Ghosted: An American Story

Ghostwriter French (co-author with of Home and Away) turns her gaze inward for this candid memoir. A lifelong conservative who collaborated on the biographies of such high-profile right-wing figures as Sarah Palin, French found herself “at odds with [her] own community” in 2015 when she and her husband, political commentator David French, refused to support Donald Trump. The decision was especially personal for French, who’d survived sexual abuse and spoke out about the willingness of the supposedly pro–“family values” Republican party to excuse Trump’s admissions of groping women. An “ever-widening gap” between the author and the Republican establishment grew into a chasm as she was alienated from her church community and frozen out by former clients. After her husband publicly criticized the president in the National Review, the couple was warned by the FBI that they might be a target of domestic terrorist Cesar Sayoc, who mailed pipe bombs to prominent Democrats ahead of the 2018 midterms. Realizing that “my unwillingness to bow the knee to an unsuitable president was the most American thing I’d ever done,” French “quit” the GOP and decided to tell her story of witnessing Trump’s ascent and the ensuing transformation of the Republican party from the “outskirts of the powerful.” French balances her frank, up-close political analysis with an uplifting message about the faith that sustained her: when she was “ghosted by political friends, spiritual allies, and even some neighbors... [God] showed up and occasionally took my breath away.” This will resonate with never-Trumpers dreading the former president’s next run. (Apr.)