There it is, sitting on my desk, where it has been for about a month, right there on top of a growing pile of papers I never seem to get filed away. It's mocking me. I've been trying to decide what do about it. If I do anything at all I will hurt someone's feelings and I really hate doing that. The thing has given me, and several of my friends some laughs, so maybe I should just let it go. It is quite probably the worlds worst written book on Indiana History.
It is so poorly written that, at first, I wondered if it could have been written as a prank, ha ha ha the joke is on anyone who spent $18.00 to order it and the author is laughing all the way to the bank.
It was never my intention to write book reviews here, but this book is so bad that I felt obligated to shout a warning to other unsuspecting readers of Indiana History who might be fooled by the book's cover.
First, let me assure everyone that I've made plenty of writing faux pas, including spelling, and grammar and I would never try to pass myself off an expert in English Grammar. I do, however, know a little something about history and the grammatical errors in this book are things most of us learned to avoid in elementary and junior high school. The book is "Indiana History, The Crossroads of America" by C.C. Straub.
The author wrote, on what I believe is commonly called the Forward, "This is a work of nonfiction. The events are real according to the author." and on another page called "Gratitudes" she writes "Historical Societies are help in their way of information wherever they are located."
The book is "richly illustrated". Normally that would be a good thing, but in this case, not so much. The author clearly does not understand that image files of a tiny size taken from the internet are very often too small to be used for print purposes. Some were so small that the resulting print image was unrecognizable. Illustrations on a page that have nothing to do with the text of the page or even of the chapter add little. It would seem that in this case they are only included to take up space. Sometimes the image fit the text, but frequently it did not. It appears that if the author could not find an appropriate image for a page that the default choice was either a squirrel, a deer, or an elk.
A summary some of the items that left me shaking my head from chapter 4 is as good as any other chapter for pointing out the reasons Ms. Straub might want to invest in hiring a good editor before she writes another book. In chapter 4 we learn that the Mississippian culture was "hightly" developed. We also learn that the author failed to use or pay attention to "spell check" which would have spotted "Missisxippians". The following sentence leaves the reader wondering if it is simply the result of poor grammar or if the author really does believe that "you cross the Falls of the Ohio and the Wabash River near Vincennes".
Illustrations in chapter 4 have little or no direct connection to the surrounding text. They included a bison, two bears, nine persons identified only as modern Cherokee people, the seal of the United States Supreme Court, portrait of Christopher Columbus, an unidentified stained glass window, The Great Seal of the United States, misidentified as the flag of the United States, portrait of George Washington "around in the 1700's"
Odd choices for illustrations don't end with Chapter 4. In the chapter concerning the French period in Indiana is a photo of "Wild Bill Cody and Sitting Bull". In the chapter concerning the British control of the area is a photo of "Young Thomas Edison", two additional images of Christopher Columbus, and one of "Benjamin Franklin, a great inventor of the past".
Lest you are left, dear reader, with the impression that the above examples were the exception rather than the rule I can only say that spelling and or grammar errors can be found on nearly every page. Oddly hyphenated pairs of words and the misuse of quotation marks were so frequent that I finally had to read up on the subject to make sure I had not forgotten some basic rule of grammar. Sadly I had not. Reading this book has had one very positive result. As bad as they are, I feel much better about my own writing skills. I want to also note that I feel lucky not to have purchased this book myself. It was loaned to me by an unlucky friend.
The above image illustrates what happens when you try to convert a very small size image file from the internet to print form.
