This worm's-eye view of extreme politics is a slightly sharper-edged version of The West Wing, dominated by world-weary but once idealistic operatives who dislike being thought of as operatives and who are loyal to a president who's got just a touch too much on his plate: health care, climate change, war, terrorism and "a big, fat, catastrophic, global recession, courtesy of [O's] predecessor." 

Herb served the Trump Organization for twenty-seven years, holding jobs in everything from a food and beverage manager at the Trump Magnifica to being the first general manager of the Trump Bloody Run Golf Course. And when his old boss asks "his favorite Jew" to take on the daunting role of chief of staff, Herb, spurred on by loyalty, agrees. But being the chief of staff is a lot different from being a former hospitality expert

by Jerome Charyn

Traces the historic arc of Lincoln's life from his picaresque days as a gangly young lawyer in Sangamon County, Illinois, through his improbable marriage to Kentucky belle Mary Todd, to his 1865 visit to war-shattered Richmond only days before his assassination.

by Dave Eggers

A boorish ignoramus takes command of a noble vessel and heads full speed ahead into chaos. Yes, it's an allegory.  When the commander of the ship Glory retires, a corrupt (not to mention "large and lumpy") kitsch merchant nominates himself for the job, enchanting some and horrifying others

by James Ellroy

There are three protagonists: a CIA agent who pimps for JFK, another agent who trains anti-Castro rebels, and a lawyer who is a Mafia hunter. Through their eyes are seen the conflicting interests of the Kennedys, the director of the FBI, organized crime, organized labor, Castro and Cuban exiles.

by Glen David Gold

Filled with historical references that evoke the excesses and enthusiasm of postwar, pre-Depression America, Carter Beats the Devil is the complex and illuminating story of one man's journey through a magical -- and sometimes dangerous -- world, where illusion is everything, and everything is illusory.

by Kristin Gore

A mildly hypochondriac but sweet young senatorial aide takes everything mean old Washington can throw at her while giving her all to a possible national program to lower prescription costs for senior citizens.

by James Lehrer

A Secret Service agent who made the fateful decision to remove the security bubble from John F. Kennedy's parade car struggles with suicidal feelings of guilt until a young reporter endeavors to determine the day's outcome if the bubbletop had been in place.

by Thomas Mallon

Conveys the drama and high comedy of the Nixon presidency through the urgent perspectives of seven characters we only thought we knew before now, moving readers from the private cabins of Camp David to the klieg lights of the Senate Caucus Room, from the District of Columbia jail to the Dupont Circle mansion of Theodore Roosevelt's sharp-tongued ninety-year-old daughter, and into the hive of the Watergate complex itself.

Amiable With Big Teeth : a Novel of the Love Affair Between the Communists and the Poor Black Sheep of Harlem
by Claude McKay
 

Written in 1941, McKay's novel describes a time a few years earlier, when Harlem was alive with talk of African-American civil rights as Franklin Roosevelt entered his third term as president

by Andrew Shaffer

Vice President Joe Biden is fresh out of the Obama White House and feeling adrift when his favorite railroad conductor dies in a suspicious accident, leaving behind an ailing wife and a trail of clues. To unravel the mystery, "Amtrak Joe" re-teams with the only man he's ever fully trusted -- the 44th president of the United States. 

On a stifling, hot afternoon in September 1901, a young anarchist, Leon Czolgosz, who has been stalking President William McKinley, waits in line to meet the president, his right hand wrapped in a handkerchief and held across his chest as though it were in a sling.  But the handkerchief conceals a .32-caliber revolver, and when the president greets him, Czolgosz fires two shots.

by Jake Tapper

After a mysterious fatal car accident kills his predecessor, Congressman Charlie Marder struggles to navigate the dangerous waters of 1950s Washington, D.C., where he finds an underworld of backroom deals, secret societies, and a conspiracy at the highest levels of the government.

by Kurt Vonnegut

Rich/poor, honest/criminal, management/labor -- Vonnegut playfully explores the ease with which an American Everyman can alternate between these ostensible extremes.  No one can make America into childlike myth like Vonnegut can. Here he takes capitalism, labor history, Sacco-Vanzetti, McCarthyism, and Watergate, and puts them all into the slender memoirs of Walter F. Starbuck

 

Natalie Savage covers the White House for ATN network.  Except the gig is temporary, to see if she's got "it".  Her competition?  A spoiled frat boy who got his TV break eating raw animal parts on a reality show.  Guess who's winning?