This is one of those tough three star reviews, where three doesn't feel like it's enough, but I try to be consistent in rounding down. Ultimately, this wasn't a four star book for me. I enjoyed reading it, and I loved the history aspects. The author did a wonderful job weaving the history lessons of the Oregon Trail and the many who braved it in with his own experience, and the book did a good job of presenting historical facts in an interesting and engaging way. But I wish the book had been 100 pages shorter, with far less of the memoir-ish aspects, which really took away from the overall flow. 
 Basically, I felt like I was reading two different books - a history/travelogue that I was really invested in, but kept getting interrupted by a memoir in which I had far less interest. Every time a memoir section cropped up, it threw off the whole flow of the book and I found myself wishing I could skip ahead and get back to the trail. 
 2016 Popsugar Reading Challenge: a New York Times bestseller