It is both a surprise and a pleasure to have this new collection, offered as the next-best-thing to a genuine autobiography, expertly pieced together from Lincoln's known speeches and letters to simulate the narrative flow of a life story.
~Blue & Gray Magazine
An artful biography of Lincoln... spliced together from interview, memoir, and speech excerpts, but always in the slain president's own words.
~Civil War Book Review
All the wisdom and insight that we have come to value in the man who presides over the temple at the west end of the Capital Mall.
~Civil War Courier
Adds to our understanding of Abraham Lincoln by demonstrating how consistent he was in his self-image and self-description.
~Civil War History
It is fun to have Lincoln's personal musings on Lincoln gathered so neatly into one place.
~Civil War News
The autobiography Lincoln never had the chance to write. The way in which Zall has blended together various sources is very clever.
~James M. McPherson, author of Battle Cry of Freedom
We do learn to share the young Lincoln's excitement when he earns his first dollar; we cringe as he consents to sew shut the eyes of some intransigent hogs; we laugh at some of the doggerel he composes about his rural background.... A collection that casts a strong light.
~Kirkus Reviews
Zall's Lincoln 'autobiography' gives a strong sense of Lincoln's personal style, practical idealism, and poetic wordsmanship.
~Library Journal
A handsome book.
~Lincoln Herald
Handily provides interested readers with autobiographical gleanings from the vast corpus of Lincolniana.
~North Carolina Historical Review
The book is accurate, even meticulous in its selections. There is nothing unreliable.
~South Carolina Historical Magazine
An absorbing trip into the mind of America's greatest president.
~Southern Historian