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Honestly difficult to make it through.
As (surprisingly) interesting as I found Andrew Jackson, his right hand man Van Buren leaves you wanting. VB's sole major accomplishment was the creation of the modern political party and the establishment of the two party system. He was a man who was personally virtuous, played it safe with most every major hot button issue and spent most of his life working the back corridors of power.
So - if you're writing about VB - this is what you have to work with, and Cole wasn't able to spin gold from this straw.
Book was written in 1984, I could have guessed 1904.