For anyone immersed in this year’s presidential campaign (and who isn’t?), Lis Wiehl’s The Candidate is a feast to behold. Erica Sparks, the dynamic newswoman in Wiehl’s previous novel and series, The Newsmakers, returns to give us a “House of Cards.”
The Candidate asks, among other things: What are the similarities between the presidential campaign in The Candidate and a real campaign for the White House? And, how far would you go to get something you wanted?
Aside from Sparks, there is a fascinating cast of characters including two presidential candidates, Mike Ortiz and Lucy Winters. Ortiz is a dynamic war hero favored to win the White House. Lucy Winters, a senator from Minnesota, describes her mother as the most influential person in her life, the one who “held her family together” and the candidate who exudes middle-class, midwestern values. Think a Minnesota version of Kelly Ayotte.
Mike Ortiz, a senator from California, has standing by his side his glamorous, adoring wife, Celeste. Think Jackie Kennedy, but with sinister undertones. While Celeste appears sympathetic and supportive of a husband who spent nine months in a squalid Al-Qaeda prison, there is much more here than meets the eye.
If you thought House of Cards provided political intrigue and a lust for power, you haven’t seen anything yet. Lis Wiehl’s latest Newsmakers Novel, The Candidate, gives us a House of Cards, with gusto – and a Chinese angle to boot.
As Erica Sparks astutely notes, “Power is such an intriguing thing. I’m never sure if having it or getting it is what turns people into monsters.” Politicians take note. In the meantime, enjoy this latest thriller from Lis Wiehl.
The Candidate
Lis Wiehl
Top photo: Bigstock
