Easy reading written in bit sized chunks. Great for car reading, or someone who just doesn't have a lot of time to read. Lots of neat stories inside too.

I recently started reading this and realized I'd read it years ago; likely when it first came out, which is what I'm marking it as though I can't recall precisely. I had loved Margaret Truman's murder mysteries and think I read this after I'd read that series of books. This is a very interesting history, fairly apolitical book given the subject matter. It is written as short vignette pieces on a variety of topics from state dinners and dining chairs and menus to secret service history to first families and weddings in the white house. I enjoyed the behind the scenes glimpse of staff and space and objects by one who has lived there and had to deal with the challenges as well as pleasure of such. An entertaining and well researched piece of light history.

Good book about the behind the scenes at the White House; good historical story.

None of the stories here are ground breaking or new, but this book is a nice overview of White House life. Truman was a bit more sympathetic toward Democrats, but she did admit this in a tongue in cheek way several times throughout the book and it should have been somewhat expected.

I loved this book. I actually bought it (used) because I thought my sister would enjoy it. She likes books about American history. I decided to read it first and I'm glad I did. It's full of fun anecdotes and more somber stories about all the families who lived in the White House from 1800 to 2008. It ended with the George W. Bush administration. There are a few photos inside also and a list of the presidents, their wives, and their years in residence. A very good use of the dollar I spent to buy it. I wish now that I could see inside the White House, but I think that will not be possible. Our world today is too dangerous to allow too many people to visit there.

This has some interesting stories of the history of the White House. She favored her father a lot but considering those were the things that she lived it was no surprise.

An odd mix of history, memoir, and political commentary

A unique, though jumbled, look at America's most famous house (claiming it is the world's most famous house is a little much for me, unless she's not counting castles, palaces, etc, as "houses").

Each chapter deals with a different aspect or topic of the White House (womanpower, pets, children, etc), but the timeline within each chapter is largely non-existent. She may start the chapter by talking about JFK, then jump back to Jefferson, then forward to Garfield, and then to Clinton. Unless you are already familiar with all the president's names and general time period then it will be very easy to loose your sense of direction. As it was, I have this general knowledge and sometimes I still had to think about it to put people in their correct context.

Margaret covers both familiar history such as Dolley Madison saving White House valuable during the War of 1812, and the less familiar, such as details about the weddings to take place there. In fact, most of the history she covers falls under "less familiar history"...and most of that falls into the 1900s and after. Apparently there just isn't much to document a lot of the aspects of the house she covers early in American history, and it seems a lot of her more recent stories come straight from the horses mouth. At least, that's the impression she gives.

She obviously did research for the book, and even makes comments about doing research, but there isn't a bibliography or a place for further sources. I think a lot of her stories come from the people who lived or worked in the White House (some of whom are credited in the text) but a lot of facts are just put out there with no reference.

It's understandable that Margaret would share stories about her father (Harry S. Truman) from her own perspective, even calling him "dad" in the text, but this was sometimes distracting. Yes, it served to remind the reader that she was an "authority" having lived in the White House for 7-and-a-half (or 7-and-three-quarters, depending on the story) years, but it broke the narrative flow.

For its history and memoir natures, this book was definitely not solely focused on facts and memories. Margaret liberally sprinkles in her political commentary. She makes no question that she is a Democrat, but sometimes she goes a little far in characterizing her opposition ("just like a Republican!", except obviously you can't make blanket statements like that). I'm an Independent so being unfair to her political opponents rubbed me the wrong way. The good news, though, is that she had no issue noting when someone in her party was out of line (Hillary's attempt at Health Care Reform while first lady is one such example).

The subtitle of the book should have been specific, instead of saying "1800s to Present" it should say "1800s to name-the-year" or "John Adams to Bill Clinton" W. Bush was in office at at the time of her writing this book, and while he gets a couple comments, she notes that during the administration is not the time to get the "insider" stories, you have to wait till his staff starts talking when he's no longer in office.

Overall, the book contains some interesting tidbits, but it's time-hopping nature along with the commentary don't make this a particularly memorable read. It is very easy to put down and forget to pick back up.

I love Margaret Truman’s mystery books, I have read almost all of her capital murder series. However, even though I found plenty of interesting information about the different residents, presidents and their families, employees and visitors, as well as the architectural transformation of the house through almost 200 years, it was slow reading. But what I was sadly surprised it was the way the author depicted Mrs Eleanor Rooselvelt. Mrs. R, according to many of her biographies have depicted her as FDR’ legs and eyes through all the trips she took around the world on his behalf due to her husband’s disability. When the author writes about the effort of Presidents and First Ladies on racial equality during pre and post WWII she failed to mention Mrs Rosevelt’s effort to have Marian Anderson sing in Washington DC and when the Daughters of the American Revolution refused Ms Anderson to sing in their hall, Mrs Lincoln resigned her membership and arranged for the talented singer, who was already famous in Europe, to sing at the foot of the Lincoln Memorial. I wish Mrs M Truman would have spent more time about Mrs Rooselvelt’s accomplishments.

I found this book insightful, intriguing, informative and fun to read. Not knowing much of the history of the White House it came to life through this book. There was a new found respect for those early "First Families", what they went through and how they tried to preserve the founding ideals.
Even though it is 396 pages it is a very quick read as the stories are short. Margaret Truman does a wonderful job bringing the White House to life. I don't remember many of the residents (okay I didn't pay attention) but those that have seen more than a few presidents come and go would enjoy this book. For me it was a history lesson that I enjoyed learning.

Wonderful audiobook and wonderful narrator. I did think it ended suddenly without a wrap up. I loved the stories and it was great to listen to in the car while running errands. Perfect for in and out.

There is very little historical value to this book. To me this was pure "fluff" history. Too much of Margaret Truman and not enough facts. Because she lived in the White House Margaret Truman must think that makes her a credible source and therefore she did not need to cite one source, make any notes or even include a bibliography. There were direct quotes but no clue as to where they came from. Truman would also occasionally mention a book that someone else has written, even quote from it but not give the title of the book. All of this really irked me and the book lost pretty much all credibility as far as I'm concerned because of it.
I could have done with out many of Truman's personal observations and feelings as well as her little side comments like this one, "You might be surprised by this, I know I was." I guess this added a conversational tone to the book but I did not care for it. I also think that a good history of the White House should give us a little less of a partisan view than the one Truman gave us.
Overall, I was not too impressed with this book but there were just enough interesting stories and little bits of trivia to make it worth the time I put into it.

This book provides lots of stories about the White House and the people that have lived there.

It is divided into topics and the topics might have several chapters. It is well written and very easy to read.

Lots of great stories!!