One question that my students always ask is how effective was FDR at the end of his life? And now with such an emphasis on age of presidents this book offers so much insight into the idea that FDR fought for the country until his dying breath. Very pro FDR, but so am I.

This is a rather detailed survey of the last 100 days of Roosevelt's life. The author tries to keep an more or less objective picture of what FDR was doing and proceeding as he slowly succumbed to heart disease, with particular emphasis on the Yalta Conference and the meetings in Europe and Africa en route there and back. He makes a good case that Roosevelt's illness was not a major factor in the strength or weakness of decisions made there as some have suggested and he chart the growing divisions not only between Washington and Moscow, but also between FDR and Churchill. One gets a sense of the power of FDR's ambition that the UN would become a vehicle to institute an American New World order. Of current interest is a more detailed than most account of the meeting between FDR and Ibn Saud though the pushing of the British out of their creation Saudi Arabia and the motion by the US to grab oil there that was central to this process is not detailed. He gives an interesting picture of FDR's relations with the other polio victims in Warm Springs Georgia and a fairly dispassionate picture of the time he spent with his mistress there. One weakness of this book is that particularly in the recounting of the Yalta trip, the writer assumes his reader is familiar with all sorts of figures from the period. I am not sure the casual reader of this book will know that a reference to "Alanbrooke" without explanation is a reference to Marshall Alan Francis Brooke, 1st Viscount Alanbrooke,, the British equivalent to General Marshall, the chief of the British Army during WWII.

This is a moving account of the end of FDR's life, which, of course, occurred at a crucial moment in world history. The common account of this period is overly simplified, and Woolner helps to shed light on the true complexity of the time. It is an interesting study of FDR's character, that even amid the terrible suffering of his illness, he still seemed to think he had more time and could continue to shape policy around the world.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for a digital ARC.