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‘Self-Serious and Altogether Disappointing’

December 2, 2025 · 10:30 am ET · Leave a Comment

The New York Times reviews American Canto by Olivia Nuzzi, which is being published amid a scandal over the author’s alleged romantic entanglements with politicians she covered.

“To paraphrase Britney Spears, a pop-culture touchstone for the author and fellow blond millennial: It’s not a tell-all, not yet a memoir. Chapterless and scattershot, it’s an attempted letter from Trump’s America in the style of a would-be Joan Didion…”

“Wafting and unfocused in a manner that makes you long for the sweet relief of a detailed policy paper, American Canto offers many scenes — a flag factory staffed by immigrants, an open highway, the Oval Office — but little sense.”

American Canto
by Olivia Nuzzi · Avid Reader Press / Simon & Schuster · 2025
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Taegan Goddard

Taegan Goddard

Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire -- which for more than two decades has been one of the nation's most influential political news sites.

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