Lincoln, by Gore Vidal

OK, the truth: I got tired of this book and abandoned it after reading about two-thirds of it.

I recall that I liked Gore Vidal when last I read his stuff, so maybe this was just my problem, or maybe this just wasn't his best book.

I recently heard a Lincoln biographer interviewed on NPR say that there have been something like 14,000 books written about Lincoln. Whew.

I grew tired of what seemed like stilted, unreal dialogue. I also became aware of a consistent use of segue to move from one scene to another. This is a legitimate and useful tool in storytelling, but it should (in my humble opinion) be transparent, or at least hardly noticeable, when used skillfully.

I did learn a few interesting things about Lincoln -- unfortunately in the context of fiction, so I'll have to do more research before I can truly "believe."