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T**Y
Brilliant!
This writing team have produced the best, most interesting and most human of the books that I have read about the super-rich American families of the 19th century. Mr Cooper's family insight is invaluable. A must for anyone interested in this period.
S**E
Different but good
Enjoyed it. Thought he more business talk but is v people and character oriented.vaccinating and sad and some lovely writing
A**R
Interesing book
Interesting book about the Vanderbilt family, however sometimes a bit too long and i would be interested in understanding more the key factors of the increase of wealth and then decrease
M**R
interesting read
the style of writing and the eye for detsil of the history of the timr
L**R
Little new information on the Vanderbilt's rise or fall
If you thought you were going to learn something new from Anderson Cooper on the eventual fall of the Vanderbilt Empire, think again. Scrolling through the acknowledgements, bibliography, index, photos, and about the author pages I realized they had taken up about 17% of the book. So there was much research done by Katherine Howe and perhaps Anderson Cooper, but these were mostly previous publications of books. There was some interesting information about the founder known as the Commodore and how he hoped to have his fortune passed down to only the eldest child (Male if possible) of each new generation so that the money would remain an immense fortune. But it seems the subsequent Vanderbilts didn't follow his example and less than 150 years later, most of the money is gone disbursed by immense over spending on parties, and luxuries of every nature and I have to assume bad business decisions though this is not elaborated on in the book. In the end, it seems only Gloria Vanderbilt, Cooper's mother, is talked about as though she were the last Vanderbilt left. I'm sure that's not possible, but we didn't hear about any others.Having seen the show "Nothing left Unsaid: Gloria Vanderbilt and Anderson Cooper, I recognize their mutual love for each other as mother and son. Cooper's father died, and his brother is also gone, so his relationship with his mother was paramount. This may have been the last memorial to his mother who passed away in 2019 and I get that. But I wanted more history and more information about how one family squandered such a massive fortune so quickly.
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