating his take on the riots. Enjoyable and informative, but not scholarly.