First published 2016
Donald Trump begins as a boy in quiet Queens, shaped by a family fortune built on controversy. Pulitzer Prize winner David Cay Johnston spent three decades tracking Trump's rise from real estate mogul to commander in chief. Johnston exposes how Trump built his media empire while facing constant legal battles and mounting scandals. The reporter reveals connections that would later explode into national headlines, including early Russia ties. Through financial records, court files, and hundreds of interviews, Johnston maps Trump's transformation into a new breed of public figure. Figures from folk singer Woody Guthrie to prosecutor Roy Cohn to mob bosses all orbit around Trump's expanding influence. Johnston documents the creative accounting and questionable business practices that powered Trump's too big to fail empire. This investigation culminates in Trump's shocking presidential victory, showing how decades of controversy prepared him for ultimate political power.
Genres: biography, business, non-fiction, 21st-century, current-affairs, american-history
Vibes: intimate, suspenseful, thought-provoking
Tropes: unreliable-narrator
Setting: Queens, Russia
Period: 20th-century, 21st-century
263 pages · Hardcover · Melville House