book review

“The Declaration of Independence” by Bradley Birzer

June 17, 2026 By Glynn Young Leave a Comment

I was on a multi-day business trip to Washington, D.C. I had a free afternoon, so I walked from the hotel to the National Gallery on the Mall. And then, for reason or reasons unknown, I walked across the street to the National Archives. And there it was – the original Declaration of Independence.

Drafted mostly if not entirely by Thomas Jefferson, the Declaration is to America what the Magna Carta is to England. The statement of beliefs. The citation of grievances against an unjust ruler (also an English king, no less). The signatures.

As Bradley Birzer points out in The Declaration of Independence: A Radical Experiment in Liberty, the Declaration is all these things. And it is more. Like the Revolutionary War that was already underway, the Declaration was about ideas. One of the most radical ideas it contained was the rights come not from a king or a government, but naturally from a creator.

How the Declaration came about is a thrilling story, and Birzer tells it accurately and contextually without losing any of the thrill or drama. Straws in the wind began as early as the 1740s, and the British government’s determination to make the colonies pay, or help pay, for the French and Indian War began to accelerate momentum. By the 1770s, whether it was rebellion (as many British defined it) or liberation and freedom, the war of ideas was moving into a real war. And Birzer says that war started when the first colonist was killed at Lexington outside Boston.

*Edmund Burke in 1774, by Sir Joshua Reynolds*

Birzer also provides the lesser-known context. The colonies were already beginning the rupture well before the Declaration was signed in July 1776 in Philadelphia during the Second Continental Congress. New Hampshire issued its own declaration, as did other colonies like Virginia. The tide was rising, and the British kept making one mistake after another in not recognizing the reality on the ground.

But not all the British. Edmund Burke, for one, championed the rights of the colonies in Parliament. Set against Burke in the war of ideas (if not Parliament) was Samuel Johnson, the author of the great dictionary, who was almost extreme in upholding the position of king and Parliament. Those debates, too, are concisely included by Birzer.

Birzer holds the Russell Amos Kirk Chair in American Studies and is a professor of history at Hillsdale College in Michigan. He received a B.A. degree from the University of Notre Dame and his Ph.D. degree from Indiana University. He serves on the boards of the Free Enterprise Institute and the Center for Cultural Renewal and is a fellow or scholar with the Foundation for Economic Education, Intercollegiate Studies Institute, The McDonnell Center, and the Center for Economic Personalism. His books include In Defense of Andrew Jackson, Russell Kirk: American Conservative, J.R.R. Tolkien’s Sanctifying Myth, Sanctifying the World: The Augustinian Life and Mind of Christopher Dawson, American Cicero: The Life of Charles Caroll, Neal Peart: Cultural (Re)Percussions, and Beyond Tenebrae: Christian Humanism in the Twilight of the West.

The Declaration of Independence is a well-researched, highly readable account of the seminal document in U.S. history. The Declaration is now 250 years old, still projecting its radical ideas about governments, people, and natural rights. It still is one of the most revolutionary documents written by man. And it remains as vital and current as it was when it emerged from Jefferson’s pen in 1776.

Related:

Beyond Tenebrae by Bradley Birzer.

Mythic Realms by Bradley Birzer.

“The Atlas of Independence” by Chris Mackowski

June 10, 2026 By Glynn Young Leave a Comment

If I had a mental image of John Adams, it was of a rather dour individual who bridged the presidencies of George Washington and Thomas Jefferson, whom my history teachers in high school and college seemed to find much more interesting.

Then came the 2008 miniseries John Adams, with Paul Giamatti in the title role and Laura Linney as his wife Abigail. I almost skipped it, but we decided to watch it. And I began to understand that my teachers and I had all missed the boat on this major figure of the American Revolution. I sought out some biographies and histories, and I discovered my understanding of the second U.S. president was seriously misguided.

It was with that improving understanding that I began reading Atlas of Independence: John Adams and the American Revolution by Chris Mackowski. Now it all clicked. John Adams wasn’t some relatively minor character; he’d played a major role in the Second Continental Congress, the one that eventually adopted the Declaration of Independence.

Adams gave speeches. He argued. He cajoled. He chaired committees (he chaired a lot of committees). He wrote letters. And as Mackowski points out, he paid a steep price. As radical as Adams was in his politics, he was equally devoted to his wife Abigail and his family. And his work with the congress and later his appointment as part of the diplomatic mission to France kept his away from his family for long periods of time.

Atlas of Independence concisely tells the story of John Adams. It’s a highly readable, fascinating account, and it gives Adams the attention and understanding he merits. John Adams himself saw his cousin Sam Adams as the central figure of the American Revolution, but by the time of the Second Continental Congress, “John would begin to eclipse his cousin as the main engine driving the movement.”

John Adams, the main engine driving the movement to American independence. Yes, my understanding had been seriously flawed.

A professor at St. Bonaventure University, Mackowski has received B.A., M.A., M.F.A., and Ph.D. degrees in communication, English, and creative writing. The author of some nine books, he’s written extensively on the Civil War for a number of publications. He also worked for the National Park Service and gave tours of the Civil War battlefields at Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville, Wilderness, and Spotsylvania.

Atlas of Independence is well-researched, and it provides a solid summary of what Adams did to move the country toward independence and then declare it, as well as what he did to serve the cause of independence afterward.

Painting: John Adams, oil on canvas by Gilbert Stuart.

“To Those Who Speak” by Adam Luke Hawker

May 20, 2026 By Glynn Young Leave a Comment

Luke Adam Hawker is a designer who made the leap to full-time art in 2015. His background is architecture and design, and in his art, he works to connect places and people. His limited-edition prints can be found at several locations in London, including the Royal Opera House, St. Paul’s Cathedral, the Old Royal Naval College, and Battersea Power Station.

Hawker has also published three books. Together (2021) is a graphic novel that turned into a surprise bestseller. The Last Tree: A Seed of Hope (2023) is a fable about a world without trees. This year, he published To Those Who Speak, a much more personal story that’s less a story and more of a non-fictional account with quiet, profound illustrations.

The story is this, simply: Hawker and his wife had a son born with an extra X chromosome. The boy is also non-verbal. Hawker did what most parents would do – researched, read, and try to understand how he could teach his son to understand and communicate. The family had or bought a dog, and the dog attached itself to the boy. The dog and the boy seemed to understand each other without a word being exchanged.

At some point, Hawker understood. Perhaps it wasn’t that the non-verbal boy could learn to understand words. Instead, perhaps the verbal parent could learn how to communicate to the non-verbal boy. And that’s what happened. One thing that resulted was this book, To Those Who Speak.

As Hawker says in his introduction, it is not a children’s book, but it is also not not a children’s book. Using black-and-white drawings and minimal words, the book is “an expression of gratitude” to his son for what Hawker calls an Invaluable education.

Emotion wells as you read and absorb the drawings. The boy meets the dog. They become each other’s world. The boy begins to hum. He and the dog discover the peace of wandering among trees. Hawker begins to see how much his son can say without uttering a word. The boy’s development is measured by steps, not milestones. The first unspoken but hand-shaped word. A respiratory illness (not uncommon among children with the extra X chromosome), an illness that was nearly fatal.

You don’t need many words to describe this beautiful book. You just nod and sit with it.

“The Burning Glow” by Luke H. Davis

May 6, 2026 By Glynn Young 1 Comment

Cameron Ballack is back. And he’s traipsing all over where I used to bike.

Ballack is the fictional wheelchair-bound police detective created by St. Louis-based writer Luke H. Davis. In previous books (and there’s been a gap of some years), he and his team were based in St. Charles County, Missouri, part of metropolitan St. Louis. In his new outing, entitled The Burning Glow, Ballack is now the lead detective for the Special Investigating Department, which operates across the metro St. Louis region. (St. Louis actually does have something similar that operates across jurisdictional lines called the Major Case Squad.)

What Ballack and his team are pulled into is a car bombing in the part of the city of St. Louis known as “Little Bosnia,” home to numerous immigrants who fled the war in the 1990s. The victim is a teenager, who had arrived at a spot behind an apartment complex to show his friends a body in a dumpster. The friends run off; the teenager dies when he returns to his car. The teen was Bosnian and Muslim.

The next day, another car bombing occurs – one in the parking lot of a synagogue in west St. Louis County. A Jewish couple is killed. The male victim happened to be the business partner of the man whose body was in the dumpster. Then a third car bombing is narrowly avoided, when the intended victim, another Bosnian in south St. Louis, happens to step outside his home for a cigarette after midnight and notices someone checking underneath a car.

And from there, the mayhem gets even wilder. Ballack is racing not only to find the killer or killers but also to solve the crimes before the FBI arrives. It culminates in a wild chase across south St. Louis. (By this time, I’m yelling at Davis to leave Ted Drewes ice cream store alone.)

Davis tells a nail-biting story. He also gets the geography exactly right. I know because I’ve biked those very same streets, and biked them a lot, including those in Little Bosnia. And I’m still trying to recover from the scene at the intersection of Chippewa and Hampton.

Davis teaches at Westminster Christian Academy in St. Louis and chairs the Bible Department there. He’s also taught at schools in Louisiana, Florida, and Virginia. He describes himself as “Presbyterian body, Lutheran heart, Anglican blood, Orthodox spirit,” all of which have served him well in writing the Cameron Ballack mysteries. He has published three Ballack mysteries, Litany of Secrets (2013), The Broken Cross (2015), and A Shattered Peace (2017), and Joel: The Merivalkan Chronicles Book 1 (2017). He blogs at For Grace and Kingdom.

So, Ballack is back, and his fans are thrilled. The Burning Glow takes the detective into new territory, deep into eastern European history and its transplant located in St. Louis. It’s a fast-paced, gripping tale, and here’s hoping we don’t have to wait long for the next one.

Reign: The Church in the Middle Ages by Luke H. Davis.

Reform: The Church at the Birth of Protestantism by Luke H. Davis.

Renewal: The Church That Expands Outward by Luke H. Davis.

Reading a Novel that Stars Your Hometown.

My review of Litany of Secrets.

My review of The Broken Cross.

My review of A Shattered Peace.

My review of Tough Issues, True Hope by Luke Davis.

Tides of Death by Luke H. Davis.

Island Games by Luke H. Davis.

“The Prodigal of Leningrad” by Daniel Taylor

January 28, 2026 By Glynn Young Leave a Comment

I’m trying to remember when I first became interested in Russian history. Most likely, when I was 10, and one of my Christmas presents (my mother knew me) was a Horizon Caravel book entitled Russia Under the Czars. I must have read it a dozen times. And I still have it.

My senior year in high school, I discovered Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn and his One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich, Cancer Ward, and The First Circle. In college, I took two semesters of Russian history, and I was glad I knew more about Russia’s past than most people. The professor was a great lecturer; he was also an unapologetic defender of the Soviet regime.

In my first job as a newspaper copy, I still remember editing the front page to include the announcement about the publication of Solzhenitsyn’s The Gulag Archipelago, Part 1. It was first published in French in Paris, and that publication led to the Soviet Union expelling Solzhenitsyn from the country. As soon as the English version was announced, I placed my pre-order at the Cokesbury Bookstore in downtown Houston, Texas. I read it almost immediately, and the next two volumes that followed.

Fast forward 40 years. I had read two novels by Daniel Taylor, Death Comes for the Deconstructionist and Do We Not Bleed?. I liked them both. I was surprised when I saw the title of his upcoming new novel, The Prodigal of Leningrad. It was a decided shift from his previous works to a story about a docent at The Hermitage museum in Leningrad during the German siege of World War II.

I knew the basic historical facts – how German and Finnish troops essentially encircled the city for nearly 900 days, with German planes bombing at will and all supplies cut off. Some 650,000 Leningraders died, many from starvation. The siege began in 1941 and lasted until 1943.

I wondered what would Daniel Taylor do with that setting. Far more than I expected, as it turns out. It may be one of the most Russian novels written by a non-Russian that I’ve read. It is a story of war and deprivation. But it is also a story about the Soviet Gulag, art, fith, and one of the most extraordinary paintings in the Hermitage – “The Return of the Prodigal” by Rembrandt.

Leningrader Daniil Aslanov works as a docent at The Hermitage. He’s an outstanding tour guide, and his favorite painting is “The Return of the Prodigal.” But all of the valuable art orks, including his beloved Rembrandt, have been removed and stored in safety, in case the Germans break through. What is left are empty frames, but Daniil can still talk about the missing paintings. He talks with his friends as well, which can be a dangerous thing in Stalin’s Russia. For at least two of them, he is in danger simply for not reporting what they talk about – criticism of the beloved ruler, the Soviet system, and anything that might be considered disloyal. Which would be anything at all.

Daniil’s story is paralleled by the story of his grandfather, whom Daniil believes is dead but is still very much alive in the Gulag. The grandfather was an Orthodox priest, and that was his crime; the Soviet regime has murdered thousands of them. But in the camps, even atheists come to appreciate this aging man who doesn’t judge, who sits with the dying, and who gives final blessings to the dwindling few who still believe.

The siege, the mass starvation, the bombing, and the corruption of the Soviet system will lead Daniil to a particular end. Like depicted in the Rembrandt painting, the prodigal will return.

Taylor is the author of The Skeptical Believer, Tell Me a Story, Creating a Spiritual Legacy, The Myth of Certainty and several other books. He’s contributed to Bible translations and is co-founder of The Legacy Center, created to help families and individuals find their stories, values and meaning. He’s also a contributing editor for Christianity Today’s Books and Culture Magazine. Taylor blogs at Neither/Nor: Ruminations of a Spiritual Traveler. Death Comes for the Deconstructionist won Christianity Today’s best novel award in its annual book awards and the Illumination Award for best fiction by an independent publisher.

The Prodigal of Leningrad connects art, faith, and a terrible time in Russian and human history to tell a story of how one man finds his soul. It’s a remarkable story.

Do We Not Bleed? by Daniel Taylor.

Painting: The Return of the Prodigal Son by Rembrandt van Rijn, The Hermitage, St. Petersburg, Russia.

“Island Games” by Luke H. Davis

January 21, 2026 By Glynn Young 1 Comment

DI Gareth Benedict and his team are assigned to help police the Island Games, a sports event held every two years and attracting teams in some 13 sports from various islands, and not only those around the United Kingdom. This year, the island of Anglesey off the coast of Wales is the host, and teams are coming from as far away as the Falkland Islands in the South Atlantic.

The reader knows, before the police forces do, that the games have also attracted two assassins. We don’t know yet their intended targets, but we will.

Benedict, for his part, spots some vandalism on the Falkland group’s tour bus, and when he raises a concern at the initial meeting of all the police forces, the local Anglesey police, nominally in charge, don’t take kindly to his concern. But when a drone is used to shoot and wound the elderly team physician, all the police have to pay attention. And the district superintendent puts Benedict and his team in charge of the investigation. Another attack doesn’t end in wounding; this time a cyclist from Estonia doesn’t escape the bullet.

Island Games by Luke H. Davis is the second in the DI Gareth Benedict series, and it’s a rollicking good tale of not exactly competent villains, grudges buried in the past, a bit of good fortune, and steady and slogging police work. The police team face an almost impossible task of identifying and tracking down the villains, and it’s only casual glimpses and solid guesswork that begin to give the game away. Davis throws in a bit of what might – or might not – develop into a police force romance. And the author has done his Welsh homework – the context of Wales rolls seamlessly through the story.

The bad news is that Island Games ends all too soon. The good news is that the third in the series, The Dark Road, is due this summer.