What do you get when you mix an Ex-President and the Grand Master of Pop fiction?

You get a pretty good read.

Regardless of what you think of Bill Clinton as a President, and even though as a man he was a womanizing scoundrel, he knows the inner workings of Washington, DC.

Regardless of what you think of James Patterson as an author who doesn't write many of his books, he knows how to write well when he chooses to do so.

Put them together and you get one heck of a political thriller, packed with non-stop action from the very start to the very end.

Much like their previous venture, “The President is Missing,” “The President's Daughter” (Penguin Random House, ISBN 978-0-316-5407-1) shows how suddenly politics can be very personal.

When the President's daughter is kidnapped on the cusp of their family's moving out of the White House for the next administration to move in, the politics of the Extremists Islamic warriors takes center stage in the ex-President's life. An ex-Navy Seal himself, with many tours of duty in the Middle East, Matthew Keating knows how big the threat is to his family and others, and solicits help from the new administration. Which is not forthcoming. Using his contacts in the military and his previous dealings with law enforcement, he takes on the task of getting his daughter free for himself with a few trusted others.

Meanwhile, the body count goes up wherever the madman Asim-Asheed goes, and he stays constantly on the move to evade capture. He keeps Mel, the president's daughter, close by his side and in the dark all the time. The Chinese are in the chase too, and would like to obtain Mel, who they would return to the US. for political considerations in the future.

And so you have these three groups coming together in a dance of death and extortion where the rules change all the time, mostly because there really are no rules. People die in this book, not always nobly. Life is a precious gift for too short, and not always yours to open. Recognizing others' sacrifices keeps us valuable to the remaining living.

Bill Clinton's insight into the way things work, or don't, provides us with a critical look at where our democracy is today. That kept me turning the pages and wondering what do we do with the system we have now.

James Patterson’s words were smooth as honey, to be gobbled down, and transports us around the world in a tasty hold on the mind and body. The man can write when he writes his own stuff. He frames his stories on the understanding that you must write well to be heard by the biggest possible number of readers.

I liked this book. It is non-stop thrills and chills because it could be true, that someday this madness may go beyond mere speculation, to a harsh truth. The Secret Service does an incredible job, and their dedication is to be admired. But there are always those little cracks that something can crawl through.