Customer Reviews

Supreme Courtship

5 star:		(20)
4 star:		(29)
3 star:		(12)
2 star:		(7)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

There are some authors who--even when they're not at their best--are so much better than almost anyone or anything else. Christopher Buckley is just such an author.

I don't think that Supreme Courtship is his strongest work. The satire isn't quite as clever and cutting as some of what he's done in the past. I'd call it "Buckley light." That said, you'd have to be made of stone not to get a giggle from this book. It's just silly and fun.

In the novel, the US is governed by a wildly unpopular president. (I'm not even going to say anything here.) Not only is he unpopular with the people, he's even more unpopular with his own congress. (He vetoes all of their pork barrel projects.) As revenge, the senate subcommittee eviscerates every Supreme Court nominee he sends their way, no matter how honorable and qualified. It's painful to watch. At his wits end, in an attempt to nominate an untouchable, he nominates Pepper Cartwright, America's favorite television judge. Hilarity ensues!

Not only is Buckley lampooning all three branches of the federal government, he takes pot shots at reality television, the uninformed populace, and possibly the writers of The West Wing. Again, this is a very light and fluffy book. If you're looking for in-depth insight into the workings of the Supreme Court, you're barking up the wrong tree. If, however, you're looking for a pleasant and not too challenging way to pass a few hours, you could do a lot worse. Christopher Buckley makes me smile. And you'll never look at the Nimitz the same way again, LOL.

If you think the 2008 presidential campaign has a tendency to collapse into absurdity on any given day, Christopher Buckley's wonderful new book, "Supreme Courtship", is the perfect companion book to the real-live antics we currently witness. Filled with sui generis characters who are only a half-step away from actuality, Buckley creates scenarios that, given a twist here or a turn there, could happen in fact.

President Donald Vanderdamp has come upon a situation not unlike one that has been faced by former U.S. presidents...difficulty in getting a Supreme Court nominee through the Senate. Through a chance viewing of a court tv-like show, Vanderdamp hits on his choice... a straight-shootin' Texan host whose husband happens to be the producer. Meet Sarah Palin, southern style. Enormously unqualified to be a Supreme Court judge, Pepper Cartwright, nevertheless, becomes an instant darling of the nation and sails through her confirmation. On the court, however, responsibilities (and her personal life) catch up with her and all... well... fun breaks out, ending with a Constitutional crisis that would make Bush v. Gore seem like Law 101.

Author Buckley has a breezy narrative style that sets things up perfectly. A chapter devoted to Pepper's first case on the court, infuses Latin beyond its limits and is the most creative and hilarious part of the book. But Buckley ratchets things up to the final election mess with such finesse that it's a shame when the book finally ends. I highly recommend "Supreme Courtship" for its humor...and its relevance to the folly of our elected and appointed servants in Washington.

This is the fourth Buckley novel that I have read and the most disappointing. The book becomes very tiring to read because Buckley seems to delight in using words that kept me running to the dictionary. He also uses French and Latin legal idioms, only some of which are explained at the end of the book. One major gaffe appears in Chapter 18. One character mentions that President Truman stated that the two big disappointments of his administration were both sitting on the Supreme Court. In point of fact, it was not President Truman who passed the remark. It was Eisenhower who took a swipe at Chief Justice Earl Warren and Justice William Brennan, both of whom he nominated to sit on the Court.

Writing political satire can be a challenging undertaking. An author risks either going into the purely silly and impossible, or making the story more realistic at the cost of losing comedic impact. I had never read any Christopher Buckley before, except an occasional newspaper piece (e.g. his recent NYT chart of GOP convention days, including a "rousing" speech by Fred Thompson), but he has managed to nicely balance these two considerations. His extensive knowledge of Washington is evident throughout, although I guess some of these would be "inside jokes" for those of us resident in D.C. He also has some solid funny points based on realistic legal concepts. I will resist suggesting that the central character, a tv judge nominated to fill a Supreme Court seat, comes across as being similar to how the media is trying to paint Governor Palin. At points, Buckley goes off the edge, but this only adds to the fun...we are too straight-laced here and a little jocularity can only be beneficial. So, enjoy this rare example of superior political satire and ask yourself is it any more bizarre than what really goes on here.

In his latest novel, Christopher Buckley trains his trademark "outside insider's insight" on the Supreme Court to parody the political and personal undercurrents shaping how the Court works. The result is political satire at its best - a fun house mirror image of the inner workings of Washington that succeeds because it starts with a deep insight into the real world and then deftly distorts it to highlight the humor (and sometimes ridiculousness) of it all.

In simple overview, Supreme Courtship tells the tale of an unpopular President who overcomes a self-interested Senator's opposition to his Supreme Court nominees by nominating a wildly popular television judge to serve on the Court. Underlying that simple story is a series of finely-drawn caricatures and "ripped-from-the-headlines" sub-plots that offer a foil for Buckley's intelligent and irreverent commentary on a range of political and social themes.

Parodying the American public's infatuation with electing outsiders as President, Buckley presents President Vanderdamp as the ultimate outsider - a bowling fanatic who is actively trying not to be re-elected, which of course is just the boost his flagging popularity needs. Pitted against Vanderdamp is Dexter Mitchell, a Senator who so desperately wants to become President that he resigns his Senate seat to play one on TV, giving him just the name recognition and outsider status he needs to then run against President Vanderdamp. Pepper Cartwright, the former TV Judge whom President Vanderdamp appoints to the Supreme Court, combines Texas sass, New York sexy, and a frank and pragmatic Judge Judy jurisprudence to emerge as the Court's center of gravity and voice of reason. A host of other characters play their parts just as effectively - from the Scalia-like Justice Crispus to the "milk-the-formula's-success" TV producer Buddy Bixby (who is also Pepper's husband).

The result is a thoroughly enjoyable read. Like a welcoming host who likes your company, Buckley brings you inside a world he knows intimately so together you can share a few hours of knowing smiles, LOL's, and occasional scary-true grimaces at the stranger-than-fiction world of Washington.

Christopher Buckley is one of our sharpest (and funniest) observers of the Federal Follies. SUPREME COURTSHIP isn't one of his best novels, but even second-best Buckley tops most humorists' finest. This shouldn't be your first CB -- that would be "Thank You for Smoking", followed by "Little Green Men" -- and who knows how anyone else reacts to humor, but I liked this one a lot. Buckley's talent is for exaggerating reality just enough so that you notice how absurd real reality really is...

Pepper Cartwright (think Judge Judy) is a splendid creation, who grows beyond her assigned role into a Woman in Full, someone you'd be pleased to get to know. It's always startling to find yourself caring about a person who is, after all, just words in a row.... One of the best rewards from reading a good novel.

So I'm probably preaching to the choir here -- if you're a Buckley fan, you'll want to read SUPREME COURTSHIP. A very entertaining book, by a very good writer. Enjoy!

Happy reading--
Peter D. Tillman

It's pretty hard not to like a novel like Supreme Courtship. It's light, breezy fun. That said: it isn't as sharp or as insightful as I would have liked and as such it doesn't quite warrant a four or five star rating (I give it 3 ½ stars)

Supreme Courtship is entertaining satire that targets some pretty `low hanging fruit': notably America's TV-obsessed celebrity culture and dysfunctional government (no branch is spared). In Supreme Courtship, the state of Texas wants to lay landmines along their border with Mexico, a former US Senator becomes the star of a TV show called POTUS and then uses his popularity as a fictional president to run in the federal election (with his TV wife by his side), the sitting president is running for re-election on a platform of `more of the same' and encouraging voters not to elect him because he doesn't really want the job anymore, and a sassy judge from Courtroom Six (think - Judge Judy, only hotter) has been nominated to sit on the Supreme Court. The best laughs come from Senator Dexter Mitchell, Chair of the Senate Judicial Sub-Committee who manages to disqualify a number of highly qualified candidates (one of them because of a review he wrote in sixth grade that said To Kill a Mockingbird was `a little boring') before being stymied by the enormously popular Judge Pepper Cartwright. His best moments come when he leaves the senate to portray tough-talking President Mitchell "Send in the Nimitz" Lovestorm on a popular TV show.

Buckley doesn't have to work too hard to lampoon these institutions (they're pretty easy pickin's). While the novel is consistently amusing, the author paints with such broad strokes that it lacks any real subtlety. The best satire cuts close enough to reality to seem absurdly plausible, but in this case the plot gets so ridiculous, particularly in the second half, that it doesn't have that edge. Even so, Buckley has written a novel that will almost certainly put a grin on your face.

This is my first Buckley novel but I look forward to reading others.

Without a doubt, this is the funniest book that I have read in years. I found at least one good laugh on every other page - hey Chris, put some funny stuff on the even numbered pages too.

Without being a spoiler, and revealing any more of the plot than has already been revealed, I would like to say that the characters are somewhat stereotypical, but then the book is satire.

There are quite a few plot surprises, however, I was able to predict one of the major plot elements.

The only difficult part was understanding some of the legalese, but then that too is satire.

"Nothing raises the national temperature more," writes Christopher Buckley in Supreme Courtship, "than a vacancy sign hanging from the colonnaded front of the Supreme Court." Fictional president Donald Vanderdamp (whose approval ratings are in the "high twenties") finds out how difficult a job filling the spot can be. Two of his stellar candidates for the seat are taken out by the head-hunting Senate Judiciary Committee. In frustration, President Vanderdamp decides to give the committee a candidate they won't dare turn down--Judge Pepper Cartwright: young, sassy, and the star of television's highest rated show, Courtroom 6.

The havoc that ensues is political satire at its finest and driest. Buckley mercilessly skewers everything political from presidential campaigns to lobbyists to the overweening egos of Supreme Court justices. He even throws in an oh-so-thinly disguised parody of a certain senator from Connecticut that will make Republicans snort into their coffee.

Anne Heche's reading is the stuff that dreams are made of. Heche breathes such life into each character's individual accent and manner of speaking that it is easy to forget that only one person is speaking. All are brought to life vividly and believably. Buckley himself couldn't have hand-picked a better voice as the narrator: Heche manages to wring every ounce of dry humor from each satirical sentence.

Supreme Courtship is a breath of fresh air in a year bedeviled with financial crises and political wrangling.

Armchair Interviews says: Supreme Courtship is an outstandingly funny political satire made even more memorable by Anne Heche's stellar performance.

We are being bombarded by politics and items in real life that are bordering on the absurd that it often seems that reality is distorted for the "people that are in charge" and leads to rather strange results and log jams.

The President and Congress are more often in the spot light and the Supreme Court is sort of the third wheel to some degree which often does not get the same press. Attention is focused usually when a major decision is released (how many decisions in the last few years are known?) and when Supreme Court nominations come up. The process for approval starts and the sometimes rather absurd political maneuvers -just think of the process as when Bork or Miers came up.

And this process is the springboard for the author's satire as appointments for the Supreme Court are shot down and a rather unlikely (unqualified) person is selected.

A great balance of humor and outlook on Washington. Though sometimes some things may not have been as funny as what may have been intended, there were so many high points where I was laughing that this is worth it to lighten up your day and also adds knowledge of Washington politics and the legal system. Nice combination and good work.

Recommended.