George Sauders’ “The Brief and Frightening Reign of Phil”

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I just finished reading George Saunder’s novella, The Brief and Frightening Reign of Phil. It is nothing like what you would expect, but yet is everything you could want in a political satire for our times. Instead of rushing headlong at the subject as I am wont to do (and did do in my own novella Homeland), Saunders started from a much more exploratory place and wound up with what is essentially a Dr. Suess book about genocide.

More from Saunders on how the book was written on the flip…

Flake endorses Shadegg for House majority leader

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Know-Nothing Ron Drake

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Richard A. Clarke’s “The Scorpion’s Gate”

I just finished reading “The Scorpion’s Gate” by former Terrorism Czar, and every Democrat’s favorite Republican, Richard A. Clarke. I cannot say that it was the best fiction I’ve read. It suffered far too much of the novice story-teller’s fault of filling in the gaps in the reader’s knowledge with unrealistic expository dialog which the … Read more