Hope Never Dies

May 21, 2018
The careers of Barack Obama and Joe Biden take an unusual turn after they leave the White House in this entertaining, offbeat whodunit from Shaffer (Fifty Shames of Earl Grey). Fuming at his Delaware lake house, Joe hasn’t heard in months from his BFF, Barack, who has been busy hanging out with celebrities such as actor Bradley Cooper. One night, Barack and a Secret Service agent show up to share some sad news—the death of Finn Donnelly, an Amtrak conductor Joe was friends with, who was struck by an Acela Express that morning. The presence of a map of the Biden home in Finn’s work desk led the Wilmington PD to suspect that he may have been stalking Joe, so they reached out to the Secret Service. Joe is further unsettled when a friend on the force, rumored to have been the inspiration for Dirty Harry, reveals that a bag of heroin was found on the body. Unwilling to believe that family man Finn was a junkie, Joe sets out to investigate what becomes a murder case, eventually aided by the hyper-cerebral Barack. Fans of Carl Hiaasen’s comic crime novels will have fun. Agent: Brandy Bowles, United Talent Agency.

June 1, 2018
Though they've both been put out to pasture, Barack Obama and Joe Biden team up once again to solve a murder practically in the former vice president's backyard.During all those years commuting between Delaware and Washington, Biden got to know every single Amtrak conductor. His favorite was Finn Donnelly, even before the stroke his wife, Darlene, suffered brought them even closer together. Now Finn is dead, inexplicably run over by a train as he lay unmoving on the tracks. When Grace Donnelly tells Biden that her father took out a $1 million insurance policy shortly before his death but the company, saying they suspect suicide, doesn't want to pay out, Biden vows to get to the bottom of Finn's death. True, he has no experience as a detective and scarcely any more as a logical thinker. But he does enjoy an intermittent alliance with the still-powerful Obama. Even though "there was no love lost between Barack and me," Obama keeps turning up at Biden's home, sharing sensitive information with him, and goading him to challenge Wilmington cops Detective Dan Capriotti, who's unenthusiastic, and Lt. Selena Esposito, who's downright hostile, by opening his own investigation. Together the salt-and-pepper duo, taking a leaf from the film My Fellow Americans, swap aphorisms, indulge in high-speed car chases, and occasionally do some actual detection. Shaffer takes the edge off his last satire (The Day of the Donald, 2016)--the nicest touch here is the failure of a single character to mention the name of Obama's successor--and conservatives are as unlikely to be offended by the unlikely sleuths as liberals are to be soothed or cheered.The mystery is wafer-thin and the solution unsatisfying, but the cool, cerebral ex-POTUS is a reasonable stand-in for Sherlock Holmes, and his ex-VPOTUS, by turns appealingly modest and laughably self-satisfied, is in some ways a better Watson than the good doctor himself.

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July 1, 2018
Here's something different: a mystery novel?not a pastiche or a parody, an actual proper mystery?starring and narrated by former vice president Joe Biden and his sidekick, Barack Obama. This is not a joke. The book has its light moments, but overall it's a straight mystery. A man dies under especially nasty circumstances; Biden, who knew the man, is suspicious. He doesn't believe the things people are saying about the dead man, and he's determined to find out what really happened. Aided by his former boss, the charismatic Obama, Biden wades into a conspiracy that threatens the stability of the country. Shaffer could have jumped on this opportunity to parody Biden and Obama, but, instead, he presents them as real people, pretty much the way we imagine them to be (allowing, of course, for literary license); and the mystery is genuinely suspenseful and satisfying, not merely a framework for a bunch of silliness. It should be noted, too, that the relationship between Biden and Obama is carefully and skillfully developed and has moments of genuine emotion. An ambitious and completely successful novel.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2018, American Library Association.)