A Very Stable Genius
Donald J. Trump's Testing of America
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3.7 • 11 Ratings
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- £8.49
Publisher Description
THE NUMBER ONE BESTSELLER
* UPDATED WITH NEW REPORTING *
'It's all here in this stunning first draft of the history of the presidency of Donald Trump' Sydney Morning Herald
'An icy, Iago-like glimpse of the emotional and moral nullity that may be the source of Trump's power' Observer
'A damning, well-reported, well-sourced and clearly written haymaker' Sunday Times
Drawing on nearly three years of reporting, hundreds of hours of interviews and more than two hundred sources, including some of the most senior members of the administration, friends and first-hand witnesses who have never spoken before, Philip Rucker and Carol Leonnig take us inside some of the most controversial moments of Trump's presidency. They peer deeply into Trump's White House – at the aides pressured to lie to the public, the lawyers scrambling to clear up norm-breaking disasters, and the staffers whose careers have been reduced to ashes – to paint an unparalleled group portrait of an administration driven by self-preservation and paranoia.
Rucker and Leonnig reveal Trump at his most unvarnished, showing the unhinged decision-making and incompetence that has floored officials and stunned foreign leaders. They portray unscripted calls with Vladimir Putin, steak dinners with Kim Jong-un, and calls with Theresa May so hostile that they left her aides shaken. They also take a hard look at Robert Mueller, Trump's greatest antagonist to date, and how his investigation slowly unravelled an administration whose universal value is loyalty – not to country, but to the president himself.
Grippingly told, A Very Stable Genius is a behind-the-scenes account of Trump's vainglorious pursuit of power in his first term.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Washington Post reporters Rucker and Leonnig deliver a granular critique of the Trump presidency, from Michael Flynn's ill-fated tenure as national security advisor to the release of the Mueller Report. Contending that "two kinds of people went to work for the administration: those who thought Trump was saving the world and those who thought the world needed to be saved from Trump," Rucker and Leonnig argue that the latter group served as "human guardrails" before they either quit in frustration or were fired. White House insiders lament everything from the preponderance of TVs ("It was like running a meeting in a Buffalo Wild Wings") to Trump's insults ("You're a bunch of dopes and babies," he once told senior military commanders) to the meddling of Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner. The book's brief epilogue links the departure of Trump's most experienced advisors to his pressure campaign on Ukraine and calls on Republicans to consider "the fate of history" as impeachment unfolds. Rucker and Leonnig try to account for their sources' private agendas (though Chris Christie comes off suspiciously well) and reveal new details about well-known events, including Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein's plans to protect the Russia investigation if Trump fired Mueller. The president's critics will find their worst suspicions confirmed by this doggedly reported account.
