History lesson

I fully admit to not being a history person. It was a subject I avoided as much as I could in high school, and steered completely clear of in college. And when I play Trivial Pursuit, my friends know that the final question for the win to give me should be yellow, since I'll likely get it wrong. (Sure, I'm not good at the Sports questions either, but there's at least a 10% chance there you get something about games or drinking.)

So imagine my surprise at how much I enjoyed and devoured Sarah Vowell's Assassination Vacation.

I picked up the book from QPB, but I think at the time I thought it was fiction or something. It's actually a non-fiction examination of the first three presidential assassinations - Lincoln, Garfield and McKinley. The author travels the country visiting historical sites related to those events.

What's wonderful is Vowell's ability to paint a picture as if the events happened today. You hear all the crazy personalities involved, and how unbelieveable some of the events actually were. Take for example Robert Todd Lincoln, who was a bizarre harbinger of death. He attended the bed of his dying father, then was near Garfield when he was shot, and later found out McKinley had been shot in Buffalo mere moments before Lincoln had stepped off the train in that city!

Vowell's sarcastic style is great fun, but I'll warn my readers that she has a pretty sharp anti-Bush bent, so she won't be everyone's cup of tea.

Fun trivia fact - Vowell (a frequent NPR contributor) provided the voice for Violet, the daughter in The Incredibles. In fact, on the DVD there is a nifty extra where she does a video essay which in part shows her writing Vacation.

A great, quick read - A-!