Q Clearance

by Peter Benchley

In this novel the author of Jaws reveals that he knows as much about the White House as he does about the sea: a knowledge which is the 'special ingredient' in an irresistibly hilarious and suspenseful story. Timothy Burnham works – as Peter Benchley once did – as a speechwriter to the President. He has been in the same room as the great man, but only with a lot of other people, and he likes it that way – he is that rarity in Washington, a man with no appetite for power. By a quirk of bureaucracy Burnham is given Q Clearance, which means that every day he receives documents crammed with the highest atomic secrets of which he understands not a word, and which he has to shred every night. Big joke, thinks Burham – but he does not laugh when for unfathomable reasons he suddenly becomes the President's blue-eyed boy. That, he knows, is more than he can cope with – except that, exhilaratingly, the terrifying old man seems to bring out in Burnham more than Burnham knew was there. While this