What Draper does with great skill in Dead Certain is debunk caricatures of George Bush, both positive and negative. In place of the dim-witted bogeyman of the left and the resolute hero of the right, Draper introduces a three-dimensional man full of contradictions.

In this ambitious work of political narrative, Robert Draper takes us inside the Bush White House and delivers an intimate portrait of a tumultuous decade and an embattled administration.Virtually every page of this book crackles with scenes, anecdotes, and dialogue based on access to every principal actor in the Bush administration, including six newsmaking interviews with the president himself.

Prologue: December 12, 2006

   PART I :BAPTISM

Chapter 1: New Hampshire

Chapter 2: Texas

Chapter 3: South Carolina

  PART II:“THROUGH OUR TEARS”

Chapter 4: The Building of Bushworld

Chapter 5: Doing a Few Things Right

Chapter 6: Then...

  PART III:DARK CITY ON A HILL

Chapter 7: Nightmare Scenario

Chapter 8: Drumbeats

Chapter 9: The Grid

Chapter 10: Thanksgiving

  PART IV:A CHOICE, NOT A REFERENDUM

Chapter 11: The One-Legged Runner

Chapter 12: “You Know Where I Stand”

Chapter 13: Ask President Bush

Chapter 14: “Stand with Me”

  PART V:COMEUPPANCE

Chapter 15: Eight-Year Men

Chapter 16: Big Ball, Long Bomb

Chapter 17: Heck of a Job

Chapter 18: “This Is Not Your Daughter.

  PART VI : THE THUMPIN

Chapter 19: The Bolten Bounce

Chapter 20: The Phantom Fence

Chapter 21: “I Owe You a Strategy That'U Work”

Chapter 22: A Fine Line Between Realism and Pessimism

Epilogue

Source Notes

Author's Note and Acknowledgments

Index