Maybe you can’t hop on a plane for a trip to Washington, D.C., but you can still read books with a Foggy Bottom backdrop. Here is a list of books, fiction and nonfiction, set in the District of Columbia.
“American Tabloid,” James Ellroy. A chilling, deeply cynical novel that is the first in Ellroy’s Underworld series.
“All the President’s Men,” Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward. We all know the outcome, but this book by the newsmen who led the Watergate coverage, is still riveting.
“The Dressmaker,” Kate Alcott. This 2012 novel is about a woman who survives the sinking of the Titanic. It visits the subsequent hearings in Washington and New York City.
“A Good Life: Newspapering and Other Adventures,” Ben Bradlee. As executive editor of The Washington Post, Bradlee, who died in October, seemed to have met everyone in the nation’s capital.
“Manhunt: The 12-Day Chase for Lincoln’s Killer,” James L. Swanson. A riveting history of the manhunt for John Wilkes Booth and his fellow conspirators in the wake of Lincoln’s assassination. You get a real sense of Washington, D.C., in the 1860s.
“The Sweet Forever,” George Pelecanos. A gritty crime novel set in the U Street neighborhood in the mid-1980s is a stark look at Washington’s underbelly.
William Porter: 303-954-1877, wporter@denverpost.com or
