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Another Reagan biographer is claiming that author Rick Perlstein, who recently published the critically acclaimed Ronald Reagan biography 鈥淭he Invisible Bridge,鈥� plagiarized.

According to , a lawyer for 鈥淩eagan鈥檚 Revolution鈥� author Craig Shirley, Chris Ashby, sent letters to Perlstein鈥檚 publisher, Simon & Schuster, demonstrating what Ashby said are 19 sections of Perlstein鈥檚 book in which either the language is the same as in Shirley鈥檚 book or Shirley鈥檚 findings are used in Perlstein鈥檚 book but not properly cited.

Since Ashby sent the letter, Shirley said he has found even more sections in which his own findings were used in Perlstein鈥檚 book without attributing Shirley, according to the NYT.

Simon & Schuster president and publisher Jonathan Karp said 鈥淏ridge鈥� is 鈥渁 meticulously researched work of scholarship鈥� and that the accusations are 鈥渓udicrous.鈥�

Perlstein says he put his endnotes on his author鈥檚 website because his book 鈥� already more than 800 pages 鈥� would have been more than a thousand if he had included all his citations, according to the NYT. Shirley is mentioned in the endnotes more than 100 times.

鈥淭he claim of plagiarism doesn鈥檛 fly; these are paraphrases,鈥� Perlstein told the NYT. 鈥淚鈥檓 reverent toward my sources. History is a team sport, and references are how you support your teammates.鈥�

Perlstein told the NYT the charges could be motivated by the way in which he depicts Reagan in the book, which some conservatives might find unflattering. Shirley鈥檚 company Shirley & Banister Public Affairs, of which he is chief executive and president, has clients such as Ann Coulter.

Ashby is asking for $25 million in damages, the destruction of all physical copies of 鈥淭he Invisible Bridge,鈥� an apology, and that revisions be made to all electronic versions of Perlstein鈥檚 book. 鈥淭he rephrasing of words without proper attribution is still plagiarism,鈥� Shirley told the NYT.

Shirley spoke more about the controversy with , saying, 鈥淣ot even is there plagiarism, but there are gross errors. [Perlstein] says Reagan鈥檚 appearance before the [1976] convention wasn鈥檛 spontaneous. I can show you copies of the tape, Reagan shaking his head no, he doesn鈥檛 want to go down and speak. There were 17,000 people in the arena, and none of them believed Reagan was going to make an appearance. That's just utterly and completely bad history.鈥澛�

However, according to Slate, Elizabeth A. McNamara of the law firm Davis, Wright, and Tremaine, which represents Simon & Schuster, wrote to Ashby that Perlstein 鈥渄ug deeper鈥� than Shirley had when researching the convention and that Perlstein had discovered that Reagan had been laughing as he watched the convention on TV but then stopped laughing when it came to his attention that he was being seen on TV.

Slate writer David Weigel referenced Perlstein鈥檚 claims that some conservatives didn鈥檛 like his portrayal of the president, writing, 鈥淚n Shirley's version of the story, Reagan was underrated once again; in Perlstein's, he is underrated but calculating. You can understand why Shirley is so upset at the new book; you can understand, too, why there is great interest in stopping Perlstein's history from becoming the official look at Reagan's rise.鈥澛�

The Monitor had selected 鈥淭he Invisible Bridge鈥� as one of its 10 best books of August and the book had previously received many positive reviews, with reviewer David L. Ulin calling it 鈥渁 magnificent and nuanced work" and 聽finding it to be an "ambitious, wide-ranging, and superbly written account filled with wonderful insights."