Blind Trust [Hardcover]

Barbara Boxer (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 22, 2009

Now married (to a Republican!) and in her second term, United States Senator Ellen Fisher (Democrat) is about to chair explosive hearings on Homeland Security. Before she goes head to head with the Vice President, whose excessive zeal in enforcing national security has begun to infringe on individual liberties, Ellen and her staff become the subjects of a barrage of charges and attacks that threaten their safety, as well as her career and marriage. This second novel by Senator Barbara Boxer is the story of dirty tricks and political survival, and the battle for integrity in the corridors of power. Combining the personal and the political, Blind Trust is an intriguing insider's view of what goes on behind closed doors in Washington, D.C.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

The second Beltway thriller (following A Time to Run) from California senator Boxer offers an insider's perspective to her agreeably told if far-fetched narrative. The intrigue begins when the Republican White House nominates Carl Satcher, an old foe that protagonist Sen. Elizabeth Fischer Lind defeated for his Senate seat, to be secretary of homeland security. During confirmation hearings, Elizabeth tries to debate his extreme views on antiterrorism and draconian stance on civil liberties. Meanwhile, a story about the Linds' private finances is leaked, offering much fodder for Republicans and the media. As the fight escalates, Elizabeth's staff swings into crisis mode while FBI director Douglas Brewer suspects more ominous doings are afoot. The big reveal is a little too out there, and the wrap-up is overly tidy, but Boxer and Hayes manage a fast-paced narrative. (Aug.)
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About the Author

Senator Barbara Boxer is now in her third term in the Senate, having previously served in the House of Representatives for 10 years. She is the author of A Time to Run. She lives in California and Washington, D.C.

Mary-Rose Hayes is the author of seven previous novels and co-author of A Time to Run. She lives in Arizona and California.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 368 pages
• Publisher: Chronicle Books (July 22, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0811864278
• ISBN-13: 978-0811864275
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.4 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 2.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (57 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,079,420 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

16 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Not for grown up tastes, August 20, 2009

By 

Ivy (Brooklyn, NY, United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Blind Trust (Hardcover)

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This book is almost child-like in its presentation of the characters. The Republicans are all bad, tasteless people. The Democrats are all good, fine people. Everyone except the protagonist, Eleanore, is a flat, two-dimensional cut out of a person. Mrs. Boxer needs to mature as an author, to learn to create a host of compelling characters and to tell a good story. She's trying, but she's not there yet.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Couldn't get past chapter one, March 11, 2010

By 

Silicon Valley Girl (Sunnyvale, CA USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Blind Trust (Hardcover)

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I expected this book to be a light but enjoyable page-turner. But the "scandal" that was created to bring down the main character was so lame that I couldn't even make it past the first chapter. I'm still a fan of Barbara Boxer's politics, but I can't vote for this novel.

47 of 69 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars "BLIND PARTISAN" A MORE FITTING TITLE, August 12, 2009

By 

Mike (Redondo Beach, CA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Blind Trust (Hardcover)

The title of this book would be more aptly titled "Blind Partisan," because that is what the author Senator Barbara Boxer is and always has been as is abundantly demonstrated in this thin and uninspired political thriller. Boxer amply upholds her distinction bestowed by Bob Dole as the most partisan Senator he had ever seen in the body as she portrays Republicans as all being malignant and conspiratorial (except of course for the moderate Republican husband of the main character Ellen Fischer--compliant, cave-in Republicans being the only kind Boxer has any use for) and Democrats as virtuous and good, driven only by pure desires to better the lives of the common man and to protect the constitution from the depredations of conservatives.

The book is disturbing, but not in the ways I think Boxer intended. These include Boxer's disdain for her political opposition and dissenting views as starkly demonstrated in the villainous character of Sam Slaughter, a conservative talk show host obviously representing Rush Limbaugh, who Boxer characterizes as "abusing the First ­Amendment" and says of him "That man's evil. He's like a disease." I have no problem visualizing these as actual conversations about Limbaugh occurring in Boxer's Senate office.

I'd like to ask Boxer what she considers "abusive free speech," speech not actionable in a civil court as either slanderous or libelous. The Founders didn't recognize such a concept. Interesting Boxer portrays herself and her party as such champions of the constitution and civil liberties when she is so glaringly contemptuous of free speech rights in this part of the book and considers dissenting views "evil" and "like a disease."

Did Boxer consider Michael Moore's smears against George W. Bush or Democratic claims that Bush invaded Iraq for oil "abusing the First Amendment," despite nearly every top Democrat from Bill Clinton and Al Gore on down saying Saddam had WMD long before Bush was president and long before Bush was saying so as well as Hillary Clinton, John Kerry, Harry Reid and many other Congressional Democrats who saw the same intelligence President Bush had all concluding Iraq had WMD as well?

And of course the majority of Senate Democrats voted to authorize the invasion of Iraq seeing the same intelligence both Bill Clinton and George W. Bush used in concluding that Saddam had WMD, but still Democrats hypocritically accused Bush of "cooking the intelligence," a crime, and thus if this accusation is falsely made as 3 different independent investigations in fact determined it was, it constitutes slander i.e. abusive free speech.

What about those on the left, including Michael Moore, who strongly implied Bush had some role in at best covering up warnings we'd be attacked on 9/11 and at worst conspired in the attacks? Any abusive free speech there or did Boxer merely nod her head in agreement with these ugly accusations?

The book's uninteresting, non-engrossing plot centers around a smear campaign against Senator Fischer by of course those Republican fiends, involving the Senator's investments and a chief of staff whose religious background is called into question. Of course Democrats would NEVER seek to take out their opponents at the knees using charges of ethical and financial impropriety, not to mention trying to make them look like religious nuts. Just ask Sarah Palin!

Interesting that Boxer uses this book to announce she now finds such smear campaigns so morally repugnant after having engaged in a few herself first against Clarence Thomas and then later her first Senate opponent Bruce Hershenson, accusing him of being a patron of strip clubs (while she later hypocritically defended Bill Clinton engaging in an affair with a White House intern.).

As a thriller the book fails to create tension or to draw in the reader. What held my attention was the narrow black and white views Boxer harbors of the partisan divide (you know the kind of black and white views Democrats bristled over Bush as having) and her thinly guised disrespect for those passionate about national security (like that on full display in Boxer's "call me Senator" tirade against Brigadier General Michael Walsh in the Senate committee hearing). This contempt is shown in her unflattering portrayal of the Carl Satcher character, the Director of Homeland Security, who is an exaggerated characture of national security policy makers, espousing draconian security policies no one has actually proposed in the real world but which Boxer has to draw out of proportion to all reality to fit with her anti-defense worldview. I kept reading to plumb the depths of Boxer's radicalism rather than out of any real interest in the story.

I've noted by the way that Boxer is not scheduling a single townhall meeting on healthcare or any other pressing issue in California during the August Senate recess, but has plenty of time to be back in D.C. all over MSNBC and CNN plugging her novel. She obviously doesn't take for granted Californians's willingness to buy this book, unlike she does our vote to re-elect her next year.

I'm unclear on Ms. Boxer's intent in writing this book, whether to give vent to her hyper-partisan antipathy towards Republicans or simply to entertain notions she may have of herself as being a female John Grisham. If meant as a political screed it fails under the weight of her own and her party's hypocrisy. If meant to establish her as a serious novelist, well MA'AM, you've got a long way to go.