Jean's Reviews > Peril

As has been the case with most of the books published about the Trump era, Peril was immediately met with immediate media attention and praise. After all, one of the book’s authors is the esteemed Washington Post editor,Bob Woodward, who became famous for breaking the Watergate scandal when he was a reporter back in the 1970s. His co-author is the talented, politically savvyRobert Costa who currently is currently a reporter for the Post and an analyst for NBC News and MSNBC. They had tons of help from insiders and confidential sources.

While I hold the authors in high regard, I was, for the most part, not overly impressed with Peril . The highlight for me was in the prologue, which largely features General Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Much has been made of the call between the general and General Li of China – Milley has been criticized by some for overstepping his bounds by assuring the Chinese that things in the US were under control following the insurrection of January 6. Following that exchange, there is another account of a phone call between General Milley and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, with the latter expressing in no uncertain terms her deep concerns about the instability of the outgoing President’s mindset and what he might do.

From there, the authors take us inside the Oval Office and the Trump camp as Trump and his allies scurried about in attempt to find a way to overturn the election results, by hook or by crook. Some of those upon whom Trump had relied heavily throughout the previous months for support were failing him, in his view. I found this rather surprising – men like Bill Barr and Pat Cipollone – were suddenly defying him in attempt to calm him and get him to act more rationally. Of course, much credit is given to Vice President Pence for refusing to give in to extreme pressure to shun his Constitutional duty. I was hoping for more insider information about what was going on inside the White House during the assault on the Capitol; all we are told was that Trump was watching on television and that there were repeated requests from staffers for him to put out tweets to the crowd to disperse.

There is significant background information about Joe Biden, his campaign, and the early days of the administration. Biden and the authors credit Black leaders Blunt Rochester and James Clyburn with whipping up the Black vote to sew up the nomination and the election. In the early days of the administration, issues that had fallen by the wayside during the past year – Covid 19, financial assistance to families, Afghanistan – behind the scenes discussions with staff, fellow Democrats as well as Republicans are included. Joe Manchin and Susan Collins, respectively, are mentioned predominantly. We get a picture of Joe Biden, the person, as much as Biden, the politician.

As someone who has followed the news quite a bit these past five years, a great deal of the information contained within these pages was not new. I suppose that is reassuring, in a sense, and for those who do not make it a habit to keep up with current events, this book will be an eye-opener. I would recommend it for you. I expected more surprises.

I do not have any quarrel with the title, however. PERIL. Too many Americans believe that the election was fraudulent. Too many Americans believe that their needs, hopes, dreams – their rights – are more important than those of other Americans, especially if the “other” is of a different race, country of origin, economic status, religious background, sexual orientation or identity. How do we address this peril? It is up to all of us.

3 stars