The Run
Stuart Woods
Harper, Dec 2008, $7.99
ISBN: 9780061711572

Everyone in the Democratic Party assumes Vice President Joseph Adams will be the nominee to replace the current incumbent. However, Joe does not plan to run as he has been diagnosed with Alzheimer's. He asks highly regarded Georgia Democratic Senator William Henry Lee IV to make a run for the presidency and he will publicly support him. Though he has some doubts as he fears to be elected he will have to give up much of his ethics, William decides to run. However, the current PROTUS suffers a stroke and Adams as acting president delays his support.

Will's primary run is filled with nastiness even as he and his campaign team take the moral high road. A South Carolina Republican arranges a dirty campaign to insure unelectable Senator Kiel becomes the Democratic nominee. Will's past ignites headlines when his lover from ten years ago movie star Charlene Joiner demands he file a Death Row appeal on behalf of a murderous rapist he once defended; both try to pressure him to acquiesce to their wishes. Even his wife, the Deputy CIA Director's past, intrudes on the run. Finally an assassin who failed to kill him years ago is back for a second attempt.

Though the timing is a bit late as the campaign is over, the reprint of this exciting political thriller remains a fun read even if Will's run for PROTUS goes off the plausibility scale; than again when Obama started he was even further off the scale. Will is an intriguing lead character as he insists on an ethical run though his staff places their values on what that means; while his stereotypical opponents prefer disinformation taking events out of context. Although health enables Will to run was also used in GRASS ROOTS to make him a senator, fans of Stuart Wood's Lee saga will enjoy his presidential campaign.