A Vast Conspiracy

Jeffrey Toobin, who covered the Clinton sex scandal for The New Yorker, has written the definitive book, superbly researched and crafted like a novel, about the unlikely events that culminated in the trial to impeach President Clinton. Filled with previously unpublished documents and classified information, A Vast Conspiracy is an entirely fresh look at the scandal that nearly brought down a president. For starters, Toobin unravels the three strands of a national scandal - those leading from Paula Jones, Monica Lewinsky, and Kenneth Starr - that created a legal, personal, and political disaster for Bill Clinton. Then, Toobin lays bare the complex and tangled motivations that fueled Tripp and Goldberg, Isikoff and Hyde, and the other motley characters. Toobin drives this provocative tale with the narrative style of a sensational (if improbable) legal thriller. Misguided, outlandish behavior was played out a the very highest levels, but Toobin analyzes the facts and the key figures with the dignity and insight that this story never received.