Gordon Leidner's Abraham Lincoln collects the know facts assembled about President Lincoln, from his marriage and his personal interests to his favorite poem and his law practice. Filled with trivia-type details, Abraham Lincoln packs in facts, quizzes and trivia information any Lincoln buff will enjoy.

Given Gordon's background, he is THE authority (and luckily THE brasilianist) to write such a piece.

I was a AMAZED by the ammount of good documentation and multiple sources quoted in the text from almost every possible source. Only improvement here is that it seems that the wave of info available on the Internet caught the author by surprise (it could have been much more up-to-date).

One can hardly expect a foreigner to have a deeper understanding of brazil's history than the person who was the US ambassador for several years, and a self-declared brasilianist. A grain of salt comes from the fact that pro-US, pro-trade behaviors and positions are an obvious consequence of Gordon's origin.

It's a shame that the version I read wasn't written after Lula's election and his first day as a president, but I learned more about Brazil in this book than in any other one. Very good job showing data and facts to support the positions and analyzing the underlying facts that took brazil to the position where it is now.

We live in troubled times. The presidential candidate of one political p[arty is ridiculed for stating that Jesus is his favorite philosopher, and the vice-presidential candidate of the other political party is castigated for speaking about religion. What has happened to the moral tone of this country, which was founded by God-fearing men? Have we completely abandoned the idea that there is a Being who guides and guards us in all that we do? Abraham Lincoln, arguably our greatest president, believed that there was Someone watching over us at all times. He also believed vehemently that our governmental system was important, and that its structure was the best that could have been devised for the country. His words are eloquent, and call to us across the gap of 150 years. Reading this work, it is easy to restore some confidence in our governmental system, even though now it is being sorely tested by the eletoral events in Florida. This work could not have come along at a better time in our history, and it is well worth reading.