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Legend: The Only Inside Story About Mayor Richard J. Daley
Written by Daley's press secretary, this book tells what it was like working with America's most controversial urban politician, the powerful and controversial Mayor Richard Daley of Chicago.
264 pages, Hardcover
First published March 1, 1989
5 people want to read
About the author
Frank Sullivan
11 booksLibrarian Note: There is more than one author by this name in the Goodreads data base.
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
September 21, 2010
I've been wanting to learn more about Chicago history and so when I found Legend in the bargain bin a few months back I decided to pick it up. I'm not sure what I was expecting but I wasn't particularly impressed with it.
First of all, it was written by one of Richard J. Daley's Press Secretaries, whose background was in reporting. He clearly didn't know how to write a book-length story and so this book was cut up into tons of chapters, each only 2 or 3 pages long. There was absolutely no flow to it. It was not in chronological order and essentially repeated much of the information over and over again.
I guess I was hoping it would give me a good background of Richard J. Daley, and move into some of the high and lowlights of his political career. Instead, it basically only touched on isolated events and showed examples of his political savviness. However, I did not need 10 chapters to serve as examples of the same point.
Overall, I learned a few things but it really read like a series of newspaper clippings, most of which were covering the same few things. I would have liked a more cohesive, chronological narrative and more background on Mayor Richard J. Daley.
First of all, it was written by one of Richard J. Daley's Press Secretaries, whose background was in reporting. He clearly didn't know how to write a book-length story and so this book was cut up into tons of chapters, each only 2 or 3 pages long. There was absolutely no flow to it. It was not in chronological order and essentially repeated much of the information over and over again.
I guess I was hoping it would give me a good background of Richard J. Daley, and move into some of the high and lowlights of his political career. Instead, it basically only touched on isolated events and showed examples of his political savviness. However, I did not need 10 chapters to serve as examples of the same point.
Overall, I learned a few things but it really read like a series of newspaper clippings, most of which were covering the same few things. I would have liked a more cohesive, chronological narrative and more background on Mayor Richard J. Daley.
October 7, 2012
Mediocre offering. Better to read Boss and American Pharaoh.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews