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Rob Wick · 07-07-2012, 08:13 AM

Right now I'm reading Jason Emerson's book on Robert Todd Lincoln. I'm enjoying it immensely. Not really sure what I'm going to read next, although I imagine it will be something for my book on Sandburg.

Best
Rob

J. Beckert · 07-07-2012, 08:24 AM

(07-07-2012 08:13 AM)Rob Wick Wrote: Right now I'm reading Jason Emerson's book on Robert Todd Lincoln. I'm enjoying it immensely. Not really sure what I'm going to read next, although I imagine it will be something for my book on Sandburg.

Best
Rob

Just finished Kate Larsen's book (Loved it!) and am now slowly getting through My Thoughts Be Bloody. It's very well researched and the history Ms. Titone dug up on the Booth family is amazing. Great read.

RJNorton · 07-07-2012, 08:27 AM

(07-07-2012 08:13 AM)Rob Wick Wrote: Right now I'm reading Jason Emerson's book on Robert Todd Lincoln. I'm enjoying it immensely. Not really sure what I'm going to read next, although I imagine it will be something for my book on Sandburg.

Best
Rob

Rob, I have been reading that, too, and I agree with you completely. One thing I noticed was what he wrote on Robert's eye operation. It's very different from what Irving Stone writes in Love Is Eternal. I realize Stone's book is historical fiction, but he definitely has a different account of Robert's eye surgery.

Rob Wick · 07-07-2012, 08:46 AM

I haven't read Stone's book. What has impressed me about Emerson's book is that it's well-written and detailed without getting bogged down. Interesting to see how RTL tried to be his own man but he knew he couldn't escape Abraham Lincoln's legacy.

Best
Rob

HerbS · 07-07-2012, 10:21 AM

I just finished the"Inner Life Of Abraham Lincoln".Great Read!

Gene C · (This post was last modified: 07-07-2012 07:33 PM by Gene C.)

I'm currently reading Sam Arnold's, "Memoirs of a Lincoln Conspirator and re-reading Betty Owensbey's "Alias Paine" both very enjoyable. Have just finished "My Thoughts be Bloody" by Nora Titone and "The Odd Couple who Hanged Mary Surratt" by Charles Bauer. Ms. Titone's book was good, Mr Bauers.....so,so.

Next is "You Lost Me" by David Kinnaman, a book about why young christians are leaving church; and "Mask for Treason" by Vaughn Shelton.

BettyO · 07-07-2012, 06:41 PM

I'm starting to reread Reville in Washington - read that about 30 years ago...really good book on life in 1860s Washington....

L Verge · 07-07-2012, 07:10 PM

We just put a paperback copy of Reveille on our library sale table at Surratt House. It brought back fond memories of college discussions and made me realize that I should read it again also.

Someone mentioned Tom Goodrich's The Darkest Dawn in another thread. That is a very good book on the assassination that is often overlooked. In some respects, it reminds me of Reveille because it touches on the human angle.

J. Beckert · 07-07-2012, 07:13 PM

Goodrich's The Darkest Dawn is an EXCELLENT book. One of my favorites. One thing that amazed me about it was he detailed the amount of casualties that resulted from Lincoln's assassination. People celebrating, (for a little while), etc.

DannyW · 07-08-2012, 09:14 AM

Well this summer I am not able to read much on Lincoln. This is due to having to renew my teacher license. The course is The Presidency of Reagan at Mississippi State-Meridian Campus. The class has 5 books required all on Reagan of course. The professor teaching the class is Dr. Toby Bates who last year wrote book titled The Reagan Rhetoric. Dr. Bates next book he told me will be on a not so well known Civil War soldier named Benjamin Mayberry Prentiss who was born in Virginia but fought for the North.

L Verge · 07-08-2012, 09:58 AM

Every chance I get, I read another chapter of Emerson's book on RTL. I knew very little on Robert until Joe Beckert sent me the time-honored one by Goff. It was a great read.

Jason's is excellent so far also and an easy read. His style of writing flows like Swanson's, while still getting every detail in, which I admire. Some writers in our field are very heavy on details, but their style jumps back and forth and tends to confuse the reader. Trying to go back and find a passage to re-read while researching is sometimes a chore with those kinds of authors.

Rob Wick · 07-08-2012, 10:13 AM

Laurie,

I think Emerson's style is helped by the fact that he was a journalist. However, he also understands and respects the rules of good scholarship, which makes it even better.

Best
Rob

L Verge · 07-08-2012, 10:44 AM

Agreed, Rob. Importantly, also, he is a historian as well as a journalist at heart. I have heard him speak a number of times, and he is just as easy to listen to as he is to read.

RJNorton · (This post was last modified: 07-14-2012 03:03 PM by RJNorton.)

Joe Beckert's current trivia question reminded of a new Mary Lincoln book just off the presses. It's titled The Mary Lincoln Enigma: Historians on America's Most Controversial First Lady, and it arrived at our home yesterday (a surprise as just the day before I had received a note from Amazon saying shipping of the book had been delayed). The book is edited by Frank Williams and Mike Burkhimer.

The book is a series of essays about various aspects of Mary's life. There are many contributors, just a few of whom are Jason Emerson, Harold Holzer, Donna McCreary, Wayne Temple, and Douglas Wilson. It looks like a "must have" for folks who have a collection of Mary Lincoln books (as I do).

BettyO · 07-14-2012, 03:14 PM

Great! Thanks, Roger - I also have a shelf of Mary Lincoln books.... I'll be on the outlook for this one -