Synopsis:
In this book McCarry turns to an aged political theme: Do the ends justify the means? When is idealism a luxury one can't afford? How much can one overlook in order to let the imperfect but preferable "better angels " remain in charge? The basic plot (a U.S. President with a secret he's been covering up) has been going 'round and 'round ever since Watergate, but McCarry is a shrewd storyteller, and this savvy tale (set in the 1990s, but with only a few, quiet futuristic touches) seems more fresh, without any shadows of Watergate's stock characters.
The scandal about to break: President Franklin "Frosty" Mallory secretly ordered the pseudo-suicide murder of a mad Islamic leader who was about to launch nuclear attacks on Israel, maybe even the U.S. and this story has now somehow been leaked to top TV newsman Patrick Graham, whose investigative reporting unseated the previous president (a potential Hitler); Graham doggedly gathers clues and presses the White House for answers.
Caught in the middle is likable, well-bred White House aide Julian Rogers, a man with a triple connection to the crisis: he knew about the assassination from the start; his suave half-brother Horace turns out to be the CIA (now called FIS) man in charge of the operation; and years ago he won out over Patrick Graham in a love triangle. (Graham, an ex-radical and self-made man, still bears something of a proletarian grudge.) Will Graham release this disastrous story even though he vastly prefers President Mallory to the alternative & even though the assassination is probably the best thing for the world? And, if so, how will Mallory and Julian fight back? Such a book can seem like old news to us today, but these issues are never out of date and are thrust forward in this book without cynicism or self-righteousness.
|
