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bookswritingandmore's review against another edition
3.0
If you've ever wanted to be inside Abraham Lincoln's head, this is the book for you!
I've always been a bit intrigued with President Lincoln and the life he lived on his way to the White House. This book is expertly written by Jerome Charyn. You can immediately tell that a lot of work and dedication went into each and every detail shown in this historical novel. It is a first person account told by Mr. Lincoln himself. Never before have I read such a well put together history of the life of Abraham Lincoln.
Rather than just reciting a series of dry facts, the story comes alive through the story written in the first person narrator, Abraham himself. The book covers the period from Lincoln's life starting out as a young man to the end of his life. The opening scene takes us back to that faithful night that Mr. Lincoln lost his life at the theatre and then effortlessly takes us back to when Lincoln was a young man just scraping by.
Abraham had nothing with which to make his way except his own willingness to work and scrap by. He fought as a young man to get an education, which was nearly impossible since his father wanted the exact opposite for him. He makes his living however he can with various occupations moving towards the occupation of being a lawyer and a circuit judge. His poverty means that he is not accepted in the higher circles of society and that suits him just fine, as he is uncomfortable around such people and their lives. He goes to parties and dinners occasionally, and meets Mary Todd. Against the objections of her family, he woos and wins her; their marriage blessed with four sons.
As he moves into politics, Lincoln finds himself fighting and arguing for his passion of freeing the slaves. From the beginning, he is quite good at rallying a crowd to agree with him. He rails against slavery leading to the creation of the Republican party. When he is elected President it is not a popular move with the Southern states who promptly succeed, leaving Lincoln to start his Presidency with the biggest, most divisive war in the country's history.
This entire book is such a great account of President Lincoln and his rise to the presidency. It has rich history, vivid scenes, and even shares with us some little known facts about the women and friends Lincoln comes across in his travels to becoming America's president.
Jerome Charyn's "I Am Abraham" is a bittersweet tale that seems to gives us a unique look into Abraham Lincoln's life. We get to see a thought-provoking and melancholic side of a man who did everything possible to bring the United States and its people together in so many ways. Abraham Lincoln fought for so much, and achieved such greatness, that he's remembered for his goodness. Yes, he had his demons, and there were times when he thought he couldn't go on, but he persevered. He did his best to fulfill every one of his duties and then some.
The perfect book for anyone who is looking for an intimate account of President Lincoln's early years and how he got his start.
I've always been a bit intrigued with President Lincoln and the life he lived on his way to the White House. This book is expertly written by Jerome Charyn. You can immediately tell that a lot of work and dedication went into each and every detail shown in this historical novel. It is a first person account told by Mr. Lincoln himself. Never before have I read such a well put together history of the life of Abraham Lincoln.
Rather than just reciting a series of dry facts, the story comes alive through the story written in the first person narrator, Abraham himself. The book covers the period from Lincoln's life starting out as a young man to the end of his life. The opening scene takes us back to that faithful night that Mr. Lincoln lost his life at the theatre and then effortlessly takes us back to when Lincoln was a young man just scraping by.
Abraham had nothing with which to make his way except his own willingness to work and scrap by. He fought as a young man to get an education, which was nearly impossible since his father wanted the exact opposite for him. He makes his living however he can with various occupations moving towards the occupation of being a lawyer and a circuit judge. His poverty means that he is not accepted in the higher circles of society and that suits him just fine, as he is uncomfortable around such people and their lives. He goes to parties and dinners occasionally, and meets Mary Todd. Against the objections of her family, he woos and wins her; their marriage blessed with four sons.
As he moves into politics, Lincoln finds himself fighting and arguing for his passion of freeing the slaves. From the beginning, he is quite good at rallying a crowd to agree with him. He rails against slavery leading to the creation of the Republican party. When he is elected President it is not a popular move with the Southern states who promptly succeed, leaving Lincoln to start his Presidency with the biggest, most divisive war in the country's history.
This entire book is such a great account of President Lincoln and his rise to the presidency. It has rich history, vivid scenes, and even shares with us some little known facts about the women and friends Lincoln comes across in his travels to becoming America's president.
Jerome Charyn's "I Am Abraham" is a bittersweet tale that seems to gives us a unique look into Abraham Lincoln's life. We get to see a thought-provoking and melancholic side of a man who did everything possible to bring the United States and its people together in so many ways. Abraham Lincoln fought for so much, and achieved such greatness, that he's remembered for his goodness. Yes, he had his demons, and there were times when he thought he couldn't go on, but he persevered. He did his best to fulfill every one of his duties and then some.
The perfect book for anyone who is looking for an intimate account of President Lincoln's early years and how he got his start.
michaeljmccann's review against another edition
5.0
In I Am Abraham, Jerome Charyn undertakes the formidable task of presenting the life of Abraham Lincoln, as seen through his letters, speeches, and other historical sources. As Charyn indicates in his Author's Note, the novel is not a biography, but a work of historical fiction: the author has reconstructed major events and players in Lincoln's life, with the poetic licence to add fictional characters when needed. The book as a whole has the feel of a picaresque novel with its expansive cast of characters as it explores Lincoln's journey through life to its inexorably tragic end. Charyn succeeds in creating a first-person narrative that feels honest and intimate.
Charyn does a masterful job in presenting the complexities of Lincoln's character. He is a dark horse candidate for the Republican nomination who wins the convention and attains the presidency. Lincoln becomes president at a time when several southern states have formed the Confederacy, and in the ensuing civil war he must come to terms with the fact that he is sending young men by the thousands to die. He must also cope with his melancholia, the 'blue unholies” that plague him throughout his life, at times incapacitating him, as well as the increasingly erratic behavior of his wife after the death of their son Willie. He is the president of a nation divided by war, but he is also a compassionate family man, often seen carrying his young son Tad on his shoulders, and a husband who must face the prospect of placing his wife in an insane asylum. (Mary in fact spent four months in an asylum following the assassination of her husband before being consigned to the care of her sister Elizabeth.)
Historians, for the most part, have not been kind to Mary Todd Lincoln, but Charyn recognizes the complexity of her character. She is ridiculed by the press for her plainness, but excoriated when she spends money to improve her wardrobe and to refurbish the White House, which has essentially gone to ruin under Buchanan. She recognizes that her husband is regarded as incompetent by many of the men who surround him, including General McLellan, who commands the loyalty of the Union troops, but her support for her husband remains steadfast. She is surrounded by flatterers and charlatans, and often succumbs to their influence. And because she has no real role in politics, she smothers her oldest son Robert, forcing him into a profession in which he has no interest. She is a woman born in the wrong century: better educated and more intelligent than many of the men who surround her (as Charyn comments in his Author's Note), but relegated to the background because she is female. She is also representative of the deep divisions and contradictions of the times: Mary Todd is from a wealthy family of slave-owners in Kentucky, yet her closest confidante is a former slave. Mrs. Keckley becomes her constant companion, as well as her dressmaker. Mary must also deal with the fact that many of her relatives in Kentucky have joined the Confederate army.
It is important to note that the subtitle of I Am Abraham is “A Novel of Lincoln and the Civil War”. More than 600,000 soldiers were killed in the American Civil War, and these deaths represented ten percent of northern males aged 20-45 and thirty percent of southern males aged 18-40. The symbolism of the novel readily underlines the horrors of the war: the ditches filled with amputated limbs (one in thirteen veterans suffered amputations); the sounds of the Friday firing squads killing Union deserters (many of whom Lincoln would have preferred to pardon); the starved Confederate soldiers outfitted with cardboard shoes in winter; and the carnage of the battlefields littered by bodies and dead horses. As Lincoln and Tad tour the ruins of Richmond, which has been burned almost to the ground by fires set by the retreating Confederate army, Lincoln recognizes that there are no real winners in this battle. He looks ahead to the Reconstruction that he hopes will mend the country's wounds, but sadly it will be a Reconstruction he will not live to undertake.
I Am Abraham will appeal to lovers of historical fiction and of the oral storytelling tradition at which Lincoln himself excelled.
It is an exuberant novel that speaks equally of life and death, hope and sorrow.
Charyn does a masterful job in presenting the complexities of Lincoln's character. He is a dark horse candidate for the Republican nomination who wins the convention and attains the presidency. Lincoln becomes president at a time when several southern states have formed the Confederacy, and in the ensuing civil war he must come to terms with the fact that he is sending young men by the thousands to die. He must also cope with his melancholia, the 'blue unholies” that plague him throughout his life, at times incapacitating him, as well as the increasingly erratic behavior of his wife after the death of their son Willie. He is the president of a nation divided by war, but he is also a compassionate family man, often seen carrying his young son Tad on his shoulders, and a husband who must face the prospect of placing his wife in an insane asylum. (Mary in fact spent four months in an asylum following the assassination of her husband before being consigned to the care of her sister Elizabeth.)
Historians, for the most part, have not been kind to Mary Todd Lincoln, but Charyn recognizes the complexity of her character. She is ridiculed by the press for her plainness, but excoriated when she spends money to improve her wardrobe and to refurbish the White House, which has essentially gone to ruin under Buchanan. She recognizes that her husband is regarded as incompetent by many of the men who surround him, including General McLellan, who commands the loyalty of the Union troops, but her support for her husband remains steadfast. She is surrounded by flatterers and charlatans, and often succumbs to their influence. And because she has no real role in politics, she smothers her oldest son Robert, forcing him into a profession in which he has no interest. She is a woman born in the wrong century: better educated and more intelligent than many of the men who surround her (as Charyn comments in his Author's Note), but relegated to the background because she is female. She is also representative of the deep divisions and contradictions of the times: Mary Todd is from a wealthy family of slave-owners in Kentucky, yet her closest confidante is a former slave. Mrs. Keckley becomes her constant companion, as well as her dressmaker. Mary must also deal with the fact that many of her relatives in Kentucky have joined the Confederate army.
It is important to note that the subtitle of I Am Abraham is “A Novel of Lincoln and the Civil War”. More than 600,000 soldiers were killed in the American Civil War, and these deaths represented ten percent of northern males aged 20-45 and thirty percent of southern males aged 18-40. The symbolism of the novel readily underlines the horrors of the war: the ditches filled with amputated limbs (one in thirteen veterans suffered amputations); the sounds of the Friday firing squads killing Union deserters (many of whom Lincoln would have preferred to pardon); the starved Confederate soldiers outfitted with cardboard shoes in winter; and the carnage of the battlefields littered by bodies and dead horses. As Lincoln and Tad tour the ruins of Richmond, which has been burned almost to the ground by fires set by the retreating Confederate army, Lincoln recognizes that there are no real winners in this battle. He looks ahead to the Reconstruction that he hopes will mend the country's wounds, but sadly it will be a Reconstruction he will not live to undertake.
I Am Abraham will appeal to lovers of historical fiction and of the oral storytelling tradition at which Lincoln himself excelled.
It is an exuberant novel that speaks equally of life and death, hope and sorrow.
truebookaddict's review against another edition
5.0
Jerome Charyn can always be counted on to put forth an interesting and entertaining work of historical fiction. Like its predecessors, The Secret Life of Emily Dickinson and Johnny One-Eye, Charyn takes a novel told in first person to a whole new level. His first person point of view makes the reader feel as if they are the character...seeing and experiencing everything vicariously.
Abraham Lincoln is a historical figure that I have always greatly admired. In I Am Abraham, the man comes to life. He is not just the illusive and enigmatic figure of history, but a real, flesh-and-blood man with the same fears, worries and loves as other human beings. His stoic nature is ever present and yet he speaks with a sense of irony, seeing situations with an eye for the comedy amidst the ordinary and even tragic.
I am a fan of Jerome Charyn and always look forward to his latest work. His is a unique and important voice in the historical fiction genre. If you have not read his books, you're missing out. I Am Abraham would be a good one with which to start.
Abraham Lincoln is a historical figure that I have always greatly admired. In I Am Abraham, the man comes to life. He is not just the illusive and enigmatic figure of history, but a real, flesh-and-blood man with the same fears, worries and loves as other human beings. His stoic nature is ever present and yet he speaks with a sense of irony, seeing situations with an eye for the comedy amidst the ordinary and even tragic.
I am a fan of Jerome Charyn and always look forward to his latest work. His is a unique and important voice in the historical fiction genre. If you have not read his books, you're missing out. I Am Abraham would be a good one with which to start.
firstimpressionsreviews's review against another edition
4.0
Fond Of
You can't exactly say I am Abraham was filled with twists and turns as Lincoln's story is very well known but the way it was told was interesting. Told in small vignettes that wove seamlessly together.
The novel didn't drag with reminisces from his childhood rather moving to his old years and didn't linger too long on each point. Hitting the major developments at an enjoyable pace.
There was also a focus on his family life and liked the personal touch it added instead solely focusing on the Gettysburg Address.
Not Fond Of
On the same token, as much as I liked reading of the Lincoln family, at times I felt that too large a focus was given to Mary Todd Lincoln and her illness, almost feeling as if the novel were about her instead of Honest Abe.
Final Thoughts
The novel's ending felt cut short which was a bit frustrating but then again so was Abraham Lincoln's life so it felt like an adequate conclusion, all things considering. Overall,with fluid, eloquent storytelling, Jerome Charyn's novel met my anticipation and then some.
You can't exactly say I am Abraham was filled with twists and turns as Lincoln's story is very well known but the way it was told was interesting. Told in small vignettes that wove seamlessly together.
The novel didn't drag with reminisces from his childhood rather moving to his old years and didn't linger too long on each point. Hitting the major developments at an enjoyable pace.
There was also a focus on his family life and liked the personal touch it added instead solely focusing on the Gettysburg Address.
Not Fond Of
On the same token, as much as I liked reading of the Lincoln family, at times I felt that too large a focus was given to Mary Todd Lincoln and her illness, almost feeling as if the novel were about her instead of Honest Abe.
Final Thoughts
The novel's ending felt cut short which was a bit frustrating but then again so was Abraham Lincoln's life so it felt like an adequate conclusion, all things considering. Overall,with fluid, eloquent storytelling, Jerome Charyn's novel met my anticipation and then some.
truebookaddict's review against another edition
5.0
Jerome Charyn can always be counted on to put forth an interesting and entertaining work of historical fiction. Like its predecessors, The Secret Life of Emily Dickinson and Johnny One-Eye, Charyn takes a novel told in first person to a whole new level. His first person point of view makes the reader feel as if they are the character...seeing and experiencing everything vicariously.
Abraham Lincoln is a historical figure that I have always greatly admired. In I Am Abraham, the man comes to life. He is not just the illusive and enigmatic figure of history, but a real, flesh-and-blood man with the same fears, worries and loves as other human beings. His stoic nature is ever present and yet he speaks with a sense of irony, seeing situations with an eye for the comedy amidst the ordinary and even tragic.
I am a fan of Jerome Charyn and always look forward to his latest work. His is a unique and important voice in the historical fiction genre. If you have not read his books, you're missing out. I Am Abraham would be a good one with which to start.
Abraham Lincoln is a historical figure that I have always greatly admired. In I Am Abraham, the man comes to life. He is not just the illusive and enigmatic figure of history, but a real, flesh-and-blood man with the same fears, worries and loves as other human beings. His stoic nature is ever present and yet he speaks with a sense of irony, seeing situations with an eye for the comedy amidst the ordinary and even tragic.
I am a fan of Jerome Charyn and always look forward to his latest work. His is a unique and important voice in the historical fiction genre. If you have not read his books, you're missing out. I Am Abraham would be a good one with which to start.
komet2020's review against another edition
5.0
Rare is it for any reader to chance upon a novel that succeeds beyond expectation in eliciting his/her excitement and capturing his/her interest with the first sentence or paragraph. Well, 'I am Abraham' is such a novel, richly told and largely spoken in Lincoln's own voice.
Lincoln goes on to take the reader back to his humble beginnings in New Salem (Illinois), where he arrived penniless and poor, yet hungry to improve his lot in life. In all, he spends 5 years there, going from serving as a store clerk, postmaster, ferrying flatboats downriver to New Orleans and back, service as a captain in the local militia during the brief Black Hawk War, and work as a railsplitter. Lincoln then moves to Springfield, where he apprentices himself to the law, serves in the local legislature, marries and has a family, serves one term in Congress, maintains a private law practice with his friend William Herndon, and keeps a hand in politics. Though losing the 1858 Senate race in Illinois to Stephen Douglas, Lincoln becomes famous as a result of the 7 debates he had with Douglas. Two years later, he is invited to New York City, where he makes a speech at Cooper Union that leads to him becoming a candidate for President for the new Republican Party, and through a close election, President of the United States. All the while, Lincoln's voice comes alive, so much so that the reader feels very much a part of Lincoln's world in matters great and small.
"I Am Abraham" has all the hallmarks of what makes a novel great. (Next to Gore Vidal's novel "[b:Lincoln|8716|Lincoln|Gore Vidal|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1403185993s/8716.jpg|658163]", it makes Abraham Lincoln live again.) It's also one of the BEST novels I've read thus far in 2015 and for that reason, comes HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.
Lincoln goes on to take the reader back to his humble beginnings in New Salem (Illinois), where he arrived penniless and poor, yet hungry to improve his lot in life. In all, he spends 5 years there, going from serving as a store clerk, postmaster, ferrying flatboats downriver to New Orleans and back, service as a captain in the local militia during the brief Black Hawk War, and work as a railsplitter. Lincoln then moves to Springfield, where he apprentices himself to the law, serves in the local legislature, marries and has a family, serves one term in Congress, maintains a private law practice with his friend William Herndon, and keeps a hand in politics. Though losing the 1858 Senate race in Illinois to Stephen Douglas, Lincoln becomes famous as a result of the 7 debates he had with Douglas. Two years later, he is invited to New York City, where he makes a speech at Cooper Union that leads to him becoming a candidate for President for the new Republican Party, and through a close election, President of the United States. All the while, Lincoln's voice comes alive, so much so that the reader feels very much a part of Lincoln's world in matters great and small.
"I Am Abraham" has all the hallmarks of what makes a novel great. (Next to Gore Vidal's novel "[b:Lincoln|8716|Lincoln|Gore Vidal|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1403185993s/8716.jpg|658163]", it makes Abraham Lincoln live again.) It's also one of the BEST novels I've read thus far in 2015 and for that reason, comes HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.
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