Friday's Forgotten Books, August 24, 2018

(from the archives)
Steve Weddle graduated with an MFA in poetry from Louisiana State University.
Weddle, a former English professor, now works for a newspaper group in
Virginia and writes fiction.


ALL THE PRESIDENT'S MEN, Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein

How’s this for a great story? A Yale grad and Navy lieutenant tries to get a reporter’s job at the Washington Post, but only gets a two-week tryout. His boss doesn’t like him enough to hire him, but gives him a job at a weekly paper in the suburbs. In 1971, he moves to the Post.
One night five guys were arrested for a break-in. This metro/crime reporter covers it along with someone who was never mistaken for a Navy lieutenant, the child of communists who’d begun work at the Washington Star as a copy boy when he was a teenager.
Together, these two young reporters -- one a Yale-graduated, Navy lieutenant with little journalistic experience and the other a disheveled reporter with plenty of experience but no comb -- solved a political mystery that would unseat the US President.
All The President’s Men was published in 1974 and is every bit as procedural a mystery as anything you will ever read.
Bob Woodward, with a degree from Yale and hardly any writing experience, works a contact from his Navy days to keep pointed in the right direction.
Carl Bernstein travels to Florida to dig through files and check stubs, finally finding a link to a Presidential slush fund.
Together the two of them sneak around the suburbs of Washington, DC, talking to secretaries and accountants, all of whom fear for their safety.
The prose is straightforward and gripping, with enough suspense to make you forget about Dan Brown.
All The President’s Men is a fantastic mystery, a timeless exploration of power, greed, and corruption, with clearly defined villains and heroes who continue to find themselves well out of their depths.
Political thriller, mystery, procedural, all thrown together with an incredible narrative, this book should be read by every mystery lover out there because it truly contains a gripping story that you can’t put down.

Mark Baker, LOST LUGGAGE, Wendell Thomas
Yvette Banek, RIVER OF NO RETURN, Bee Ridgway
Les Blatt, LONELY HEART 4122, Colin Watson
CROSSEXAMININGCRIME, THE MURDER OF MY AUNT, Richard Hull
Martin Edwards, THE HANGED MAN OF SAINT- PHOLIEN, Georges Simenon
Richard Horton, THE FLAXBOROUGH CRAB, Colin Watson
Jerry House, LANDS OF THE EARTHQUAKE, Henry Kuttner
George Kelley, THE REMINISCENCES OF SOLAR PONS, August Derleth
Margot Kinberg, BRUNO, CHIEF OF POLICE, Martin Walker
Rob Kitchin, KOLYMSKY HEIGHTS, Lionel Davidson
B.V. Lawson, THE MYSTERY OF THE BOULE CABINET, Burton Stephenson
Evan Lewis, MACHINE GUNS OVER THE WHITE HOUSE, Novell Page 
Steve Lewis/Barry Gardner, THE LAKE EFFECT, Les Roberts
Todd Mason,  THE WAR BOOK edited by James Sallis; A SHOCKING THING edited by Damon Knight
J.F. Norris, MYSTERY AT OLYMPIA, John Rhode 
Juri Numellin, FURY, Jason Pinter
Matt Paust, GENTLY DOES IT, Alan Hunter 
James Reasoner, THE SALAMANDERS, Maxwell Grant 
Richard Robinson, THE CARETAKER'S CAT, Erle Stanley Gardner
Gerard Saylor, SHARPE'S TIGER  Bernard Cornwell
Kerrie Smith, BODIES FROM THE LIBRARY: LOST CLASSICS, Tony Medawar 
Kevin Tipple, TRESPASSER, Paul Doiron
TomCat, DEATH OF A BEAUTY QUEEN, E. R. Punshon 
TracyK, THE BIG OVER EASY, Jasper Fforde