5 comments about The Darkest Dawn: Lincoln, Booth, And the Great American Tragedy.

1. He was merely a player in this tragedy. Trained as an actor, he did his biggest role which changed the face of this country forever and ended his short life. John Wilkes Booth would never have killed Lincoln on his own. For some reason, by indoctrination or brain-washing by the conspirators who wanted Lincoln dead, he was used by the group and was in his own mind playing the theatrical role of his life. He was A Deluded Southern Sympathizer. He sprang from a great family of actors; his brother Edwin was an accomplished stage actor. Edwin did his deed so as to be famous in his own right. Many books have been written about John Wilkes Booth's participation in the Lincoln death.
   
   It is sad that so much blame was put on his shoulders. I have been interested in Lincoln's assassination for over twenty years, mainly because they hanged Mary Surrat, the first woman to be officially killed in this manner. It was at her boardinghouse where the conspirators met to discuss and plan killing Lincoln and others in his Cabinet. John Wilkes Booth, from a prominent acting family, was a Confederacy sympathizer. But that in itself does not make him guilty. He was denied his right to a trial.
   
   Most of the South were more than a little upset when Lincoln was inaugurated for the second time. They refused to accept him as "our" President. We had Jefferson Davis who married Zachary Taylor's daughter. I have read so much about Lincoln and also sympathized with Booth's reasoning. Lincoln, as it so happens, was a Shakespeare fan and enjoyed going to Ford's Theatre. John Wilkes Booth (Brutus) was one of the most promising young Shakespearean actors of his day. Booth considered Lincoln an "American Caesar." John Wilkes Booth is sometimes called the "American Brutus." There is a book out with that title, also one called The Myth of John Wilkes Booth.
   
   He was a very handsome man and, even though he broke his leg in the leap to the stage (instead of running down the back stairs), he eluded capture with the help of a Dr. Mudd for twelve days. He was not given a chance to tell his side and the complex, misleading reasons he did what he did. That took fortitude! He did not act alone! That's a major issue. He was cornered in that barn like an animal and burned (at the stake) by the vigilante cowards. He was merely a misinformed player who ended up "on his own" after the dasdardly deed. He deserves better than to be called a devil. To some, he was an avenging angel. Terry Weber played the dual role in the Knoxville production of "Killing Lincoln," and had both Lincoln and Booth down pat. I have read many books about Abraham Lincoln and several about John Wilkes Booth which I have reviewed for Amazon.com



2. I thought I knew a lot about the assassination of Lincoln. I was wrong. This easy to read book holds your attention as well as a novel, but is completely documented to please an academic. It provided intriguing information on the era, the people, and most notably to me, Mrs. Lincoln. I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in American history.



3. I've read all I've found on Lincoln and yet I found new details about his death here that I had not read elsewhere. It doesn't rehearse the ins and outs of the conspiracy which is good if you've read "Blood on the Moon" and, even more so, "American Brutus". My cavil with 'Darkest Dawn" is that it portrays Booth all but sympathetically and Mrs. Lincoln as the devil herself. Mary Todd Lincoln was, without doubt, a manic-depressive who was dogged by bad health and hellish luck. She was a difficult lady who nevertheless withstood considerable slander and ridicule from both North and South. However, she was a staunch abolitionist who loved her husband dearly and was a kind and devoted mother. The author has the irritating habit of referring to her consistently as the "woman" and even finds her breakdown immediately after the assassination as reason for criticism. I guess if she hadn't, he'd be accusing her being part of the murder plot.



4. I enjoyed this book a great deal. The author is obviously not as much an admirer of Lincoln as I am. Other books I've read are more biased in Lincoln's favor. This author went much deeper into the history of the conspirators and others surrounding the assassination than other have done. A refreshingly unbiased account of the months before and after America's greatest tragedy.



5. He is one of the most recognisable figures in history: The tall, angular frame, the sad half smile, eyes dark, tired and sunken. The last picture of Abraham Lincoln, 16th president of the United States, and reproduced here, is that of a man whose race is almost run.
   
   Taken four days before the prominent actor and Southern sympathiser John Wilkes Booth ended his life with a shot to the head, Lincoln seemed ill at ease, the slight blurring around the hands indicating he was unable to keep them still for the time required for the exposure to take effect.
   
   Could he be wondering about the next four years of his presidency, the monumental task of healing the wounds of a civil war he had insisted should be fought? The conflict, in which he had thrown the overwhelming might of the United States at the rebel Confederacy to bring about a difficult and costly victory, was all but over, but as shrewd a man as he would have guessed that the peace was going to be an even more formidable adversary. Did he have the answers?
   
   We shall never know as Booth's dramatic act at Ford's Theatre in Washington relieved Lincoln of that responsibility, leaving him simply as the leader who saved the union. Dying with Southern armies still in the field and the final acts of the war yet to take place, his administration was linked wholly with the conflict. The emotions his assassination unleashed ensured not just his place as a great American president, but his conversion into a secular saint.
   
   As Goodrich points out in his epilogue: "In the stampede to elevate the slain president, his virtues were magnified and his vices diminished until the one became a caricature and the other all but forgotten." The cynic might add: "good career move, Abe."
   
   The author, an historian and storyteller, who has specialised in this brief, dark period in American history, has taken the events of a few weeks of the spring and summer of 1865 and made them live again.
   
   An act of outstanding scholarship, he has amassed hundreds of contemporary sources - biographies, eye-witness accounts, newspaper articles - to the point where he blends his own narrative with the quotations from which he draws, producing compelling descriptions that immerse the reader in the zeitgeist. His passage on the chaos that resulted from a `lying in state' in Philadelphia during Lincoln's cross-country funeral procession is typical.
   
   "Mingled with the normal dull roar of so many thousands were the shrieks of crushed women, the shrill cries of trampled children, and the cursing and shouting of men. Silk hats, bonnets and parasols were smashed flat, dresses were ripped, hoop skirts were broken and mangled, the neatly pinned hair of ladies now fell to their waists in a disheveled mass. Ragged and tattered debris, including destroyed mourning badges and black crepe, littered the ground below."
   
   The book is full of such rich description, including the wild and random acts of vengeance wreaked on anyone who did not show proper respect for the slain president. Any words said against Lincoln in public risked a beating or worse. Lynch law took hold. Even those whose mourning was not considered sincere enough faced the anger of the mob.
   
   In the occupied Confederacy, civilians were forced to decorate their houses in black to honour the man they hated and reviled. Most swallowed their pride and complied, some like Mrs Stuart, hung herself rather than yield to the humiliation.
   
   From the fall of Richmond, which signaled the end of organised resistance in the Confederacy, and Lee's surrender at Appomattox, through the assassination, its aftermath, the funeral procession, the death of Booth and the trial and execution of his associates, Goodrich opens a series of windows on those troubled, turbulent times.
   
   For a while the victorious north, plunged from the pinnacle of joy to the depths of despair, became unhinged. As one witness recalled: "The sorrow and sadness caused...cannot be written; no pen can tell it. Only those who lived in these dreadful days can appreciate the pain we suffered."
   
   Thanks to this book, we can appreciate a little of the anguish experienced by the bloody, war-ravaged nation as, united once more, it wearily resumed the journey towards its ultimate destiny.

5 comments about Philippa.

1. I'm sorry, I love Bertrice Small, but this book was awful. I wanted to take a stuffed capon or a wheel of hard cheddar and bash this brat over the head with it. (and yes, I can see describing one meal in length, but when the characters eat the same things over and over again - salmon, trout, eggs poached in marsala wine - there's no need to drone on for 2 pages about it.) Philippa was such a stuffy, prudish, uninteresting character that I really could have done without her story. Banon seemed interesting, or maybe she should have just skipped right into Elizabeth's story. I don't know. I bought this book because I didn't want a gap in my Friarsgate Inheritance collection, but I'm thinking it was a waste of $14.95.



2. Bertrice Small does it again. Philippa is everything and more. Super reading.



3. This was my first Bertrice Small book and I have to say I was not impressed. I did not care for the character at all. She was spoiled, and self rightous to everyone, including her family. I also thought the book was extremely boring. There was to much descrpition on small mundane things and not enough plot and action. It took me forever to get through this book and I am a very fast reader. This book made me not want to read any of her other books because I am afraid that they will be just as bad. I hope this was a one time oops for Ms. Small because this book was not good at all.



4. I'm not going to write a long review, as, I didn't get very far into this book. It's very far and few between that I have to put a book away after starting to read it. Unfortunatley, this was one of those times. I had not read Bertrice Small before, and I won't do so again. This book was just terrible. Terrible plot and terrible characters. But, that's not the worst part..........I wasted my money buying this book. That's the worst part. My advice.......save your money and room on your library card.



5. I enjoyed Rosamund and Until You but I didn't like this book at all. When I read this book I did something I've never done before - I skimmed through a Bertrice Small historical romance. I hated Philippa - she was so annoying. Crispen was a huge bore. All of the sections written about life at court put me to sleep. I liked Thomas in the first two books but for some reason he annoyed me in this book. I found it odd that Rosamund would let him control how her daughters would live their lives. Bertrice Small has many great books but this book is one of the worst books she's written.

5 comments about The Secret Plot to Save the Tsar: The Truth Behind the Romanov Mystery.

1. When I first became interested in the Romanovs I knew very little about Russian history so the context was difficult for me. Some suggested I read the standard books that are the usual recommendations but then one of my professors suggested I read The Secret Plot to Save the Tsar so that I could put the events leading up to the final days of the Tsar and his families' lives in Siberia into context. I am so glad I did,

   You will never have a complete understanding of the last days of the Romanovs until you read McNeal's first book. She attempts to walk between a page-turner and an academic exercise that we all benefit from each time we read her footnotes. Reading The Secret Plot to Save the Tsar is well worth the time you will invest.




2. This is just another crackpot book about the Romanovs after the manner of Summers and Mangold's File on the Tsar. Nothing in this book should be taken seriously. The worst argument is about the Romanovs escape. Nonsense like this should have stopped being written decades ago. It is sad that some people still think there is something to say on the matter. The only decent thing about this badly written book is that it does not claim to be definitive-which it is not. Among other things the author never satisfactorily explains the existence of the Romanov remains. She never gets into how the Bolsheviks could come up with remains that matched those of the Romanovs so well. She tackles the question of the DNA match in a contrived manner. Everyone can decide for themselves, but I think this book is worth no one's time.



3. I could only get into a few pages of this book, but from what I can tell the main premious of this book is off.
   
   Many people want to believe that Nicholas, Alexandra and their 5 children did not die such a horrible death, but more than likly they did. In 1917 not much could have been done by their family in different countries and the chances of seven people matching the genetic makeup of the royal family as well as their ages would be hard to find, even amoung inbred royal Europe.



4. I have read this book and numerous others on the subject. Unfortunately most of the reviews below were written before Stanford University and the Japanese government independently discredited the DNA evidence in late 2004. There is now no physical evidence of an execution but there is a great deal of evidence for a rescue. I applaud Shay McNeal for her diligent research. She has opened my eyes and I hope many others.



5. As hard as I tried to take this book seriously, I just can't. The evidence she provides to suggest the Romanovs bones were not authentic fell flat on its face, making the rest of the book do the same. And better yet, she places much of her reliance on a book written in 1920 called "Rescuing the Czar" which suggests the Imperial Family were rescued through a "secret tunnel" under the Ipatiev House. I'm sorry Ms. McNeal, but there's got to be more to convince me. 2 stars for effort!

2 comments about The Assassination Chronicles: Inquest, Counterplot, and Legend.

1. Epstein was an early skeptic of the Warren Commission Report and the reasons why are laid out in Inquest. His approach is scholarly and measured. His assessment of Jim Garrison (Stone's hero) is scathing but well-grounded in fact. Legend is an examination of Lee Harvey Oswald and his time in Russia. Epstein has included updates at the end of each section to bring them up to date with current information. All in all, a masterful body of work



2. The Assassination Chronicles consists of three short books - Inquest, Counterplot, and Legend - written over a period of about a dozen years and combined into one volume.
   
   Inquest established Epstein's bona fides on the Kennedy assassination and is the most readable volume. It is essentially an effort to concede criticisms of early and penetrating critics such as Joachim Joesten while preserving the Warren Commission's central findings intact. It contains pretty much nothing that others had not already said by the time of its publication.
   
   Other writing of Epstein's suggests intelligence connections, and his handling of the issues around the assassination tend very much to serve official interests.
   
   If you are informed on the hard facts of the assassination, Counterplot and Legend are almost unreadable. There is a palpable sense of reading a case against an accused without a word from the defense. These are not investigations in any meaningful sense of the word. Epstein assumes the role of Judge Warren without the judicial robes, dressed instead in the deceivingly casual dress of a supposedly authentic critic.
   
   There is no explanation to this day for the secrecy that still surrounds important parts of the Kennedy assassination, and it is this secrecy that blurs and distorts so much of the key evidence. Were this not so, books like Epstein's would not be published. Except for the concessions made in his first volume, Inquest, Epstein simply does not deal with the case's central issues of missing evidence, weak evidence, and implausible evidence. He stands ready to accuse and judge a man who had no motive, almost no means, and against whom what genuine facts we have would never convince a conscientious jury.
   
   Something terribly significant has been kept from the world for more than forty years since the assassination, and books like The Assassination Chronicles, or Gerald Posner's update, aka Case Closed, are significant efforts along the way to keeping it that way.
   
   One can only speculate on the reasons for all the secrecy, including the possibility that the CIA and FBI never understood who was responsible. Now, there was a state secret worth keeping in a time of Cold War paranoia. And the secrecy concerns are still valid. After all, the CIA and the FBI blew it on the imminent fall of the Soviet Union and on the activities of the 9/11 gang who entered the U.S. with legally-issued visas to take flying lessons.
   
   No one should read this book without also reading Anthony Summers' monumental work of genuine investigation, Conspiracy.

5 comments about Best Evidence (Signet).

1. We all know what was supposed to have happened. Kennedy's body was taken to Love Field and flown to Andrews AFB accompanied by the widow. At Andrews, there was the sad scene where the body was put into an ambulance and driven to Bethesda Naval Hospital still accompanied by the grieving widow. How could anything have possibly happened to the body on that sad trip in 1963? Well, Lifton does a very thorough job of reseach and shows exactly what and how and who.
   
   Lifton became interested in the Kennedy autopsy after noticing that the two FBI agents present at the autopsy had referred to pre-existing 'surgery of the head area' in their official report published with the Warren Commission report. What could they have been referring to? First, Lifton did a very thorough job of tracking down and interviewing many of the people who were present when the body was transported to Bethesda and autopsied. Then he visits the locations where events occurred to see what was possible and what was not. Then he puts everything together and shows exactly how Kennedy's body was moved around to give the conspirator's time before the official autopsy to remove bullets from the body and doctor up the wounds to incorrectly show that bullets struck Kennedy in the head from behind.
   
   Some of the things that Lifton proved: Kennedy's wife escorted an empty casket. Kennedy's body arrived at Bethesda the first time in a military shipping casket and zipped up in a body bag. Kennedy's brain was missing when the body arrived. The military team escorting the casket chased after an ambulance containing an empty casket across the Bethesda grounds before losing it and returning to the hospital in their pickup truck to find another ambulance and another casket at the back door.
   
   People often say things like 'how could anyone have done anything to the body with everyone watching?' Lifton shows exactly how. Lifton shows that everything happened at Bethesda and that everything there was observed by disinterested bystanders but they simply didn't know what they were seeing. Lifton gathers all of their stories, reviews all of the official documents and timelines, researchs the news reports, television broadcasts, and other accounts, and puts everything together to show what really happened. If it wasn't an assassination of the President of the United States, the final story that Lifton unearths would be hilarious and is certainly worthy of a movie.
   
   The Warren Commission report is based on the medical evidence established at the autopsy. Lifton shows that the autopsy 'evidence' cannot be used to determine the nature of Kennedy's wounds because it is false. The only reliable evidence left to use then about the nature of Kennedy's wounds is the statements of the doctors who were present in the room when Kennedy arrived at Parkland Hospital in Dallas. That evidence shows that Kennedy had one entrance wound in the front of his neck and one exit wound in the back of his head. Period.



2. I agree with the writer who suggests reading the book first. I think you have to have an open mind and not simply ingest everything the government tells you. I can tell you that unless you have seen the "head snap" that the author refers to in this book which is clearly evident in the videotape obtained by Abraham Zapruder, your comment might as well be as full of agitation as the longwinded one by David V.P. I witnessed this clip out of the videotape and I am convinced- as in CONVINCED, that at least one (1) shot came from the front. Well, how can that be? The TX book depository was way in back. Just follow the motorcade route and simply "Look at it". Open your mind and free your mind enough to be able to ask a logical question. Don't just eat up everything the government gives you. P. in NY



3. .....of JFK assassination books. One of my troops told me about this book in the early 80's. Since then, I've worn out two hardbacks, given away a bunch of paperbacks to people who probably won't read them, and, over 20 years ago had one long phone conversation with the author. Since that conversation several key players have died, but nothing has come out to shake my belief that Mr. Lifton got it right.
   
   Up front, I will say that reading this book will NOT tell you who killed President Kennedy, or why. It WILL tell you how the killers [plural] got away with it.
   
   Everyone over a certain age can tell you where they were on November 22, 1963 [I was in Chemistry class]. Early on, many of us realized that the "Oswald did it" solution was just too simple. My Dad was a firearms expert who said that the [alleged] sixth floor shots would have been easy, UNTIL he saw Olwald's rifle; then he said that they would have been impossible. [Of course, "easy" for Daddy doesn't mean "easy", but hundreds of Military and Police shooters could make those shots WITH A DECENT RIFLE].
   
   The gist of this book is that JFK's body as autopsied at Bethesda was in much different condition than it was when it left Parkland. Dr. Humes was not a liar; he was lied to. By all accounts, J.J. Humes was a fine man. Despite a 25 year career in Navy Medicine [the first years in Laboratory Medicine], I never met him. Several people I knew respected him greatly. Dr. Humes was presented, in the presence of numerous superior officers, with an altered body, and told to perform an autopsy. An impossible position.
   
   When President Kennedy went to Dallas, the plot was in place. Had it worked as planned, much of the controversy of the past 44 years would have never come to light, but two things went wrong: [1] JFK arrived at Parkland still [barely] alive, and [2] John Connally got shot. The Parkland ER was to receive one victim, DOA. Instead, they got two live ones, one of whom could be saved. The doctors at Parkland included "sheep" and "goats", but they got hopelessly mixed up during the half hour attempt to save the President. They body had to be altered after leaving Parkland [somewhere], but mistakes got made, witness saw [parts of] things, and an eternity of controversy started.
   
   The wound descriptions given by the Parkland doctors are totally different from those given by Dr. Humes in the autopsy protocol. Do I remember every detail of every patient I've ever treated in an ER? Preposterous. But some, I can never forget; I would absolutely remember every slightest detail of treating a President. Anyone would. In the end, there's simply too much evidence for the Grassy Knoll, and an altered body.
   
   I disagree with Mr. Lifton about 1 or 2 minor points. He considers Oswald an innocent victim; I'm not so sure, though I agree that he fired no shots.
   
   If I have to criticize this profoundly great book about anything, it's Mr. Lifton's assumption that the average reader possesses a level of medical knowledge that they really don't. [I made the very same critique of Cooper's biography of Jeff Davis, another President whose term was unjustly shortened by tragedy].
   
   President Kennedy is dead. God rest his soul. I don't know who killed him, and David Lifton doesn't, either. Something of ALL of us died with him. That's true be you liberal Democrat, conservative Republican, or those like me who still use present tense in speaking of Jeff Davis. ALL of us are Americans who had our innocence stolen from us. Read this book. Make your OWN descisions, but be informed when you make them.



4. This is one of the more interesting books on this subject, and I have read most of them. Mr. Lifton does at times belabor the point, and indeed there are small sections of the book that become so redundant I found one could skip ahead several pages and miss nothing. It is at times as though Mr. Lifton is afraid his reader won't "get" some new piece of evidence when in fact it was quite clear. The theme of the book, however, is unique, credible, and a must read for assassination researchers.
   
   Mr. Lifton is asking us to think outside of the box (please excuse the trite and overworked phrase, it does apply here). Given the lack of progress that has been made in this particular murder case over the past 45 years, I think this is perhaps a more valid request to make of the reader today than when originally published. I purchased a first run hardback of this book from an antique bookseller, and it does not contain the 32 pages of "shocking" photographs. This is just as well, Mr. Lifton's thesis does not require these gory photographs to be convincing and I am of the opinion they probably do more to discredit more recent editions of this book than they could possibly add to it.
   
   The central theme of the book is the concept that if the body of the slain president was altered before it arrived at Bethesda Naval Hospital for the autopsy, then it is not necessary that Dr. Humes or the Warren Commission themselves were willful participants in a deliberate cover-up. Certainly the behavior of these men in the years that have passed would indicate they are, at the very least, unwilling to review their work with an open mind and accept the fact that they may well have been deceived, but ignorant and ugly mulishness is a far cry from deliberate complicity. Mr. Lifton provides ample evidence, all of which is to be found in the Warren Commission and the National Archives own files, that there was not only opportunity for such pre-autopsy surgical alteration of the body to have occurred, but also evidence that people did observe and note clues that it had.
   
   Many of the books' critics, easily found right here on Amazon, dismiss the book out-of-hand in such a manner as to indicate the entire theme of the book was lost on them. They cannot or will not "think outside the box". One critic dismisses the entire book, for example, because Dave Powers stated he never left the casket while it was onboard Air Force One. But we know as a matter of record who the medical personnel were at Parkland Hospital who put the body in the casket, and Mr. Powers was not one of them. None of these medical personnel traveled with the body all the way to Bethesda. Mr. Powers may well be entirely truthful when he states that he never left the casket; he is only assuming, however, that the casket contained the remains of the president. It is unlikely he would engage in such ghoulish behavior as would be required to verify this for himself onboard Air Force One in the presence of the late president's widow.
   
   And indeed, if you look at the reviews posted here about any Kennedy assassination book, you will find the same basic phenomena. It takes a particular type of individual to hate dissent, to tow the party line at all costs and view life with such a closed mind as to hate others who do not. You will note, not 100% of the time but in the overwhelming majority of cases, that those who discount a pro-Warren Commission book generally do so by sighting specific evidence that was overlooked, misinterpreted, or ignored. Those who discount a pro-Conspiracy book tend to do so by merely insulting the author, his readers, even witnesses who gave contrary testimony that does not align with their preconceived notion of events. Supporters of "Case Closed" and "Reclaiming History" will say "this book is full of FACTS", never seeming to realize that just because they agree with a particular statement does not in and of itself make that statement a "fact". I can respect a differing opinion from someone who gives me an informed argument; I do not respect a differing opinion from someone armed only with the juvenile weapons of name-calling and character assassination, and among the community of assassination readers, such persons have done a great deal more to harm the pro-Warren Commission side than they will ever do to help it.



5. Lifton's research is impeccable, and his conclusions both startling and obvious. He, and he alone, put the medical evidence together in a way that demonstrates beyond any doubt that JFK was killed as a result of a conspiracy by factions within the U.S. Government. Don't believe me. Read it yourself.
   
   But be forewarned that the first 150-175 pages are a little dull, because he wrote the text chronologically, taking the reader with him as he struggles to reconcile the movement of JFK's body with the official report.
   
   However, you should also be forewarned that after that point, the book reads like thriller fiction...except that it isn't. David Lifton has done primary research and has opened up a whole area of the assassination to the light of day.
   
   I wish I could give it ten stars.

2 comments about The Man on the Grassy Knoll.

1. I have read quite a lot of books about the Kennedy assassination but this one is the best by far. It is well written and reads like a thriller.

   At the end of the book a groundsheet of the Rogers' house is shown. This helps to understand the description of the crime and the search through the house by the two police officers. What I miss is a groundsheet of the parsonage. From the description it is not possible for me to imagine how it looked like. It plays an important role so I think it would better the book if it was printed too. A thing that makes me curious is: what did the authors put on their trail? Where they one of those informed by Marietta Gerhart?




2. I have read a lot of books on the JFK assissination.

   This book caught my eye for that reason. However, once I began reading it, this book kept my attention. It read like a novel. I liked that, it was a switch from the usual fact presented like facts JFK conspiracy books. I liked that about this book. It certainly had me convinced that this guy had something to do with the JFK murder. It made me wonder why we didn't do more then in regards to this guy.

   The book was gory when talking about the dismemberment of his mother and father. I really didn't like that. I'm not sure that it added much to the book except some length. However, it did make me realize that this was the type of man who would do what he thought needed to be done and might certainly shoot at a president.

   This book is very interesting and those interested in reading about the JFK assassination would do well to consider reading this book. It is an easy one to skip over with the massive amounts of books available to read. However, the novel like feel of this does not detract from the research completed and conclusions drawn in this book.

No comments about Shakespeare on the Double! Julius Caesar (Shakespeare on the Double!).

5 comments about Mrs. Paine's Garage: And the Murder of John F. Kennedy.

1. Thomas Mallon's most recent foray into "non-fiction," is not only a disappointment. It's a disgrace. The book's a bust not so much for what it is but for what it fails to be.
   Mallon's subjects, Ruth and her ex-husband, Michael Paine, were the young couple who befriended Lee and Marina Oswald
   in early 1963. When President John F. Kennedy's long-awaited visit to Dallas rolled around on Nov. 22, 1963, Marina was living at Ruth's house in Irving, Texas. Lee Oswald, who would eventually be charged with the president's gunshot slaying, spent the night before the assassination there at Ruth's home. When Dallas police appeared at the Irving address on that fateful Friday afternoon, Marina told them Lee's rifle was in the garage. When they searched, the gun was missing.

   Mallon could've delved deeply into the Paines' background, revealing their family's relationship, for instance, to former CIA Director Allen Dulles, who became one of the primary investigators into the Kennedy assassination. When the Paines each testified before the Warren Commission in 1964, Dulles oversaw their questioning. For many years, Michael's New England-based mother and stepfather, Ruth and Arthur Young, had been close friends of Mary Bancroft, Dulles' mistress dating back to his days as an undercover operative in Switzerland during World War II. If the public had known in 1964 about the Paine family's ties to Dulles, the Warren Commission may have been exposed for the sham that it was, a tool of FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover and President Lyndon Baines Johnson. Hoover and Johnson both desperately wanted the JFK hit to dissolve swiftly into history, attributed to a "lone nut," Oswald, who in turn was assassinated by another "lone nut," Big D nightclub operator Jack Ruby. Mallon is apparently among the shrinking number of Americans who swallow that unlikely scenario, the double-lone nut theory.
   Instead of exploring the Paines' unholy alliance with Dulles in this book, Mallon wallows in Ruth's Quakerism and her worries over her lost friendship with Marina. Instead of examining Michael's classified work at Bell Helicopter or his father's interest in the assassination of Leon Trotsky, he describes the husband's fascination with cabinetry and contradancing. In doing so, Mallon effectively trivializes the JFK murder and expressly taunts conspiracy theorists who insist that the Paines deserve more serious probing. Mallon actually mocks longtime assassination researchers by comparing them to "Trekkies," the cult-like followers of a long-ago canceled TV science fiction show. Having endeared himself to Ruth, courting her carefully over years via mail and telephone in order secure her permission to interview her at length about the murder of the president, Mallon literally sold out. The Westport, Conn. writer boasts a lengthy and impressive resume, having cranked out well-received novels such as "Dewey Defeats Truman." His years of experience fail him here, however, as he relies on his literary talents to dance around issues he should have more fully embraced.
   Specifically, he simply labels such facts as the Dulles connection as mere "coincidence." In making this point, Mallon quotes two people: Ruth's mother, who blames "fate" for her daughter's unusual notoriety, and Norman Mailer, author of "Oswald's Ghost," a mid-90s biography of the alleged assassin. In "Oswald's Ghost," Mallon neglects to inform readers of "Mrs. Paine's Garage," Mailer actually asserted that -- given the unlikelihood of the Warren Report's single-bullet theory -- a second gunman may well have stood, completely by chance, firing at JFK from behind the stockade fence on the grassy knoll in front of the presidential limousine while Oswald fired from behind, totally oblivious to the other shooter! After reading illogical deductions such as that, you can see why writers such as Mailer and Mallon remain more highly admired for their fiction than for their non-fiction.
   To illustrate his insistence that coincidence ruled the Paines' fate, Mallon concludes his book by relating a story about Mr. and Mrs., Raymond Entenmann, former Paine pals who happened to help stock JFK's Fort Worth Hotel room with artwork on the night of Nov. 21-22, 1963. The Entenmanns have nothing to do with the killing of the president, of course, but Mallon seems to be saying that since the Paines knew the Entenmanns, it's also logical that they may have known Dulles as well or Dallas FBI agent James Hosty, or that we shouldn't be surprised that Ruth's father worked for a CIA-related development agency in South America or that Michael's father-in-law was an inventor for Bell Helicopter and his father, Lyman Paine, had been a prominent follower of Soviet expatriate Leon Trotsky.
   Although they both gave lengthy testimony before the Warren Commission in 1964, neither of the Paines were called before the House Select Committee on Assassinations in 1979 nor before the Assassination Records Review Board in the mid-1990s.
   Now THERE's a coincidence that bears explaining, because both Ruth and Michael, now in their early-70s, still have plenty to answer for. They sure didn't tell Mallon anything other than what they WANT people to hear, and he was oh-so-agreeable to participate in that subtle subterfuge.




2. Thomas Mallon's most recent foray into "non-fiction," is not only a disappointment. It's a disgrace. The book's a bust not so much for what it is but for what it fails to be.
   Mallon's subjects, Ruth and her ex-husband, Michael Paine, were the young couple who befriended Lee and Marina Oswald
   in early 1963. When President John F. Kennedy's long-awaited visit to Dallas rolled around on Nov. 22, 1963, Marina was
   living at Ruth's house in Irving, Texas. Lee Oswald, who would eventually be charged with the president's gunshot slaying,
   spent the night before the assassination there at Ruth's home. When Dallas police appeared at the Irving address on that
   fateful Friday afternoon, Marina told them Lee's rifle was in the garage. When they searched, the gun was missing.

   Mallon could've delved deeply into the Paines' background, revealing their family's relationship, for instance, to former CIA Director Allen Dulles, who became one of the primary investigators into the Kennedy assassination.
   When the Paines each testified before the Warren Commission in 1964, Dulles oversaw their questioning. For many years, Michael's New England-based mother and stepfather, Ruth and Arthur Young, had been close friends of Mary Bancroft,Dulles' mistress dating back to his days as an undercover operative in Switzerland during World War II.
   If the public had known in 1964 about the Paine family's ties to Dulles, the Warren Commission may have been exposed for the sham that it was, a tool of FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover and President Lyndon Baines Johnson. Hoover and Johnson both desperately wanted the JFK hit to dissolve swiftly into history, attributed to a "lone nut," Oswald, who in turn was assassinated by another "lone nut," Big D nightclub operator Jack Ruby.
   Mallon is apparently among the shrinking number of Americans who swallow that unlikely scenario, the double-lone nut theory.
   Instead of exploring the Paines' unholy alliance with Dulles in this book, Mallon wallows in Ruth's Quakerism and her worries over her lost friendship with Marina. Instead of examining Michael's classified work at Bell Helicopter or his father's interest in the assassination of Leon Trotsky, he describes the husband's fascination with cabinetry and contradancing. In doing so, Mallon effectively trivializes the JFK murder and expressly taunts conspiracy theorists who insist that the Paines deserve more serious probing. Mallon actually mocks longtime assassination researchers by comparing them to "Trekkies," the cult-like followers of a long-ago canceled TV science fiction show.
   Having endeared himself to Ruth, courting her carefully over years via mail and telephone in order secure her
   permission to interview her at length about the murder of the president, Mallon literally sold out.
   The Westport, Conn. writer boasts a lengthy and impressive resume, having cranked out well-received novels such as "Dewey Defeats Truman." His years of experience fail him here, however, as he relies on his literary talents to dance around issues he should have more fully embraced.
   Specifically, he simply labels such facts as the Dulles connection as mere "coincidence." In making this point, Mallon quotes two people: Ruth's mother, who blames "fate" for her daughter's unusual notoriety, and Norman Mailer, author of "Oswald's Ghost," a mid-90s biography of the alleged assassin.
   In "Oswald's Ghost," Mallon neglects to inform readers of "Mrs. Paine's Garage," Mailer actually asserted that -- given the unlikelihood of the Warren Report's single-bullet theory -- a second gunman may well have stood, completely by chance, firing at JFK from behind the stockade fence on the grassy knoll in front of the presidential limousine while Oswald fired from behind, totally oblivious to the other shooter!
   After reading illogical deductions such as that, you can see why writers such as Mailer and Mallon remain more highly
   admired for their fiction than for their non-fiction.
   To illustrate his insistence that coincidence ruled the Paines' fate, Mallon concludes his book by relating a story
   about Mr. and Mrs., Raymond Entenmann, former Paine pals who happened to help stock JFK's Fort Worth Hotel room with
   artwork on the night of Nov. 21-22, 1963.
   The Entenmanns have nothing to do with the killing of the president, of course, but Mallon seems to be saying that
   since the Paines knew the Entenmanns, it's also logical that they may have known Dulles as well or Dallas FBI agent James Hosty, or that we shouldn't be surprised that Ruth's father worked for a CIA-related development agency in South America or that Michael's father-in-law was an inventor for Bell Helicopter and his father, Lyman Paine, had been a prominent follower of Soviet expatriate Leon Trotsky.
   Although they both gave lengthy testimony before the Warren Commission in 1964, neither of the Paines were called
   before the House Select Committee on Assassinations in 1979 nor before the Assassination Records Review Board in the
   mid-1990s. Now there's a coincidence that bears explaining, because both Ruth and Michael, now in their early 70s, still have
   plenty to answer for. Tyhey sure didn;t tell Mallon anything expept what they WANT people to hear, and he was oh-so-agreeable to participate in that subtle subterfuge.




3. Thomas Mallon has written about Ruth Paine, the woman who found she had harboured one of the most infamous criminals of all time- Lee Harvey Oswald. Whatever you believe about the Kennedy assassination, you'll appreciate Mallon's glimpse at what it was like to be standing right next to one of the most important, disruptive, and tragic events of the twentieth century. Ruth Paine is revealed to be a woman with a very sure sense of who she is and what she stands for, a woman who- almost alone among survivors truly close to the assassination- refuses to be defined by her proximity to what happened that day in Dealey Plaza.

   Mallon's skill at conveying a sense of what the world was like in 1963 is remarkable, and very welcome. In several paragraphs, he details just how un-sophisticated a planet we lived on then; it was a day of hand-typed copies instead of Xeroxes and the 8-cent stamp instead of e-mail. As someone who was around at that time, I've often wished that more authors dealing with this topic would take more care to remind readers that the world was a very different place then. Forgetting that has led many assassination researchers and theorists down many a specious and unproductive pathway. One example (which is not to be found in Mallon's work) is Michael Paine's ownership of a Minox camera. Today's researchers have made the most prodigious hay out of that, never suspecting the truth- the Minox was heavily promoted and sold in the early Sixties as a toy for the well-off (which Mr. Paine was, despite his unassuming lifestyle), advertised in 'National Geographic'. The camera- in the context of its time- was no more meaningful than possession of a laptop is today. Yes, both COULD be used for nefarious purposes, but most owners use their laptops for peaceful, private purposes, and so did most Minox buffs. Mallon's work is always scrupulous in remembering the difference between Now and Then, and it is most refreshing.

   Ruth Paine seems to have given much of herself to Mallon, and therefore to us. She is revealed to have been very pained at several questions and revelations that came up both before and during the interviews for the book, but she seems never to have cut off the author's lines of inquiry, nor even to have directed them, answering frankly. Touchingly, Mallon's research revealed things to Ruth Paine even she had not known about the central event of her life, and her reactions to them are interesting indeed.

   Mallon has not produced a perfect book- there does not seem to have been much direct questioning of Mrs. Paine on some of the topics that assassination researchers raise the most questions about (that Minox, for one), and so the book will give a great deal of unnecessary ammunition to those who feel that Mrs. Paine has something to hide, rather than clearing matters once and for all. And there are a few places where Mallon does not make clear that he's quoting from previously published material, giving rise to the impression that he interviewed people he did not. While a reader familiar with the subject will be able to discern immediately that, say, Robert Oswald did not grant Mallon an interview, the author waits a bit to let the average reader in on that.

   Still, it's a remarkable look at a remarkable witness to history, a woman who has had staggering events roll over her, and like the slender reed she resembles, has sprung back, ready for new life, ready to bend in new directions, respecting the force of the storm, but quietly, serenely confident in her ability to survive it.




4. This book is an example of creative nonfiction as it is written like a novel. The operative word here is "creative". This book is written as the title suggests from Ruth Paine's point of view. Both the author and interview subject have placed much more importance on her relationship with the Oswalds than was really there. Ruth seems to think that she was an integral part of what happened as if she could have stopped Lee. The truth is she had only met them at a party in early 1963 and even though Marina was living with her; Ruth barely knew the couple.

   Mallon makes a lot of assumptions in this book like stating that Oswald went back to the boarding house to pick up the pistol "he used minutes later to kill the patrolman, J. D. Tippet who stopped him near the corner of Tenth and Patton." The gun Oswald had on him at the time of his arrest at the Texas Theater had a defective firing pin so he couldn't have shot anyone with it. Witnesses were goaded into identifying Oswald during the police line-up. I might remind readers that it has never been proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that Lee killed Kennedy or Officer Tippet.

   I must admit that Ruth's obsession with Marina before and after the assassination was VERY INTERESTING and the only part of the book that seemed based on reality.

   If you like historical comedy, this is the book for you!




5. Very good book taking information from the account of the landlord for Marina Oswald at the time of the shooting....I read the whole thing....Interesting addtl info re: Dallas happening.

3 comments about Marina and Lee.

1. Shortly after the assassination of President John Kennedy, Priscilla McMillan contacted Oswald's widow, Marina, and spent considerable time with her. McMillan had interviewed Lee Oswald when he defected to Russia and had the added advantage of knowledge of Russia and Russians. She used this to persuade Marina to give an account of her life with Oswald. To this day, 2000, nobody has given a better account of Marina's view of their relationship. It is very worthwhile reading.



2. "Marina and Lee", by Priscilla Johnson McMillan, is without a doubt the the best book available on the mind and personality of Lee Harvey Oswald, assassin of President John Kennedy.
   
   McMillian's excellent book sheds considerable light on who Lee Oswald was, how he developed into the man he became, how he thought, how he acted, what drove his actions, how he interacted with his wife and others, his ambitions, and ultimately, his final days before he entered the Texas Schoolbook Depository on November 22, 1963. Although McMillian focuses her attention on both Marina and Lee Oswald, (the book is essentially the recollections of Marina Oswald) the reader's attention is of course focused on learning what Lee Oswald was like as a person, and what forces drove him to act as he did. The reader obtains a very sympathetic viewpoint of Marina, which is natural considering the narrative is from Marina's point-of-view. However, the book strives for day-to-day historical accuracy, and the personalities of both Marina and Lee are presented warts and all. I believe it to be an accurate portrayal of both persons.
   
   McMillian, an American writer living in the Soviet Union, interviewed Lee Oswald in the USSR, when he defected there in 1959. She also extensively interviewed Oswald's wife Marina after the assassination. From these in-depth interviews, she is able to piece together the intensely and tragically flawed personality of Lee Oswald, and she ultimately builds to the conclusion that Oswald killed Kennedy on 11-22-63.
   
   Folks, this is a MUST-READ if you have interest in the Kennedy assassination, for it is the only book of its kind that lends intricate insight into the mind of Lee Oswald, helping the reader to understand the depravity of conscious that Oswald possessed. You will be amazed at the depth of insights McMillian provides the reader in regards to Oswald! After reading this book, one can come to understand that Oswald was most capable of politically-movitated killing, and must be the prime candidate for the assassination of President Kennedy.
   
   The book will grab you in the first chapter and hold your interest to the last chapter. I guarantee that after reading it, you will begin to understand how Oswald was capable of shooting President Kennedy, and how his intense drive to "be someone" led to his ultimate act.
   
   Get this book!
   
   Jim "Konedog" Koenig



3. What can you call a woman with a Bryn Mawr education who makes fun of a 10th grade drop out from the south because he, like about half of the other people from his socio-economic background, mispronounces the word "ask" as "axe"...? An arrogant idiot! And one who knowingly and for profit perpetrated an indelible stain on an American tragedy, and further muddied the waters for future researchers.
   
   And unlike contemporary audiences of this unfortunate work, the modern reader now has access to the knowledge that both McMillian and her husband have been exposed as known CIA assets and propagandists.
   
   This book is a good way to waste 6-8 hours of your life that you can never get back, is based on what the writer knew to be bald-faced lies, and is presented in an insultingly smug manner. This book isn't worth the matches it would take to set it on fire.

5 comments about Regicide: The Official Assassination of John F. Kennedy.

1. Regicide provides a good overview of the the facts surrounding the JFK assassination, and offers what it claims to be documentation that the plot originated in the CIA. Regicide relies heavily on a DIA reports which summarizes Soviet intelligence investigation into the assassination, and what it claims to be the original documents of something called OPERATION ZIPPER; the removal of President John F Kennedy. The DIA documentation is believable because, it basically summarizes that physical evidence and provides background information on Oswald and Jack Ruby which is pretty much known fact at this point. As for the OPERATION ZIPPER documents, I suspect they're antoher case of planted disinformation. The facts show that there was a conspiracy to kill JFK, however, I'm yet to see any credible evidence that that the CIA authorized the plot. CIA Director John McCone was Kennedy's appointed man, it doesn't make sense that he'd authorize a plot to kill JFK. Overall, Regicide is a very quick read for background information on the JFK assassination, but far from the final word on the topic.



2. Mr. Douglas purports to be in possession of "secret files" furnished to him by Robert Crowley.
   
   In fact Gregory Douglas never met Robert Crowley.
   
   Robert Crowley regarded Douglas as a harmless eccentric.
   
   I know this to be a fact because I am Robert Crowley's son.
   
   Legal action was considered pointless since Douglas has no assets and a trial would only produce publicity for Douglas's book.



3. Good, but ULTIMATE SACRIFICE the best book ever
   While I thought this book was worthwhile in many respects, ULTIMATE SACRIFICE is simply the best book ever on the JFK assassination.Still, worth your time.
   
   Vince Palamara-JFK/ Secret Service expert (History Channel, author of two books, in over 30 other author's books, etc.)
   Pittsburgh, PA



4. Interesting how the detail of the DIA report confirms data that is already available from various other sources and books. Particularly interesting that the DIA report states that the final, frontal, head-shot bullet was mercury filled so as to explode and fragment. This is exactly what James Files claims in his confession to being the grassy knoll assassin. [...]
   
   Of course, everything depends upon the DIA report being genuine, but there is nothing in this report that stands out as being incorrect.



5. I tried to contact both, but it was fruitless. Like one fellow said, there may may a number of facts here, even those which are accidentally correct.
   
   I'd still like to be able to submit a question to the author or publisher....