A review by asteroidbuckle
Boomsday by Christopher Buckley
4.0
Two words: Effing hilarious!
I picked this up in the Midway airport on my way back from Chicago and wow...what a wonderful find!
Picture it: 77 million Baby Boomers are on the verge of retirement, which is putting a strain on the already floundering Social Security system. The US economy is in the toilet and Congress just passed a bill raising Social Security taxes 30% for the under thirty crowd.
Enter Cassandra Devine. She's a PR spin doctor at a high-profile Washington, D.C firm that specializes in scraping the muck of crooks until they shine. In her spare time, she operates a blog called CASSANDRA that focuses primarily on spewing vitriol at Baby Boomers and inciting riots at Florida golf courses.
There are many wonderful characters in this scathingly funny book: the blue-blooded senator who rides Cassandra's "Voluntary Transitioning" platform all the way to a run at the presidency; the conniving and back-stabbing presidential chief of staff who goes to any lengths to make his boss look good; the billionare software mogul who has a tennis pro wife and delusions of grandeur (and who also happens to be Cassandra's father); the pompous and portly Southern Bible-beater who waxes poetic about the sanctity of human life (and who may or may not have killed his own mother); and last, but not least, the incomparable and selectively blind PR wizard (Cassandra's boss) who doesn't care how morally bankrupt his clients are as long as the pay is good.
All of these characters come together in a fantastically-crafted story about the generation gap, politics, religion, and the art of spin. This is the first Christopher Buckley book I've read, but if his others are as good as this one, I'll definitely read them.
My only complaint? The ending was a little too abrupt.
I picked this up in the Midway airport on my way back from Chicago and wow...what a wonderful find!
Picture it: 77 million Baby Boomers are on the verge of retirement, which is putting a strain on the already floundering Social Security system. The US economy is in the toilet and Congress just passed a bill raising Social Security taxes 30% for the under thirty crowd.
Enter Cassandra Devine. She's a PR spin doctor at a high-profile Washington, D.C firm that specializes in scraping the muck of crooks until they shine. In her spare time, she operates a blog called CASSANDRA that focuses primarily on spewing vitriol at Baby Boomers and inciting riots at Florida golf courses.
There are many wonderful characters in this scathingly funny book: the blue-blooded senator who rides Cassandra's "Voluntary Transitioning" platform all the way to a run at the presidency; the conniving and back-stabbing presidential chief of staff who goes to any lengths to make his boss look good; the billionare software mogul who has a tennis pro wife and delusions of grandeur (and who also happens to be Cassandra's father); the pompous and portly Southern Bible-beater who waxes poetic about the sanctity of human life (and who may or may not have killed his own mother); and last, but not least, the incomparable and selectively blind PR wizard (Cassandra's boss) who doesn't care how morally bankrupt his clients are as long as the pay is good.
All of these characters come together in a fantastically-crafted story about the generation gap, politics, religion, and the art of spin. This is the first Christopher Buckley book I've read, but if his others are as good as this one, I'll definitely read them.
My only complaint? The ending was a little too abrupt.