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3.0étoiles sur 5
The New Center Provides Middle-of-the-Road Reading, Avril 19 2004
Will Lee, a southern senator (D-Ga.), is the lead character in this novel. He's bland, relatively inoffensive, Centrist, and by-golly he'd like to be your friend if not your next president. The novel shares a lot of these traits, too: It's eager to please, but there's not a lot to get excited about.The most exciting parts in the book are focused on a survivalist nutjob intent on assassinating Lee. His motives are never clearly defined (perhaps reading "Grass Roots" would help, but this was my first Woods novel), but he seems to know his stuff; he's got the preparation of his plot down pat, but falls short in its execution (pun intended). Because Lee is such a "nice" guy and won't sling mud at his opponent, the campaign is dull and thankfully kept to a minimum. Unfortunately, as a result of Lee's personality and actions, his political opponents have nothing against which to act as a foil. In fact, we'd have to believe the Republicans are as dull as Lee were it not for a blackmailing campaign run by an incarcerated former CIA executive. Somehow, Woods manages to create a world where Bill Clinton was impeached, but a different administration is in office at the beginning of 2000. A lot of flak is aimed in the Republicans' direction, and Woods has the Democrats retaining the presidency, taking back the House, and almost getting the Senate as a consequence of voter revolt over the impeachment proceedings. Please, Righties, take a deep breath and remind yourself that this is fiction (doubly-so, since nothing of the sort actually happened). Still, most of the Republicans come off as bland as the Democrats, and there's really little to get your briefs (or boxers) in a twist. The Run is ultimately undone by its Centrist positioning. By staying middle-of-the-road in its liberal v. conservative positioning and not giving Lee any flaws to exploit or defend, Woods fails to generate any heat in this novel. As many other Amazon reviewers have noted, it's a good way to kill a few hours, but it's just not a very good novel.
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