Booth

By: Karen Joy Fowler

Narrated by: January LaVoy

Length: 13 hrs and 44 mins

Publisher's summary

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.

©2022 Karen Joy Fowler (P)2022 Penguin Audio

Critic reviews

Most Anticipated Books 2022
Kirkus Reviews • Entertainment Weekly • Virginia Living • Veranda • The Millions • Medium • CNN

One of New York Post’s Best Books of the Month

"Gripping novel….Booth is historical fiction, but it’s impossible to ignore the resonance with present-day America." —NPR

"[Fowler] demonstrates how family tragedies ripple out from the source, causing trauma on an exponential scale. It’s hard to read her story of the Booth family and not think of those whose lives have been upended by senseless acts of personal or political violence….To know Booth, to fully reckon with who he was and to grapple with why he did what he did, is to have a window on the modern United States.” —Los Angeles Review of Books

"Fowler’s riveting saga explores these strains of familial devotion and sorrow connecting the colorful Booth brothers and sisters." –Washington Post

Incredible. Absolutely incredible.

If you condemn the sinner as simply insane you do yourself an injustice. You allow yourself the belief that devastating tragedy happened because of a momentary imbalance or mental illness. But the truth is so much more complex and can’t be portrayed in a headline on social media. Karen Joy Fowler’s BOOTH shows us the life and times of the booth family. It is a time that eerily resembles our own and if it doesn’t scare you how easily one domino hits the next, hits the next, hits the next until the world is changed forever, then I’m unsure if we’ll be able to stop the next, and the next, and the next great tragedy. If we don’t make an effort to communicate (listening as well as speaking) with those we vehemently disagree with, we will one day again realize we missed our chance to stop a tragedy.

Fascinating

Tells the story about how the family was affected by Lincoln’s assassination and in addition just tells the story of the family entirely. Really good book

Excellent!

Loved the story and narration! Very interesting way to relate this fascinating history. Going to find more from this author.

To think . . .

Every member of the Booth family didn't have the same beliefs as John Wilkes??? I don't think I entirely believe that. From this story I can definitely believe that Edwin was staunchly opposed and I think Rosalie was too sweet to think ill of anyone unless they'd wronged her or her family . . . The rest of them? Junius Jr may have been indifferent, but Asia, definitely complicit as John was her favorite brother and she adored and looked up to him. This was sad, because you feel for the family, but clearly John Wilkes has always been a menace.

4 stars

Not what I was hoping for

Lots of history in this novel but got kind of boring at times. I was hoping for more. I’ll give it a 3.5 total!!!

Rambling

I don't even recall hearing thr Booth name until late in this rambling story. So much of the farm life of this family with kids being born and dying young, of slaves and absent father then suddenly translated to the city where their story continues. There is a sudden, passing, refrance to a depressive Lincoln and then we are back with this family and o and on and on! There is an oblique, passing, reference to Wilkes; not John Wilkes, but it's just a flash in the pan, as other characters take center stage. While the character's are interesting.,and well developed one has to wonder what they are being developed for or why the Wikes character isn't being developed? He is,after all, a principle character in this story.

I could not maintain an interest in this rambling story that does not appeR to be coming together any time soon.

Outstanding

This book was well written and engaging. I enjoyed it immensely. It is a fascinating look at not only John Wilkes Booth but about his family and the lives of them all that certainly were influential in the man that Mr Booth became. A must read.

Engaging

Well written and well read - recommend to history lovers. I didn’t want it to end.

Powerful

I thought this was an excellent book although I had to keep reminding myself that it was not a John Wilkes Booth book, Rather it was about the family and how he fit there. I would definitely recommend it!

Engrossing listen

Wonderful historical read about all the lesser known Booths and perfectly performed - completely immersive story.