The President's Man

It was a great team from the start. Simon Faircliff: candidate for the U.S. Senate, the liberal's darling, with the charisma of a great leader. And Frank Austen: young, sharp, ruthless; in search of a job-and a cause. It took them eight years to get Faircliff the White House, and Austen the directorship of the C.I.A. and Faircliff's only daughter for his wife. For Austen it was eight years orchestrating campaigns and clearing the way for the man he had come to love and deeply respect.Only then, when he thought they had captured the world, did Austen have the time to sit back and listen to the nagging inner voice telling him that something, somewhere, was profoundly wrong. A chance encounter with an old man, imprisoned so long he had come to be known as the Political Prisoner Emeritus, sets Austen off to piece together a puzzle so sinister, so terrifying in its implications, that its only resolution is treason.An espionage novel of the highest caliber, The President's Man is also a brilliantly crafted psychological novel, reminiscent of All the King's Men and Advise and Consent in its portrait of political life.