Fear: Trump in the White House by Bob Woodward
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
One thing’s for sure: Robert Mueller is the sexiest man in America right now.
I’m awarding five stars even though I couldn’t push myself through it. It’s not the research, which seems deep and impeccable and comes from a Pulitzer-winning author renowned for exactly that. It’s not the writing, which is engaging and evocative. It’s not even the ugly picture on the cover.
It’s the subject itself. I have a probably-terminal-at-this-point case of Trump Fatigue Syndrome. I am so utterly sick of that stupid smarmy shit-eating smirk and this White Trash White House and knowing any more about it feels like immersing myself in a tub of flesh-eating bacteria. Trump’s narcissism, his clear and shining prejudices, his divisiveness, and his gross incompetence have become so normalized that it’s difficult to be outraged anymore. I read today’s five slimy and alarming headlines and say “oh, so now that happened, we’re one step closer to economic depression and nuclear war and it’s Tuesday and I need to get that spreadsheet to my boss and remember to pay that parking ticket and boy doesn’t my manicure look like shit” and keep on scrolling, and I have to work to tell the difference between his own Twitter feed and the parody account I follow (which used to be hilarious but isn’t anymore because the real thing has devolved into something frighteningly similar).
I waited months, starting at #859 on my library’s waiting list, and now I can’t make myself read it. I’m giving it five stars to push it higher on the bestseller lists and piss Trumpty Dumpty off. Is that fair? No, and I don’t care, take that, you nasty orange whiny grifter man-baby.
Bookshelves: somebody-get-the-slime-off-me, couldn’t-really-read-it, politics, non-fiction, journalistic, in-the-news
99 Monkeys 