Grant and Twain by Mark Perry

So, this is my third read and the book for my third and last book club group this month. I have 3 monthly book clubs that I participate in for work. This is the one I am in charge of and they picked a history book for January. I love history and my first Masters degree is in American History.

Random House

Perry did a great job making the book readable. This is definitely popular history at its finest. His style is great, but he did not compromise on sources to achieve this style. Perry basically wanted to show the influence Grant and Twain had on each other and he looked in particular detail about how Grant wrote his autobiography and for Twain, he focused mainly on Huckleberry Finn. He showed what influenced the men and how Twain helped Grant survive to finish his autobiography and how Grant helped Twain to finish Huckleberry Finn. Perry also included some wonderful quotes, particularly one by Hemingway in which he said Twain started contemporary American fiction and Grant wrote the best contemporary American nonfiction. Our whole group loved this read and almost every person who took a book, finished it. Overall this was a 5 cups of cocoa read and has helped me to want to read more nonfiction, particularly history this year.