Take a photo of a barcode or cover
rmardel 's review for:
I really enjoyed reading this book and found it rather gripping. In fact I could have plowed right through it but I limited my time on it to specified period each day or it would have been finished much faster.
We all lived through the story told in this book, and that is a large part of the excitement of reading it. The book is well written, better than I expected for a book about recent politics, and reads like a delicious novel, which is not a bad thing. That said, although there is a lot about the different candidates and their personal lives, I am not sure that I hold that data to be all that accurate. Everything is interpreted through the eyes of the observers, most of the quotes are unattributed, and the particular details aren't really that important beyond their titillation factor. Certainly the personal stories are what really drives this book. That said, I was not surprised by any of the revelations in the book either.
But there is more to the book than the personal stories and the gossip factor. What particularly intrigued me was the way the game of politics was played, and how badly some of the key players actually played that game. The whole thing really reminded me of a chess match played on a rather grand scale with people as the pieces.
At the end of the book, I think I want to know more. Although the book is long, over 400 pages, there are many areas that only get surface treatment. I want to know more about the process of politics and I think I will probably pay more attention and watch with a more critical eye in the future. At the very least, I think I will be looking at the process somewhat differently than I have in the past. I also think I have more respect for the process of campaigning than I did before, I hadn't really made the connection between the control and calculation necessary to steer a campaign and win and the control and calculation necessary to run a country. To me the title Game Change reflects not so much the game-changing political campaign, but the way reading the book has changed the way I look at the process of politics. If the book has the same effect on other readers, that too is a game change.
We all lived through the story told in this book, and that is a large part of the excitement of reading it. The book is well written, better than I expected for a book about recent politics, and reads like a delicious novel, which is not a bad thing. That said, although there is a lot about the different candidates and their personal lives, I am not sure that I hold that data to be all that accurate. Everything is interpreted through the eyes of the observers, most of the quotes are unattributed, and the particular details aren't really that important beyond their titillation factor. Certainly the personal stories are what really drives this book. That said, I was not surprised by any of the revelations in the book either.
But there is more to the book than the personal stories and the gossip factor. What particularly intrigued me was the way the game of politics was played, and how badly some of the key players actually played that game. The whole thing really reminded me of a chess match played on a rather grand scale with people as the pieces.
At the end of the book, I think I want to know more. Although the book is long, over 400 pages, there are many areas that only get surface treatment. I want to know more about the process of politics and I think I will probably pay more attention and watch with a more critical eye in the future. At the very least, I think I will be looking at the process somewhat differently than I have in the past. I also think I have more respect for the process of campaigning than I did before, I hadn't really made the connection between the control and calculation necessary to steer a campaign and win and the control and calculation necessary to run a country. To me the title Game Change reflects not so much the game-changing political campaign, but the way reading the book has changed the way I look at the process of politics. If the book has the same effect on other readers, that too is a game change.