Fortune’s Fool: The Life of John Wilkes Booth
Terry Alford
When John Wilkes Booth assassinated President Abraham Lincoln at Ford's Theatre, his friends were stunned--not only by the murder but by the thought that someone they knew as fantastically gifted, successful and kind-hearted could commit such a crime. Fortune's Fool, the first biography of Booth ever written, is the life story of this talented and troubling individual.
Award History
0 wins · 3 total
| Award | Year | Result | Category / Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Los Angeles Times Book Prize for BiographyMajor | 2015 | Finalist | Secondary source |
| National Book Critics Circle Award for BiographyMajor | 2015 | Finalist | Secondary source |
| PROSE Award for U.S. History | 2016 | Honorable mention | Official source |
Experimental book profileGenerated by GPT-5.4 nano · may contain inaccuracies
This is an unverified interpretation of the catalog description, offered as an opt-in discovery experiment—not as bibliographic fact.
01 Central figures
- John Wilkes Booth95%
Show lower-confidence suggestions
These suggestions did not meet the normal display threshold and are more likely to be wrong.
- Abraham Lincoln45%
02 Central places
None extracted with sufficient confidence.
These suggestions did not meet the normal display threshold and are more likely to be wrong.
- Ford's Theatre60%
03 Suggested argument
No argument inferred with sufficient confidence.
This suggestion did not meet the normal display threshold and is more likely to be wrong.
The biography presents John Wilkes Booth as a talented, successful, and kind-hearted person whose friends were stunned by his assassination of President Abraham Lincoln at Ford's Theatre.
Model confidence 45%
04 Reading orientation
65 / 100 academicAcademic
An estimate of intended readership and scholarly apparatus—not quality or importance.
Confidence percentages are the model's own estimates. Profile confidence: 70%.