The Second Life of John Wilkes Booth is a gripping historical novel that follows the renowned stage-actor-turned-assassin from Ford’s Theater, through his escape and into the American West, to Montana Territory. He is pursued by his own personal demons and by a suspicious newspaper reporter on the trail of the scoop of a lifetime. The author offers an epilogue about the novel’s origins: In 1947 Conrad was serving as personal secretary to Sinclair Lewis when the Nobel laureate spontaneously composed the Booth tale over breakfast.