He seemed to be odd and not too bright, and people thought he was not in control. He and his family didn't really fit in well with the existing society. It was not the best place to be a Yankee. The White House was a rat-infested dump with smelly swamps and garbage all around, where people were often sick or died, and inhabited by mostly confederate sympathizers. It was nothing like what I would have thought, had I thought more about it. He really brought this period to life and made it interesting and understandable. This is the first book I've read by Gore Vidal, and now I want to read more. Lincoln is a well-written historical fiction novel by Gore Vidal that shows the 16th President in the middle of a political maelstrom inside a civil war. The focus on Lincoln the man as told from the perspective of those around him is an intriguing premise and Vidal’s prose make it a good read. While Vidal pieces together an excellent narrative and interesting characters, he obviously stretches the historical facts or downright makes stuff up including reversing some character’s real-life opinions, so reader beware.

from faction ridden Republican Cabinet and Congress to the pro-secessionist inhabitants of the capital. Though the many valleys and the peaks of the Union war effort are mentioned, Vidal focuses on the political atmosphere within Washington D.C. Lincoln by Gore Vidal looks at Abraham Lincoln’s time in Washington from his secret arrival in late February to his death a little over four years later not from the titular character’s point-of-view by those around him.Ībraham Lincoln is the central character of this historical fiction novel that only has three paragraphs from his perspective in the whole 655 pages of text as Vidal’s cast of characters either interact with or reaction from afar to the man in the White House. The man who divided a nation, who endured a political divided Cabinet, and lived in a divided house yet somehow got them united in some form or another before his death.

Lincoln a novel by gore vidal