Citizen Washington - 2000 publication. [Paperback]

Product Details

• Paperback
• Publisher: Grand Crntral Pub,2000 (2000)
• ASIN: B001MPM6Y0
• Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (35 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #9,075,783 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

In his boyhood, William Martin loved what he later called "big stories on broad canvases." He read the novels of C.S. Forester, Dickens, and western author Will Henry. He sat transfixed by the big movies of the early sixties. So after college he went to Hollywood to try his hand at screenwritng but quickly found that his instincts were better suited to novels. His first, "Back Bay," introduced treasure hunter Peter Fallon in a new kind of adventure that joined the contemporary mystery-thriller to the historical novel. In his nine novels (including four best selling Peter Fallon adventures), Martin has tracked national treasures across the landscape of the American imagination, chronicled the lives of the great and the anonymous in American history, and brought to life legendary American locations, from "Cape Cod" to "Annapolis" to the "City of Dreams." He has also written an award-winning PBS documentary on the life of Washington and a cult-classic horror movie, has contributed book reviews to the Boston Globe, and has taught writing across the country, from the Harvard Extension School to the famous Maui Writers Conference. He lives near Boston with his wife and has three grown children. His work has established him as a "storyteller whose smoothness matches his ambition."(Publisher's Weekly) And he was the recipient of the 2005 New England Book Award, given to "an author whose body of work stands as a significant contribution to the culture of the region."

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

32 of 32 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Humanizing, September 8, 1999

By 

Charles Andrews (Fort Worth, TX USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Citizen Washington (Hardcover)

William Martin's latest efforts supports his position as the premier historical novelist of this generation. Like Michener and Vidal in earilier years, Martin is able to bring history alive and shsow us that history is a story and not a recitation of dates so often taught in school. Accurately researched and presented in wonderful detail, Martin sets about doing what Hesperus asks Christopher to do. Find Washington the human. At first I was conflicted reading a narrative that showed Washington as a man with feet of clay like all of us. By the the end of the book I admired Washington more because he was human. By the same devices used on Washington, Martin begins to show us how all the Founding Fathers may be more like us than different or better. I have read all of Martin's novels. Annapolis is by far my favorite but I can't think of any of his historical works that would merit less than 5 stars. Another reviewer wished that this book could be used in a schools curriculum. I wished all his books would become standard. There are fewer literary licenses taken in Martin's works than there are errors in current history books.

I went to Washington College in Maryland, a school founded by a financial donation from George in 1782. I have a special spot in my heart for this man now made more special by this book.

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The best of many great Martin books., July 8, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Citizen Washington (Hardcover)

Citizen Washington is the best written and most dramatically satisfying of William Martin's books, and I have read all of them. He captures Washington and his world with more fire and manipulation and chicanery and passion than any history book I've read, and yet he uses all legitimate facts and truths about the man and his times. If you want to read one novel about the beginnings of this nation, this is it.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars my review, February 9, 2000

By 

Ana Maria Barrenechea - See all my reviews

This review is from: Citizen Washington (Mass Market Paperback)

I want to congratulate William Martin on this work. His use of narratives to tell us the way Washington evolved from a third son to one of this nation's founders is extremely well done. By using characters from all aspects of Washington's life makes it all more real. We read about the man, the "massa", the general and the husband. Great Work.