Eckert's description [in "Wilderness Empire"] of the often bloody encounters between the competing forces of empire, with the Indians taking different sides at different times, offers exciting reading. However, the author's use of extrapolated "dialogue" in an effort to make his book more lively and the absence of interpretation limit the value of the account. (pp. 82-3)

[In Search of a Whale] is a well-written action narrative with plenty of excitement to maintain the interest of the reader, and with much solid natural history material concerning ocean fishes and marine mammals in general, and pilot whales in particular. When you have finished the story you will have enjoyed the excitement of being present during the pursuit and capture of a blue shark, a sea lion and a female pilot whale.

[The Conquerors] tells of the bloody frontier upheavals of 1758–1765 at the close of the French and Indian War…. In his foreword to this interminable book [Allan W. Eckert] states: "The facts are presented with the greatest possible degree of accuracy…. There has been no author's interference." The worthiness is obvious, but "author's interference" embraces his habit of describing in detail the unrecorded thoughts, gestures and speeches of long-dead characters, and his quoting, verbatim and in English, of Pontiac's windy speeches at all-Indian councils where no English was spoken. This disrupts an otherwise exciting narrative and obscures the author's wide knowledge of his subject. (pp. 1222-23)

[Incident at Hawk's Hill is an] overblown and curiously old-fashioned tale of an eerie little being—an undersized six-year-old boy—who is adopted, for gawd's sake, by a badger (oversized)…. Benjy is lost in the wilds and the badger, having just lost her babies to a human killer, adopts Benjy and feeds him field mice and yech…. Benjy is rescued and Mother Badger comes to live in. It all ends with a furry deathbed scene. Were it not for Mr. Eckert's natural history credentials one might think he had been sniffing too much meadow grass. (pp. 252-53)

Not since Francis Parkman, a century ago, has there been a more fascinating (and detailed) account of Pontiac's conspiracy than this third volume in Eckert's series about the Indian wars ["The Conquerors"]. With the example of Plutarch before him, Eckert invents conversations and reports what goes on in the minds of his characters, but he derives it all from the latest research and indulges in no overt moral instruction. Vivid narrative history.