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Unbelievable: My Front-Row Seat to the…
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Unbelievable: My Front-Row Seat to the Craziest Campaign in American History (edition 2017)

by Katy Tur (Author)

MembersReviewsPopularityAverage ratingMentions
5873840,105 (3.91)43
Biography & Autobiography. Politics. Nonfiction. HTML:

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

"Compelling... this book couldn't be more timely." ā?? Jill Abramson, New York Times Book Review

From the Recipient of the 2017 Walter Cronkite Award for Excellence in Journalism

Called "disgraceful," "third-rate," and "not nice" by Donald Trump, NBC News correspondent Katy Tur reported onā??and took flak fromā??the most captivating and volatile presidential candidate in American history.

Katy Tur lived out of a suitcase for a year and a half, following Trump around the country, powered by packets of peanut butter and kept clean with dry shampoo. She visited forty states with the candidate, made more than 3,800 live television reports, and tried to endure a gazillion loops of Elton John's "Tiny Dancer"ā??a Trump rally playlist staple.

From day 1 to day 500, Tur documented Trump's inconsistencies, fact-checked his falsities, and called him out on his lies. In return, Trump repeatedly singled Tur out. He tried to charm her, intimidate her, and shame her. At one point, he got a crowd so riled up against Tur, Secret Service agents had to walk her to her car.

None of it worked. Facts are stubborn. So was Tur. She was part of the first women-led politics team in the history of network news. The Boys on the Bus became the Girls on the Plane. But the circus remained. Through all the long nights, wild scoops, naked chauvinism, dodgy staffers, and fevered debates, no one had a better view than Tur.

Unbelievable is her darkly comic, fascinatingly bizarre, and often scary story of how America sent a former reality show host to the White House. It's also the story of what it was like for Tur to be there as it happened, inside a no-rules world where reporters were spat on, demeaned, and discredited. Tur was a foreign correspondent who came home to her most foreign story of all. Unbelievable is a must-read for anyone who still wakes up and wonders, Is this rea… (more)

Member:PeggyK49
Title:Unbelievable: My Front-Row Seat to the Craziest Campaign in American History
Authors:Katy Tur (Author)
Info:Dey Street Books (2017), 304 pages
Collections:2017
Rating:*****
Tags:Non-Fiction, Politics, Trump, Presidential Campaign, News Reporter, human Relations

Work Information

Unbelievable: My Front-Row Seat to the Craziest Campaign in American History by Katy Tur

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» See also 43 mentions

Showing 1-5 of 38 (next | show all)
The book easily engrossed me, but left me with little new knowledge of Trump, campaign coverage, or the life of a reporter. Maybe I just didn't connect with her. It doesn't help that I stopped watching television news 15 years ago. ( )
  wvlibrarydude | Jan 14, 2024 |
The author of "Unbelievable", Katie Tur, was the NBC reporter assigned to the Donald Trump campaign from the time he announced his run for President. As a result of that assignment, she spent 510 days on the road with Candidate Trump, hearing stump speech after stump speech, reading tweet after tweet. Being on the road for that long, and reporting on the events day after day, Tur had the ultimate front row seat for the campaign. As a reporter, she filed her reports and reported on the candidate as events unfolded. It is not a reporter's job to present the candidate favorably or unfavorably, but simply to report the events of the day. Some days, as she notes, candidate Trump may have been inconsistent on a position, or a changed what had previously stated in the campaign. Given Trump's on-going battle with the main stream media, and his continuing criticism of any reporter who wrote anything the least bit critical, it was inevitable that Ms. Tur would be criticized by Trump during the campaign. At times, he singled her out as a "3rd rate reporter", "dishonest", a "liar", etc. So given an opportunity to give her side of the story, it isn't surprising that she had more than a few negative things to say about Trump. Some may consider that simply payback, but I never got that impression. Her writing seems genuine and honest, and simply tells the story of what it was like to cover a candidate on the campaign trail, and especially what it was like to cover this most unusual candidate, one who can lie if it suits him, and still manage to shift the blame to anyone bold enough to challenge him on the discrepancy. Despite the criticism she received from President Trump on occasion, and the threats she received from Trump supporters, Ms. Tur managed to survive the campaign rigor, and now can be seen as an afternoon host on MSNBC.
( )
  rsutto22 | Jul 15, 2021 |
I wish none of this was real. It was done very well. ( )
  Tosta | Jul 5, 2021 |
Honest, believable, terrifying and real. The audio book was amazing. ( )
  hootowl1978 | May 4, 2021 |
Katy Tur attempts to do 3 things with this book: 1) provide a record of the campaign events leading up to Trump's election, 2) provide a bit of background on herself, and 3) provide some information on the role of journalists in an election.

For #1, her account is accurate, if not complete. I think an exhaustively complete record would be impossible - there's just too much to include, even for the relatively short period of time covered, even if the other 2 purposes of the book were dropped.

For #2, I think Katy opened with a bit too much too quickly. I really didn't care about the French boyfriend. But I did value the information - a large part of what Trump did was dehumanize journalists, siccing his supporters on them and generally harassing them both in person and online. Hopefully its harder to leave death threats when you're reminded Katy is a person.

For #3, a little more information would be welcome. I think Trumpists take any challenge or question as an attack, and progressives are inclined to take a lack of hostility as support. (To be fair, that complicit tolerance usually is tacit support, but the circumstances with journalists are unique.)

Katy's book is fair and accurate, with little bias. It doesn't break anything new for folks who have been paying attention (and it'd be pretty gross if it did), so I think most people will find it a waste of time. The largest flaw with the book is the non-linear report. Flashbacks to parents are fine, but jumping back and forth between the beginning and end of the campaign really wasn't necessary and obscures development. ( )
  kaitlynn_g | Dec 13, 2020 |
Showing 1-5 of 38 (next | show all)
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» Add other authors (3 possible)

Author nameRoleType of authorWork?Status
Katy Turprimary authorall editionscalculated
Peterson, MarkCover artistsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Siripant, PloyCover designersecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
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Epigraph
EPIGRAPH

"I play to people's fantasies . . . People want to believe that something is the biggest and the greatest and the most spectacular. I call it truthful hyperbole. It's an innocent form of exaggeration -- and a very effective form of promotion."

-- Donald J. Trump,
The Art of the Deal
Dedication
DEDICATION

For the love of God
First words
This is a true story. (Author's Note)
TRUMP VICTORY PARTY

NEW YORK HILTON MIDTOWN
10:59 P.M., Election Day

I'm about to throw up. (Prologue)
MAY 23, 2015
535 Days Until Election Day

Paris.
I'm up with the sun, in a studio apartment that's tiny even by New York standards.
(Chapter 1, "Katy Hasn't Even Looked Up Once at Me."
Quotations
His sentences call to mind an aerial shot of a burning derailed freight train. The syntax is mangled. The grammar is gone. "Donald Trump isn't a simpleton, he just talks like one," reads a Politico article from last August. [...]

Every fourth word seems to be very, great, beautiful, or tremendous. [...] His insults are even simpler. Our leaders are "dumb," "stupid," or "weak." Our deals are "terrible." His critics are "losers" and "haters." The press is "scum." Women he doesn't find attractive are "disgusting." (Chapter 4, "She's Back There, Little Katy")
His supporters feel that he is fighting for them. They identify with him. They can relate. "He talks just like us," supporters say over and over again. He's the rich guy they would be if they were rich. And he knows it. (Chapter 4, "She's Back There, Little Katy")
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(Click to show. Warning: May contain spoilers.)
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Biography & Autobiography. Politics. Nonfiction. HTML:

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

"Compelling... this book couldn't be more timely." ā?? Jill Abramson, New York Times Book Review

From the Recipient of the 2017 Walter Cronkite Award for Excellence in Journalism

Called "disgraceful," "third-rate," and "not nice" by Donald Trump, NBC News correspondent Katy Tur reported onā??and took flak fromā??the most captivating and volatile presidential candidate in American history.

Katy Tur lived out of a suitcase for a year and a half, following Trump around the country, powered by packets of peanut butter and kept clean with dry shampoo. She visited forty states with the candidate, made more than 3,800 live television reports, and tried to endure a gazillion loops of Elton John's "Tiny Dancer"ā??a Trump rally playlist staple.

From day 1 to day 500, Tur documented Trump's inconsistencies, fact-checked his falsities, and called him out on his lies. In return, Trump repeatedly singled Tur out. He tried to charm her, intimidate her, and shame her. At one point, he got a crowd so riled up against Tur, Secret Service agents had to walk her to her car.

None of it worked. Facts are stubborn. So was Tur. She was part of the first women-led politics team in the history of network news. The Boys on the Bus became the Girls on the Plane. But the circus remained. Through all the long nights, wild scoops, naked chauvinism, dodgy staffers, and fevered debates, no one had a better view than Tur.

Unbelievable is her darkly comic, fascinatingly bizarre, and often scary story of how America sent a former reality show host to the White House. It's also the story of what it was like for Tur to be there as it happened, inside a no-rules world where reporters were spat on, demeaned, and discredited. Tur was a foreign correspondent who came home to her most foreign story of all. Unbelievable is a must-read for anyone who still wakes up and wonders, Is this rea

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