Black Potatoes: The Story of the Great Irish Famine, 1845-1850 Paperback – May 2, 2005

I really found this book to be informative about the history of the potato blight and starvation that happened in Ireland.

It gives a good overview of, and introduction to, the Potato Famine for someone who is looking for general information. A worthwhile read.

Sooo Interesting. I read it through. Wonderful. Captivating drawings. Suitable for pre teens and adults.

This nonfiction read gives us characters that are real and almost touchable. The struggles are so terrible that it's hard to imagine that even the strength of the human spirit could survive the tragedies that the Irish people endured. A read worth your time!!

Read this when I was young. Now I'm reading it to my kids. Very sad but important to know.

Good for a gift of anyone who enjoys history especially Irish history

BLACK POTATOES is a fairly comprehensive summary of the Great Hunger in the mid-eighteen hundreds. Most effective is the use of contemporary writings and illustrations to tell the story. Less effective is the tendency to downplay England's political agenda to rid Ireland of the Irish by the most expedient means. Also, the preachy tone of the last few paragraphs didn't seem to Bevin keeping with the studied neutral tone of the rest of the book.

I just finished reading Black Potatoes and I loved it! It was easy to read and kept me turning the pages, which is a lot to say about a book about an Irish Potato Famine. I'm not a history buff or a lover of Ireland or anything. This author just did a really good job making a potentially dry subject into a fascinating one.I bought the book because the Look Inside on amazon was interesting and easy to read. What you see in the Look Inside is a good idea of what the entire book is like.I am planning on homeschooling and I wanted to get the book for that. I think it would be great for maybe middle school, but I plan to start earlier and reading it aloud.Some parts are very sad, especially about the hunger, but the author also highlights positive things, like the brother who gave a whole loaf of bread to his little brother self-lessly.It paints England as helping, but also worrying about their bottom line. They almost begrudgingly give Ireland help because they think they brought it on themselves or that the Irish should pay the brunt of it. But they do give money, not that it helps much. It seems that people who are not the poorest of the poor, do not quite understand exactly how bad things are for them. For example, when a man was trying to rally an army, he told them to get 3 days worth of bread and biscuits and didn't understand why many didn't come back. They didn't have 3 days worth of food.It seemed like the poorest class was the worst off, with the middle and upper classes doing better. The troubles for the landlords was not as much income, whereas the troubles for the laborers was not having food to eat. This book mainly focused on the worst conditions, painting the landlords mostly as heartless for putting the poor out of their houses.Overall, it gives a good history and makes me feel like I understand a little bit more about the world.