After enjoying Sarah's earlier "Take the Cannoli," I picked up "Assassination Vacation" a few years ago to take on a future business trip. It finally bubbled to the top in 2012. The book discusses the assassinations of Lincoln, Garfield, and McKinley as viewed by travelling to the locations where events took place and homes of the people involved. In other words, she tracked down a lot of historical plaques. While still a humorous writer, Ms Vowell is clearly INTO this kind of history. The book leans much harder toward historical facts than laughs. Think more like Doris Kearns Goodwin after a bottle of wine. I took two big-picture items from the text. First, growing up I was bombarded with the single-shooter narrative for Lincoln and JFK, mainly by people trying to draw parallels between them. But there was an actual conspiracy to kill Lincoln. And some serious debate on whether some of them aided and abetted Booth's attempted escape. Second, when this 2005 book quoted people who supported assassinating Garfield, I felt the same tone I would hear from the Tea Party in 2009. Lots of talk of threats to the nation but few policy specifics. If you want to dork out on the details of Garfield's or McKinley's assassination, this is the book for you. If you want light humor mixed with history, try her earlier works.