Watergate

November 14, 2011
Mallon’s historical novels have been moving steadily closer to the present, from the Lincoln era through the Gilded and Jazz ages to the 1940s and, with Fellow Travelers, his last book, the McCarthy era. Here he takes on the ’70s, which, depending on the reader, will seem either ancient or way too recent to be history. As Mallon moves from the break-in of the Democratic National Committee offices to Nixon’s resignation, shifting viewpoints as he goes, he provides a lot of exposition. Some of it, implausibly, occurs in dialogue and internal monologues, as people go over what they know for the sake of readers who no longer do or never did. It’s hard going at first, but the reward is getting to enter the heads of Watergate participants who were off to the side or never wrote memoirs: Nixon secretary Rose Mary Woods, progenitor of the famed 18-minute tape gap; stoic Pat Nixon; meddling Alice Roosevelt Longworth, famously tart-tongued and responsible here for some very funny moments; and Mississippian Fred LaRue, aka the “Bagman.” Mallon makes these people sympathetic, no small feat; readers may be surprised at how much they end up disliking Elliot Richardson, one of the era’s few heroes. If the author can’t bring the story to a satisfying close or explain why so many were so loyal to the president they call “the Old Man,” well, history is often messier than fiction. Agent: The Wylie Agency

November 15, 2011
Revisiting the history of the '70s with our favorite cast of characters. Mallon casts a wide political net, starting at the time of the Watergate break-in and ending (except for an epilogue) just after the time Nixon resigned. In between he reconstructs the whole insalubrious episode and how it played out for the prime suspects. Players like Presidential Aide Fred LaRue are also given prominent space, and there's a special affection Mallon seems to have for Rose Mary Woods, Nixon's hapless secretary (or Executive Assistant, as she became) who notoriously erased 18 minutes of taped conversations in the Oval Office...or did she? Other favorites include Martha Mitchell, whose boozy garrulity got her husband, Attorney General John Mitchell, into even deeper trouble. Mallon takes us to the salons and dinner parties of the Highly Connected, like Alice Roosevelt Longworth, where the unfolding of sordid incidents serves as relish to the meals. Pat Nixon emerges as a sympathetic character, disturbed by her husband's machinations yet powerless to stop--or even to comprehend--them. We witness the hubris and self-satisfaction of Nixonites as Sam Ervin is named to head the investigating committee. (He's dismissed as an "old, unenergetic southerner who lacked any particular animus toward Nixon"). Elliot Richardson is ingratiating, whipsmart and super-ambitious--and craves even more political power when Spiro Agnew resigns in disgrace. And we're reintroduced to characters time has almost forgotten: Leon Jaworski, Judge John Sirica and Howard Hunt, who frequently consumes milk to keep at bay effects of a troubling ulcer. While billed as a novel, this book reads more like a documentary of a fascinating yet unlamented time.

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September 15, 2011

Author of such celebrated novels as Dewey Defeats Truman, Mallon would seem to have the right mix of historical understanding and fresh whimsy that a crazily earthshaking event like Watergate requires. As he unfolds the story from the perspectives of seven characters, Mallon takes on some of the abiding questions of this scandal (e.g., who erased those crucial moments on the tape?). This will be popular.

Copyright 2011 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from November 15, 2011
Mallon (Fellow Travelers, 2007), astute and nimble, continues his scintillating, morally inquisitive journey through crises great and absurd in American politics by taking on Watergate. Mixing judiciously selected facts about the infamous break-in and cover-up with shrewd invention, Mallon creates a whirling behind-the-scenes drama with a selective and intriguing cast: Nixon, a misanthrope in a flesh-presser's profession, able to succeed from cunning and a talent for denying reality at close range. Howard Hunt, a mediocre fiction writer turned ill-fated White House plumber. Ambitious cabinet member Elliot Richardson, and melancholy and enigmatic bagman Fred LaRue. Always sensitive to the marginalized, Mallon tells the stories of the Watergate women with particular insight and panache, beginning with Pat Nixon, a clandestine smoker with a secret love and far more wit and moxie than her public persona suggests. Nixon's devoted and flinty secretary, Rose Mary Woods, loves to dance and conceals a molten temper. The venomously funny belle of this satirical ball is Alice Longworth Roosevelt, who, in her mischievous nineties, knows everyone and will say anything. Mallon himself is deliciously witty. But it is his political fluency and unstinting empathy that transform the Watergate debacle into a universal tragicomedy of ludicrous errors and malignant crimes, epic hubris and sorrow. HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: With Washington politics in an uproar, Mallon's knowing and entertaining take on Watergate will garner avid media attention as he makes appearances accompanied by a high-profile ad campaign.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2011, American Library Association.)

October 15, 2011

If ever a historical event was worthy of a comic novel, it's Watergate, and Mallon, with several outstanding historical novels to his credit (most recently, Fellow Travelers), has the skills to write it. What a cast of characters we meet! Ex-spy G. Gordon Liddy is nearly certifiable; his colleague H. Howard Hunt's hold on reality seems equally tenuous at times. Around them floats a cast of clowns and self-serving creeps who make the familiar story a veritable opera buffa. At the top, clinging desperately to his fading political success, is Nixon, a complicated man who can't understand why people don't trust him. Events unfold through the perspectives of six characters: Republican Party fixer Fred LaRue; ex-spook Hunt; 90-year-old society madam Alice Roosevelt Longworth; Nixon's doggedly loyal secretary, Rose Woods; Nixon himself; and his wife, Pat, who comes across as far from the plastic Barbie Doll she's usually portrayed to be. There are no surprise revelations here, but Mallon writes with such swagger that it all seems new again. VERDICT A sure winner, for its subject and Mallon's proven track record as a historical novelist, and because it's good. [See Prepub Alert, 8/15/11.]--David Keymer, Modesto CA

Copyright 2011 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.