Dick Cheney Code (Henry Beard) - Simon & Schuster - 2004 (193 pages)

Henry Beard is the Harvard Lampoon editor and National Lampoon founder who also co-wrote Bored of the Rings, one of the best parody books of all time.  In this parody of Dan Brown's Da Vinci Code, Beard uses the parody format to deftly skewer the Bush administration and their idiotic policies that unfortunately continued for four years after the book's publication.

After the Smithsonian curator is murdered, Urban Mythology Professor, William Franklin and Thomas Jefferson relative, Sandra Damsel escape from Homeland Security agents Dan Fine & Jim Dandy and begin solving clues that may lead to a John Kerry victory in November 2004 (but probably not).  Along the way, we learn that Dick Cheney hunts whooping cranes with a bazooka, the President is a nitwit, and that there may have been an expiration date on the Louisiana Purchase contract.

Read this book if you are a liberal or if you enjoy the clever wordplay of one of the greatest comic minds of our time.  [JAM 7/27/2009]