Product Description
“My brother killed Abraham Lincoln. That is my weight, my shame. While he remained at large, I was held captive in my home. I should have told the soldiers who came with guns drawn and bayonets at the ready this true thing: I might have stopped him, for I harbored him and kept his secrets. I was a pie safe locked tight and guilty as he.” Asia Booth Clarke was twenty-nine years old and pregnant when Union soldiers and Federal detectives stormed her Philadelphia home in search of her assassin-brother. John Wilkes Booth’s older sister had grown up in one of America’s most notoriously troubled but spectacularly acclaimed acting families. “Johnny” and Edwin, her handsome brothers, were the matinee idols of t… More >>
Booth’s Sister
Although the cover of Booth’s Sister by Jane Singer describes this 227 page paperback as “A novel inspired by the true story of John Wilkes Booth’s sister, Asia,” it would be more accurate to describe it as a fantasy with more in common with the pathetic rantings of Ophelia or Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. Booth’s Sister certainly has very little to do with Asia Booth Clarke’s “personal memoirs.” Any “history” in Booth’s Sister has been transformed into a bad dream or an hallucination. Readers seeking true insight into the relationship between Asia and her brother John Wilkes will find John Wilkes Booth: A Sister’s Memoir by Asia Booth Clarke (edited by Dr. Terry Alford) to be a much better source of information. John Wilkes Booth: A Sister’s Memoir Rating: 1 / 5
I downloaded the free copy for the PC Kindle and I was pleasantly surprised. What a wonderful job Jane Singer has done to step the reader back in time to tell the story as if it came from Asia Booth’s own mouth.
An easy and very interesting read.
Congrats Jane Singer… Thank you for a wonderful story. Rating: 5 / 5
I savored Jane Singer’s writing sentence by sentence-the writing has a wonderful rhythm that carries you along through this compelling story of Asia Booth. Treasure this book as I did Rating: 5 / 5
Jane Singer is a published Civil War scholar. Booth’s Sister is her first fiction foray from Bell Bridge Books.
Singer first came upon two photographs of Asia Booth Clark and the story she wrote about her brother, John Wilkes Booth, published in 1938 as The Unlocked Book. Singer felt the need to know more about Asia and has written this fictionalized account exploring Asia Booth’s life.
Nearly everyone (including us Canadians) can tell you who shot Abraham Lincoln and where. Beyond that I didn’t know too much. Booth’s Sister is a fascinating look at the life of the sister who was left to deal with the aftermath of the assassination.
The book opens with the statement:
“My brother killed Abraham Lincoln. That is my weight, my shame.”
From there we travel back to relive their childhood, from Asia’s viewpoint. Raised in rural Maryland with an often absent actor father who insisted that Shakespeare be part of everyday life, the two youngest Booth children embraced the theatre. The freed black woman Gillian seems to have been a much stronger force in her life than their own mother. Inklings of Johnny’s political leanings are hinted at in his childhood.
I found the first part of the book a little confusing. Singer has taken great literary license in imagining their days. Asia seems to want to be her brother. Lots of Shakespearean quotes and references let us know how great a role the theatre plays in their lives. But I sometimes had to read pages two and three times to understand what was real and what was imagined.
The second half of the book, their adult life, captured me more. It seemed more grounded and readable. Asia still longs to be a man and particiapate in the theatre. Her brothers are celebrated actors and she longs to be on the stage with them. Instead she enters a loveless marriage, but continues to help her brother with his plans to bring down Lincoln’s government. ‘Johnny’ commits his crime and Asia’s life is forever changed.
There are two monologues- ” Voices From the Time of the Assassination” at the end of the book that I found to be excellent. I enjoyed them almost as much as the book. I love the idea of fictionalizing history and Singer has done an admirable job of bringing to life a lesser known figure from the past Rating: 3 / 5
It is not often that I can not find a single good thing to say about a book but this is one of those occasions.
This book is not even worth it at the free price tag.
If I wanted to read Shakespeare, I would read Shakespeare. The author has filled up many pages of Shakespeare’s writing in an effort to create enough pages to call it a book.
There is a great story to tell about Asia Booth but this was not the way to tell it. I realize this is a fiction but the story could have been made into an interesting and captivating tale. This author did nothing to create an interesting story but instead meandered about in a maddening insane way.
This is quite possibly the worst book I have ever attempted to read, it even ranks below Toni Morrison’s “Beloved”
I would not recommend this book to anyone. Rating: 1 / 5