“Lively. Burns convincingly dispels a number of popular beliefs, including the idea that the 'ignoble experiment' of Prohibition was solely responsible for the birth of organized crime in America. He also finds parallels with many issues and 'civil wrongs' still running through our landscape: terrorism, immigration, women's rights, political corruption, and tabloid culture.”
The New York Times Book Review “Burns’s territory stretches far and wide across the realms of politics, Prohibition, pop culture and more: communists, suffragettes, Teapot Dome, birth control, the radio. He skillfully builds portraits of such figures as con artist Charles Ponzi, Planned Parenthood founder Margaret Sanger and crusading U.S. Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer. He brings to light events that have probably received scarce attention in standard school curricula. An eminently readable, informative book.”
The Washington Post “Burns builds upon existing scholarship to explain the significance of this one year in an accessible way for non-academic readers.”
Choice “Covers one of the most dynamic periods of American history. A fine review of the new kinds of power emerging among women and minorities of the times, and the concurrent events that made the 1920s so significant.”
Midwest Book Review “A thorough tour of the upheavals and events of the year when ‘the Roaring Twenties first began to roar.’ An entertaining and informative look at a pivotal period. Burns makes it possible to recognize the century to come in this intimate study of a single year, and the result is downright fascinating.”
Publishers Weekly (starred review) “In picking the one that set off the fabled Roaring Twenties, former NBC correspondent and 'Fox News Watch' host Eric Burns has really hit the mother lode. Like all good writers, though, Burns does not allow the confines of his chosen year to be a straitjacket. Burns shines a valuable light on the beginnings of domestic terrorism in the United States, a too little remembered chapter in our history, which continues to resonate.”
The Washingtonian “In a fascinating work about a remarkable year, former NBC News correspondent Burns shows us what put the roar in the Roaring '20s. Burns follows it all with verve. In this delightfully readable book, the author expertly shows how those affected by the Great War linked together, nourished each other and really did change the world.”
Kirkus Reviews (starred review) “Burns delivers history with flair and vividness.”
The Wall Street Journal “A roaring read, a thorough and thoughtful appraisal of a single year in our past and all its implications for our future.”
BookReporter “Burns proves that a year can hold a reader's attention and then some, with the year bringing on the fiasco that was Prohibition, jazz, the beginning and end of Ponzi's great scheme, and so much more. People with such characters as Marcus Garvey, William James, Dorothy Parker, Louis Armstrong, and Warren G. Harding, and with such events as the first-ever broadcast of presidential elections, Agatha Christie publishing her first book, and the Nineteenth Amendment to the Constitution being passed, 1920 makes history vibrant, exciting and palpably important. Entertaining and highly readable.”
Booklist “A work of genuine historical research, colorful personality, intellectual sophistication, heft, and durable interest.”
Vanity Fair “Extremely readable. Burns’s vigorous narrative is rich in genuinely engaging anecdote. He so clearly appreciates history’s sweep.”
The Los Angeles Times