Shadow Cabinet

In a fast paced, suspenseful novel about the struggle for influence, power, and prestige during the first year of the Reagan administration, Tyler focuses his multiple talents as a fiction writer on Washington, D.C. and a superb cast of American idealists and rogues. Haven Wilson is a lawyer who has served in the Carter administration and is now on the sidelines biding his time. Quite by accident he finds himself involved simultaneously in the complicated efforts of a colorful West Coast self-made millionaire to secure the Washington appointment he feels he deserves; as a witness to a veteran Soviet analyst's efforts to uncover duplicity among certain arms negotiators in the Defense Dept; and as an unpaid counselor to some of his wild-eyed ex-CIA pals who are determined to expose criminal culpability in the earlier climb to power of a popular Bible Belt, Moral Majority U.S. Senator.

This is an intelligent and thoughtful book about suits in Washington, DC in the early years of Reagan. Haven Wilson was up for a big job in Justice, but Reagan won. With an uneasiness he faces the changed political landscape, but without the bitterness, rancor and cynicism of his friends. W. T. Tyler gives us a tour of DIA bureaucy, academic thinktanks, and shadowy political operatives. As is typical of Tyler, his characters are thinking, feeling individuals with complex human motivations. A great read!