Face-Time: A Novel - Hardcover

Tarloff, Erik

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0609604635 ISBN 13: 9780609604632

Publisher: Crown, 1998

Synopsis

What if your girlfriend is sleeping with your boss? And what if your boss is the President of the United States?

These provocative questions are at the heart of Face-Time, a compulsively readable, devastatingly insightful, and darkly humorous morality tale about how celebrity, sex, power, and ultimately love collide in the corridors of the White House.

Face-Time is the story of Ben and Gretchen, two young political activists who meet and fall in love while working on a presidential campaign. When their candidate wins, both are given jobs in the new administration, his as an increasingly prominent speechwriter and hers in the Office of Social Affairs. But then Ben finds out that Gretchen has been sleeping with his boss,
the president, and he confronts her. Gretchen swears her love for Ben and vows to do anything to ensure their future happiness together...except end the affair. She has gained the ultimate Washington prize: one-on-one "face-time" with the president. And, perhaps not coincidentally, Ben's stock as a speechwriter has never been higher. But is the professional success worth the personal price?

Far more than an echo of recent headlines, this thoughtful, riveting novel by Washington insider Erik Tarloff is an important work of politically inspired fiction that poses a fascinating and culturally resonant question: In a society that venerates power and celebrity, how far are we willing to go to bring ourselves in proximity to them? With the inside-the-Beltway appeal
of Primary Colors coupled with the literary distinction of All the President's Men, Face-Time is a perceptive entertaining examination of the seductive power, both personal and professional, of position and status at the highest altitudes.

About this title

Review

Face-Time is set at an unspecified date in the early 21st century, when the sex scandals rocking the presidency of Bill Clinton have faded into history--but the Washington, D.C., in which it takes place isn't too much different from that of 1998. Ben Krause is a thirtysomething speechwriter for charismatic president Charles Sheffield. His girlfriend, Gretchen, works in the White House travel office--and when President Sheffield catches sight of her at a party, he quickly executes his droit de seigneur. When he finally puts the pieces together, Ben is naturally less than thrilled... especially when Gretchen reports that she doesn't want to break up with him and she doesn't intend to stop servicing the chief executive.

First-time novelist Erik Tarloff--the husband of former Clinton advisor Laura Tyson and an occasional contributor to Clinton's speeches--has a firm sense of plot development, although at times the narration comes across as overerudite, as Ben casually drops allusions to Desmond Morris, the madwoman of Chaillot, Casablanca, and other topics that make the young protagonist seem about a decade or so older. But this is a minor quibble that does nothing to detract from the book's perfect suitability for a weekend's entertainment.

From the Back Cover

"Yes, this is a book about a president who has an extramarital affair. But, no, it is not a documentary about any real person living, dead or damaged. This is real fiction, a superbly written novel of believable people with real emotions and dilemmas that come
from deep within the human soul--not the headlines."
--Jim Lehrer, author of Purple Dots and White Widow

"This book may be the best thing written about Washington in these strange times. It works beautifully both as a novel and as commentary on contemporary politics. It offers glimpses of the interior lives of political people you won't find anywhere else."
--Michael Lewis, author of Liar's Poker and Trail Fever

"I'm never one to judge a book by who's under the covers, but this account of an occupant of the Oval Office's penchant for bestowing his very intimate Presidential Sealof approval on the women around him is a total joy. Erik Tarloff's wit, fueled by his razor-sharp perception, skillfully reveals the price that lesser mortals are forced topay for such extracurricular executive privileges."
--Larry Gelbart, author of Laughing Matters: On Writing Mash, Tootsie, Oh, God! and A Few Other Funny Things

"It is the ultimate Washington novel, and only Erik Tarloff, with his extraordinary writing talent and his insider's knowledge of the White House, could have pulled it off. You literally won't put this down until you are done."
--Judy Woodruff, Anchor and Senior Correspondent on CNN

"Erik Tarloff, a wickedly funny writer and bona fide Washington spouse, lays bare the disconnect between power-sex and anything resembling love, commitment or even pleasure. A more convincing morality tale than the Starr report, and a helluva lot more fun to read."
--Gail Sheehy, author of Passages and Understanding Men's Passages

"Sex in the White House is not rare, and cynicism in high places is not rare, but rare indeed is the novelist who can handle these topics with irony and wit, and the right sort of below-the-Beltway savvy. Tarloff in '99!"
--Christopher Hitchens, Washington Correspondent, Vanity Fair

"Face Time is a brisk, scintillating, funny, poignant and revelatory look at the intersection of public and private lives in Washington by an acute social critic who has seen it all from the inside."
- Michael Beschloss, author of RooseveIt and Kennedy and Taking Charge

"Erik Tarloff has written an uncannily insightful book, funny yet moving, about Washington and about power and what power does to the human heart and spirit."
--Elizabeth Drew, author of Whatever it Takes: The Real Struggle for Political Power in America

About this edition

• Publisher: Crown
• Publication date: 1998
• ISBN 10: 0609604635
• ISBN 13: 9780609604632
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 249