Customer Reviews

I, Jfk

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Dictating from purgatory, JFK sheds light on his life and all that has been written about him since his death. JFK talks about his mob connections, his friendship with Frank Sinatra, his feelings about Nixon, Jackie, LBJ, and Martin Luther King, his hatred for J. Edgar Hoover, and his affairs with Marilyn Monroe and Judith Campbell.

LBJ, Adlai Stevenson, J. Edgar Hoover, and Martin Luther King chime in as well.

With Kennedy wit and charm, Mayer brings Kennedy to life. Irreverent, wry, and suspenseful, it's hard to distinguish between fact and fiction.

Finally, the book also offers some illumination regarding Kennedy's assassination and death.

Robert Mayer's main characters are: JFK (Handsome Jack) in the afterlife ... along with RFK (Robert, the Young), Lord Veep Nixon (the stubble-hearted); LBJ, Bane of Texas, Henry Cabot (the Large), J. Edgar Hoover, Dr.King, Fiddle and Faddle, Judy, and of course, Marilyn, who sternly lectures Handsome Jack on morality and the Monroe Doctrine before and after their romps in the sack. Brilliantly written with much thought provoking truth woven in this delightfully humorous work of fantasy where JFK explains ALL.

OUTRAGEOUS!
Since I first purchased and read this book in the late 80's, I have enjoyed sharing it with friends and colleagues who share my interest in this period of our history. Whether you have read only one account of the tragic events of November, 1963, or, like me, haver probably contributed to the burgeoning growth of the JFK assassination "cottage industry" works that continue to fill library shelves, you will not find another work like this.
Having worked with several entertainment personalities over the years, stories abound in Hollywood concerning the private life, and particularly the sexual escapades of it more prominent citizens. Joseph P. Kennedy's sexual exploits may be legendary across the nation, but I have heard tales of his sexual dalliances of his Hollywood days that make many other ribald stories seem pale by comparison. Thus the premise early in the book about a disadvantaged offspring he had as a by-product of one of his many West Coast flings is all too believeable.
But the premise that this physically disadvantaged "son" was actually the triggerman in Dallas that Friday aftrenoon can be found nowhere else.
Thus begins the fictional (?) account of what the author would have use believe is the "real" story.
After re-reading this book several times, I am struck with a preoccupation with the following questions/concerns.
(1) Is it possible that the elder Kennedy could have fathered such an offspring?
Quite likely.
(2) Did the author write about the sexual proclivities of JFK with information and passion only capable of being known by someone who had such knowledge in the real world?
Quite possible. Other accounts of JFK's sexual appetite and boasting comments are well documented.
(3) Concerning JFK's alleged involvement with Marilyn Monroe, who was also involved with both parties who in later years sold any story he (and perhaps only he could know) for a price?
People I know who knew Peter Lawford have told me that he practically invented "checkbook journalism".
Reference his telephone calls from a rehab center in Palm Springs fibbing on such luminaries as Liz Taylor, for example. It is said thnat he was considered almost a regular contributor to such sensational publications as "The National Enquirer" inter. alia.
(4) The descriptions of two older husky men dressing up as Ethel and Jackie with masks to torment Marilyn during her last days suggest someone with quite a knowledge of such types of activity. Could the FBI be involved in this charade, even inclduing Hoover and his buddy Tolson?
Who knows? Only recently have subsequent books bring us a better understanding of these two.
In summary, if you are looking for a very different - and somewhat thought-provoking - discourse on what may have been background events to late 1963, this book is worth your time.
I am left with a disturbing impression that even if this is truly a work of fiction, someone who may have been very close to these times and people may have an invisible involement in this story.
My only regret is that I may have to buy another copy, since I loaned my book to a Cuban attorney three years ago who has since failed to return it!

This book should be heard, since the two reader's accents contribute tremendiously to the wit and enjoyability of this book. One doesn't have to be a Kennedy fan to delight in this book, but personal familiarity with the New Frontier is necessary.

The book is witty, moving and terribly clever. There probably are historical inaccuracies. This story is Kennedy talking from "heaven" so it seems more than a little pedantic to expect that his "remeniscence" will be accurate. The point is the sense of time, the Irish version of the Kennedy accent and the personal view of the Kennedy myth.

I read incessantly. However, sometimes books on tape are superior to the written form. Some books are simply better read. For example, for an adult, the book on tape version of Harry Potter is just better. Bernard Cornwell's "Sharpe" series are infinitely better read by Frederick Davidson.

I, JFK is such a book. Like Kennedy or loath him. This book remembers a time and a group of people who changed who were are as a nation. For a trivial amount of money you can experience, but more importantly, enjoy a unique time in American history. I cannot recommend a book more highly.

If you are old enough to remember Kennedy's death, then I urge you to listen to this book. I don't think you will regret it.

I, JFK is probably the funniest book I've ever read. After I read it I passed it to half a dozen friends. It has been lost in limbo for a few years but I hope to get another copy to share. My favorite part has to be the positive image of Marylin Monroe and how she sums up Jack as "just a pretty face". I highly recommend this book to anyone who lived through the era or knows their history.

I'd give it a 10, but I'm not quite old enough to have lived through it all, and therefore, some of the jokes go RIGHT over my head. But most hit me in the belly, where they're intended to: J.Edgar Hoover, for instance, the only "commuter" in the afterlife, with an open door to both heaven and hell; Robert Kennedy, a poignant character still in love with Marylin, who left "purgatory" a few years ago; Johnson, a cowboy still; and the mysterious cloud that occasionally drifts by, speaking in a voice like thunder. If you've seen the conspiracy films, you must read this book. A few laughs never hurt anyone, and yet you'll be moved as well. The novel humanizes the late President in a way that more serious treatments have not managed to. 'Tis a pity it's a special order; this one deserved monumental success

JFK Senior is still probably the most famous dead celebrity so it's rather surprising that no one else has chosen to write a book in which JFK and his contemporaries deliver a retrospective from heaven.

So I'll give the author minimum credit for imagination. And no credit beyond that.

The author, Robert Mayer, makes several mistakes. First of all, he puts JFK, RFK, LBJ, and Martin Luther King in heaven. This is probably a mistake, as far as the first three go, and even No. 4 might owe an explanation or three before being allowed entry.

The author also consigns J. Edgar Hoover and old Joseph Kennedy to hell. In both those instances, he might be right. But his treatment of Hoover in particular is extremely distasteful and even juvenile.

Even if every rumor about how Hoover lived while he was on this planet was true, the author's treatment of Hoover is way out of line. WAY out of line. I think that Robert Mayer fancies himself as a far leftist with a magnanimous ability to see all sides of an issue.

It's funny how if you scratch an individual like that just a little beneath the surface, you see that same UGLY thing below the skin that you see in all liberals. Mayer's tone is pretty reasonable throughout most of the book, EXCEPT for the J. Edgar Hoover scenes. THAT'S the ugly liberal in Mayer seeping through. He might be Janet Reno in male drag.

His treatment of Richard Nixon is surprisingly even-handed. This book was written in 1988 when Nixon was still alive so Mayer was not required to consign Nixon to heaven or hell. He got to dodge that bullet.

Third of all, the story stars famous dead people in the afterlife. And when you try to make real the unknowable, even in a work of fiction, it's necessary to establish certain rules and stick to them.

Mayer doesn't really do that. It's not really clear what these dead personalities are able to do and are not able to do -- Mayer unfairly shifts this in order to accommodate whatever the plot requires, as the characters weave back and forth from their little corner of heaven to other little corners to earth to hell and back. No fair, Mr. Mayer.

Another thing that isn't fair is that when flashing back to actual historical events (the most noteworthy ones, of course, being the assassinations), the author, in Oliver Stone fashion, deliberately mixes fact with fiction without making the distinction clear.

A number of the passages in this book include conversations between JFK and his valet in Dallas. My eyes bugged out as I read the text of these conversations, which seemed remarkably prophetic and then I realized, with disgust, that they were all too prophetic because they were entirely fictitious. But the author introduces them as history.

Fifth of all, does anyone imagine that if these four characters got together again in heaven, they would sit around and discuss issues of policy, as they did on earth?

No. The world of the policy wonk would not have been heaven for the Kennedy brothers, who sought and achieved office in order to fulfill a destiny and not specifically with the goal of influencing policy.

Maybe LBJ would be happy as an eternal policy wonk. MLK, of course, led by inspiration and did not hold elective office. Maybe, in the event that hell freezes over and Clinton is allowed into heaven, policy wonking might be his second or third choice of recreation. But not for the Kennedy brothers.

Finally, Mayer makes the same mistake that all leftists do. His "even-handed" treatment of the Kennedy brothers only criticizes them from the left -- they expanded the Vietnam War, they didn't do enough for civil rights, they were too "Cold War" and too obsessed with getting Castro, etc.

But as Kenneth Lynn has said, there was a yellow thread of timidity that was interwoven through the ostentatious aggressiveness of the New Frontier. All of the "hard-nosed" Kennedy actions were done within the framework of domestic politics, which caused them to often betray those who took their fighting words at face value. Kennedy foreign policy left the Communists more firmly entrenched in Vietnam and Cuba at his death than they were when he took office.

The author, Robert Mayer, doesn't raise THIS critique of the Kennedy brothers; as a leftist, he is incapable of understanding it and may not be aware that it exists.

The book is readable enough and can be finished in one sitting and might be worthwhile if all that you are looking for is an afternoon of whimsy. But not if what you are looking for is an honest fictitious treatment of history.