Book picks similar to
Prohibition A by Mike Hockney


novels
political
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political-fiction

Breaking Point


Boyd Craven - 2015
     We hear with increasing frequency, reports of mass shootings or terrorist activities on American soil. Don’t you get tired of the media sensationalizing everything? Do you hate how the police have their hands tied on how they can react, by politicians who are more worried about political correctness, and getting re-elected? Don’t you fantasize about just giving the bad guys what they have coming to them? That’s what this story is about. It’s guaranteed to offend the crap out of some people! It’s not illegal to fantasize in this country… Yet. -Rated R by us, for language and violence-

The God of Atheists


Stefan Molyneux - 2007
    It it impossible is to resist quoting passages from this novel, given the author’s brilliant insights into character, wonderful literary flourishes and stunning demonstration of what is meant by inspired writing." - Humber School for Writers. A savage, brilliant, hilarious attack on modern hypocrisy, "The God of Atheists" follows the downfall of three men who wake up one morning and decide to take what they have not earned. Al, a down-and-out music producer, bullies his handsome son into forming a boy-band. Alder, an obscure academic, steals a brilliant idea from a grad student. As they exploit the talents of the naïve youths around them, their fame and wealth increase – but they become more and more terrified of exposure and destruction...

Democracy: An American Novel


Henry Adams - 1880
    At its heart is Madeleine Lee, a young widow who comes to Washington, D.C., to understand the workings of power. Pursued by Silas Ratcliffe, the most influential member of the Senate, Madeleine soon sees enough of power and its corrupting influence to last her a lifetime.

The Beautiful Poetry of Donald Trump


Rob Sears - 2017
    By simply taking the 45th President of the United States' tweets and transcripts, cutting them up and reordering them, Sears unearthed a trove of beautiful verse that was just waiting to be discovered.This groundbreaking collection gives readers a glimpse of Trump's innermost thoughts and feelings on everything from the nature of truth, to what he hates about Lord Sugar. And it will reveal a hitherto hidden Donald, who may surprise and delight both students and critics alike.Now with fifteen all-new poems as we lurch deeper into the Trump presidency, this timely publication also includes Sears' scholarly footnotes and introduction, in which he excavates new critical angles and insights into the President's poetry which the casual reader might initially overlook.

Live Girls


Beth Nugent - 1996
    Her only friend is Jerome, an anorexic drag queen who searches for love among the sailors.As Catherine and Jerome set out for Hollywood, we witness -with equal horror and fascination -- their desperate attempt to find redemption in a world that offers them so little.In haunting, stylized prose, Nugent takes us deep into her protagonist's psyche while painting a bizarre -- yet oddly familiar -- picture of a dissociated, disconnected America. Live Girls is a tour de force that will leave no one who reads it unshaken.From the Hardcover edition.

The Ghost


Robert Harris - 2007
    1 bestselling author of Fatherland; Enigma; Archangel; Pompeii and Imperium. “The moment I heard how McAra died I should have walked away. I can see that now. I should have said, ‘Rick, I’m sorry, this isn’t for me, I don’t like the sound of it,’ finished my drink and left. But he was such a good storyteller, Rick — I often thought he should have been the writer and I the agent — that once he’d started talking there was never any question I wouldn’t listen, and by the time he had finished, I was done for.”After five books set firmly in the past, Robert Harris returns with a contemporary novel that brings the reader face to face with some of the biggest issues of our time — the result is a gripping and genuinely thrilling read.

The President and the Frog


Carolina De Robertis - 2021
    Once known as the Poorest President in the World, his reputation is the stuff of myth: a former guerilla who was jailed for inciting revolution before becoming the face of justice, human rights, and selflessness for his nation. Now, as he talks to the journalist, he wonders if he should reveal the strange secret of his imprisonment: while held in brutal solitary confinement, he survived, in part, by discussing revolution, the quest for dignity, and what it means to love a country, with the only creature who ever spoke back--a loud-mouth frog.As engrossing as it is innovative, vivid, moving, and full of wit and humor, The President and the Frog explores the resilience of the human spirit and what is possible when danger looms. Ferrying us between a grim jail cell and the president's lush gardens, the tale reaches beyond all borders and invites us to reimagine what it means to lead, to dare, and to dream.

Watergate


Thomas Mallon - 2012
     In Watergate, 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 (“The clock is dick-dick-dicking”), and into the hive of the Watergate complex itself, home not only to the Democratic National Committee but also to the president’s attorney general, his recklessly loyal secretary, and the shadowy man from Mississippi who pays out hush money to the burglars. Praised by Christopher Hitchens for his “splendid evocation of Washington,” Mallon achieves with Watergate a scope and historical intimacy that surpasses even what he attained in his previous novels, as he turns a “third-rate burglary” into a tumultuous, first-rate entertainment.

So Far from Heaven


Richard Bradford - 1973
    The Tafoyas include a physician philosopher, a radical daughter with a degree from Bryn Mawr, a clumsy, stupid son, and a governor of New Mexico. From these elements Bradford creates a story as funny and tender as RED SKY AT MORNING, also set in New Mexico, also well worth reading.

Cleo McDougal Regrets Nothing


Allison Winn Scotch - 2020
    From congresswoman to senator, the magnetic, ambitious single mother now has her eye on the White House—always looking forward, never back. Until an estranged childhood friend shreds her in an op-ed hit piece gone viral.With seven words—“Cleo McDougal is not a good person”—the presidential hopeful has gone from in control to damage control, and not just in Washington but in life.Enter Cleo’s “regrets list” of 233 and counting. Her chief of staff has a brilliant idea: pick the top ten, make amends during a media blitz, and repair her reputation. But there are regrets, and there are regrets: like her broken relationship with her sister, her affair with a law school professor…and the regret too big to even say out loud.But with risk comes reward, and as Cleo makes both peace and amends with her past, she becomes more empowered than ever to tackle her career, confront the hypocrites out to destroy her, and open her heart to what matters most—one regret at a time.

First Among Equals


Jeffrey Archer - 1984
    . . In the 1960s, four ambitious new MPs take their seats at Westminster. Over three decades they share the turbulent passions of the race for power with their wives and families, men and women caught up in a dramatic game for the higest stakes of all. But only one man can gain the ultimate goal - the office of Prime Minister.

Duet


Carol Shields - 2003
    Carol Shields' first novels, "Small Ceremonies" and "The Box Garden," each told from the viewpoint of a sister, published as one.

The Race


Richard North Patterson - 2007
    A decorated Gulf War Air Force pilot known for speaking his mind, Grace's reputation for voting his own conscience rather than the party line--together with his growing romance with Lexie Hart, an African-American movie star--has earned him a reputation as a maverick and an iconoclast. But Grace is still haunted by a tragic mistake buried deep in his past, and now his integrity will be put to the test in this most brutal of political contests, in which nothing in his past or present life is off-limits.Depicting contemporary power politics at its most ruthless, The Race takes on the most incendiary issues in American culture: racism, terrorism, religious fundamentalism, gay rights, and the rise of media monopolies with their own agenda and lust for power. As the pressure of the campaign intensifies, Grace encounters betrayal, excruciating moral choices, and secrets that can destroy lives. Ultimately, the race leads to a deadlocked party convention where Grace must resolve the conflict between his romance with Lexie and his presidential ambitions--and decide just who and what he is willing to sacrifice.

Hell Has Harbour Views


Richard Beasley - 2001
    Not for him the stereotype of the greedy lawyer. He'd be the defender of the abused, the voice of the poor, the champion of the oppressed. And he was for a time...until Rottman Maughan and Nash dangled the office with the harbour view in front of him.Now he's turning blind eye to suspect time sheets, championing the powerful against the powerless, and not being entirely honest with his girlfriend.Is there a way back?

Story of the Eye


Georges Bataille - 1928
    It's something of an underground classic, rediscovered by each new generation. Most recently, the Icelandic pop singer Björk Guðdmundsdóttir cites Story of the Eye as a major inspiration: she made a music video that alludes to Bataille's erotic uses of eggs, and she plans to read an excerpt for an album.Warning: Story of the Eye is graphically sexual, and is only suited for adults who are not easily offended.