I enjoyed both 1491 and the sequel 1493. The author does start doing back flips to fight the obvious conclusion that the natives may not have been as benign to the environment as the Al Gorites would like to think. They were humans they used technology to defeat enemies, grow crops and in general survive. Clear cut burns,water diversion and other tactics don’t fit into the modern liberals view of the world back then. And then he quoted Ward Churchill and I knew where he was coming from.
I’ve been slogging through 1493.
Don’t find it quite as enjoyable as 1491—and the author’s politics taint the narrative a bit more—but still a lot of info that is omitted in high school/college presentations of the subject.