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The Paid Companion of J. Wilkes Booth

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THE PAID COMPANION OF J. WILKES BOOTH weaves page-turning narrative from speculative history. Motion picture actor Jan Merlin adds dramatic spin to the dark facts of events surrounding the Lincoln assassination conspiracy provided by scholar and collaborator William Russo. It's a hair-raising account that, not unsurprisingly, moves like an action film.

(Review by Terry Harris) Jan Merlin, the excellent character actor who appeared in numerous western movies and TV series, usually in villianous roles, is also an author who has written several books. His latest, with co-author William Russo, THE PAID COMPANION of J.Wilkes Booth, focuses on the life of Lewis Paine, the man who conspired with John Wilkes Booth to overthrow the Federal Government at the end of the Civil War. The novel deals with the events leading up to Paine's attempted assassination of Secretary of State William Seward, Paine's capture, trial, and execution by Federal authorities. What Merlin and Russo do so well is to take a potentially repugnant character, Lewis Paine, and present him in such a way the reader is rendered sympathetic to him. The Civil War and its effects on the teenage Paine make him an object of compassion. As Merlin says, "Slavery made him immoral, war made him a murderer, and necessity, revenge and delusion made him an assassin." In many ways, Paine is like us, except he was taught to believe things we know to be wrong, were right. The novel's searing indictment of the dehumanizing evil effects of a vicious Civil War onma a young man's psyche is compelling and sticks in your mind long after finishing the book. Highly recommended, deserves to be ranked among the best of Civil War novels.

It is hard to believe that there could be a new look at the Lincoln Assassination after hundreds of books and 150 years after the event. However, these two writers have found a vein of storyline that has not been examined up to now. Because of their interest in this off-shoot of the Booth murder scheme, we can see some new possibilities in the facts. It may be that the prejudice and denial of a century has finally been lifted. Past historians and writers have ignored the bizarre sex life of Booth and how it shed light on his actions. In the past he was dismissed as a promiscuous actor, but this tale indicates a far darker personality--which was too difficult for past generations to accept. His manipulation of a Confederate deserter is nearly satanic in its power, but is definitely Machiavellian. To put the limelight on the least known of the Booth conspirators makes this a fascinating new look at the Lincoln murder plot. The intensity of the execution scene alone makes this a tour-de-force of literature.

One of the most significant moments in American history gets a fresh look in this fascinating mythology from authors Jan Merlin and William Russo.

'Paid Companion' turns the tables from the onset, reducing Abraham Lincoln and John Wilkes Booth to supporting characters as the book focuses on Lewis (Paine) Powell, an individual many historians agree is the most compelling of the Lincoln conspirators.

As a mythology, the authors are able to take liberties with the many unknowns surrounding Powell, and this freedom allows them to weave an interesting (and quite plausible) tale. And while some of the liberties are controversial, the authors present them with such skill that the story itself is not overshadowed.

Merlin and Russo effortlessly fill in the blanks between large and small historical facts, but in the end, it was the subtleties that won me over. Case in point - historical documents cite a simple straw hat Powell wears to his own execution. This minor fact of history seems inconsequential. In 'Paid Companion,' a small yet poignant vignette details how Powell comes upon and ultimately uses the headwear to dramatic and symbolic ends.

Whether you are a history buff or not, Paid Companion is a fascinating read and highly recommended.

It is notorious that American history has many dark, terrifying places, but
this new and carefully researched historical novel by actor/writer Jan Merlin and
Professor William Russo plunges headlong into one of the darkest
of those places, and one that was generally new to me.

The novel focusses on a remarkable and enigmatic individual who is usually
referred to simply as "Lewis"--- his correct name is not revealed until toward the end. As if to demonstrate
over and over that truth is stranger than fiction, few if any writers could
have invented anyone even vaguely like the real Lewis, from whose viewpoint we
observe the people and events leading up to, and following, the
Lincoln Assassination. Nor would anyone dream up a villain like the
real one we encounter here... a viciously sadistic, opium-smoking necrophile who kept
the corpses of his wife and daughter sealed in his home for years, who
was reputed to have been driven raving mad by the suicide of his brother, and
who despite all this was Lincoln's Secretary of War... Edwin Stanton!

The historical framework is fairly straightforward: fading actor John Wilkes
Booth gathers about him a ragtag bunch of losers, and plots to kidnap
Lincoln and spirit him off to the capitol city of the Confederacy.
Lewis automatically becomes a member of the bunch, as the
general factotum, lover and "paid companion" of Booth. When it becomes clear that Booth's group could no more
stage a successful kidnapping than they could fly to the moon by
flapping their arms, Booth sends his tiny group by ones and twos
to launch roughly simultaneous attacks on Federal officials, while
Booth himself shoots Lincoln in Ford's Theater. The only other planned attack
which actually takes place is Lewis's, on the Secretary of State, Seward.

But as soon as the "conspirators," including several innocent bystanders
such as Lewis's sometime landlady and a medical doctor who treated Booth,
fall into the hands of Stanton, the real nightmare begins, and Merlin and
Russo don't spare the reader. Stanton outdoes himself in devising
the most fiendish conceivable tortures for the prisoners, their trials are a sham, the verdicts being written out
before the trials start, and the ultimate horror is reserved for the
end--- the hanging of Lewis has a totally unexpected aspect that is almost
unendurable even for the hardened Civil War veterans who witness it... many
of whom faint, vomit, or run screaming from the prison courtyard!

The novel is full of minor characters about whom history does not preserve much
information. Jan Merlin, with his sure actor's instinct, brings even
the smallest parts to life. A long appendix gives the actual eloquent final defense
of Lewis, as provided by his lawyer, W. E. Doster. Print-on-demand books
are usually a seething sea of misprints, but I found few in this edition.
Recommended.

I wonder if Mr. Russo just likes slandering the names of people who have been dead for years, or if he actually thinks he is anywhere near the mark. I, however, am a professional historian who has spent years researching the Lincoln assassination, and to anyone considering buying this book I warn you not to waste your money. The writing is choppy, the scenarios unbelieveable and the historial data way off the mark. As for the charge that Booth hired a bunch of 'losers' to help him kidnap the president, here are the facts. First of all, David Herold was a pharmacist's assistant and had easy access to drugs that could be used to knock Lincoln out when the time came to kidnap him. Second, Paine (whose real name was Powell, by the way), was the perfect muscle for the job, a man who could easily have overpowered Lincoln, something that neither Booth, Herold, Atzerodt or Surratt could have done on their own. John Surratt had contacts in the Confederacy and in the Union, so not only could he find a friendly place to stash Lincoln, he could act as a middleman during negotiations to reacquire Lincoln. Mr. Russo, the line between historical fiction and slander is a thin one, and you have crossed it. I reccommend a new career.

shamefully bad, voyeuristic in the worst imaginable way, and without the slightest respect or attention to known historical detail.

it's not only bad if you're a student of the lincoln conspiracy, it's bad as a piece of fiction, period. i'm embarrased for the writers of this book.