American Hero

by Larry Beinhart

Book Overview

"A funny, ingenious and outrageous political thriller joining Hollywood and the Bush administration in a revisionist fiction about the Gulf War." Los Angeles Times. Once upon a time, there was a mean, dying GOP chairman named Lee Atwater who had the most brilliant, insane, frightening and do-able idea ever concocted to assure that his man, George Bush, would retain the office of the president of the United States. And the only man on the face of the...

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0679472762
• ISBN13: 9780679472766
• Release Date: September 1993
• Publisher: Pantheon Books
• Weight: 1.75 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.6" x 6.4" x 9.5"

Customer Reviews

Great book, but it is now in print as Wag The Dog

Please note, if you want a new copy of this book, buy the novel by the same author -Larry Beinhart- entitled Wag The Dog. The movie was based on the novel, American Hero, both are now called Wag The Dog. THE BOOK IS VERY DIFFERENT FROM THE MOVIE. The novel is well worth the read. Mamet did a fine job turning this into a screenplay.

Nobody gets it

If the author intended to or not, this turned out to be a greatbook. Whilst the two intertwined plotlines were radically obvious, Ithink the involvement of the clichéd PI part only added to the extravagance of the situation, and the outlandishness of Bush and Baker's involvement in the Gulf...

I Liked the Outrageous Humor

I find outrageous humor in so much that is nonfiction that this novel with great footnotes helped to remind me how much I like footnotes in the other books, particularly in history, which have to find a way to deal with all the information that no one could possibly agree with. This novel is much longer than I would like, because when I think of a line that I would like to find to make sure that I am remembering it right, I have a terrible time finding it now. Putting in a favorite joke or two here might spoil it for those who haven't had the pleasure of reading this yet. As far as I am concerned, I liked all the jokes.

American Hero is a fictional (or non-fictional) masterpiece!

I read Larry Beinhart's "American Hero" after seeing the Oscars. Wag the Dog looked like such a good and interesting movie, but my mom wouldn't allow me to go (I'm 14). I asked her if I could buy the book and read it, so she agreed, and I read it. It was the best book I have EVER read! I enjoyed the spine-tingling mystery and the suspense which kept me reading way past midnight most nights!! I also thought the way he tied himself into his own book was very clever. I know that the rating for books is up to 5 stars, but I think that "American Hero" deserves more...for creativity (or research)! You figure it out : did Pres. Bush really stage the Gulf War?

An important novel by an under-rated writer

There's something about _American Hero_ that pulls at the edges of the reader's mind: you will not turn a page without pausing to think, "Could this really happen? DID this really happen?" I'm a veteran of the Gulf War. I was there. I KNOW what I saw. And yet... _American Hero_ is putatively the novel on which the hit film "Wag the Dog" is based. A president intent on reelection, a film producer confronted with the biggest project ever, a war made for the screen. But however much Beinhart's opus depends on the world of film, that paradigm doesn't have enough dimension to capture the essence of _American Hero_ in return. You NEED to read this. The book is complex, heavily footnoted, and written in such a manner as to prove itself fact or fiction, whichever you prefer to believe. Chances are, you won't KNOW what to believe by time you read the final summation. Beinhart, whose other work (_You Get What You Pay For_, _Foreign Exchange_ and _No One Rides For Free_, as well as the non-fiction _How to Write a Mystery_) hasn't achieved the popularity it deserves, has delivered a masterpiece.