On the Road to Washington, D.C., Fictionally

Watching the pundit-confounding presidential candidates, it dawned on me that one of these people will actually move into the White House and I might want to get a feel for his or her new home city. There are many historical, biographical and journalistic books about Washington, D.C., but I focused on fiction, especially mysteries and thrillers, hoping to dig under the facts to the politics-fueled soul of the place. Thanks to author Neely Tucker's scarred, Ducati-riding Cajun journalist sleuth Sully Carter in 2015's Murder, D.C.,  I can take a quick visit to the underbelly of the Washington beast. Tucker's series joins James Patterson's Alex Cross, David Baldacci's Camel Club, and George Pelecanos's D.C. Quartet series in the Nation's Capital setting--all best-seller mystery-thriller options. For a woman's angle, turn to two daughters of famous politicians. Margaret Truman Daniel (President Harry Truman's daughter) offers traditional mysteries with a D.C. twist in Murder in Georgetown, Murder in Foggy Bottom and Murder on K Street. Kristin Gore (VP Al Gore's daughter) has written Sammy’s Hill and Sammy’s House about the inner workings of Capitol Hill and the White House. River, Cross My Heart by Breena Clarke is an Oprah-endorsed novel about the emotional impact on an African-American family and community of a child's drowning in the Potomac. Now sometimes it's more revealing to consider a place from an outsider's viewpoint, so I was especially interested in The Guardian newspaper's British recommendations on D.C.-based fiction. Unsurprisingly, Pelecanos topped the author list, but other notable suggestions include 2002's The Emperor of Ocean Park by Stephen Carter, about two different privileged elites--the upper-crust African-American society and an Ivy League law school. Then there's Heartburn by the great Nora Ephron, a 1983 autobiographical novel of her marriage to Washington Post journalist Carl Bernstein and their divorce. Finally, although I don't agree with author Allen Drury's politics, I think British readers were right to choose his fascinating 1959 portrait of power politics in the Pulitzer-Prize-winning Advise and Consent about U.S. Senate confirmation of controversial Secretary of State nominee. For more views of Washington from "across the pond," see http://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2014/sep/02/books-about-washington-dc-readers-picks