A deathbed confession and a long hidden conspiracy are at the heart of a riveting historical mystery centered on the assassination of Abraham Lincoln.
In March 1900, as former Congressman John Bingham of Ohio lies dying, he begins to tell a strange tale to his physician, Dr. Jamie Fraser. Bingham famously prosecuted eight members of John Wilkes Booth's plot to kill Lincoln. But during the 1865 trial, conspirator Mary Surratt divulged a secret so explosive it could shatter the republic.
Though Bingham takes the secret to his grave, Fraser cannot let go of the mystery. Bored with smalltown medical practice, he begins to investigate, securing an unlikely ally in Speed Cook, a black, college-educated professional ballplayer and would-be newspaper publisher. Cook is fascinated by Fraser's inquiry and, like Fraser, thinks the accepted version of Lincoln's assassination rings false. Was Booth truly the mastermind or were other, more powerful forces pulling the strings?
Blending real and fictional characters, The Lincoln Deception is a superbly researched, brilliantly plotted and thoroughly gripping mystery that explores one of the nation's darkest and most fascinating eras and the conspiracy that changed world history.
Author:
After practicing law for many years, David O. Stewart began to write history, too. His first book, The Summer of 1787: The Men Who Invented the Constitution, was a Washington Post bestseller and won the Washington Writing Award as Best Book of 2007.
The Lincoln Deception, an historical mystery about the John Wilkes Booth Conspiracy, was released in late August 2013. Publishers Weekly called it an "impressive debut novel." David also is president of the Washington Independent Review of Books, an online book review.