Short Synopsis
Penetrating in its insight, elegant in its prose, and gripping in its vivid re-creation of Abraham Lincoln's roving mind at work, Founders' Son allows us to think anew about the first hundred years of American history, and shows how we can, like Lincoln, apply the legacy of the Founding Fathers to our times.

Full Synopsis
In Founders' Son, celebrated historian Richard Brookhiser presents a compelling new biography of Abraham Lincoln that highlights his lifelong struggle to carry on the work of the Founding Fathers. Following Lincoln from his humble origins in Kentucky to his assassination in Washington, DC, Brookhiser shows us every side of the man: laborer, lawyer, congressman, president; storyteller, wit, lover of ribald jokes; depressive, poet, friend, visionary. And he shows that despite Lincoln's many roles and his varied life, he returned time and time again to the Founders. They were rhetorical and political touchstones, the basis of his interest in politics, and the lodestars guiding him as he navigated first Illinois politics and then the national scene.

But their legacy was not sufficient. As the Civil War lengthened and the casualties mounted, Lincoln wrestled with one more paternal figure—God the Father—to explain to himself, and to the nation, why ending slavery had come at such a terrible price.

"The narrative always smoothly returns, though, to the Founders and Lincoln's unceasing attempt to divine their intentions and to examine the institutions they built and the opportunity they created for someone like him to thrive." ---Kirkus

"Lincoln knew that history was both past and prolog, and he sought to appropriate the earlier age properly to guide the nation successfully through the Civil War." ---Library Journal

"Brookhiser excels in describing Lincoln's political fights over government banks and in parsing his presidency in wartime." ---Publishers Weekly