Blame It on the Rain: How the Weather Has Changed History
Blame It on the Rain: How the Weather Has Changed History – Review
Blame it on the Rain by Laura Lee is a terrific, enjoyable widely read about how the weather moves us in ways we don’t realize. I love books like this: filled with small bits of historical trivia that frequently inspire me to widely read other books and dig deeper. From pre-historical times to the present, episodes in history are fully explained with some kind of weather as their major cause. The reason the Anglo-Saxons were able to finally conquer Great Britain? A drought in Africa. The reason several rulers possibly including Hitler and Napoleon were unable to conquer Russia? The cold. Even Truman’s triumph over Dewey is fully explained by the torrential rains that possibly kept moderate voters away from the polls on voting day. Her conclusions are heavily notated at the purpose of the book. Perhaps generally entertaining about the book is Lee’s writing style. She includes occasional sarcastic and snarky comments within the text rendering the book consider less like a history book and more like fun.