Book Review: 'The Mueller Report'

First-time author Robert Mueller gives readers a riveting, yet sometimes dry, government thriller in the new novel The Mueller Report.

Cleverly packaged to look like an actual government document, the first volume of The Mueller Report focuses on a special counsel investigation into President Donald Trump to ascertain whether the president has conspired with Russia to win an election. The somewhat maddening answer to this question seems to be that the special counsel cannot prove conspiracy.

The second volume focuses on whether the president has obstructed justice and it is here that the real fireworks begin. The most vivid scene happens when Trump is informed that his firing of an FBI director will spur the investigation chronicled in Mueller’s novel. “Oh my God,” Trump says. “This is terrible. This is the end of my presidency. I’m fucked.” What follows is Trump trying to get White House attorney Don McGahn, in a meta flourish, to fire Mueller, the very author of the book. Several instances of obvious obstruction of justice follow.

Mueller makes the stylistic choice of presenting the book in a non-omniscient second person style, as if the information is being presented to a government team that we never see. However, it is odd that the author names the novel after himself, as it would more accurately be called The Trump Report.

Throughout, the author makes an impressive commitment to getting names and dates correct. The book does contain some typos and formatting inconsistencies but the assumption is that this is intentional to mimic the look of a government report that was produced quickly to be transmitted to the public and would thus contain mistakes. The book cites (real) court cases at every level to bolster its legal arguments. It also includes voluminous appendices and supporting documents. There is even the nice touch of frequently redacted passages, tantalizing to the reader.

However, one misstep in the publication is the inclusion of a four-page summary written by the attorney general. This summary is misleading and glosses over many of the key points of the main text. Reading only the summary and not the full Mueller Report would be like when George Costanza embarrassed himself at his book club after only watching the movie version of Breakfast at Tiffany’s and recounting scenes that happened only in the movie and not the book. However, another interpretation of this summary is possible. Did Mueller intend to use the device of the unreliable narrator to make a critical point about how the government distorts information?

As interesting as the legal machinations are, we don’t get a lot of fully formed characters in the book. The character of Donald Trump does not significantly evolve throughout the story, starting as an under-informed, corrupt narcissist and ending pretty much the same way. It would have been better to have a more dynamic character as president.

Like David Foster Wallace, Mueller includes endless footnotes in his novel. Many of these are dry legal citations but many contain juicy information. For example, one footnote at the end of the book implies that even if the report does not indict the president, Congress does have the option of impeachment proceedings to hold the president accountable.

Tucked away at the end, does this footnote hint that a sequel is on its way? As interesting as The Mueller Report is for political nerds, one gets the sense that there are more fireworks to come.