After reading JUDGMENT DAYS Lyndon Baines Johnson, Martin Luther King Jr., and the Laws That Changed America I became very fond of LBJ and decided to look up a full biography.
Caro's books (I've gotten through 2, I'm guessing that the 4th book about hist presidency which I haven't gotten to yet will probably portray him more even handedly) are wonderful, super detailed things but the author seems to have a simple picture of Johnson and everything feels like another link in his argument chain. It's not that Caro hates LBJ or that he never portrays him positively but he seems to greatly accentuate his flaws. While portraying LBJ (and his crowd) as cynical and amoral it seem to me that he portrays some of the people around LBJ(like his mother, father, mentor Sam Rayburn, opponent Coke Stevenson) as saints, sanding of any of their rough edges to make him LBJ worse in comparison.
I was wondering if there's a 2nd/3rd best biography that while not being pro-LBJ propaganda accentuate more of his positive aspects, to balance me out.
Interesting, I've never heard that critique of Caro's series before, I'm about to pick up the first volume and give it a read here soon. For other biographies you might find a little more neutral or positive, I might recommend Robert Dallek's one-volume Lyndon B. Johnson: Portrait of a President. He also wrote a longer two-volume biography of LBJ which I believe presents him in a more positive light. (The single-volume at least: I can't speak about the two volume edition.)
The three biggest anecdotes from Dallek's book that come to mind present LBJ in a positive light: early on, he says he wants to be in a position of authority so he can give back to the disenfranchised, the discussion of the wonderful job he did (pre-politics) as a schoolteacher, and the sad fact that LBJ's friends surrounded his coffin after his death when Lady Bird told them he "never liked to be alone."
Another book I've heard glowing things about and is the other biography of LBJ is Doris Kearns Goodwin's Lyndon Johnson and the American Dream, which I plan to pick up at the end of the month. Goodwin is respected for such books as Team of Rivals about Lincoln's cabinet and The Bully Pulpit about Teddy Roosevelt and No Ordinary Time about FDR and Eleanor Roosevelt. She is highly regarded and I've heard her LBJ biography is phenomenal, as he was the president she looked up to while in college, as I understand it. The book also includes interviews with LBJ, I want to say I read recently, which really helps to understand his POV.
Those are the only two I can speak of specifically, but if you're looking for some more ideas, this website always gives me a few ideas for difficult-to-find presidential biographies.
Sources:
Doris Kearns Goodwin, Lyndon Johnson and the American Dream
Robert Dallek, Lyndon B. Johnson: Portrait of a President