Sarah Vowell’s Assassination Vacation is an interesting book following Sarah Vowell while she follows the stories of famous assassinations such as Lincoln, Garfield, and McKinley. Sarah Vowel’s purpose is to allow a better understanding of both sides by shedding new light on the assassins, and gave new life to moments long forgotten. Vowell may go on a few too many tangents but she excels at examining the motive that drove the assassins to murder, while still giving analysis of events of the past in a unique style that engages the reader.
Vowell is successful in shedding new light at the assassins by examining their motives. Most people would automatically assume that killing a president is a horrible thing to do, but what if the president was a tyrant. Vowell talks about by first telling us that John Wilkes Booth shouted “Sic simper tyrannis”, Thus always tyrants, while jumping off the balcony after shooting Lincoln. This shows that Booth saw Lincoln as a tyrant. She also states while Lincoln was giving his reconstruction speech, Booth said to Powell, “That means nigger citizenship. Now, by god, I will put him through. This will be the last speech he will ever make”. Booth believed he was doing something great when he shot Abraham Lincoln. If the south would have beat the Union then Booth would have gone down a hero, but since the north won he didn’t. Also during this time about 50% or less of the nation liked him but when Booth killed him the half that disliked Lincoln had decided to just let it go. Because of Booth, Abraham Lincoln will be remembered for a long time. Vowell also does well with the motives of Garfield’s assassin, Charles J. Guiteau. While Booth had killed for reason he felt were legitimate, Guiteau, well, he was probably insane. Vowell talks about how Guiteau was probably insane because he was told by god to kill the president. He also believed he was the reason Garfield was in office in the first place. The last of the 3, McKinley, was a...