The Pulitzer Prize-winning author draws upon the four presidents she has studied most closely—Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and Lyndon B. Johnson—to tell the story of how they all met with dramatic reversals that disrupted their lives and threatened to shatter forever their ambition. However, they all emerged better fitted to confront the challenges and dilemmas of their times. The book addresses the questions: Are leaders born or made? Where does ambition come from? How does adversity affect the growth of leadership? Does the leader make the times or do the times make the leader?
Reviewed by Carol Campbell, PhD
Vice President for Education
Southwestern Union Conference
Author: Karin Hess
Author: John Kotter
