Customer Reviews

Father's Day

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

While the premise of the book my seem unbelieveable, the very fact that the 25th Amendment makes this scenario possible makes this book very chilling. I found it to be very entertaining and very hard to put down. I highly recommend it for an political junkies looking to get lost in something other than the current events in Washington!

I was sick with the flu this week and this book was all I could find. Kinda makes the whole concept of a benevolent god hard to swallow. Please don't bother to buy the book. The author is trying desperately to be Tom Clancy and he's failing miserably. Not only is the whole premise unbelivable everything about it rings false. The Governor of Maine disappers for a few days and no one says a word? Just believe me and ignore it. If you're aleady half way through it and don't want to read the rest I'll be happy to tell you the ending.

Those who ignore the past are bound to relive -- politics, greed and righteousness -- so what is difference with our current Congress and the folks who walk the halls. Entertaining, fast reading and leaving one for a sequel. Real life is about tomorrow's accomplishments and no one can predict. Excellent read -- foreshadow of tomorrow? Maybe..................

The Bookcassette Adapter gives you balance control on your headphones and is so easy to use: Plug it into the stereo jack of your personal tapeplayer and then plug your headphones into the other side. The Bookcassette Adapter Works ONLY on Stereo Tapeplayers.

If you plan on listening to Bookcassette audio books on a stereo system where you can adjust the sound between the left and right speakers separately, such as a rack system with separate left and right speaker controls or a car stereo with a left and right balance dial, you will be able to listen to Bookcassette audio books without a problem. If you plan on listening to these audio books on a portable cassette player that does not have this capability, such as a Walkman with headphones, you will require an adapter.

As I said, it would be cheaper to buy it on the Internet, especially on eBay, instead of directly from the company (Brilliance Corporation) at 1-800-697-6797

In the election year of 2000, Governor Theodore G. Jay is elected popularly as the 43rd President of the United States, with Senator T.E.Garland (d-Tex) as Vice President. Just two years later, President Jay has dropped significantly in the polls, and subsequently invokes the 25th amendment, declaring himself as having a "major depressive episode" and unfit to perform his duties as President. He transfers hid duties to Vice President T.E. Garland. When it is learned President Jay is ready to re-assume his duties, a massive plot emerges to overthrow the sitting president and arrange some sort of coup d'etat. This is where it becomes incredibly confusing. There are far too many characters to keep straight, everyone seems to have a code name or "Go Code", the Vice President who is really the President seems in on the plot, as do the Joint Chiefs of Staff and several Senators. I like political intrigue, conspiracy and mystery, I really do, but I listened to this audio cassette (two tapes) four times and still I don't think I got it right. Frankly, it's one big mess. AND - the narration, with its obviously contrived Texas accent - is horrible. It is narrated by Bill Weideman.

"Father's Day" starts with a good premise: the tension between an elected President who has voluntarily taken a leave of absence under the disability clause of the twenty-fifth amendment, and the Vice President who has been acting as President during the disability. Two years after winning a landslide, but with his "approval rating . . . plunged to a post-Cold War low" and his marriage disintegrating, President Theodore G. Jay "collapsed with a disability diagnosed as a major depressive episode." For five months, Vice President T.E. Garland acts as President while Jay recuperates. Then Jay decides that he is rested and ready for resuming his office. But Garland, enjoying the office and its power, is reluctant about handing them back. And Garland has been accumulating quite a few friends while he has been running the country.

That premise would have made for a good, fast-paced, tense political drama. But author John Calvin Batchelor takes it too far: instead of weaving a plausible story out of politics and psychology, he opts for cheap but implausible thrills. The denouement is unsubtly foreshadowed in the first three pages, so I am giving nothing away by telling you that the first chapter opens with an unquestioningly obedient military rehearsing for an assault upon Air Force One, ending in an assassination. To Batchelor's credit, he gets the law right, and his application of the twenty-fifth amendment's provisions for a political contest between a disabled President and a Vice President acting as President is unimpeachable (no pun intended). But once the story steps outside politics and into action-adventure, reality bites the dust, and the story takes a turn so far-fetched that it ruins what may otherwise have been a good book.

No doubt about it, Batchelor did a solid job making his characters into flesh and blood people, bringing to the surface all their strengths and weaknesses. You wanted to root on one of the big heroes, Maine Governor and Presidential hopeful Jack Longfellow, but there was a taint on him due to his affair with another woman. I also liked Joint Chiefs Chairman General Sensenbrenner. He's a guy still not afraid to walk where regular foot soldiers go and has a soft spot for those in poverty, especially children. He comes off as such a stand-up guy you forget he's trying to help Vice President Shy Garland overthrow President Teddy Jay. Speaking of the Veep, I don't think he really came off as the power-hungry nut he was. One really interesting aspect of the story was the fact that while Garland is power hungry, President Jay is still battling depression and sounds like a total wet noodle throughout the book. You start to wonder who is the better guy to have in the White House. The ending, however, did leave me scratching my head in certain places.