A simultaneous biography of Lincoln and his cabinet, highly recommended to me by A2J, Glen V and Mike K. If you've read civil war histories, you will know the story. The viewpoint here is unusual, though; the history is a personal one with a lot of attention to everybody's feelings about each other and long quotations from their 19th century letters and diary entries (they hadn't figured out how to write 20th century letters yet). You feel like you know these people much better than you might after a more typical history - whether the feeling represents some kind of reality, to quote Pee-Wee Herman, I don't know. I did give it 4 big stars. I must say it took me a long time to read this, and the author at times seems to leave no blind alley unexplored. A few comments:

Fascinating description of Delaware Senator Willard Saulsbury (page 503)another great Delawarean that I didn't know about. He said to the sergeant-at-arms of the Senate "Damn you, if you touch me I'll shoot you dead".

One of the books best features, I think, is that instead of saying what a cut-up Lincoln was, it actually uses others' accounts of their conversations to actually report Lincoln's jokes verbatim! Apparently a favorite phrase of his was "the bottom is out of the tub"(page 426). Perhaps this will gain currency again.

Just a few exemplary complaints: On page 678. Is it really necessary to list all of Stanton's "heartfelt" note replying to Henry Ward Beecher's "heartfelt" note saying how great they both were?
On page 617 there is a lengthy aside about Jefferson Davis' son falling off the balcony and killing himself. What is this doing here?