Mack to the Rescue (Volume 6) - Hardcover

Lehrer, Jim

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0806139153 ISBN 13: 9780806139159

Publisher: University of Oklahoma Press, 2008

Synopsis

When he’s not anchoring the NewsHour on PBS, Jim Lehrer may be found casting a satirical eye at America’s heartland in such books as Crown Oklahoma and The Sooner Spy.Mack to the Rescue is the latest of his successful One-Eyed Mack novels. Set in Oklahoma and tracing the exploits of a fictional lieutenant governor, the series allows Lehrer to address contemporary national issues with a unique blend of humor and insight.

When Governor “Buffalo Joe” Hayman calls for privatizing state government, Mack decides to oppose his re-election bid, but a medical mishap prevents Mack from running. While attending a lieutenant governors’ conference in Washington, he suddenly collapses. Hospitalized, he is given a heart bypass operation intended for another patient. Mack backs out of the race and throws his support behind his flaky friend and former state house Speaker, Luther Wallace. Embroiled in a medical malpractice suit while following Luther’s questionable shenanigans, Mack finally has no choice but to come to the rescue when the governor’s race takes a particularly ugly turn.

Rife with Oklahoma-isms and brimming with memorable characters, this is political satire at its best, employing ironic twists and sharp dialogue to poke fun at government foibles. Inventive and hilarious, it demonstrates once again that Lehrer knows Middle America and its ways all too well.

About this title

About the Author

Jim Lehrer novelist, playwright, and award-winning journalist is best known as executive editor and anchor of the NewsHour with Jim Lehrer on PBS. Born in Wichita, Kansas, Lehrer was a political columnist early in his career for the Dallas Times-Herald. In the past five presidential elections, he served as moderator for ten of the nationally televised debates among the candidates. This is his eighteenth novel, and the eighth in the One-Eyed Mack series. Lehrer lives in Washington, D.C., with his novelist wife, Kate. They have three daughters and six grandchildren.

Reviews

Though billed as a mystery, the broadly satiric eighth entry in PBS news anchor Lehrer's One-Eyed Mack series (Kick the Can, etc.) contains no crimes as such—unless one counts the antics of zany Oklahoma governor Joe Hayman (aka Buffalo Joe or Chip), who announces on radio's popular Sooner Sam Screams at Noon show that he intends to privatize the entire state government. Mack, Oklahoma's lieutenant governor, is prepared to run against Hayman in the next election, but he's sidetracked after undergoing a heart-bypass operation, one intended for another patient, which leads to a juicy malpractice trial in Washington, D.C. While recuperating from surgery, Mack does his best to keep Oklahoma from falling apart. In taking aim at such subjects as the health care system, the courts and talk radio, Lehrer is more likely to evoke wry grins and the occasional chuckle than anger or outrage. (May)
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Baited by the host of Sooner Sam Screams at Noon, a radio call-in show, Oklahoma governor Buffalo Joe Hayman boldly announces that he will privatize the whole entire state government. One-Eyed Mack, the lieutenant governor, knows that the Second Man of Oklahoma must now challenge the First Man in the primary election to save Oklahoma from ruin. Through seven One-Eyed Mack novels, the anchor of PBS’s The News Hour with Jim Lehrer has genially satirized U.S. politics and extolled the virtues of simpler times, simpler places, and good people. But this eighth Mack novel is different: nearly every page suggests that Lehrer is really angry with privatization, the corporatization of nearly everything, Republicans, insurance companies, talk-radio bloviators, political lies, and the manipulation of voters who accept simpleminded solutions to complex problems. Most readers of this series tend to picture Mack as Jim Lehrer with an eye patch; it’s hard to imagine gentle-spirited Lehrer as angry and venting, but that image is hard to dismiss here. That said, this is another fine addition to an outstanding series. --Thomas Gaughan

Edition details

• Publisher: University of Oklahoma Press
• Publication date: 2008
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0806139153
• ISBN 13: 9780806139159
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 216