\u201cJFK: Public, Private, Secret\u201d by J. Randy Taraborelli; \u00a9 2025, St. Martin\u2019s Press\u2019 592 pages.<\/p>\n
History often isn\u2019t kind.<\/p>\n
It can be rightfully critical, scrutinized, debated, corrected, and held up as a lesson. What was intentional in a long-ago time might be seen as wrong or disturbing with modern eyes. Is this unkind, revisionary, or a natural reaction? Read \u201cJFK: Public, Private, Secret\u201d by J. Randy Taraborelli and ask yourself: can we view history with empathy and compassion?<\/p>\n
Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy never wanted nine children.<\/p>\n
She didn\u2019t seem to like children much, in fact, and she certainly didn\u2019t want any more with her philandering husband, Joe. But a century ago, having a large family was expected of a Catholic woman, especially one in the public eye \u2014 and so, Rose was \u201calways pregnant and always sick.\u201d<\/p>\n
Her second son, John (also called Jack), was aware of his mother\u2019s feelings when he was small and he accepted it, understanding early that she wasn\u2019t going to change. His dad, according to Taraborelli, was the better parent anyhow, although Joe sometimes seemed to dismiss Jack to favor his elder son, Joseph, Jr.<\/p>\n
That was something that haunted Jack his entire life. In later years, living in his brother\u2019s shadow made him question himself, and he often thought he\u2019d failed as a man.<\/p>\n
And yet, that didn\u2019t stop him from his dreams. Despite that he was often in constant pain due to myriad health issues, his father managed to arrange for Jack to enter the Navy, with the hopes that it would lead to a political career. Jack wanted to be a Senator, and more. Joe urged him to marry soon, because a President needed a wife.<\/p>\n
Specifically, Joe pushed for someone well-bred and quietly cosmopolitan, so when Jack began dating a \u201cDanish Beauty\u201d who\u2019d been photographed with Hitler as part of her job, Joe tried to put his foot down.<\/p>\n
But Jack loved Inga. He didn\u2019t love Jacqueline, and he wasn\u2019t sure he ever would \u2026<\/p>\n
So. In the past 70 years, can there possibly be anything new to learn about John Kennedy?<\/p>\n
Surprisingly, pleasantly, yes.<\/p>\n
In \u201cJFK: Public, Private, Secret,\u201d author J. Randy Taraborelli tells a story that\u2019s familiar but with raindrops and bombshells in between what you already know. Taraborelli makes JFK more human, less politician and you get a front-row seat; information comes from a variety of sources including letters and interviews so you can rest assured that, even though this has the feel of a novel, it\u2019s not fictional.<\/p>\n
What it is, though, is sad \u2014 not just for Kennedy\u2019s mental pain over his parents, his brother, his sisters, and expectations he had to live up to \u2014 but for his wife, for multiple reasons. This book takes you to 1963 with glimpses of how it resonates today and reading it\u2019s almost frustrating because you know how history played out. Despite that it happened many decades ago, you won\u2019t be able to be unaffected by it.<\/p>\n
Readers of politics and fans of biographies will devour \u201cJFK: Public, Private, Secret,\u201d and for good reason: it\u2019s a great story. It\u2019s your kind of book.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cJFK: Public, Private, Secret\u201d by J. Randy Taraborelli; \u00a9 2025, St. Martin\u2019s Press\u2019 592 pages. History often isn\u2019t…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":97971,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[1022,718,171,2252,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-97970","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-books","8":"tag-books","9":"tag-community","10":"tag-entertainment","11":"tag-life","12":"tag-united-states","13":"tag-unitedstates","14":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114927898736018214","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97970","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=97970"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97970\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/97971"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=97970"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=97970"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=97970"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}