Katherine Howe (1) (1977–)

If you're interested in the Gilded Age and nouveau riche this is a great book. It was really interesting reading about the rise to wealth of the family. The extravagance and opulence that they lived among and created are mind-blowing. Also mindblowing is the fact that so little of this great empire exists today. It is a star-studded cast of characters told from a removed but insider voice of Anderson Cooper. It probably deserves a higher rating because it is very well done I just am not sure that I cared all that much about the rise and fall of the family as much as others might.… (more)

This book surprised me. I really borrowed it because I have so much respect for Anderson Cooper. I have very little interest in the stories of rich people, including Cooper’s family, the famous Vanderbilts. I had read one of Anderson’s previous books, “The Rainbow Comes and Goes: A Mother and Son on Life, Love, and Loss,” and on the strength of that book, I thought I would take a chance on this one. I’m glad I did. I listened to the audio version of the book, narrated beautifully by Anderson Cooper. Anderson was in the process of adopting his first son, Wyatt, while writing this book. He said that friends and acquaintances constantly asked him if he was going to give Wyatt, who was named for Anderson’s father, the middle name Vanderbilt. His response, “I never considered naming him Vanderbilt.” And when someone asked him how it felt to be a member of one of the richest, most powerful families in the history of this country, he said, “I’m a Cooper, not a Vanderbilt.” What I found extremely interesting about this book was what I learned about the life and times of the culture the Vanderbilts, the Astors, and the rest of that world they lived in. A sideline was an interesting section on Truman Capote. I learned several things about him I didn’t know, including what led to his downfall: an ill advised article he wrote for Esquire Magazine in 1975, “La Cote Basque—1965.” In that article he exposed many of the embarrassing stories behind the gossip about the rich and famous at the time. He claimed it was “thinly disguised,” but it was anything but that, and everyone mentioned in the piece as well as those who were friends and family of those people, cut Capote off. His masterpiece, “In Cold Blood” put him on the map and made him the center of the A list on both coasts. “La Cote Basque” knocked him off…permanently. Cooper wrote this book with novelist Katherine Howe, and I’m not sure how much Anderson actually wrote. The writing is masterfully written whoever wrote it. I highly recommend “The Vanderbilts: The Rise and Fall of an American Dynasty.”… (more)