Mr. Leebaert, a tech exec and freelance writer on politics and history, takes a granular but propulsive approach to their story. He’s a dependable guide through bureaucratic and diplomatic thickets, and few of his subjects’ maneuverings seem to have escaped his notice ... e’s interested in questions of leadership, especially during the war years—he’s written extensively about foreign policy—so his tale naturally gravitates toward the levers of national power and the officials angling to grasp them. Most appealingly, he offers persistent but unobtrusive parallels to our own disordered moment: reminders that we are still bedeviled by many of the same problems ... He doesn’t ignore his subjects’ private lives, although he doesn’t dwell on them either ... Mr. Leebaert’s touch here is light, even tentative, as if he’s reluctant to go poking around in the trash or let his attention drift from the realm of officialdom, and the book is disappointingly less vivacious as a result.
Leebaert illuminates the dynamics of FDR’s consequential administration by focusing on four of his lieutenants ... Leebaert sheds new light on FDR’s managerial capabilities and ably demonstrates that the cultivation of diversified and resilient talent was essential to the administration’s endurance.
This well-researched, absorbing narrative reveals what it was like during the FDR administration from four unique perspectives. Unlikely Heroes should be of interest to a wide range of history and biography readers.
A deep examination ... Leebaert is good at adducing current themes in past history, including regional divisions, racism, inequality, trickle-down economics, and a politicized and obstructionist Supreme Court ... A nuanced study.
Laudatory ... Though the prose occasionally plods, Leebaert thoroughly mines diaries, letters, and oral histories to deliver a fine-grained study of the ties that bound this consequential administration. It’s an enlightening investigation into the alchemy of successful governance.
