Books I've read, and am planning to read

I love C-SPAN.

The authors of historical books get literally hours to talk. I'm watching an author named Jack Hamann.

His book:

"On American Soil : How Justice Became a Casualty of World War II" (Jack Hamann)

Looks interesting. Many people, in decrying the treatment of prisoners in relation to Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib have said that we didn't mistreat prisoners in WWII. Interesting in light of how we mistreated minorities in that war. This is about an incident involving Italian prisoners, who were being treated very well, and black soldiers who were not. This is a complicated story, but in looking it up on Amazon, it is getting great ratings and reviews.

I just finished:

"The Franklin Affair : A Novel" (Jim Lehrer)

This was an interesting book. I have the greatest respect for Jim Lehrer of PBS' News Hour, which is the best news program on TV. However, this book was weak. That doesn't mean it isn't worth reading, but I expected better.

Still, my increasing interest in history was peaked a bit more, and coincidentally I saw a rerun of an "In Depth" interview on C-SPAN with a historian who had written on Ben Franklin, along with several other presidents, and subjects. His name: H.W. Brands. Franklin is my favorite character in American History. I grew up in a printing and publishing family and have always loved science. Franklin was a printer, publisher and scientist. Most people know about Kites and Electricity, Poor Richard's Almanac, and other stories (not to mention his role in creating our nation). Did you know he also is considered "the father of display advertising"? He included etched illustrations in his newspaper, an original idea.

Yet I've never read in detail about his achievements all in one book... just periodical articles and TV pieces. So I'm ordering:

and after that I may try Ben's autobiography:

"The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin (Dover Thrift Editions)" (Benjamin Franklin)

My experience with historical writings is that they are painful to read. However, reading Franklin is probably not much different than reading Twain, I imagine. We'll see.