"The controversial conservative columnist bares all...Novak's memoir offers a rich self-assessment of his work. Sure to be popular reading inside the Beltway, and worthy of an audience far beyond it as well."
—Kirkus (starred review)
"Novak's insider-perspective, vitriolic pen and damn-the-torpedoes frankness make it a lively and eye-opening account of big-foot journalism."
—Publisher's Weekly
"Every now and then a book comes along that everyone interested in politics should read. The new memoir by veteran journalist Robert D. Novak, I think, is one of those books...For the story it tells about American politics, as well as its candor, Novak's book covering his five decades as a print and TV journalist, immediately becomes the indispensable guide to what you really need to know about the messy intersection of the media and politics in Washington."
—Deal W. Hudson, former publisher of Crisis magazine
"Anyone interested in politics, journalism, and the course of public events over the last 50 years who does not buy and read The Prince of Darkness is denying himself one of the pleasures that life on this earth very seldom offers."
—Michael Barone, The Weekly Standard
"An extraordinary inside look at life in Washington over the last 50 years."
—Tim Russert
"Highly readable account of a remarkable journalistic career...A meaty book, full of delicious anecdotes."
—Wall Street Journal
"Novak should be celebrated for his brutal honesty."
—Christian Science Monitor
"Arguably the best journalist in Washington in the last half century...Both a brutally candid and important book, as well as a riveting read."
—Pat Buchanan, syndicated columnist
"This is history as it happened, without spin or an agenda...While older people with much experience in life may be better able to appreciate this outstanding book, it should be especially valuable to the young in presenting a realistic and three-dimensional picture of the world. They can get a lot of enlightenment from a prince of darkness."
—Thomas Sowell, syndicated columnist
"A book that anyone interested in politics or journalism ought to read...This is a book to savor."
—Human Events
"A lot of fun...It really is just a great slice of political history and Americana."
—Jonah Goldberg, National Review Online
"[Novak is] a Washington institution who paints himself, convincingly, as churlish, brave, resilient, petty, and indefatigable. I got it as soon as it came out and found it entertaining,...human, and frank."
—Peggy Noonan, Wall Street Journal
"Characteristic bluntness reigns throughout as he recalls 50 years of political reporting...He is frank and unapologetic about his work, his viewpoints, and his personal shortcomings."
—Booklist
“Fascinating . . . an enlightening field guide to the politicians and journalists.”
—New York Times Book Review
“You won’t be able to put this book down.”
—The American Spectator
“Page-turning . . . So informative is the book, and so rich its story of Washington, D.C., over the past half century, that many readers no doubt will long for more.”
—Washington Times
In the half century in Washington, conservative political journalist Robert D. Novak has often been a newsmaker as well as a news commentator. During the LBJ and Nixon administrations, his columns were closely read for their insider's information on Vietnam and Watergate. In more recent years, he has been embroiled in debates over the Valerie Plame leak scandal and his own abrupt dismissal from CNN. In The Prince of Darkness, this controversial pundit bares his soul and his secrets about life on that side of the Potomac.
Journalism is the first rough draft of history, Philip Graham, the publisher of The Washington Post, once said. Many Novak columns—including the Plame piece—are first rough drafts of journalism; they require further assembly by readers. While other writers concentrate on the arteries of power, Novak has made a specialty of the capillaries. Still, his book is an enlightening field guide to the politicians and journalists who inhabit those micro places.
—The New York Times
The barbs start flying on page one (Bush critic Joseph Wilson: "What an asshole!") and continue to nearly the end (CNN correspondent Ed Henry: "duplicitous phony") of this thick memoir by the conservative journalist and pundit. Novak recounts his journey from Associated Press cub reporter through longtime "Evans and Novak" columnist scooping up Beltway political dirt to ubiquitous talk-show talking head. Along the way he drinks and gambles, battles liberal media bias, wrangles contracts with cable channels, settles scores with critics (more-hawkish-than-thou pundit David Frum is "a cheat and a liar"), defends his outing of Valerie Plame and tosses in many old columns, which read like a seismograph tracing of political microtremors (Melvin Laird to be Nixon's defense secretary!). More tantalizing are the glimpses of his relations with official sources, who know they won't be attacked in print as long as they give good tips. Novak's insider perspective, vitriolic pen and damn-the-torpedoes frankness make it a lively and eye-opening account of big-foot journalism. (July)
Copyright 2007 Reed Business Information
The controversial conservative columnist bares all-or some, at any rate-to stake a claim for fame beyond naming Valerie Plame. To trust Novak, long ago nicknamed "the prince of darkness," he named Joe Wilson's CIA-agent wife as a sort of afterthought in the wake of a conversation with Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage. Why, Novak asks, would the CIA send Wilson, with no intelligence experience, off to check on whether Saddam Hussein was buying yellow cake uranium in Niger? Because his wife is in the agency, Armitage replies: And the rest, apart from a quick check of Who's Who, is history. "I have written many, many more important columns," Novak laments, "but the one on the CIA leak case will forever be part of my public identity." As if by way of rebuttal, Novak's memoir offers a rich self-assessment of his work. Regardless of what one thinks of his politics, which can charitably be branded as somewhere between paleoconservative and reactionary, Novak's abilities as a writer of vigorous, highly readable prose are not to be dismissed. And admirably for a journalist these days, Novak takes pride in his legendary scrappiness: "I am not a person who is easy for a lot of people to like," he writes. "No stirrer-up of strife is ever very popular." When he is not recounting his stinging disagreements with every administration since Ike's-his longtime partner Rowland Evans made Nixon's enemies list, but Novak, unaccountably, did not-Novak details the boozy world of Washington politics, writing, for instance, that Daniel Patrick Moynihan "was most qualified to be president and did not make it," thanks in good measure to an over-fondness for the sauce. Moreover, he tallies up his legendaryfeuds with just about everyone who is anyone-revealing, along the way, that political operatives such as Carville and Atwater can be as vicious to their own kind as to their enemies. Sure to be popular reading inside the Beltway, and worthy of an audience far beyond it as well. Agent: Esther Newberg/International Creative Management, Inc.
