A gripping novel about the deterioration of the criminal justice system and the mysterious, powerful body at its core-the Supreme Court of the United States. Earle Holgren-murderer, terrorist, lost soul-is the center of a vortex that sweeps up a fascinating cast of characters in their ambitions, politics, honor, and scandal. From the eight Justices of the Supreme Court, to the Attorney General of South Carolina who sees a compelling, controversial trial as an opportunity for demagoguery that might pave his path to the White House, to the idealistic defense lawyer who seeks to save a man she knows to be a psycopathic killer, to a driven Washington journalist in love with one of the Justices whose marriage is crumbling, and other Justices with their own agendas, vendettas, and secrets, Decision is a sweeping tale that begins at a nuclear power plant in South Carolina, works its way through the courts of that state, and finally to the halls of the Supreme Court. From Allen Drury, the master of spellbinding political fiction, author of Advise and Consent

The sequel to the Pulitzer Prize winning bestseller Advise and Consent From Allen Drury, the 20th Century grand master of political fiction, a novel of the United Nations and the racial friction that could spark a worldwide powderkeg. International tensions rise as ambassadors and politicians scheme, using the independence of a small African nation as the focal point for hidden agendas. A cascade of events begun in the General Assembly Hall of the United Nations could lead to the weakening of the United States, the loss of the Panama Canal, and a possible civil war. Allen Drury paints a vivid and laseraccurate portrait of Washington and international politics, from top secret conferences, to elite cocktail parties, club luncheon rooms, and the private offices of the key players in government. A novel as relevant today as when it was first published.

The epic story of a Senator's rise and fall. Mark Coffin of California was barely thirty years old when he won a startling upset victory in his race for a seat in the U.S. Senate. A bright, handsome, energetic idealist with a passion for decency in government, he thought his honesty and dedication would see him through anything. But Washington, DC, was all too eager to teach him the hard lessons of gamesmanship and compromise. Neither Mark Coffin nor his wife were prepared for what Washington had in store for them: the bizarre sex scandal that would threaten to destroy not only Mark Coffin's career and his personal life, but all of the political reforms he was fighting so desperately to achieve. Mark Coffin, U.S.S. is a magnificent novel of Washington politics-an insider's view of power at the top, shown through the eyes of vivid, fascinating, and humanly likable characters. From Allen Drury, the master of spellbinding political fiction, author of Advise and Consent

""We live in the Republic of Feel-Good in a time when all the scum of America is rising to the top." "So begins "Public Men, " the final novel of "the University trilogy" in which Pulitzer Prize winner Allen Drury concludes some fifty years in the lives of the members of the World War II generation whose stories he began on the eve of the war in the novel "Toward What Bright Glory?"
The second novel, "Into What Far Harbor?, " carries them on through the challenges, triumphs, and tragedies of the war and on to the years when they must worry about their world and the world of their children against the backdrop of the later Vietnam War. Now in "Public Men, " set in the year 2000, when most are either about to embark upon, or have already entered, their eighties, the fifteen who remain of the original twenty-six meet for a last reunion on the beautiful campus where they shared a fondly remembered fraternity house and the hopes and dreams of youth confronted by history's most chaotic and ominously foreboding century.
"Public Men" concerns them all, but overshadowing their lives as in the two previous novels is the life of Richard Emmett Wilson--"Willie," now and for many years a United States Senator from his native California; his legislative triumphs on Capitol Hill; the tragic death of his first wife, Donna; his second and third marriages; his political disagreements with, but ultimate pride in, his older son Latt as Latt follows in his footsteps into the House of Representatives and then into the Senate; and, finally, Willie's campaign for president, threatened by other personal tragedies, most devastatingly those of his gentle, vulnerable younger son, Amos.
Through it all, Willie, often in alliance with Tim Bates, does battle against what he sees as the "phony liberalism" of his famous fraternity brother Dr. Rene (Renny) Suratt; and Renny and his powerful friends of academe and the media in turn do battle with what they see as the "reactionary conservatism" of Willie and his friends. Tim, wielder of a savage commentator's pen, refers to "Renny and his crew" as "the scum" he attacks. Renny responds with equally scathing pen and matching contempt. As with many of the public men in "Public Men, " these three fraternity brothers sum up what they regard as the major political and social issues of end-of-the-millennium twentieth century. Allen Drury skillfully meshes the public and private lives of his characters against the Washington world that has formed the rich backdrop of many of his twenty-five books.