Jack Anderson (1) (1922–2005)

Where to start with this book?

First of all, it's billed inside the dustcover as being written by Jack Anderson, the famous Pulitzer Prize winning newspaper columnist, 'and' Robert Westbrook, 'the author of the Howard Moon Deer Mysteries… as well as many works of non-fiction…[who] lives in New York'. So, the first mystery is: who wrote this book? The dust cover also informs that Jack Anderson died in 2005, while the copyright notice is 2006. So, again, who wrote this book?

There are, of show more course, many mysteries which we would like to solve, and we all like to have a go at one now and then. But don't bother about this one. It's not worth it. This book is just a sorry collection of cardboard characters, wafer-thin plots and a mid-numbing selection of outrageously ridiculous coincidences that would make even a Victorian novelist wince.

So why did I bother persisting to the end? Discipline, I suppose. And the hope that some of Anderson's legendary magic might surface.

It didn't. show less

Anderson lays out dizzying details on Nixon (and his brother's) financial hijinx with ITT leading to judicial favors, convention backing, international, intrigue, and the San Clemente estate. What a mess - mix in Hughes schemes and it is no wonder we still don't known the purpose of the Watergate break-in. Another book convincing me Nixon ran his government like a criminal enterprise in a way only exceeded by J. Edgar Hoover's gestapo FBI. Also interesting here is the details on The Bureau show more of Indian Affairs building takeover occurred from November 3 to November 9, 1972 and the aftermath of stolen property and incriminating documents. Probably the most earth-shattering for me is how Kissinger-Nixon megalomania nearly made WW III out of the Bangladesh Liberation War (1971), especially considering the potential Russian involvement an Ukraine on the news these days. show less