BROKEN: The Troubled Past and Uncertain Future of the FBI

Popular historian Powers, biographer of J. Edgar Hoover, has produced a timely and nuanced history of the legendary agency that puts its current struggles in appropriate context. Beginning with the debate about the need for a federal detective force in the early 1900s, Powers traces the evolution of a small unit within the Justice Department into the G-Men of lore. Despite some odd omissions (there is no mention of the bureau's role in investigating the assassinations of Martin Luther King and Robert Kennedy or the first bombing of the World Trade Center) and a little sloppiness (Rudolph Giuliani passed on trying the Mafia Commission in order to try a political corruption case, not to handle insider trading investigations), Powers succeeds in showing how the FBI's handling of terrorist threats prior to 9/11 was the direct result of the public backlash against Hoover's excesses and a desire to better respect civil liberties. His balanced and reasoned defense of recent director Louis Freeh, who has become a convenient scapegoat in the eyes of many, will spark renewed debate, especially as the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission and consideration of reforms of the intelligence community remain in the spotlight. History Book Club alternate. Agent, Virginia Barbar at William Morris. (Oct. 16)