A Treasury of Great American Scandals: Tantalizing True Tales of Historic Misbehavior by the Founding Fathers and Others Who Let Freedom Swing

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Binding: Paperback Dewey Decimal Number: 973.099 EAN: 9780142001929 ISBN: 0142001929 Label: Penguin (Non-Classics) Manufacturer: Penguin (Non-Classics) Number Of Items: 1 Number Of Pages: 336 Publication Date: 2003-07-01 Publisher: Penguin (Non-Classics) Release Date: 2003-07-01 Studio: Penguin (Non-Classics)
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Editorial Reviews: Following on the heels of his national bestseller A Treasury of Royal Scandals, Michael Farquhar turns his attention to matters a little closer to home with A Treasury of Great American Scandals. From the unhappy family relationships of prominent Americans to the feuds, smear campaigns, duels, and infamous sex scandals that have punctuated our history, we see our founding fathers and other American heroes in the course of their all-too-human events. Ineffectual presidents, lazy generals, traitors; treacherous fathers, nagging mothers, ungrateful children, embarrassing siblings; and stories about insanity, death, and disturbing postmortems are all here, as are disagreeable marriages, vile habits, and, of course, sex: good sex, bad sex, and good-bad sex too. We can take comfort in the fact that we are no worse and no better than our forebears. But we do have better media coverage. Bonus educational material: * A brief history of the United States, including scandals! * The American Hall of Shame! * A complete listing of presidential administrations!
Spotlight customer reviews: Customer Rating: Summary: An Epigrammatic Endorsement Comment: This enjoyable book is a quick read, so here's my quick take on it: Reading the pithy, juicy anecdotes that Michael Fraquhar provides prompted me to read further about the characters and events portrayed herein. Yep, I learned MORE history than is contained between this book's covers! Nice work, Mr. Farquhar. Customer Rating: Summary: AMERICA'S DIRTY LAUNDRY! Comment: This book was hysterical. It exposed some of our most revered historical heros as the plain, living men they really were. Not perfect, but just like us. Only sometimes they liked to duel with each other to death. I don't think that would fly today. Now I want to read his book on Royal scandals! Customer Rating: Summary: Interesting and informative. Comment: For everyone who's a history fan but doesn't necessarily like long and dry historical accounts, check this book out. It offers bits of history with lots of detail (and some wit) but not in a long format. And there's a large variety of people that are covered: politicians, explorers, presidents, lovers of politicians, and so on. I have all the books by Mr. Farquhar and enjoy reading them again and again. Something to read at the beach, on the subway, at any lull in one's day. It'll add to your knowledge of American history. Fun. Customer Rating: Summary: A great read for short attention spans Comment: Some of the scandals in the book aren't exactly scandals by today's standards or are so well known we regard them as hardly shocking. And indeed, some stories we already knew. But the lay out of the book is in such a way that it provides an ease with reading. A book with short stories on scandals is always a fun read. I'm often traveling on public transportation and find that it's nice to read when I have the chance, but find it frustrating to leave a good story in the middle of the tale because I've arrived at my destination or the break isn't long enough to finish the chapter. But this book, and the others this author has written, is set up so that leaving in the middle of a chapter doesn't happen that often. Plus, you can flip through and pick a topic at will. I really enjoyed this book, and have read his other two books and ejoyed them as well. I recommend it. Customer Rating: Summary: A sense of humor is required Comment: There seems to be a side of Americans that they do not want to believe the mud being slung at every election since it's birth. The message is not so much how horrible some of the icons of our history have been but how there really is nothing new under the sun. They were as human and as prone to use their power for selfish purposes as any modern day leader. Mr. Farquhar tastefully avoids recent history in an attempt to remain objective and not bring in the emotionally charged scandals of our own day. The stories he tells can garner a chuckle now because they are all relatively distanct memories to us at the most. If you would prefer to keep your heros on pedastals, you probably want to avoid this book. Some of the stories leave a lot to interpretation in determining if it was true or if Mr. Farquhar is telling only parts of the story that make it seem true - those you will have to judge on your own. For the most part though, Mr. Farquhar appears to offer dissenting opinion on matters and avoids pronouncing historic dogma. Most of the stories are rather petty familial disputes unrelated to matters of real corruption in government and such. Perhaps avoiding the more weightier matters of government is best in a light-hearted treatment of history like this one. The serious matters are perhaps better served in a serious history. Like it or not, this book is purely for a light-hearted escape at the expense of a few public families in our past. More Reviews