I was slightly disappointed by this book. I’d expected better of such an eminent historian. Stronger at the start dealing with Caesar (“the bright day brings forth the adder”), Lincoln, and others; weaker later on when it deals with what are more like mass killings in Congo and Cambodia rather than assassinations per se. But it does have an insightful section on Anarchism as a philosophy that embraced assossination and the “propaganda of the deed” more than any other movement of recent times.

The style is quite dense and the timelines not always clear, which is a shame as it covers a lot of ground: perhaps that’s the problem, and a more focused book would read better.

3/5. Finished Tuesday 30 May, 2023.

(Originally published on Goodreads.)