American Colonies

I just finished the book American Colonies by Alan Taylor.  It was incredible.  The books is a behemoth at 477 pages, but worth the read.  It cleared up a lot of misconceptions I had about America's history, and I learned a ton I never learned in high school history.  Basically reading this book taught me more about American History than my high school American history course.
It's an overview that starts from when the Native American ancestors entered North America through Russia and ends right before the American Revolution.  Some of the misconceptions it cleared up were:

The first Thanksgiving was not so safe and happy
Columbus' contemporaries did not think the world was flat
African slaves were sold by other African chiefs
to name a few

The only inaccuracy I came across was his understanding of the Puritan's God.  He referred to their Calvinist views towards God as an arbitrary God who chooses whoever for heaven and hell.  Though Calvinists do believe that you can't earn heaven, I don't think they consider God as arbitrary.  He basically made God seem more cold and distant then I believe Puritans thought.  He did do a good job overviewing Jonathan Edward's views though.

As a side note, this book really made me want to play Age of Empires III for the computer.  It is a real time strategy game.  The book made me want to play it because the game is based in the American Colonies pre-American Revolution.  It does an interesting job giving each European civilization its own strengths and weaknesses.  I especially love how the French have an easier time gaining Indian allies, which is pretty accurate overall historically.  Real time strategy (RTS, another TLA!) games are great, but they are also maddening too me as they take a lot of micro-management.  Nevertheless I find myself wanting to play this game.  Another cool feature is that you can get shipments from the European home country to help you out during the game.

Anyways, 2 reviews for the price of 1!  Can't beat that in this economy!