"Booth's Daughter" by Raymond Wemmlinger

I was attracted to the book by the title: ‘Booth’s Daughter’.  What would the daughter of John Wilkes Booth have to say on the subject of the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln.   Did John Wilkes Booth even have a daughter?  Not that I was aware of.  Being not about the daughter of the infamous Booth, but rather his niece, Edwina, the daughter of his elder brother, Edwin, the topic is rarely mentioned.  The Booth family refers to it merely as ‘The Incident’, abandoning it to the past.

Yet there is no leaving tragedy fully behind that is never fully brought out into the light.  Wemmlinger infers this reality by showing Edwina, one’s guide through 1880s New England, that tragedy follows all shows of greatness.  One example after the next enters her life of how both affect all people.  That juxtaposition of the two even affects her father, the great tragedian actor of his day.  ‘The Incident’, she surmises, infused him with the lament of personal pain to draw upon in all his performances.

Even moreso, Wemmlinger draws upon the tragedies of historical figures from that time, inferring the difficulty of having 'greatness' thrust upon oneself, how it is a arduous burden to bear.

While this is a fictionalized version of events, it does succeed in telling the after-affects of a pivotal historical event and parallels it with the general theme of 'greatness' often being a burden too great to bear.  I recommend this highly to anyone.  It is a book I would add to my own collection to read again throughout the years to come.

“There is even a subtle inference to Edwin’s superior acting talent as being the impetus to John Wilkes’ act – an effort to upstage his brother.  This is never explicitly declared.  It is Wemmlinger’s superb writing of the story to plant the possibility in a reader’s mind.  It is one mere nugget of treasure to cull from this wonderful story a century past in our past.