Not quite fact, not quite fiction

I will admit that I had decided not to read this book for two reasons: (1) I tend to ignore books by “celebrity authors” (with name in large type on book jacket) and a “co-author” (with name in much smaller type); and (2) there isn’t much point in reading a history book which is promoted on the jacket by two authors of fiction, albeit writers I really enjoy for works of fiction.

There are, for instance, no citations, even for direct quotes, so I’m not sure that Nelson DeMille’s depiction on the jacket of Bill O’Reilly as a “historian” is really accurate. There are so many statements that make me wonder at the source: (Lincoln) “furls his brow” (Page 3); “his guts churn” (Page 11). Really? The source for this information? My favorite example is on Page 91. Booth “stands alone in a pistol range” to practice his aim. Alone, and yet every detail of his stance is described in full. Also, “the smell of gunpowder mixes with the fragrant pomade of his mustache.” Since he was completely alone at the time, did Booth himself describe somewhere the details of his stance and the fragrance of his mustache?

Perhaps the strangest claim for historical accuracy is the story on Page 5. It is the day (March 4, 1865) of Lincoln’s second inauguration. While there is no doubt that John Wilkes Booth was present (a famous long-range photograph shows the actor on a balcony overlooking the inaugural platform), I cannot find a single corroboration that at this event “Booth lunged at Lincoln.” He was caught and held back by a D.C. police officer, but he was not detained. “Arresting a celebrity like Booth might have caused the policeman problems.” Perhaps in historical writing there is something akin to “poetic license,” and that this “revelation” is an excellent example. It makes a good story, but I don’t think that it is true.

However, if the reader can overlook such questionable statements, this is a popular book. It has been on the Publishers Weekly best-sellers’ list for 19 weeks. Lincoln’s birthday is today.

It is officially classified as nonfiction, but perhaps we need a category between fiction and nonfiction. I recommend “historical fiction which is more-or-less accurate.” The book does tell the story of Lincoln’s assassination, and the subtitle is accurate: “The Shocking Assassination that Changed America Forever.” Historians to this day debate the effects Lincoln’s steady hand might have had on the unfortunate and divisive period of Reconstruction. Alas, we will never know.

I found the afterword and the replication of Harper’s Weekly very interesting and good additions to the text. The notes section gives the reader who wants to dig more deeply into the subject a fine list of optional reading material. Most of the books mentioned here are considered to be first-rate history books by the national “Lincoln community.” In fact, I wonder if it entered O’Reilly’s mind to run the completed manuscript by one of these currently available experts. I believe that by listing these books, the co-authors give “Killing Lincoln” at least a semblance of historical accuracy.

This is an important book because its position on best-seller lists means that people are reading of one of the most significant events in the history of the United States, and I firmly believe that we should know this story. I wish that it were more historically accurate, but that is only because I am firmly entrenched, for better or for worse, in the category of “history geek.” As I mentioned earlier, I believe that the book deserves a special category between fiction and nonfiction: “historical fiction which is more-or-less accurate.”

Sara Vaughn Gabbard is executive director of the Friends of the Lincoln Collection in Indiana, as well as the editor of “Lincoln Lore.” She was the vice president of the Lincoln Museum before it closed and is editor of several books on Lincoln. She wrote this for The Journal Gazette.

Originally posted here:
Not quite fact, not quite fiction