By Elaine Carlson

I have been thinking I might want to buy a book (or maybe several) to carry me over if the Pandemic goes on much longer. Maybe such a purchase is how I can use some of my Stimulus Check.

The first book I want to consider is John Bolton's The Room Where It Happened. I realize President Trump tried to block its publication and is now very mad at author. Even so I am not sure it is something I want to purchase.

Like a lot of people I am critical of Bolton for not testifying at the House Impeachment Hearing. The accusations in the book would have been much more credible (and valuable) if he had made them under oath before the House.

I know it made so much more sense financially for him to not testify. Now that the book has come out so much later he can be sure of it becoming a best seller. But if he had spoken back then a lot of what he would have put in would be old news and we can assume Bolton would have sold a lot fewer books.

After the House impeached the President and passed the issue on to them, the Senate voted (53 to 47) to not issue any subpoenas for documents or witnesses.

I bet those 53 Senators were familiar with Bolton's accusations and feared they were both explosive and credible. If I am right it is reasonable to assume they didn't what to hear what the former National Security Adviser had to say.

It is hard for me to figure out why Trump is still mad at the author. It would be more appropriate for him to express some gratitude to the guy. After all one of biggest reasons Trump is still our country's Chief Executive Officer is because Bolton kept his mouth shut way back then.

I am getting tired of Trump. I now think I would prefer to learn about the MeToo Movement. So I might think about getting Catch and Kill: Lies, Spies, and a Conspiracy to Protect Predators by Ronan Farrow.

I hope Farrow provides good coverage of the Harvey Weinstein Trial. I was very pleased with the way it concluded and knew we could look forward to reading news account of him that don't include the word alleged.

What I really want to do is to read about his defense attorney Donna Rotunno. I thought it was neat when one reporter referred to her as a "legal Rottweiler" (with no alleged).

This book is not a complete break from Trump coverage. The author repeats the charge that our current President raped a teenage girl in 1994. And he tells how the publisher of the National Inquirer worked hard to keep accounts of that allegation out of the news.

He also states their editor told Trump's attorney Michael Cohen "that they would track down the women with the rape allegation and see what they could do about her." Representatives of the paper said that what Ronan Farrow said in his book is not true.

If I decide I want to want to read more about the current President rather than Bolton's book I think it would be better to consider a book by one of Trump's relatives.

Mary Trump, his niece, wrote Too Much and Never Enough. The book will go on sale next week but bookstores are already taking advance orders. Mary Trump is a clinical psychologist (on the title page there is a PhD after her name) and all of the advanced reviews I have read are laudatory.

A review in the Amazon listing says "Donald's only niece, shines a bright light on the dark history of their family in order to explain how her uncle became the man who now threatens the world's health, economic security, and social fabric."

I know I don't have to go out and buy any books. When the S. C. Public Library had curb-side pickup I got Founding Brothers – The Revolutionary Generation by Joseph Ellis.

The first thing I read was the chapter on the dual between Aaron Burr and Alexander Hamilton. I think I will go on to read his chapters on Benjamin Franklin, James Madison and Thomas Jefferson but skip his chapters on George Washington and John Adams.

But to tell the truth I don't know how any insights I gain about that early period of American history will be helpful (transferable?) to our current National Situation.

I might think about the idea of skipping non-fiction books for a while. I have heard that good fiction books can be the more true than a lot of books in the other category.

One is East of Eden by John Steinbeck (a book I also got from the library when I picked up the Ellis book). So I look forward to seeing how much truth it has in it.