Chasing Lincoln's Killer Author: Visit Amazon's James L. Swanson Page | Language: English | ISBN:
0439903548 | Format: PDF
Chasing Lincoln's Killer Description
From Publishers Weekly
Starred Review. The YA version of Swanson's bestselling
Manhunt, this account of Lincoln's assassination and the 12-day search for his killer reads like a historical thriller, no matter that the narrative jumps among its locations and characters. As President Lincoln delivers victory speeches in April 1865, an enraged John Wilkes Booth vows death: "Now, by God, I'll put him through." Every bit of dialogue is said to come from original sources, adding a chill to the already disturbing conspiracy that Swanson unfolds in detail as Booth persuades friends and sympathizers to join his plot and later, to give him shelter. The author gives even the well-known murder scene at Ford's Theatre enough dramatic flourish to make the subject seem fresh. While Lincoln lays dying, Booth's accomplices clumsily attempt to kill Secretary of State William H. Seward, and Booth talks his way past a guard meant to bar him from crossing a bridge into Maryland. In focusing on Booth, the author reveals the depth of divisions in the nation just after the war, the disorder within the government and the challenges ahead. Abundant period photographs and documents enhance the book's immediacy. Ages 12–up.
(Feb.)Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
From School Library Journal
Starred Review. Grade 5 Up—This volume is an adaptation of Swanson's
Manhunt: The 12-Day Chase for Lincoln's Killer (HarperCollins, 2006). Divided into 14 chapters and an epilogue, the sentences are shorter and chapters are condensed from the original but the rich details and suspense are ever present. Lacking are a bibliography and a notes section. Excellent black-and-white illustrations complement the text. Devoted to the South, John Wilkes Booth had planned to kidnap Lincoln and hold him hostage, but when that plan did not materialize, he hatched his assassination plot. Co-conspirators in Washington, Maryland, and Virginia helped him escape and evade capture for 12 days before being surrounded in a barn and killed. Readers will be engrossed by the almost hour-by-hour search and by the many people who encountered the killer as he tried to escape. It is a tale of intrigue and an engrossing mystery. With the approaching bicentennial of Lincoln's birth, this is a most welcome addition to all libraries.—
Patricia Ann Owens, Wabash Valley College, Mt. Carmel, ILCopyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
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- Age Range: 12 and up
- Grade Level: 7 and up
- Lexile Measure: 980L (What's this?)
- Hardcover: 208 pages
- Publisher: Scholastic Press; 1 edition (February 1, 2009)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0439903548
- ISBN-13: 978-0545204705
- Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.7 x 0.8 inches
- Shipping Weight: 11.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
"The crowd gasped when they saw Lincoln being carried out of the theater. They swarmed and surrounded the president. Leale, the doctors, and soldiers cradling the dying president halted. Where should they take Lincoln? Leale scanned the street for a refuge. Straining his voice to be heard by a sword-bearing officer, he shouted a command. Take the president straight across the street and into the nearest house. A soldier crossed ahead, pounding on the door, demanding entry.
"In view of the horrified mob in the street, Dr. Leale pulled another blood clot from the hole in Lincoln's head to relieve the pressure on the brain and tossed the gooey mass into the street. Fresh blood and brain matter oozed through Leale's fingers.
"When Leale was halfway across the street, soldiers on the other side yelled that the house was locked and no one answered the door. The scene was incredible, impossible! Stranded in the middle of the muddy street with no place to go, the president of the United States was dying in the presence of a mob of hundreds, perhaps a thousand, witnesses."
It was no small feat to bring together a thousand witnesses in those days. It was such a relatively small US population. Imagine if nine out of every ten people around you instantly disappeared. That would give you a good idea of how many people lived in the US at the end of the Civil War. Nevertheless, I still cannot get my mind around how in those days "almost anyone could walk into the Executive Mansion without being searched and request a brief meeting with the president." This, at a time when countless citizens of the defeated Confederacy were actively plotting revenge against Lincoln, horrified by his push for equality for African Americans, and blaming him for the loss of their former way of life.
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