Pub Date: 2022
Publisher: Putnam & Co.
Rating: 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟

Whenever I read a historical fiction book, I sit back and wonder why I don’t read them more often because I tend to really enjoy them. This was no different…And while I’ve seen some reviews that weren’t loving on this one, I was the opposite and didn’t want it to end!

At nearly 500 pages, I was hesitant to start it because I’ve got so many books going but once I read a few pages, I was sucked in. Starting at the beginning of the Booth family, the men with their fame on the stage and the children that followed in their footsteps, it tells of family loyalties while leading up to the inevitable moment for which John Wilkes Booth is known. But it’s all the goodness in between that is what I enjoyed. The bonds of the brothers and sisters, the ones who stayed away and the ones that were bound to stay close all made for an epic that I couldn’t’ put down.

I appreciated that Fowler didn’t spend much time on the actual man that killed Lincoln, but spent the bulk of the pages keeping the reader immersed in the trials and tribulations of that time period. Her author’s note at the end was perfection as well so don’t skip that!