You Never Forget Your First

I was skeptical over the trendy nature of the book but I picked it up to see what it was all about. Coe is not honestly writing a deep biography. She is more interested in trying to find enough material for a gossip rag, and goes about it in the old “guilty until proven innocent” way...how cliche can it be that she proudly writes a book as a woman and then spends the entire time doing a thing women were historically stereotyped for: sitting down to tell all the salacious bits with little evidence and much imagination. Basically, to Coe it's likely that Washington made very sure he was sterile by raping a whole bunch of his slaves. Never mind that his peers wouldn't have believed it of him...he was just rather quiet about it and no one can prove he didn't, so he likely did. Well, he grumbled about not getting promoted in the British army. Must be a sign of bad temper, right? But the whole story was that it was happening to all Americans, that they had been declared disqualified from officer positions (which were all about who got money and were more political than merited, but Brits could on occasion win them in battle). There were many more instances of assumptions without context of the times or of a line or two from a larger letter that mostly were taken with a modern reading-into of the text. In all, she seemed to be focused on forming a view of his character more from the negative (from what she did not see or could not disprove) rather than building a picture off of the solid things we do know, and making smaller inferences based on known facts. This is a great way to blow any character out of proportion and the result is a caricature.I've got no time for a “biography” that incredibly un-scholarly. What a disgraceful way to try to grab kudos as a “woman biographer” and then prove oneself to be that flighty when it comes to research? Also, a very considerable portion of the book is dedicated to lambasting male biographers simply because they have produced large and scholarly biographies of Washington which she considers boring (and she ignores those lesser known ones which I don't consider boring). She also doesn't take time to record an exhaustive system of footnotes to show every source. What a way to cheapen the term of “female biographer” as a whole.I get that she's trying to be controversial, but Washington is almost completely unrecognizable and his legacy is more obscured than enhanced.For those looking for a quick and interesting read about Washington by a woman, pick up a copy of [b:George Washington: Our First Leader 107743 George Washington Our First Leader (Childhood of Famous Americans) Augusta Stevenson https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1347567121l/107743.SX50.jpg 103843], [b:George Washington: True Patriot 1650918 George Washington True Patriot Janet Benge https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1347790488l/1650918.SY75.jpg 1645450], or [b:George Washington, Man of Courage and Prayer 178579 George Washington, Man of Courage and Prayer (Sowers) Norma Cournow Camp https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1348134498l/178579.SY75.jpg 172518].