Chasing Lincoln's Killer

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Scholastic Press, 2009 - Assassins - 194 pages
"This story is true. All the characters are real and were alive during the great manhunt of April 1865. Their words are authentic and come from original sources: letters, manuscripts, trial transcripts, newspapers, government reports, pamphlets, books and other documents. What happened in Washington, D.C., that spring, and in the swamps and rivers, forests and fields of Maryland and Virginia during the next twelve days, is far too incredible to have been made up." So begins this story of the pursuit and capture of John Wilkes Booth and gives a day-by-day account of the wild chase to find this killer and his accomplices. Based on James Swanson's adult book Manhunt: The 12-Day Chase for Lincoln's Killer, this young people's version is a look at the assassination of a president, and shows readers Abraham Lincoln the man, the father, the husband, the friend, and how his death impacted those closest to him.

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About the author (2009)

James L.Swanson is the Edgar Award winning author of the New York Times bestseller Manhunt: The 12-Day Chase for Lincoln's Killer. In 2009 in Newsweek magazine, Patricia Cornwell named Swanson's Manhunt and Truman Capote's In Cold Blood as the two best nonfiction crime books ever. In 2006, Entertainment Weekly magazine named Manhunt one of the ten best books of the year. Swanson has degrees in history from The University of Chicago, where he was a student of John Hope Franklin, and law from the University of California, Los Angeles. He has held a number of government and think-tank posts in Washington, D.C., including at the United States Department of Justice. He serves on the advisory council of the Ford's Theatre Society. His other books include the acclaimed photographic history Lincoln's Assassins: Their Trial and Execution, as well as Chasing Lincoln's Killer, and adaptations of Manhunt and Bloody Crimes for young readers. In 2014 his title, The President Has Been Shot!: The Assasination of Joh F. Kennedy, made The New York Times Best Seller List. James L. Swanson was born on Lincoln's birthday.

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