ISBN John F. Kennedy 96 pages English

Robert Dallek's masterful John F. Kennedy: An Unfinished Life was a number one national bestseller and it remains the most widely read one-volume biography of the 35th President. Now in this marvelous short biography of John F. Kennedy Dallek achieves a miracle of compression capturing in a small space the essence of his renowned full-length masterpiece. Here readers will find the fascinating insights and groundbreaking revelations found in An Unfinished Life. The heart of the book focuses on Kennedy's political career especially the presidency. The book sheds light on key foreign affairs issues such as the Bay of Pigs debacle Khrushchev's misguided bullying of Kennedy in Vienna the Cuban Missile crisis the nuclear test ban the race for space and the initial dealings with Southeast Asia especially Laos. It also highlights the difficulties Kennedy faced getting a domestic agenda passed from a tax cut to spur the economy to federal aid to education Medicare and civil rights. Dallek reveals the thinking behind Robert Kennedy's appointment as Attorney General and convincingly argues that Kennedy would never have expanded the war in Vietnam the way that Lyndon Johnson did. The book also addresses questions about Kennedy's assassination and concludes with his presidential legacy and why he remains so popular despite serving only a thousand days in office.