An American Classic Turns 50

This year is the 50th anniversary of a Pulitzer Prize winner, and one of my favorite novels, Advise and Consent by Allen Drury. It is the tale of Bob Leffingwell's nomination to be Secretary of State and the convulsion it causes. It's not exactly great literature, but it is tightly plotted and exciting. It leads off a 6-book series featuring one of the great men of American literature, Orrin Knox. Even I, who broadly agrees with Mr. Drury's political leanings, find his later work (like, say, Come Nineveh, Come Tyre, in which a liberal President falls flat on his face) a bit much. Advise and Consent, however, represents the work of a Washington insider at the height of his powers.