John F. Kennedy: A Life of Growth and Maturity in the Twentieth Century, 1917-1956

LDL: book as described

United States on Oct 04, 2023

Geoff: Bought this book in late 2022. Started it recently. Forty pages are missing due to a misprint that replaces that material with sections of the bibliography and index. Very disappointed in Random House. And, since I waited too long to start reading it, the book is not returnable.

Canada on Jun 06, 2023

MEL: "JFK: Coming of Age in the American Century, 1917-1956" is the first volume in a projected 2-volume biography of John Fitzgerald Kennedy. This is the first definitive biography to be written about JFK for many years. What's more: it's very much a solid, readable, well-crafted and researched book that gives the reader a deep sense of JFK himself and the factors that contributed to his personal growth and political career from his birth in May 1917 to 1956, when he emerged from the Democratic National Convention that summer as a major national, political figure -- someone to be watched, with future prospects for higher office.

United States on Oct 31, 2022

Paul DiFilippo: Fantastic read. Hard to put down, can't wait for volume II.

Canada on Dec 12, 2021

Michael Sargeant: A beautifully written biography

Australia on Jun 28, 2021

J. Rodeck: I mostly enjoyed the history of scorn for the Irish Catholic in America and the rise of Joe Kennedy Sr. He became a major Hitler appeasement/stay out of overseas wars strategist his son Jack was brave enough to ideologically break away from.

Not sure I wanted to go through the history of the 20th century--Hitler, Korea, Viet Nam--please save it for another book.

In this very thorough rise of a star tome we meet the entire Kennedy clan, their wives, their close associates. This kind of work should appeal more to academic completists. Too Harvard.

The author covers most of the “like father/like son” promiscuous playboy life styles of Joe Sr and Jack, but this is frustratingly all surface. We can assume they are all raving beauties, but doesn’t anybody ever get knocked up? Have abortions? Disappear mysteriously? No irate husbands? Public scandal? Blackmail? How can one be such a sexual athlete with such a bad back?

JFK was a man in terrible health. If you want a profile in courage, the man battled debilitating ailments that had him in agonizing pain all his life and on a deathbed many times.

“X-rays showed that his fifth lumbar vertebra had...

United States on May 29, 2021

Kay: This is a beautifully written, meticulously researched, and even-handed biography of John F. Kennedy. This volume covers his birth and concludes with his election to the U.S. Senate. The author is currently working on volume two, which I am eagerly anticipating because this first volume was absolutely enthralling. The portrait of the young JFK that emerges is thorough and fascinating, as is the in-depth picture of the entire Kennedy family. History shaped the family, and vice versa. The book fully fleshes out JFK’s youth and the development of his keen intellect and talents. Never having known much of JFK’s earlier life, I tended to believe the rather common assumption that he was uninterested in politics until the death of his older brother, Joe P. Kennedy, Jr., and that his father, Joe Sr., seized upon his second son as a “replacement” and future presidential aspirant. This book clearly demonstrates that this was not at all the case. JFK developed his intellect and knowledge of history and politics himself, and was a more independent thinker than his older brother had ever been. I could go on and on. Take my word for it - this book is essential reading for anyone...

United States on Apr 28, 2021

Brian Bruce: The author writes in prose that is never dull and is always honest and objective. I thoroughly enjoyed reading this biography and am looking forward to the 2nd volume.

Canada on Jan 23, 2021

Clark G Ross PhD: JFK Coming of Age in the American Century, 1917-1956 by Fredrik Logevall
By Clark G. Ross, Frontis Johnston Professor of Economics, Davidson College, December 2020
Having taught U.S. economic and political history to curious, intelligent college students for over forty-years, I have a pretty good sense of that bibliography which will most interest them and benefit them as students. To a list of four seminal works, I am delighted to add as a fifth work, the first volume of Fredrik Logevall’s new biography of John Fitzgerald Kennedy: JFK Coming of Age in the American Century, 1917-1956 by Fredrik Logevall.
This volume joins other great works: David Halberstam’s The Best and the Brightest (1972) that chronicles our post-World War II struggle with communism and its leading us to Vietnam; David Kennedy’s Freedom from Fear: The American People in Depression and War 1929-1945 (1999) which provides an extraordinary explanation of the Great Depression, its causes and its remedies. Let us also add economist’s Robert Gordon’s work with its excellent economic analysis, supplemented by major social insights, The Rise and Fall of American Growth: The U.S. Standard of Living...

United States on Dec 04, 2020

Melinda L Anderson: Excellent book... so much so that, when I finished reading it, so wished it continued on...

Canada on Nov 09, 2020