Rating: 
Summary: My Favorite Biography!
Review: Biographies are my favorite type of book, and ALL ON FIRE is my all time favorite biography. Mayer does an excellent job of describing the leading role that Garrison played for decades in the abolitionist movement. One can't help but be impressed by the moral courage and vision that Garrison demonstrated throughout so many decades of the 1800s. Don't let the size of this book put you off, if you enjoy biographies, or just a fascinating tale, ALL ON FIRE is for you.
Rating:
Summary: Outstanding, truly outstanding!
Review: For those that have grown accustomed to thinking of the Civil War as some kind of athletic contest, rather than a war of ideas, this book should be on the "must read" list. One of the best biographies I've read in a lifetime of reading biographies, Mayer's 'All on Fire' covers the full sweep of mid-Nineteenth Century American history from the perspective of an activist organizer and outsider rather than the centrist perspective we're used to. Ten years in the making, the book is detailed but not boring. Mayer is a great writer who allows us to see, and feel, the mounting crisis as Americans in the past Century saw and felt it. I can't rate it high enough.
Rating:
Summary: Inspiring story of a man committed to battle against sin
Review: Garrison decided that slavery was wrong, and devoted his entire life to publishing The Liberator, a newspaper whose only mission was to end slavery. He did so, week after week, often without money, and occassionally despite violent attacks by pro-slavery forces. He refused compromise. He refused to accept "workable" solutions. Slavery was morally bankrupt, and he fought against it, using the power of words alone. When he began his crusade, slavery was accepted, and most people thought it was here to stay. Garrsison was a voice crying in the dark. When he closed down The Liberator, slavery was over, and the vast majority of the country thought it was wrong. Anyone who reads, anyone who fights for social justice, and certainly anyone who writes should read this book. It is hard to imagine anyone whose life reflects the axiom: "the pen is mightier than the sword" better than Garrison.
Rating:
Summary: Spectacular, rich and rewarding read about great U.S. hero
Review: I cannot recommend it highly enough. A rich read about a great American hero for all times. Mayer obviously loves and admires Garrison, but this did not keep him from portraying this hero with his blemishes as well as strengths. The most startling thing about this great read is just how important Garrison was to America's most tumultuous time --- the abolitionist of all abolitionists, a leader who appreciated how deep religious beliefs and moral politics go together, who believed in the power of the written and spoken word, who helped perhaps as much as anyone in our history to move our nation and free it of slavery. Truly a companion biography to go with the best biographies of Lincoln --- no understanding of the Civil War can be complete without knowing about Garrison, and this is definitely the way to know about Garrison. To say it simply: no one can claim to be a Civil War buff without knowing about Garrison, and no one can know about Garrison any better way than by reading this book. Highest kudoes to Mayer!
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Summary: NO LOVER OF AMERICAN HISTORY CAN IGNORE THIS MONUMENTAL WORK
Review: I read a great number of biographies that deal with American history, and this is simply one of the finest works I have ever read. In terms of scope and ambition and writing style, I compare ALL ON FIRE with Robert Caro's THE POWER BROKER. Henry Mayer should come to be known as one of America's finest living biographers. In addition to being the definitive biography of William Lloyd Garrison, this is also a brilliant retelling of nineteenth-century American history as seen through the eyes of its greatest Abolitionist leader. This is social and intellectual history at its finest, for Mayer uses Garrison as a focal point to tell the story of the political leaders, writers, agitators, and early women's rights advocates whose lives were affected by the fight to abolish slavery. I realize that this book will take you a good chunk of time, but it is worth every minute. ALL ON FIRE becomes an absorbing, tragic tale, yes, an epic, with all events leading to the carnage of the Civil War and the emancipation of the slaves. Once you have finished this book, you will put Garrison before Lincoln as the one person most responsible for setting free the slaves. It's hard to imagine a time in American history when people were so socially and politically responsible (read the section where 10,000 people encircle a Boston prison to protest the removal of an escaped slave back to South Carolina, for example). There is a great tradition in America of social protest. This book is really a colossal achievement that harkens back to an age when people and ideas still mattered.
Rating:
Summary: Magnificent! Every paragraph is a fascinating gem.
Review: I thought I knew my American history reasonably well until Henry Mayer taught me how much I had missed. Garrison certainly was far more than the hot-headed crusader on the nut fringe I read about in one text after another. But this book also is more than a correction of an historial footnote; Mayer breathes life into the moral arguments about slavery before the Civil War and weaves America's history from the signing of the Constitution to the passage of the 14th Amendment into a colorful, lively tapestry. This is biography raised to its finest form.
Rating: 
Summary: Are you a Southerner? Because Garrison hates you
Review: Let's just get the obvious criticisms out of they way. First, the author pretty much flat out states that The Civil War was fought only because of slavery--and in the preface! Yawn. Will I ever be able to find a Northerner who can write a book that examines both sides of the conflict? I mean southern writers do it all the time. The second problem is the assertion that the Texas Revolution was some kind of government conspiracy--from Pres. Jackson on down to Sam Houston--to perpetuate slavery and continue manifest destiny. While I'm sure some men fought for those reasons, this moronic conspiracy theory about secret government shenanigans has no basis whatsoever. In fact, I would recommend the wonderful biography, Sam Houston, by James Haley. It expertly destroys that awful line of thinking that has somehow survived all these years.
But, being from Texas, I tend to be sensitive to such things. For most people it won't matter.
I still highley recommend All On Fire, though. It is very well written and researched. But most of all, it is the only real biography on Garrison worth reading. And say what you want about the author's biases, he can't muddle the fact that Garrison was one of this country's great patriots, willing to stand up to anyone to free his fellow man. He dedicated his entire life to this noble cause--and except for a few references in some Civil War books--is largely forgotten. What a shame.
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Summary: Garrison the Crusader
Review: Rare is the book that well captures the temper and tone of the times as well as distilling the great arguments that have shaped our world. This book does exactly that and far more. This biography delves deeply into a man who has been reviled and scorned in both his era and ours. Admittedly, I too approached the book with the presumption of guilt for Garrison's complicity in setting the course of the nation toward our tragic civil war. My respect for the man, and the cause he championed, has grown immeasureably from reading this elegantly crafted work. Rich in detail and awesome in it's prose this is one of those books that one can truthfully say is hard to put down. Garrison the zealot, and Garrison the firebrand are well known stereotypes but they do little credit to a man who steadfastly and courageously fought for the equality of all races and the end of slavery. Equally appealing is Garrison the Christian who applied the tenants of his faith to the most confounding and perplexing issue that faced the new nation. Defiant in the face of death threats, and eager to confront all comers in debate, Garrison displayed a moral courage rare in the annals of history. This is the story not only of one man's struggle but also of social change and the abolition of a great evil. Much can be learned, and much enjoyment obtained, from this wonderful volume.
Rating: 
Summary: Overkill
Review: There can be no doubt that this is a thoughtful historical work about Garrison. Nor should anyone doubt that Garrison was an important figure during the time leading up to the Civil War. However, the book is some 630 pages long and has mountains of minute details about the abolitionist movement. Every obscure activist is mentioned no matter how unimportant. I got the feeling that the author wanted to impress readers with the scope of his knowledge about Garrison and the abolitionist movement. In all of the detail, I felt that some of the sense of who Garrison was was lost. I have read the book and learned a great deal, but the gold nuggets in the story were obscured by all of the details.
Rating:
Summary: The Union and the coming of disunion
Review: This excellent biography of Garrison seems to unlock one of the enigmas of both abolition and the Civil War, where the attempt to preserve the Union led to the abolition of slavery. But we might backtrack to the generation of the heroic abolitionists, among them the completely consistent and unwavering Garrison whose platform on disunion is one of the key steps in the mystery of opposites here.
The tale is told in fine grain of a very remarkable one-pointed focus by one who did not compromise and yet outlasted all those who did. From his humble beginnings as an apprentice printer til the suspension of the Liberator after eighteen hundred issues in 1865 we have the portrait of one who brought about real social change, yet was almost marginalized near the end, as the harvest of his labours was achieved.
Even if we are secularists, we should tip our hats to these agitator Christians who had the presence of mind to see the obvious in a culture where everyohne else was out in left field and even the Northern states were racist and seened to resist every step of the way.
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