Too Much and Never Enough: How My Family Created the World's Most Dangerous Man

Mary L. Trump

Jul 2020 · Sold by Simon and Schuster

About this ebook

In this revelatory, authoritative portrait of Donald J. Trump and the toxic family that made him, Mary L. Trump, a trained clinical psychologist and Donald’s only niece, shines a bright light on the dark history of their family in order to explain how her uncle became the man who now threatens the world’s health, economic security, and social fabric.

Mary Trump spent much of her childhood in her grandparents’ large, imposing house in the heart of Queens, New York, where Donald and his four siblings grew up. She describes a nightmare of traumas, destructive relationships, and a tragic combination of neglect and abuse. She explains how specific events and general family patterns created the damaged man who occupied the Oval Office, including the strange and harmful relationship between Fred Trump and his two oldest sons, Fred Jr. and Donald.

A firsthand witness to countless holiday meals and interactions, Mary brings an incisive wit and unexpected humor to sometimes grim, often confounding family events. She recounts in unsparing detail everything from her uncle Donald’s place in the family spotlight and Ivana’s penchant for regifting to her grandmother’s frequent injuries and illnesses and the appalling way Donald, Fred Trump’s favorite son, dismissed and derided him when he began to succumb to Alzheimer’s.

Numerous pundits, armchair psychologists, and journalists have sought to parse Donald J. Trump’s lethal flaws. Mary L. Trump has the education, insight, and intimate familiarity needed to reveal what makes Donald, and the rest of her clan, tick. She alone can recount this fascinating, unnerving saga, not just because of her insider’s perspective but also because she is the only Trump willing to tell the truth about one of the world’s most powerful and dysfunctional families.

Ratings and reviews

I had no preconceived notions for this book. As a Behavioral scientist and a psychologist, I was interested in the recounting of the early life of the Trumps'. Unforturnately, the family history, largely typical in the mid to upper-class, and often over dratmaticized, recounting of her younger years; has more of a "why not me?" angle of the authors' point of reference. An insider's, up close and personal, of a "bigger than life" family. A family that many have been fascinated by. While we all have skeleton's in our "family closet," it definitely is an interesting and well-written piece. However, timing is everything. It absolutely hints quite frequently, at the writer's dissatisfaction regarding monetary gain, unfair and preferential treatment. This book is helpful in giving the reader insight to the earlier years of the current president, the family and author. Overall, not an indicator of current behavior in regards to the president. The author is, quite a talented writer.

Nothing of vaule. She states early in the book that she was written out of the well and no one really likes her. The book is about Fred Trump but she her self never really knew the guy and tries to tie tons of her opinions as facts...namely Donald Trump and his background. Most of it seems psuedo psychology...based around her imagination and nothing of any merit. Well written...nothing of vaule. People who hate trump will love it....because that's the target audience. Any peer review or basic objectivity would end up with about 4 pages of dark humor. Fan fiction in the darkest timeline.

I think this is nothing more than a family member who feels she was wronged by not getting what she feels was her rightful inheritance! She admits shes not been close to the president in years, yet still harbors a deep resentment for things in the past. She try saying things done by others Trump wished was him. How do you know he thought that? Where is the evidence to back up your claims? Every family has history they are not proud of, or dark secrets they don't want to tell anyone. If he wasn't our president or a television icon these secrets would remain just that. I feel bad for public icons as they have absolutely no privacy! They are entitled to privacy just as much as you or I yet they do not get that luxury. Mary could easily be telling her truth, but even if the American people ate it up & believed her, people change! Just because you may have been a 'bad' person in your past, doesn't mean you are still that person!

About the author

Mary L. Trump holds a PhD from the Derner Institute of Advanced Psychological Studies and taught graduate courses in trauma, psychopathology, and developmental psychology. She lives with her daughter in New York.