Cramlington Book Club

Well we didn't like this one did we? "The President is Missing. The world is in shock. But the reason he’s missing is much worse than anyone can imagine. With details only a President could know, and the kind of suspense only James Patterson can deliver." Not many of us had read a James Patterson book before and I can see why. As a group we are clearly not fans of the American thriller genre. A few of us gave up along the way, one wished she had and no one really seemed taken by the dream team that was ex President Clinton and numero uno crime thriller writer Patterson. I'm not a fan of this style of book in any event but I find what makes them work is the pace - there needs to be a deadline fast approaching. A good bad guy and a loveable rogue hero. Whilst there was a pretty big deadline, in the form of the Dark Ages, we kept taking time out to be force fed minute detail about the inner workings of the White House and the President's close knit team. Th

“Lorena Hickok meets Eleanor Roosevelt in 1932 while reporting on Franklin Roosevelt’s first presidential campaign. Having grown up worse than poor in South Dakota and reinvented herself as the most prominent woman reporter in America, “Hick,” as she’s known to her friends and admirers, is not quite instantly charmed by the idealistic, patrician Eleanor. But then, as her connection with the future first lady deepens into intimacy, what begins as a powerful passion matures into a lasting love, and a life that Hick never expected to have. She moves into the White House, where her status as “first friend” is an open secret, as are FDR’s own lovers. After she takes a job in the Roosevelt administration, promoting and protecting both Roosevelts, she comes to know Franklin not only as a great president but as a complicated rival and an irresistible friend, capable of changing lives even after his death. Through it all, even as Hick’s bond with Eleanor is tested by forces both extraordinar