The book's main selling point--the "Table talk" or informal interviews Young conducted with Grant--are mildly interesting in spots, but are not, on the whole, valuable enough to justify this new edition, particularly since Young's original two volumes are readily available at most libraries and on the internet's various used bookstores. Instead of wasting their time on such a relatively common and uninteresting work, I wish the publishers had turned their attention to reissuing more compelling old books on Grant that are less readily available.

However, this new edition is edited by Michael Fellman and he does quite a nifty job in eliminating the extraneous material and retaining the essentially great elements of Young's original volumes. The heart of the book is Grant's table talk, where he spoke with rare candor about some of his civil war contemporaries such as Lee, Longstreet, Jackson, Sheridan and Sherman. These comments still resonate today, and rarely did Grant speak about these men at such length or with such perception.

John Russell Young idolized Grant and saw in him the qualities that make him the quintessential American hero. Grant was a bashful, hopelessly naive and honest man, and these traits come through in this work, illuminating his wry humor and extremely likeable character. Fellman has done well in editing this new version which focuses the reader on Grant and not trivial details about flowers, luggage or place settings. A nice book!