I received a free Kindle copy of The Cowboy President by Michael Blake courtesy of Net Galley and Rowman and Littlefield, the publisher. It was with the understanding that I would post a review to Net Galley, Goodreads, Amazon, Barnes and Noble and my nonfiction book review blog. I also posted it to my Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and Google Plus pages.

I requested this book as I have read a great deal about the Presidents of the United States and Theodore Roosevelt in particular, but none that focused solely on his time in the Dakotas. This is the first book by Michael Blake that I have read.

The subtitle of the book "The American West and the making of Theodore Roosevelt" generally describes what the author is attempting to do. Blake does address Rossevelt before and after his adventures in the Dakotas, but the primary focus is on that time. He does an admirable job of relaying the events of those times and discusses other sources some of which he believes and others that are questionable. His writing style makes this an easy read as it does not get overly bogged down in minute detail, but he does leave out large sections of time where Roosevelt is bouncing back forth between the Dakotas and New York. He did not totally convince me that Roosevelt's time in the west led to him becoming the person we remember as I believe that it was part of it, but not the major contributor.

I recommend this book to anyone who has an interest in Theodore Roosevelt and is not looking for an overly detailed read.

If you like biographies of presidents then this is for you. The author skips over many well known parts Roosevelt's life and concentrates on those parts dealing with his outdoor adventures. It is well written but badly edited, which I assume will be fixed prior to publication. Roosevelt meets and befriends many larger-than-life characters and the author brings them to life. Easy to read.

If you are curious about this book and deciding whether to read it, I recommend visiting the official website of the author, Michael F. Blake. At the time of this review, there is not an abundance of information on the site, just a photo of the author and some of his previous titles. That should be all you need to see that this is not going to be a wonky biography of a former president who was once a cowboy, but a book about a cowboy who happened to become president.

I received an advance copy of this book for review purposes. The review is more of a challenge to write than I expected. It fits more into the Western genre than the Presidential Biography category, and at times it's not about Roosevelt at all as much as it is about the land and the cowboy lifestyle of the late 19th century. I think I learned more about cattle drives than I did about the 26th president. I enjoy westerns, so this was an interesting read. It's not a definitive biography of President Theodore Roosevelt, but it may be exactly the kind of biography he would have wanted for himself.

Thank you to NetGalley, the publisher, and the author for providing me with an advance copy for review.