The gold standard of contemporary political reporting, Cramer’s 1,000-page epic follows six candidates in the 1988 presidential election through the Iowa dinners and New Hampshire motels that are the mileposts of the road to the White House. Armed with thousands of interviews, the author, a Pulitzer Prize–winning former foreign correspondent, shows how the American political system has fashioned a gauntlet that grinds down candidates as a way of assessing their worthiness for the job. Setting out to examine why candidates sacrifice their lives (and occasionally their souls) in the service of unthinkable ambition, he ends up answering a different question altogether: “What did we do to them?” Published in the midst of the 1992 campaign, Cramer recreates the ’88 contest with empathy and artistry.