66 PUBLISHERS WEEKLY ■ JANUARY 27, 2020
Review_NONFICTION
Mulvaney over the Ukraine affair was “the
question that saved America”?). Readers
searching for headline-worthy insights
into the Trump White House should look
elsewhere. Agent: David Larabell, Creative
Artists Agency. (Mar.)A Hundred Little Pieces on the
End of the World
John Rember. Univ. of New Mexico, $24.95
(192p) ISBN 978-0-8263-6136-3
Novelist Rember (Sudden Death, Over
Time) meditates on finding hope in the face
of ecological catastrophe in this thoughtful
collection. Organizing his work into 10
chapters consisting of 10 short sections
each, he advises preserving one’s sense of
identity in trying times via storytelling:
“Losing faith in one’s own story, false or
not, is dangerous if not fatal. Fiction has
the power to keep us alive, which is why
we all practice creating it.” In addition to
modern-day issues, Rember considers
postapocalyptic scenarios, imagining sur-
vivors of a nuclear war who aren’t overcome
with despair but are filled with wonder
that they’re still alive, and with hope at
the prospect of a new world. Trying to
come up with his authorial credo, he comes
up with the conviction that “there’s plenty
to write about in this world, if you keep
existentially funny and honestly grief-
stricken about it.” In the end, Rember
finds the most promising and assuring
model for morality to be a small-scale one
focused on “love, kindness, empathy,
caring” toward loved ones. Rember’s
sometimes dark, sometimes humorous
book of reflections dispenses hard-earned
wisdom on a world in crisis. (Mar.)★ The Lady’s Handbook for Her
Mysterious Illness
Sarah Ramey. Doubleday, $27.95 (432p)
ISBN 978-0-385-53407-9
In this illuminating debut memoir,
musician Ramey offers an account of a
mysterious illness that plagued her for
more than a decade, beginning when she
was in college in the early 2000s. Ramey
recounts years struggling with excruciating
pain, at times being unable to rise from bed.
She pursued multiple medical treatments,
but her pain persisted; when she turned to
alternative approaches such as acupuncture
and positive thinking, she found some
relief, but also what she felt to be a Newrehabilitating his battlefield injuries in
an area hospital; abolitionist Frederick
Douglass, harboring deep suspicions about
the president’s commitment to “the plight
of African Americans”; and Supreme Court
Chief Justice Salmon P. Chase, who admin-
istered the oath of office after having
schemed to wrest the 1864 Republican
presidential nomination from Lincoln.
Achorn also tracks John Wilkes Booth’s
movements over the course of the weekend,
citing reports that the actor attempted to
“strike [Lincoln] down” in the U.S.
Capitol rotunda. The book climaxes
with a close reading of the speech itself,
highlighting its biblical allusions and
“astonishing” denunciation of slavery “as
an unmitigated evil.” Though Achorn
covers well-trod ground, he skillfully
plumbs his sources for colorful details
and draws memorable character
sketches. History buffs will savor this
evocative narrative. Agent: Lisa Adams,
the Garamond Agency. (Mar.)Free Thinker: Sex, Suffrage, and
the Extraordinary Life of Helen
Hamilton Gardener
Kimberly A. Hamlin. Norton, $28.95 (384p)
ISBN 978-1-324-00497-4
Hamlin (From Eve to Evolution), a pro-
fessor of American studies at Miami
University of Ohio, delivers an eye-
opening biography of women’s rights
activist Helen Hamilton Gardener (1853–
1925). Born Mary Alice Chenoweth,
Gardener became the youngest school
principal in Ohio at the age of 21. When
a newspaper exposed her affair with the
married school commissioner, Charles
Smart, she left Ohio, became a protégé of
noted “freethinker” Robert Ingersoll, and
delivered her first lecture as Helen
Hamilton Gardener in New York City in
1884 (“Hamilton” and “Gardener” were
Smart’s grandmothers’ maiden names). In
speeches and writings, Gardener refuted
claims that women had different brain
structures than men, challenged traditional
views on sexuality, and led a nationwide
campaign to raise the age of sexual consent
to 18 (most states had it at 12 or 14). After
Smart’s death in 1901 (the couple lived
together in New York, but never married),
Gardener settled in Washington, D.C.,
where she helped to organize the 1913
women’s suffrage parade and forged closerelationships
with members
of Woodrow
Wilson’s
White House.
Following pas-
sage of the 19th
Amendment
in 1919, she
joined the
Civil Service
Commission as
“the highest-ranking and highest-paid
woman in federal government.” Though
the book’s middle section occasionally
flags, Hamlin provides a captivating
behind-the-scenes view of the suffrage
movement on the cusp of its final victory,
and her eloquent account sparkles with
Gardener’s sharp personality. Feminists
and fans of women’s history will be
exhilarated. (Mar.)Front Row at the Trump Show
Jonathan Karl. Dutton, $28 (368p) ISBN 978-1-
524745-62-2
ABC News correspondent Karl (The
Right to Bear Arms) offers a blow-by-blow
chronicle of Donald Trump’s path to the
White House in this detailed yet disap-
pointing account that concludes two
months before impeachment. Though
Karl credits Trump with “pulling off the
greatest political upset in American his-
tory” and carefully notes that all presidents
have “bitterly complained” about their
press coverage, he condemns the Trump
administration for waging a “war on truth”
and “pour[ing] rocket fuel” on America’s
political divisions. His litany of evidence
includes a 2013 TV interview in which
Trump refused to take the “golden oppor-
tunity” to walk back claims that President
Obama wasn’t born in the U.S.; White
House press secretary Sarah Sanders lying
to reporters about air strikes against Syria;
and Acting Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney
admitting, in response to Karl’s question,
that Ukrainian military aid had been with-
held for political reasons, then denying the
admission. Karl delivers a plethora of
insider anecdotes, but his analysis of the
administration’s impact on democratic
norms feels shallow, and his tendency
toward self-congratulation grates. (Is it
really necessary to know that Anthony
Scaramucci thought Karl’s exchange with