This volume is significantly shorter than the other 2. Perhaps because almost the entire book focuses on LBJ's 1948 run for the senate against Coke Stevenson. There is minimal coverage to his tenure as a congressman and also his short stint in the Navy during WWII. The time in the Navy is rather interesting. I don't look at the Silver Star lapel that LBJ was fond of wearing in the same light anymore!

Caro spends a fair amount of time on Coke Stevenson. I was not familiar with Coke Stevenson, and Caro presents him as a man with no skeletons in his closet. A man with no faults except that he was too nice, and in politics "nice" gets you beat. While I don't doubt he was a decent man, I find it hard to believe he was the saint that Caro portrayed him as. I plan on reading up on Coke from other sources to get a better idea of who he was. He is of great interest to me. For those of us who enjoy reading, you'll be interested in him too as he was a voracious reader.

If there is one thing I took away from this book, it is that I have increased my dislike for LBJ. Granted, Caro is helping with that as he seems to share the same disdain. After the first volume in this series, I was on the fence leaning towards disdain. My disdain has shifted towards disgust after reading the second volume, but you still have to admire LBJ's tenacity. He was a master politician. ( )

INCREDIBLE! I love Coke Stevenson, and my how history would be different if the 87 votes that changed this election swayed the other way. The amazing thing about reading a Robert Caro book is that you are introduced to the oddest of characters, yet each and every one of them is based in history. He makes history a story worth hearing about, even when he goes on and on for chapters about the most minuscule of information. I can't wait to start Master of the Senate. ( )

2333 The Years of Lyndon Johnson: Means of Ascent, by Robert A. Caro (read 14 Oct 1990) (National Book Critics Circle biography award for 1990) This second volume of Caro's biography of LBJ covers the years from 1941 to 1948. About 2/3rds of the book is about the 1948 campaign. The book is positively hagiographical on Coke Stevenson, LBJ's opponent in 1948, and I found this bias a little sickening. The story of LBJ's stint in the Navy in World War II is interesting--MacArthur gave him the Silver Star for a trip as an observer in a plane which was attacked by Zeros--no one else in the plane got one! The account of the way Abe Fortas saved LBJ's fraudulent election in 1948 is super-interesting. There is no doubt in my mind that LBJ should not have been the winner in that race, and that fraud gave him the 87 votes which were his margin of victory. Some of the account about LBJ's campaigning in 1948 seems exaggerated. Caro is a flamboyant writer, though he has done a lot of research. ( )

Volume two of the Lyndon Johnson biography covers the years from 1942-1948. Years in which Johnson, frustrated with his seat in the House of Representatives, lusted after a seat in the US senate, and got it, after stealing the election from Coke Stevenson. This is the book that makes you really hate LBJ. ( )

The weakest of the three, by a long shot. The story is shaped not so much by history but by Caro's desire for a struggle between good (Coke Stevenson) and evil (Johnson), sugarcoating and whitewashing the one and demonizing the other. No question Johnson was deeply corrupt, but Caro's animus toward his subject tips his hand. ( )