Political Fiction a Hot Genre

James Grady is at the top of his form in his "What's Going On: A Political Fiction" novella up on the Politics Daily site.

Known for his cult classic novel that became the movie, "Three Days of the Condor," starring Robert Redford and Faye Dunaway, Grady is a virtuoso of the political thriller. Now he turns his attention to the streets of Washington, the often unseen war zone of gang turf in the shadow of the U.S. Capitol. "Political campaign consigliores know: It's about the narrative," Grady writes in The Huffington Post of the influence literature can have in the shaping of American life and politics.

In Grady's hands, such banal subjects as government earmarks have dramatic tension. "What's Going On" is a stark and compelling portrait of the ironies and failures of local and federal government, and of the real-life consequences of corrupt policies and politicians. Grady is the best American writer of the capital's inner city. With an unparalleled literary grace, he shows how things work in the real world. Illustrated with a series of raw and poignant photographs, Grady's novella, written on assignment for Politics Daily is a perfect example of what could become one of the first in a new level of online publishing. Tina Brown, the Daily Beast blog publisher announced this week a joint venture with Perseus Books to speed up the achingly slow process of bringing books to market. Brown plans to take a month to produce an e-book edition of commissioned titles.