My Thoughts Be Bloody

The Bitter Rivalry Between Edwin and John Wilkes Booth

By: Nora Titone, Doris Kearns Goodwin - introduction/notes

Narrated by: John B. Lloyd

Length: 19 hrs and 24 mins

Publisher's summary

My Thoughts Be Bloody, a sweeping family saga, revives an extraordinary figure whose name has been missing, until now, from the story of President Lincoln's death. Edwin Booth, John Wilkes's older brother by four years, was in his day the biggest star of the American stage. He won his celebrity at the precocious age of 19, before the Civil War began, when John Wilkes was a schoolboy. Without an account of Edwin Booth, author Nora Titone argues, the real story of Lincoln's assassin has never been told. Using an array of private letters, diaries, and reminiscences of the Booth family, Titone has uncovered a hidden history that reveals the reasons why John Wilkes Booth became this country's most notorious assassin.

The details of the conspiracy to kill Lincoln have been well documented elsewhere. My Thoughts Be Bloody tells a new story, one that explains for the first time why Lincoln's assassin decided to conspire against the president in the first place, and sets that decision in the context of a bitterly divided family—and nation. By the end of this riveting journey, listeners will see Abraham Lincoln's death less as the result of the war between the North and South and more as the climax of a dark struggle between two brothers who never wore the uniform of soldiers, except on stage.

©2010 Nora Titone (P)2010 Simon and Schuster Audio

Critic reviews

"Titone's account paints a colorful panorama of 19th-century theatrical life, with its endless drunken touring through frontier backwaters and showbiz pratfalls. Neither deep nor tragic, her John Wilkes is oddly convincing: the first of the grandiose hollow men in America's cast of assassins." ( Publishers Weekly)

Wonderful!

This is a wonderful, totally absorbing biography of Edwin and John Wilkes Booth. Nora Titone has an almost magical ability to create a sense of place and time as she follows the Booth brothers from their family farm to New York, Philadelphia, and Baltimore. It really is about both brothers, and the look at 19th-century American theater fully justifies the dual focus: how is it possible that Edwin Booth (and their father Junius Brutus Booth -- not to mention their resourceful mother!) has been overlooked for so long? There is plenty of time as well in this generous narrative to develop a number of figures peripheral to the main story, like Julia Ward Howe and her husband "Chev" (short for "Chevalier"); John Brown; and a number of theatrical colleagues and managers.

John B. Lloyd provides a clear, well-paced reading. My only regret is that Titone leaves the description of the actual conspiracy to kill Lincoln to others; but reading this makes it clear what direction John Wilkes Booth was headed in, and why. I loved it. I would recommend it to anyone interested in Lincoln, the Civil War, the American theater, or the 19th century in general.

A new take on the assassination of Lincoln

Titone's thesis is that JW Booth wanted fame so badly that he murdered the president to secure a place in history. JW had failed in his efforts to be an actor, whereas his father and older brother had excelled in dramatic acting, becoming two of the best and most acclaimed actors in US history prior to the age of cinema. JW had also failed in business....and pretty much everything else, except for charming the ladies owing to his exceptional good looks and physique. But conquering women did not compensate for his failure to equal his father and brother on the stage, so JW acted the most dramatic role any actor ever played: he shot the president in view of a few hundred theater goers, jumped on the stage in front of them, and deliberately made a bold statement to the crowd (reported variously) even as the smoke was hanging in the air in the presidential box and Mary Lincoln was screaming. Then he strode off stage deliberately (not with a broken leg as has been mistakenly reported) and jumped on a horse and rode into history.

Titone does an excellent job supporting her thesis. The story she tells of JW's father and brother and other family members is detailed and quite interesting. She also documents JW's collaboration with Rebel agents in the last year of the war, and she details the escape and capture of JW, which resulted in his being fatally shot by an army sargeant who had such finely tuned religious sensibilities that he had castrated himself to defend against being tempted by loose women.

What a story!

The narrator does an excellent job interpreting this highly dramatic tale.

Worth your credit

I knew very little about the Booths when starting this book. It is a very interesting story with a lot of information. If you already know some history about this tale I can't guarantee that you'll hang onto every word like I did. Also with so many hours of audio you definitely get your moneys worth. I have recommended this audiobook to many of my friends. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

wow!

loved it, finished it fast, may revisit. gripping characters, lots of lush historical detail, learned a lot about the entertainment industry of the era. loved Junius Brutus most, such a tragic tragedian <3 still a jerk. all of them are loveable jerks, even JW, except you like him less as he gets older because he gets progressively worse, of course

Ok, but could stand a bit of editing

I bought this audiobook because this week I finished, and enjoyed much more than I had expected, the (print) historical fiction of the Booths in " Fate and Traitors" by Jennifer Chiaverini ( which Audible offers as an audiobook). I picked up "Fate" on a whim from the library ( hey, it was free) and was quite taken with the Booths ( plural) story. Although I have listened to or read a fair amount of American Civil War history, I had no idea of the Booth family history. That Wilkes' father and brother were, respectively, in their own way and time, as famous as (for example) Brad Pitt or George Clooney are in our time.

Though notionally fiction, Chiaverini's book is a very fact -based telling. As to " My Thoughts Be Bloody" - it told - almost identically - the same story, but ( I confess) after 17 or 18 hours, I was saying to myself "yes, I get it, I've heard the rivalry told in a different way at hour 8 ( or 11 or 15). Narration was "acceptable". Not stellar, but not bad.

If you have not read or listened to " Fate" then by all means get " "My Thoughts Be Bloody". If you have a choice, I recommend " Fate"

But both - here (finally..) is the point - tell of a VERY interesting ( if not weird) family, a compelling Civil War story

Very good read

I recommend this book highly. It reveals a time lost to many but important to those interested in US history. The story of the Booth family and the feelings of Americans during the 1800's. Come alive in a way no fiction can match

Fascinating Historical and Character Study

This book illuminates not only John Wilkes but his far more influential and famous actor brother Edwin as well as other figures involved in these tumultuous times and events. This filled an absolute vacancy of knowledge about the Booth family, their loyalties, talents and leanings, and the resulting effect on the personality needs and actions of J. Wilkes Booth. Just a joy to read-great flow-no a dull moment!

You thought you knew the story? Guess Again

Where does My Thoughts Be Bloody rank among all the audiobooks you’ve listened to so far?

One of my top 3 audible books of all times.

What did you like best about this story?

As a stage technician on a Broadway show, I was fascinated by descriptions of stage craft in the 1800's. Everyone, even now, thinks how glamorous show business is. This gives a long hard look behind those velvet curtains. What a struggle it really was just the logistics of getting from one town to another.

What about John B. Lloyd’s performance did you like?

Excellent performance by John B. Lloyd. Very easy on the ears.

If you were to make a film of this book, what would be the tag line be?

Think you know the story of Lincoln's assassin? You don't know 1/2 of the drama.

Any additional comments?

1/3 of the book is about the father of John Wilkes and Edwin Booth. You cannot begin to understand the motivation of the brothers without understanding their nutty as a fruitcake father Junius Brutus Booth, a genius, a vegetarian, a drunk and a wife beater. They don't make them like that anymore.

Sibling Rivalry Meets the Civil War

Much more than a biography of Lincoln's killer. A panorama of mid-19th century America through the lives of the famous, brilliant but flawed acting family, the Booths. In the 1820's, Shakespearean actor Junius Brutus Booth flees his wife and baby in England for a new life in America with his mistress, a Covet Garden flower seller. Hidden away in the Maryland woods, she bears him ten children while Junius works as a travelling actor, alternately earning and drinking away the family's fortunes. The results resonate through history to the present day.

Nora Titone presents previously researched facts in an engaging style that reads like a novel, or a Shakespearean tragedy. As noted by other reviewers, the book slows down towards its inevitable conclusion and Lincoln's assassination. I believe this is because facts become thin, and the book is, above all, a historical record. History will probably never reveal precisely what John Wilke's interactions with his Confederate handlers were and what Wilkes initiated based upon his own whims. To attempt to discern to what degree subsequent events resulted from sibling rivalry versus Confederate sympathies is simply impossible. The author cannot explore John Wilke's deepest motivations. They are forever lost to history. What John Wilkes did during the winter and early spring of 1864-1865 is still a mystery and forever eclipsed by his calamitous actions on April 14, 1865. Play acting, demonstrating passionate Confederate sympathies, or simply seething with jealousy, John Wilkes forever upstaged the rest of his acting family.

A thoughtful and compelling history .

I could not stop listening to this incredible story of an American family who lived through and shaped our history directly. Shakespearean indeed.
Fact is stranger than fiction.
In other words you can't make this stuff up!! Fabulous, great narrator as well , flawless delivery.