Booth

Written by Karen Joy Fowler

Narrated by January LaVoy

Best Book of the Year
Real Simple • AARP • USA Today • NPR • Virginia Living

Longlisted for the 2022 Booker Prize

From the Man Booker finalist and bestselling author of We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves comes an epic and intimate novel about the family behind one of the most infamous figures in American history: John Wilkes Booth.

In 1822, a secret family moves into a secret cabin some thirty miles northeast of Baltimore, to farm, to hide, and to bear ten children over the course of the next sixteen years. Junius Booth—breadwinner, celebrated Shakespearean actor, and master of the house in more ways than one—is at once a mesmerizing talent and a man of terrifying instability. One by one the children arrive, as year by year, the country draws frighteningly closer to the boiling point of secession and civil war.

As the tenor of the world shifts, the Booths emerge from their hidden lives to cement their place as one of the country’s leading theatrical families. But behind the curtains of the many stages they have graced, multiple scandals, family triumphs, and criminal disasters begin to take their toll, and the solemn siblings of John Wilkes Booth are left to reckon with the truth behind the destructively specious promise of an early prophecy.

Booth is a startling portrait of a country in the throes of change and a vivid exploration of the ties that make, and break, a family.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Penguin Audio
• Release date: Mar 8, 2022
• ISBN: 9780593552810

Karen Joy Fowler

KAREN JOY FOWLER is the author of six novels and four short story collections, including We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves and Black Glass. She is the winner of the 2014 PEN/Faulkner Award, a finalist for the Man Booker Prize, and has won numerous Nebula and World Fantasy Awards.

Reviews for Booth

[hardlyhardy · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Villains have families, too. That's not something we often think about. When villains die in movies, it doesn't occur to us that they must have had someone who loved them. And it is much the same way with real-life villains.

This thought led Karen Joy Fowler to write her excellent 2022 novel “Booth” about not John Wilkes Booth but rather his family.

Fowler tells her story through the eyes of various members of the Booth family, but never John Wilkes, the handsome, unpredictable younger brother. It is Edwin, an older son in a family of actors, who becomes the family's central figure. It is he, not Junius or John, who matches their father's greatness on the stage.

It turns out that their father and mother had never actually married. It's a shock to all when his actual wife arrives from England and begins making demands. Then there is his alcoholism, a trait passed down to his elder sons. The daughters — Rosalie, the plain one, and Asia, the beauty — also feature prominently in the novel.

Although the Booths have slaves — set free but still working for the family — their sympathies lie with the North when war breaks out. That is, except for John, who has lived in Richmond, and Joe, an even younger brother, who was notable for being a deserter from both armies.

The assassination of Abraham Lincoln comes as as much of a shock to the Booths as to anyone else, and they all pay the price of notoriety. Edwin's acting career tanks; Junius spends time in prison for the crime of being John's brother.

At times you don't know whether you are reading fiction or history, and this uncertainty seems to be deliberate on Fowler's part. Little is actually known about Rosalie, one of the best drawn characters, and so she is almost entirely fictional. Others left letters or are mentioned more in historical records, and so their stories read more like history. All in all, it makes for an impressive book, not as good as some of Fowler's other novels, yet better than many books written by historians about this tragedy.

[bibleblaster · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A totally captivating family saga that provides, also, a way to engage with U.S. history that I (thought I) already knew. Characters (and revolving viewpoints) were handled beautifully.

[vwinsloe · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I'm not sorry that I read Booth, but I do wish that there had been at least one likeable character. Rosalie was almost likeable, but she was really only pitiable, and, in the end, I really didn't care what happened to any of them. The author writes mundanely about the lives of the members of the Booth family. but kept my interest by dropping emotional and factual bombshells along the way. I did learn things about that historical period, and that also made it worth reading.

[booklover1801 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

In "Booth," Karen Joy Fowler provides her perspective on the family relationships and historical events that helped shape John Wilkes Booth, the infamous assassin who shot Abraham Lincoln in 1865. We learn a great deal about the triumphs and misdeeds of John's volatile father, the actor Junius Booth, and the angst of Junius's long-suffering wife, Mary. Junius was a self-destructive alcoholic and actor, known as much for his enormous ego and unstable personality as for his extraordinary performances on stage. Mary bore Junius ten children, six of whom survived into adulthood. John Wilkes Booth's ignominy crushed his mother's spirit, particularly since she had always gone out of her way to pamper and praise him. John's brother, Edwin, was, like Junius, a renowned thespian who engaged in frequent drinking binges

This engrossing work of historical fiction is fascinating not only for its portrayal of the Booths, but also for its sketches of Lincoln's psychological, moral, and political challenges. Like the Booths, Lincoln endured emotional setbacks and personal tragedies. In addition, he agonized over the loss of thousands upon thousands of soldiers who perished during America's bloody and calamitous Civil War. Readers will be enthralled by Fowler's compelling portrait of the complex, eccentric, and close-knit Booths. Alas, their peace of mind was destroyed by John, whose name lives in infamy until this day. Those closest to John Wilkes Booth would suffer the consequences of his shocking crime for the rest of their lives.

[bookwyrmm_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This expertly-crafted historical fiction novel is not about John Wilkes Booth, but about his siblings, which is a rather unique take.

[maydacat_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This work of historical fiction focuses more on the family of John Wilkes Booth than on the man himself. Junius, the father, was an acclaimed actor, but he was also an alcoholic, mentally unstable, and unpredictable. He raised sons who were also actors, but who also became alcoholics, and had periods of instability. It was this background that formed John Wilkes Booth into the man he would become. It was fascinating to read about his siblings and parents, especially his father, the life they led, and the people they became. Well written with many facts, this fictional account is gripping from the beginning to the end.

[castlelass · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Historical fiction based on the (real) Booth family, set in the US in the mid-19th century. Junius, the patriarch, is an accomplished Shakespearean actor. His wife, Mary, bears ten children. The story focuses on four. Eldest son, Edwin, follows in his father’s footsteps, becoming a famous actor. Both Junius and Edwin suffer from alcohol addictions. Eldest sister, Rosalie, provides the links to the family’s early years, describing siblings who died young. Asia is the second surviving daughter. Abraham Lincoln’s future assassin, John Wilkes Booth, is the youngest. The family ends up divided in political opinion.

I tend to enjoy reading non-fiction history paired with historical fiction about the same topic. In this case, I had previously read several non-fiction accounts of the American Civil War and specifically about Lincoln’s assassination. What these non-fiction books do not provide is a deep dive into the Booth family. This book fills in the gap. The author states she intended to portray a family’s culpability, but honestly, I cannot blame the family. The majority are unionists, but John Wilkes follows his own rebellious path.

It is well-constructed. It is interspersed with snippets from Lincoln’s life, which provide context for the political turmoil leading up to the Civil War. There are no glaring anachronisms, though the author admits that accounts vary widely, and she had to pick and choose what perspectives to include. The author specifically wanted to keep the focus off John Wilkes Booth so as not to glorify someone who committed a horrible crime, and in this, she succeeds, but what is missing is a character who serves as a witness. Rosalie serves this function early in the book but was not present for the climactic scenes. Other than this one issue, I found it to be well-researched historical fiction with a strong sense of time and place.

[adonisguilfoyle · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

So refreshing! A well written and researched character driven novel, which was a pleasure to read (even at nearly 500 pages!) I, like the author and probably most people, knew nothing about the family of John Wilkes Booth, Abraham Lincoln's assassin, and was intrigued to learn that his father and brothers were famous in their own right as actors. Karen Joy Fowler also makes sure that his sisters Rosalie and Asia are included too.

I read a few reviews before starting this mammoth bio-fic (is that a word?) and noted a couple of remarks about the subject of the book. The title Booth refers to the family name, not JWB in particular, and Lincoln only features in brief chapters to establish the historical background. Anyone hoping for a study of the assassin himself - although he does unavoidably feature - or his presidential victim will be disappointed, but I wasn't. Who wants to read about another little man trying to make a name for himself by killing a greater personality? As the author writes, 'This is a man who craved attention and has gotten too much of it; I didn’t think he deserved mine.'

Instead, the focus is on his family, who were naturally destroyed by his actions in 1865. I loved Rosalie, whose representation here is mostly fictional as little is known about her: 'She’s never wanted to be at the center of a story, not even her own, but she likes very much being near the center'. Her sister Asia, far more suited to the limelight and keen to preserve the family's memory in her memoirs, wrote that Rosalie was an 'invalid' but never explained why. Brothers Edwin and June continue the family trade on stage, while never quite matching their father's national acclaim or personal ego, while the mother Mary Ann, who was technically living with another woman's husband for the first twenty years of their family life, claimed to 'love her children more than her [adopted] country' - especially the ever wayward John, who the author suggests was triggered by the death of a friend's father at the Christiana Riot.

Karen Joy Fowler brings to life a period of history and a cast of characters - even Lincoln - that I wasn't overly familiar with, employing a quirky free indirect narrative which is equal parts biography and family saga. I honestly learned so much while growing to love real life 'characters' like Rosalie and her larger than life father, Junius. An amazing read, if slightly overlong!

[laytonwoman3rd · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Fowler has envisioned family life in the Junius Brutus Booth household from the early days of his bigamous marriage to Mary Ann Holmes, through the lives and deaths of his 10 children, including, of course, John Wilkes Booth. Dysfunctional barely begins to describe the madness, compulsions, and passions of this group of actors, alcoholics, and abolitionists, even before John Wilkes's political leanings create a rift among the siblings. The sisters, Rosalie and Asia, are much too fond of their famous brothers, who are much too fond of drink, like their father, who is prone to violence and unreasonable demands. Their mother verges on nervous collapse much of the time, due to multiple pregnancies, a mostly absent (also drunken) husband, and the loss of four children at early ages. Fame and fortune rise and fall, suitors come and go, the family moves back and forth between Baltimore and "the farm", and that inconvenient first wife and son show up, to the utter disbelief of Mary's brood, threatening to consign them all to illegitimacy and the poorhouse. Fowler invented a good deal of this story, of course; almost nothing is known of the eldest daughter, Rosalie, other than her vague unspecified "invalid" state, nor of the youngest son, Joseph, who did not follow his father and older brothers into the theatrical life. Yet a strong foundation of research underlies the narrative, and in fact some portions read more like history than fiction, with references to 20th and 21st century consequences tucked in. The writing was fine; there was no drama or suspense to speak of, and I had very little connection to any of the characters; I certainly did not develop any sympathy for John Wilkes Booth. I think I would much prefer to have read a good narrative non-fiction account of the history of the Booth family. I'm left feeling that the author's efforts and imagination were somewhat wasted on this story.

[maryreinert · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Rather than focusing on John Wilkes Booth, this book is about his family - all actors, fairly prosperous and respected and opposed to slavery. The chapters center around different members of the family - the parents and each child. The story focuses on the affect that the assassination of Lincoln by a family member had on each member.

Well written, interesting.

[vashonjim · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Delightful account of the troubled family that included John Wilkes Booth.

[hccpsk · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

In the author’s note of Booth, Karen Joy Fowler discusses her desire to write a book that did not focus on Lincoln’s murderer, but one that explored the environment that raised him. As a result, readers learn a lot about the famous Booth family, but it all feels very surface level without any deep connections. Although the content was interesting, the tone and feel of the book dragged at times. Readers of historical fiction will still enjoy this novel, but if you are looking for a character analysis of John Wilkes Booth — look elsewhere.

[thewanderingjew_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Booth, Karen Joy Fowler, author; January LaVoy, narrator
John Wilkes Booth was born into a family of pretenders. Although they were also farmers, they made their living, largely by acting. Although, there was a great deal of dysfunction in the family emotionally, morally they were against the practice of slavery. While they had slaves, they paid them a wage and allowed them to purchase their freedom. Perhaps the life of John Wilkes Booth took such a turn for the worse because the lines of morality were often blurred in his lifestyle. Slavery, alcoholism, debauchery, bigamy, and so many more contradictions all figured into his history. His upbringing had to have been somewhat confusing for him. Still, none of the other 9 siblings entertained such murderous thoughts or behavior, as he did. I wondered if perhaps, in the end, he could not tell the difference between what was real and what was not. One of the youngest of the siblings, he was a carefree, precocious child, by all accounts, and there was no way to have predicted the heinous act he eventually carried out. However, some of his pranks, if true, surely did indicate a mind that was not perfectly sound. Perhaps we are all somewhat good and evil.
The author chose to use a sibling that was least known, the spinster sister, Rosalie, to illustrate the story of the family of the murderer of Abraham Lincoln. She describes the grief for the losses the family suffered, the interactions of the siblings, their rivalry, the parents lifestyles, and how what could have been an ordinary, talented man, was instead whipped into a frenzy influenced by the politics of the day, the prejudices of man, and the madness of his own interpretations of life at the time he grew up, the time of the Civil War. Perhaps the moral atmosphere and the divisiveness of the times simply exacerbated the genetic thread of madness and emotional distress that ran through the Booth family, and they all merged together to create the monster that murdered a President who was larger than life and changed our world for the better.
At first, I thought that the author was trying to humanize Booth, to give him a more sympathetic history, but gradually, I was disabused of that idea and realized she was just defining his metamorphosis into a murderer. Fowler does not present Lincoln as a perfect person either, and intimates that his first efforts were not to free the slaves and make them equal, but just to guarantee them certain rights. In addition, he was not wound too tight emotionally either. He was a man driven by the problems of the day and the need to fix them. Politically, the time was right for a man of his stature and beliefs. Fortunately, freedom for slaves was the ultimate outcome of a war that tore the country apart and made us, forever after, question our own motives and feelings about how people are treated.
The author has married fact and fiction to present a picture of the family that John Wilkes Booth was born into, the tragedies and celebrations of the family are given air to breathe and the reader is free to determine which of them they believe and which of them they may doubt as rumor. Obviously, the author has done an enormous amount of research into a subject that moved her deeply, still, she has taken a great deal of poetic license. The story was sometimes repetitive since so many of the sibling’s lives were explored. Also, at times, the story seemed more realistic than at others, but at all times, this story was truly engaging and enlightening. I learned much more about the possible background of the Booth family than I had ever known before. Fowler painted Booth as the monster he turned into, a creature whose mind, in the end, was in an alternate universe of his own making. He was not beloved for his act of horror, as he had hoped he would be.

In conclusion, the book was interesting, but a bit confusing because of the fact that at first, I wasn’t sure which John Wilkes Booth was being portrayed. Apparently, it was a name handed down from generation to generation, and the family’s history was in the theater. Because so many siblings' lives were described, the time line often meandered and the thread became repetitive. However, the author deftly knitted quotes from Shakespeare and others, writings from diaries, some moments of the supernatural with ghostly visitations, and newspaper stories into a very creative book about the Booth family, their relationships, loyalties, politics, rivalries, and love for each other, beginning with the grandparents early in the 1800’s, and continuing to explain the development of the family even after the murder, so that the reader glimpsed into the window of their lives to see how they coped with their traumas. I was surprised that the Booths were able to continue any kind of normal life after the assassination, so great was the effect on the population and so great was the effect on their lives when they and the world discovered that such evil lurked in the mind and body of a brother that was loved so dearly. Although fantasy was blended with reality, much of it seemed very plausible, especially the descriptions of the actual history, the draft riots, the fires in the theaters, life on the farm, the abuse of indigenous people and slaves, and the actual murder and attempted murders.

I would be remiss if I didn’t make a comment about the notes from the author. For me, when Fowler chose to go off script to conflate former President Trump with the heinous behavior of John Wilkes Booth, it was a bridge too far. President Trump was not the cause of any deaths, on the contrary, there were fewer military deaths during his tenure, crime did not rise, the economy hummed. There were no wars during his administration, he did not divide the country, although the media did, did not commit treason, but was falsely accused of crimes he never committed. He did a great deal for the black community, and overall, he improved the lot of minorities and the impoverished. He did not enslave anyone, nor did he promote the prejudice that he has been accused of; that was done by his enemies. It is obvious that the author dislikes him and that is her privilege, but her personal feelings were defined by the politics of our times and a good deal of news about him that unfairly maligned him. Putting the fiction of her own beliefs on the pages of her book, beliefs that were gleaned from many news stories that blended fact and fiction, to support the party she supports, detracted from a book that would otherwise have left a far better impression on me. If January 6th was an insurrection, what were the months and months of riots and destruction called? Absent her own personal, a bit biased politics, the novel was eye opening and well researched.

[novelcommentary · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Though starting off a bit slow, I enjoyed Karen Joy Fowler's exploration into the family with the famous name: Booth. I guess we are always interested in the families of killers and evidently so was Ms. Fowler. She did not, however want to give John Wilkes her attention as much as she wanted to develop a narrative from his siblings. This makes for some nice historical insight into the times as the novel concentrates on Rosalie, the older invalid sister, Edwin, the hugely successful actor, and Asia, the younger sister. The family is plagued by the alcoholic father , who is not only the foremost Shakespearean actor of his time, but also a bigamist who left a wife and son in England when he fell in love with Mary Ann. Junius Booth looms large to his children among whom are four living brothers, three of whom follow him onto the stage. The siblings' narratives, derived from extensive research, show the magnetism of the second youngest of ten children. John Wilkes, like his two brothers, followed in their father's acting footsteps and they all commanded audiences with their presence, playing mostly Shakespearean roles. The story flows chronologically as we see the siblings start to notice a southern sympathy from John, his joining the Know Nothing Party, his frequent spats over the direction that Lincoln was leading the country. We know the outcome here but the author remained more focused on the three family narrators and how the events changed their life as well. I especially enjoyed revisiting historical events like the Harpers Ferry revolution, the New York Riots, and getting a glimpse of the life of free blacks living in Maryland during this climatic time. Though the story may have bogged down at times and though was a bit surprised that the assassination was not more detailed, I enjoyed seeing a family portrait of this most notorious of villains.

Lines
So here she’s been, on the farm, for sixteen years now. For seventeen years, almost without break, she’s been either expecting a baby or nursing one. It will be twenty continuous years before she’s done.

In his speech, he warns of two possible threats to the republic. The first is found in the lawless actions of the mob, the second in the inevitable rise someday of an aspiring dictator. The gravest peril will come if the mob and the dictator unite.

The ten-year gap between Rosalie and Edwin is where all the dead children are.

“Children can snatch happiness from even the darkest times,” Ann said. “That’s God’s gift, that’s how God loves children. You grow up, you can’t do that no more. You don’t have that gift. God’s taken it back.”

Instantly a flame rose from the ashes and, shaping itself into an arm, stretched toward the baby as if to knight him. In that flame, Mother said, she could read the word Country, followed by Johnny’s name. And then the arm fell back and faded away. This strange, unfirelike behavior taking place on their own little hearth has the whole family excited. It may be an ambiguous fate, but it’s clearly a glorious one,

[cariola_6 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Fowler's most recent book has gotten a lot of bad reviews, but I actually quite enjoyed it. My only negative comment is that it could have been considerably less than 450 pages, given some good editing. What Fowler attempts is a fictionalized memoir of the Booth family and its members, famous, infamous, and unknown. The family patriarch, Junius Brutus Booth, was one of the country's most renowned actors in his day. He married an English girl and brought her to the US to settle on a farm in rural Maryland, where she bore ten children in 14 years. During most of that time, her husband was touring, often spending more on booze than he sent back home. The eldest son, Junius Brutus Jr., known as June, was left in charge of managing the farm (a job he hated) and the oldest daughter, Rosalie, left in charge of the household and her younger siblings. Several children died as infants or young children. Four sons (June, Edwin, John Wilkes, and Joe) and two daughters (Rosalie and Asia) lived to adulthood. Rosalie, who had an undefined disability, stayed home to care for her mother for the rest of her life, Asia married an actor friend of Edwin's, and all of the boys except Joe followed in their father's footsteps on the stage.

Fowler attempts to fill in the blanks with both research and imagination. Each family member has her focus in at least one chapter. If they have anything in common, it's that each was affected by the behaviors of their parents: their father's long absences and drunken escapades, the scandal of the legal wife he abandoned arriving to America to stalk him with her son at hand (which of course meant that the American Booths were all illegitimate), numerous legendary episodes (such as digging up the body of a child who he missed saying goodbye to before she died and holding a funeral for a pigeon); their mother's forfeiture of parenting, her obvious favoritism of John, her obedience to the whims of Junius Brutus, her moving the family from home to home to home, depending on their financial fortunes. The novel moves from the teen years of June and Rosalie through the next 20years or so, ending more or less with Lincoln's assassination and the death of John Wilkes Booth. Fowler does include some final chapters that describe the effects on their personal and professional lives in having a sibling who committed one of the most horrendous murders in our nation's history.

Despite some slow stretches and a need for better editing, I enjoyed the novel and it's portrait of a troubled family.

[gpangel_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Booth by Karen Joy Fowler is a 2022 Putnam publication.

I received a few emails about this one from various book sites and publishers, so I decided to give it a try, though I must confess, I’ve never given a great deal of thought to John Wilkes Booth’s family.

The prompt, though, was all about the families of those who commit heinous crimes, which is a subject I have given some thought to in the age of mass shootings.

Unfortunately, this book wasn’t as interesting as I’d hoped. To make sure everyone is on the same page here- the book is not specifically about John. Rather, it is about his family, and though John naturally has a role in the book, he is not the primary focus.

The story gives voice to a handful of John’s siblings – of which there were nine- each with a unique disposition and set of circumstances, but all bound by tragedies, scandal, humiliations, and madness.

With all that going on, John’s antics were not especially troublesome to anyone, until much later, when a few of his siblings did notice him spiraling far away from their belief system- while others excused him or might have even shared some of his political opinions. This is where the question of what the family knew comes into play. What signs did they miss, or ignore- or were they in any way complicit?


The author did a good job with time and place-eerily so, truth be told, which was of more importance to me than anything the Booth family was doing.

The pacing is slow, and often rambling, with many segments being just plain boring. I did become frustrated enough to consider throwing in the towel, but had just enough curiosity to see how the author would build up to the assassination to soldier on- though there was some skimming involved.

In the end, other than the reminder of the undercurrent leading up to the civil war, which so mirrors the undercurrents of today- which probably wasn’t the author’s main goal here- this book is a take it or leave it type story, for me.

It has some interesting moments, sure, but mostly it was a slog.

3 stars

[nancyadair-1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Reacting to the headline of a mass shooting, Karen Joy Fowler wondered about the families of the shooters. Did they struggle under the burden of notoriety? Were they stigmatized, or able to navigate in society? She realized she knew little about the family of the most notorious American shooter–the man who killed President Lincoln, John Wilkes Booth.

As she researched extensively to understand the Booth family, she realized the relevance of this episode in American history, especially after the January 6 insurrection.

In her new novel Booth, Fowler brings to life the nine children and parents of the Booth family, beginning with Junius Brutus Booth, a famous actor. He was also a deeply flawed man, a bigamist and an alcoholic. Junius abandoned his English wife and child when he met the beautiful Mary. He settled their family on a farm, scrambling to survive as their patriarch was on tour most of the year. As the boys came of age, they are tasked with being their father’s guardian and caretaker, endeavoring to keep him sober. The eldest son, June becomes an actor with a career in the West. Edwin had hoped for college but was next tasked with his father’s care; he falls into the same bad habits as his father, going on to forge his own acting career. The youngest son to go into acting is John Wilkes, beloved and handsome but demonstrating disturbing traits since childhood. He had little academic interest, joined a gang, and was swayed by extremist politics.

The eldest daughter Rosalie experienced the death of younger siblings. She was plagued by physical handicaps, a limp and a curved spine, keeping her at home, a perpetual daughter and caretaker. Asia, strong willed and beautiful, settles for a comfortable marriage, but she remains devoted to her brother John Wilkes.

These deeply flawed characters share family trauma of loss and poverty and alcoholism, revering their absent, unreliable father and idolizing their long suffering, beautiful mother. They move from the hard life of the farm to city luxury as the family fortunes rise. The family is apolitical, but Republican, but for John Wilkes who comes to hate abolition and defends slavery.

Interspersed are chapters summarizing President Lincoln’s life, career, and speeches–which today seem prescient, referring to mobs and political division and populist leaders. Baltimore and Maryland’s political strife and division are central to the story. The political division in Maryland mirrors the entire country, then and now.

Fowler’s story is deep and rich. The Booths seem like a family meant for fiction, encompassing such a broad swath of human experience.

I received a free egalley from the publisher through NetGalley. My review is fair and unbiased.