Hope Rides Again

Book 43 of my 2020 Reading Challenge

read from June 3 - 10

Hope Rides Again
by Andrew Shaffer

Summary (via the book jacket)
published 2019

Former Vice President Joe Biden has been on the road non-stop since returning to public life, promoting his memoir and testing the waters for a presidential bid. He has one final stop before he can head home: Chicago, where his old pal Barack Obama has invited him to meet an activist whose endorsement could help him win his party's nomination in 2020.

When Obama's prized Blackberry is stolen, Joe puts his presidential aspirations on hold long enough to track down the thief...who winds up full of lead. The police are content to write it off as just another gangland shooting, but Joe and Obama smell a rat. Together they hit the streets to find the shooter, only to uncover a conspiracy that goes deeper than the waters of Lake Michigan - which is exactly where they'll spend the rest of their retirement if they're not careful.

My Opinion

3 stars

It was fine.  I didn't like it as much as the first one because the metaphor-heavy thoughts felt clunky at times, which I think it was an effort to really lean into Joe Biden's "folksy" conversational tone.  It didn't always land and got tiresome at times, usually when it was his inner monologues so there were no gaps for dialogue from others that would have broken it up a bit.

The mystery was unpredictable so I think I would enjoy the author's writing even without this fun "bromance" premise (assuming the metaphors were going with Biden's persona and not the author's actual writing style).