Book review: 'Valley Forge' by Newt Gingrich and William R. Forstchen

VALLEY FORGE

By Newt Gingrich and William R. Forstchen

Thomas Dunne

438 pp. $27.99

Newt Gingrich has an easy way with words; he's silver-tongued as well as silver-haired. This is his seventh novel, the second in a projected "George Washington series" and a sequel to "To Try Men's Souls." William R. Forstchen, his collaborator, is the author of more than 40 books -- a prodigious number -- and the title page of "Valley Forge" also acknowledges the work of Albert S. Hanser as a contributing editor. This is a text that several hands have fashioned and many eyes have scanned.

Which makes it all the more troubling that it's so slipshod and rushed. Few attributes of a review are less attractive than pedantry, and this reviewer doesn't want to play grammarian throughout, but there are so many lapses that I need to growl a little. Time after time, the language here slides into imprecision. "Over the distant ridge by the Mueller farm he could see puffs of smoke and the echo of gunfire" suggests that one can "see" an "echo." "The smoke seemed to trap the thunder of battle, pressing in on their ears so it felt as if they would burst" suggests that the smoke exerts physical pressure, entering the ear.

No single instance matters much, but there are a hundred such gaffes. So the reader who hopes to enter fully into the world of Valley Forge is caught up time and time again by its haphazard language, its flag wavering instead of waving and its musket-powder wet. One wishes this were not the case, since it's a darn good yarn. These were more than cardboard villains or wax-figure heroes.

The winter of 1777 was brutal; Washington's battered Continental Army endured privation in stark contrast to the luxury of Loyalists in Philadelphia -- and Valley Forge is hallowed ground. The large cast of characters -- Martha Washington, the Marquis de Lafayette, Mad Anthony Wayne among them -- are vividly rendered, and the research rings true.

Historical figures and invented ones interact quite plausibly, too. But there's a connection between clarity of thought and clarity of diction; a thing worth saying is worth saying well. This "Contract With America" has so many suspect clauses and contingencies in its fine print that my best advice is: Reader, beware.

Delbanco is the Robert Frost Distinguished University Professor of English at the University of Michigan. His new book, forthcoming in January, is "Lastingness: The Art of Old Age."