Review:
Richard Bausch's 19-year-old protagonist, Walter Marshall, is a naive young man in a time when cynicism has not yet hardened the American spirit. He reveres the recently assassinated Jack Kennedy, is a complete idealist, and wants to be president so that he can change the world. He is also an inept innocent with little chance of making it in politics, a realization that fails to keep him from trying to please everyone, including the two young women to whom he is simultaneously engaged. Bausch handles Walter's unworldliness with gentle comedy, as if he somehow pines for a bit of the before-the-flood innocence irrevocably lost to his own generation in the Vietnam War. In the end, Walter gives up on the White House but fails to lose his endearing optimism.
About the Author:
Richard Bausch's other books include Good Evening Mr. & Mrs. America and All the Ships at Sea, Rebel Powers, Violence, and The LastGood Time. He is the recipient of the Lila Wallace-Reader's Digest Writer's Award and the Award in Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. He lives with his wife, Karen, and theirfive children in rural Virginia.
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