"It's twelve days before the presidential election, and someone wants the incumbent eliminated from the race -- forever. For Jack Flynn, Washington correspondent for the Boston Record, it's a chance for the type of exclusive story about which most reporters can only dream: a round of golf with President Clayton Hutchins just days before he stands in front of voters in what has been the closest race for the White House in decades. But events on the links take a surprising turn. On the tenth tee, the president, confident of renewing his mandate, offers Jack the job of press secretary in his new administration. Minutes later, shots are fired. The president is wounded. Jack is caught in the hail of bullets. And the gunman lies dead nearby, taken out by the Secret Service. As he recuperates in the hospital, Jack receives an anonymous telephone call about the shooting, warning him that ""nothing is as it seems."" Using his considerable journalistic skills, Jack sets forth on an investigation that takes him from a remote militia compound in Idaho to the inner sanctums of the federal government -- and which forces him to face a devastating personal tragedy he has been unable to confront for a year. Along the way, with his bosses at the newspaper hounding him for daily scoops, the White House urging him to accept the president's job offer, and a fetching female FBI agent breathing down his neck, his anonymous source continues to contact him with new clues -- and new warnings. But just as he seems to be getting close to the truth, Jack Flynn unwittingly becomes front-page news himself. In the tradition of the bestselling Washington thrillers Absolute Power and The Tenth Justice, combining riveting authenticity with a wry narrative sensibility, The Incumbent hums with the vitality of the newsroom and bristles with the excitement of the final stages of a presidential election campaign. It marks the debut of a major talent. "