Change the names from 1972 to today's names and nothing has changed. The talking points and the words are the same. Denials and coming down on the press from the White House. I am astounded how much things stay the same in 50 years. While the book at first is a little disconcerting because of all the names as well as feeling I was dropped into the middle of a conversation, I soon got comfortable as Bernstein and Woodward tell of putting the Watergate story and the subsequent fallout stories together to get a full story of what happened during the Nixon reelection campaign. This is much more interesting now than it was 50 years ago when all I cared about was my soap operas being exempted for the Watergate coverage. There are so many parallels to 2020 and beyond.

It was one year ago today that I was sideswiped by news that I was laid off my two year temp job. I was so confident that I would be hired full time that the news really took me off guard. And unlike my layoff from my 20 year job in 2012 - at which time far worse things were happening to me that it was the least of my problems - this time I had to go through all the grieving processes one goes through when losing a job. So as a result, I was not even able to concentrate on a book for many months.

And why I chose "Watergate" by Thomas Mallon to be my next read I'll never know, but boy am I glad I did. It's a historical fiction story of the Watergate mess told by the imagined point of view of all the people involved. And being I grew up in that era and remember what happened like yesterday, it wasn't difficult for me to figure out which was based on real life and what was entirely made up (I seriously don't think Pat Nixon ever had an affair). The book is, on the whole, a very darkly funny take on the whole scandal, with some poignancy thrown in for good measure - and it all works. Yes, it took me probably four months to actually finish it, but hey, I did it, and it was worth the, in this case, very trying effort to concentrate on it.

And on a happy note, I'm currently working and getting a regular paycheck again and getting my footing back financially, so I get way fewer nasty calls from bill collectors. I'm pretty sure that is helping me with my concentration problems. hehe. Anyways, if you choose to read "Watergate" by Thomas Mallon, you will enjoy it - ESPECIALLY if you lived in that period of time.

Book 5, in the Fiona FitzGerald Mysteries

This mystery focuses on the death of a gossip columnist, who is discovered hanging from a balcony in the Watergate apartment complex.

Mr. Adler is a real tale-teller and a dandy weaver of political intrigues. Fiona makes good reading, in this installment she teams up with a cynical rookie Charleen Davis and all along the case the two squabbles continuously rarely seeing eye to eye.

Mr. Adler’s views on Washington’s political life are a real kaleidoscope of scandals and he is not shy to fictionalize his experiences in entertaining ways. The plot in “The Witch of Watergate” primarily showcases law enforcement rivalries at its best and takes the paranoia in Washington to a different level. Of course he did not forget to have the media sharks looking for a good bite and usually they take a real gone one into a mayor, a police commissioner, a sleazy politician, the usual prime targets are always the favourites. The full drama is dedicated to figuring out what may have happened: if not a suicide who was behind this terrible deed. Although this story may be a drama it is not fast moving and we do not find extensive suspense to thrill us. It snails along and is steady till Fiona unlocks the mystery into the columnist’s murder. Fiona is a great character and all the players are cleverly handled. The dialogue is written with care, is simple and to the point. This book is not very taxing so an easy read.

“The Witch of Watergate” is good entertainment but not much more

[This a crosspost with MSP Reading Time, the book segment of my Twin Cities blog, Minneapolis-St. Paul Adventure Time.]

Over on my Twin Cities blog, I wrote about attending the recent launch of the Minnesota Historical Society's new publication, Downtown Minneapolis in the 1970s, at the Mill City Museum. Photographer Mike Evangelist, who worked downtown in the '70s and took many pictures on his breaks, and writer Andy Sturdevant put together this awesome book and discussed the background of the photos and the world they came out of. Read more over here!

In spite of never having lived in the decade, I have always found it fascinating, so seeing so clearly what the area I now live in looked like forty years ago, as the old city of Minneapolis was in the transitional stage to the corporate, modern city we know today was really cool. There seems to be some similarities between this uncertain decade and the transitions going on in it, with today.

This was the intriguing argument of historian Andreas Killen's 1973: Nervous Breakdown, which posited that the year 1973 marked the transition between the modern and the postmodern worlds.

As one of the biographies of a certain specific year in the western calendar, it was pretty convincing, connecting threads regarding fears of terrorism, renewable energy in a time of shortage, and political gridlock and distrust after Watergate. 

The chapter on fears of cults was particularly interesting, and I also enjoyed Killen's ability to draw in pop culture items of the day to explore the evolution of the American psysche during the time; the first reality TV, the first punk bands, and even the nostalgia for the late fifties current at the time that would presage the later nostalgia for the '70s themselves.

Francis Wheen makes a similar argument in his account of paranoia throughout the world during the 1970s, drawing upon popular culture, cinema, and literature to explore how the 1970s made the world we live in today. 

Wheen’s book, which examines this ten year period through the lens of one its, arguably, most defining features; paranoia, paints a vivid and disturbing picture, yet one compelling in the similarities that can be found to the world today. Paranoia, according to Wheen, truly erupted onto the world scene at the time and his anecdotes involving Nixon, Mao, Harold Wilson, and Idi Amin illustrate how a deep fear of the future had haunted the halls of power throughout the world.

In addition, he describes the emergence of fears of a doomed economy, terrorism, growth in occult and conspiratorial beliefs, and other interesting themes. I particularly enjoyed Wheen’s citing of various period literature and cinema to illustrate his points, which really help to evoke the thoughts and feelings of the time. On the other hand, the variety of these diverse themes brought together in “Strange Days Indeed” under the overarching theme of paranoia can bury his arguments in these many interesting stories.