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Recent Reviews
Julia Sweig
Positive The Washington Post The detail can be eye-glazing ... But Sweig finds in the tapes \'golden nuggets\' of insight about the Johnsons, their marriage and \'the ambitions animating the presidency they together crafted\' ... The book is less forthcoming about the romantic partnership between Lady Bird and Lyndon than it is about their political partnership. What was their marriage like? Pet names for each other? Private jokes? He was known for sexual infidelities. Did they wound? We must assume so, but the author, like her subject, does not choose to spend time on this. You would think that 123 hours of audio diary recordings would dish up at least a little dirt ... Do we need a fat tome on this former first lady? To my surprise, my answer is yes. Sweig makes a persuasive case for Lady Bird’s influence not just within her marriage but on her husband’s career. In doing so, she forces us to adjust the lens through which we’ve viewed one of our most consequential presidencies. She also forces us to take a hard look at this country — at the state of our cities, the state of our environment, and the fights for civil rights and women’s rights — and to see both how far we’ve come and how very far we have to go.
Lynne Olson
Positive The Washington Post \"Madame Fourcade’s Secret War” manages in spots to be a little dull. The writing is clear, detailed and reminiscent of your high school history textbook. As the names and places and dates whizzed past, I was left hungry for a more fully dimensional, complex portrait of the woman behind the tough-cookie persona. It is possible to devote 400 pages to someone and still leave their character feeling underdeveloped ... None of which is to devalue the broader contributions of the author or her subject ... Brava to Lynne Olson for a biography that should challenge any outdated assumptions about who deserves to be called a hero.\
Michael Isikoff, David Corn
Positive The Washington Post Russian Roulette is an engaging, smart but ultimately unsatisfying read ... It’s a challenge familiar to all writers of contemporary history and current affairs: How to construct a narrative that won’t be quickly dated and overtaken by events? How to weave a story, when you don’t know how it ends?
Ben Macintyre
Rave The Washington Post ...what details Macintyre has gleaned from these dusty diaries and photographs! Even minor characters bristle with life ... This is a book about war, and some chapters make for uneasy reading ... Macintyre has produced yet another wonderful book.
Peter Bergen
Positive The Washington Post United States of Jihad sketches succinct cameos of the Americans who have embraced militant Islam ... The stories are grim, and of course — we know how they end. Still, Bergen pulls you in with snappy, conversational writing.