custard20 's review for:

Crisis of Character: A White House Secret Service Officer Discloses His Firsthand Experience with Hillary, Bill, and How They Operate by Gary J. Byrne

2.0

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Saw this book at the top of the NYT List a month ago. It's moved down a few spots since then and rightly so. This book is pretty poorly written - more tabloid than memoir. It seems to have been written for two purposes. The first of which is a memoir with a focus on positive character anecdotes from the author's career. The second is a character attack. Either way it's full of sad anecdotes of leadership failures. But it's not written as a guide or manual to avoid leadership failures. There's no strategy listed for avoiding leadership failures. Rather it has been written has been written with an attitude of someone who is wiser than everyone else. Yes, experience goes a long way and we can learn something from our seniors but it doesn't come across in a way that mentors younger leaders. Rather the book comes across as someone finally getting their say and finally getting to grind their ax.