Rating: 
Summary: Where to go after "Thank You For Smoking"
Review: "Thank You For Smoking" is still Christopher Buckley's best effort to date. But if you want to know where to go *next*, I suggest this lesser-known volume rather than "Little Green Men" or "Wry Martinis." "Mess" has a psychic feel to it - written during the days of the Reagan Administration, it could just about pass as a roman-a-clef by a Clinton cabinet member.
Rating:
Summary: Where to go after "Thank You For Smoking"
Review: "Thank You For Smoking" is still Christopher Buckley's best effort to date. But if you want to know where to go *next*, I suggest this lesser-known volume rather than "Little Green Men" or "Wry Martinis." "Mess" has a psychic feel to it - written during the days of the Reagan Administration, it could just about pass as a roman-a-clef by a Clinton cabinet member.
Rating: 
Summary: Another great Buckley book!!
Review: Another hillarious, must-read Buckley book. You'll love it. Trust me, once you read one of this guy's books, you'll be hooked. I'm just waiting for Buckley to put out a new one.
Rating:
Summary: Oh, I Needed That
Review: Believe it or not, I managed to make it through this much of my life having never read a word by Christopher Buckley. This book was loaned to me by a friend, and I was a little skeptical about reading a political satire after coming off the past several months of "political cartoon overload." The belly laughing had begun by paragraph 5 of the prologue, and I was unable to put this book down. I read the entire book in two sittings, and I have to say that I haven't laughed so hard or so well in a long, long time. I was genuinely concerned that the book would be just another politics-driven piece of thinly disguised propoganda for one "side" or the other, but it was, instead, a refreshing and silly poke at government in general. In fact, I would go so far as to say that this book is a good poke at <i>people</i> in general. I loved every page of <u>The White House Mess,</u> and I recommend it whole-heartedly to anyone looking for a good chuckle.
Rating:
Summary: Oh, I Needed That
Review: Believe it or not, I managed to make it through this much of my life having never read a word by Christopher Buckley. This book was loaned to me by a friend, and I was a little skeptical about reading a political satire after coming off the past several months of "political cartoon overload." The belly laughing had begun by paragraph 5 of the prologue, and I was unable to put this book down. I read the entire book in two sittings, and I have to say that I haven't laughed so hard or so well in a long, long time. I was genuinely concerned that the book would be just another politics-driven piece of thinly disguised propoganda for one "side" or the other, but it was, instead, a refreshing and silly poke at government in general. In fact, I would go so far as to say that this book is a good poke at people in general. I loved every page of The White House Mess, and I recommend it whole-heartedly to anyone looking for a good chuckle.
Rating: 
Summary: lame, toothless, anemic
Review: Having savored, and highly recommended Buckley's "Thank You for Smoking", "Little Green Men", and "Wry Martinis" I was severely disappointed by this book. Frankly, I find it astonishing that this has the same author. It does, however, sound like a comic novel which would have produced by George H. Bush's speechwriter. After reading it I now understand why Washington insiders George Will and Bob Woodward praised it as uproarious. This is an entirely safe book; you could recommend it to an elderly spinster aunt, or a conservative clergyman without any fear of offense. It is tame middlebrow humor reminiscent of the "daily chuckle" one might find in a small town paper. I found it hard to believe that it was written in the '80's by a man who was still in his thirties; it reminds me of the type of satire Art Buchwald wrote in the '60's. The average television sitcom has more wit and punch and is far more riske. This involves a parody of a presidency in no way reminiscent of others beset by one tame crises after another. It is totally devoid of the rapier wit, irony, and irreverance one finds in Buckley's later works. The book takes no risks and no group could be bruised. As I struggled to get through it I never cracked a smile.
Rating:
Summary: Another great book from Christopher Buckley.
Review: Like the tobacco industry and the conspiracy obsessed alien abduction movement, Christopher Buckley has always picked targets that deserve ridicule for their pompous self-absorption and their lack of contact with reality. Those self-serving political memoirs that politicians write after leaving office or their jobs were a natural target for Buckley's poisoned pen. The White House Mess is a letter perfect parody of the fictional Thomas N. Tucker administration from the perspective of his Assistant, Herbert Wadlough. Anyone who reads memoirs will recognize the usual things- the vivid remembrances of petty turf battles, self-serving recollections of conversations where they believe their input was the decisive factor, etc. Buckley tosses in a hilarious series of crisis for the Tucker Administration to wallow over, and equally inept administration officials to mock. The scary thing is that the Tucker Administration bears a striking resemblance to the first year of the Clinton Administration. Oddly prescient for a book written in 1986. Fans of Christopher Buckley will not be disappointed.
Rating:
Summary: One To Return To
Review: One of Buckley's earlier efforts, The White House Mess is a slight, inconsequential book, good more for chuckles than the guffaws some of the writer's later books induce. Still, I find myself pulling it off the shelf every now and then just to pass some time.
It's easy to dip in and out of Buckley's imaginary White House, a goofy place more akin to "That's My Bush!" than "The West Wing." Putting a Democratic governor of Idaho (!) in the White House after the 1988 election, Buckley leads the reader through the most inept administration in modern political history, while also casting light on the petty maneuverings of those aides clamoring to be close to the crown, however tarnished.
Rating:
Summary: Hilarious Send-Up of Washington
Review: Perhaps the most hysterical book I have ever read. Buckley presents an uproarious picture of the most maladroit administration in ages -- I imagine a Democratic one so as to appease his conservative relation, William F. Anyone looking for a quick read and a memorable laugh, especially someone who is aware of politics, ought to read this book.
Rating:
Summary: Prophetic Comedy
Review: The book's hook is that it's a parody of White House politics, where the status of the characters' relationships among one another is given more importance than the issues that are being governed over. Written before an Arkansas governor won the real presidency, it's narrated by a sidekick of the [obviously fictional] Democratic Idaho governor that went on to inherit the White house for a term. Buckley does a wonderful job of telling the story with sublety - the narrator is too dignified to admit his own wrongdoings while burying his peers, who have also all written their own memoirs doing the same thing. True to the title, the President's term is embroiled with controversy, ranging from a missing hamster to a poor decision to gas an uprising in the Bahamas. There's a sex scandal involving interns, a first brother that causes some grief, and strain in the bedroom of the first lady. Can you believe it was written before Reagan left office?
Recommended for anyone that can laugh at Presidential politics, political critics, or the pretensions of executive staff members.
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