On the face of it this series seems an excellent idea: a timeline and a short chronological biography, followed by sections that focus on three key issues about the individual concerned. Then some exam-style questions, to test students’ understanding of the issue. Very minimalist and very exam focused.

Each book in the series begins with a brief section ‘Why do Historians Differ?’ This is meant to set the scene for the ‘interpretations’ work. To a certain extent it does, but to say that ‘a Marxist historian looking at an historical issue may take a completely different viewpoint to a non-Marxist historian’ doesn’t really add a great deal to our understanding of why historians differ. The introduction states ‘it is important therefore, for students to understand why historians differ in their views….’ Unfortunately these texts show how historians’ views differ, without really exploring the why, or giving students enough information to work it out for themselves.

FDR focuses on the three key issues of ‘New Deal: success or failure;’ ‘Was FDR’s foreign policy isolationist or interventionist?’ and ‘Was FDR the first imperial president?’ – all absolutely critical to understanding Roosevelt’s time in office. The structure, however, leads to some repetition of content, although taken as individual sections the text makes a good, perceptive introduction to each issue, and an introduction to the different ways each topic has been viewed by historians, but that is all. Students would need to look elsewhere to be able to fully understand these debates.

Considerable effort has been put into making the texts accessible – language, structure, etc, are all appropriate for the target audience, and each author uses a wide range of historians to tell students the differing views. I can’t help feeling though, that these books don’t really do justice to such important topics.